Current Projects Using my Favorite Things

So you all know my healthy, long standing obsession with fabric and paper. I can never get enough of them, and I can't resist trying new projects that use them! In the last month I've tried a few new crafts using beautiful papers and fabrics that I love, love, love.

Last month my friend Michelle hosted a "Forever Pink Party" for three friends, all pregnant with their fourth child and fourth boy. Instead of the traditional baby gifts, we were instructed to bring a girlie, gift (~$5 each) for each mom. I spent hours and hours trying to think of just the right gift. I knew lots of lotions and bubble baths and chocolate, etc. would be given, and so I wanted to give something beautiful, but different. I had lots of ideas floating around, but settled on this one:


Composition notebooks I covered with scrapbook papers -- notice the stripe and dot theme? The inside front and back covers are also covered in coordinating papers that have pockets sewn in them for keepsakes. I LOVE this project and have made three more notebooks since ... one for myself, one for a dear friend birthday and one for ... humm ... I'm not sure. I've considered selling them on etsy as journals for recording the cute things your kids do and say as they grow ... but we'll see.

The day after I got back from Nevada, a friend came by the house with a large box of fabric. Someone she knew, knew someone who died and this box of fabric scraps was from her stash, and chalk full of vintage fabric from the 50s-70s with a few more contemporary prints. Some really ugly stuff got made during that time frame, but there's also really cool prints.

This box of vintage fabric has been the source of lots of inspiration.

Our Stake Women's Conference is coming up at the end of the month - April 28th and I spent all of Thursday last week creating the posters ... I wanted to use paper dolls as the graphic and found this image -->

To save time - the thought of cutting all those pieces made me cringe - I scanned some favorite fabrics from the box, all in shades of purple and created this little number in Photoshop (if you click on the picture you should be able to see a larger version):

I found directions online for making the cover button pony holders. And put a few of the smaller scraps to use making large (1.5") covered button pony holders (pictured top). I also found a tutorial for making fabric yo-yo's. I put the covered button idea and the yo-yo's together to create these cute as a button flowers for the girls hair.




I made some to coordinate with the girls Easter dresses - a pink gingham yo-yo with white button for Emily and a white yo-yo with beige button for Becca hand sewed onto hair clips - oh so cute! I'm planning on making a few more with some bright vibrant fabric scraps for the girls summer outfits.

Next, I want to figure out how to make this. I know, I know, it's a little wild, and a little funky, but oh so cute!

Happy Easter!

I found out mid week that Mary Ann and the girls were planning a two week visit to the States and would arrive in StL on Friday night. So the kids and I started to make plans for a long weekend (no school Monday!) visit to the homeland. Despite extremely cold temperatures - it was colder this weekend than it was during the Christmas holiday - we had an amazing visit with the family and I've put together some picture collages to show some of the things we did...


Daddy hard boiled two dozen eggs and the kids pulled out all their creative juices and drew designs on the eggs with colored pencils and crayons - everything from swirly lines (scribbles to the untrained eye) and thick rings, to poke-a-dots and zig-zags. The end results were magnificent and made for a yummy breakfast Monday.


Suzanne had her birthday while we were in Nevada, so we opted to celebrate while everyone was in town this weekend. Mary Ann made her famous 'silly hats' and an amazing chocolate soufflé cake. And of course the kids helped Daddy make/decorate a sign they hung above the bay window.

For dinner, Suz requested a couple of recipes out of the latest issue of Food&Family - fish cakes and baked fries. We made tuna cakes, crab cakes and shrimp cakes - I think we all liked the crab cakes the best, although all were very yummy. Mom made the baked fries for lunch Sunday to serve with the ham and used baking potatoes and sweet potatoes. The sweet potatoes turned out wonderfully! I've been looking for a good sweet potato fry recipe and this one fits the bill!

Sunday while we were at church Joe and Suz played Easter Bunny and prepared an Easter egg hunt for the kids in the backyard. We were lucky that the weather had warmed to about 48-50 degrees much warmer than the day before making an outdoor hunt possible. And the kids were very good at sitting for a few pictures after collecting their eggs.