Valentine Topiary Tutorial

As promised (a few posts ago) here is the tutorial on how to make a Valentine Topiary.

Materials You Will Need:

1 Foam Ball

1 Circle Foam Piece (for bottom of pot)

Metal Pail

2 packages Mini Muffin Cups

1 small dowel rod

1 stamp pad pink or red to match your pot OR acrylic paint

Decorative Gift Filler (white)

Hot Glue Gun

Valentine Candy Hearts with sayings

 This is the piece that I used to put into the bottom of the pot. It came with the double stick square tape, just peel it and stick it on the bottom, then push it into the bottom of the pail.

 Like so, I unwrapped the plastic first of course.

Unwrap your mini muffin cup and you can use these 2 ways. You can either put the color facing out or facing in. I did it both ways on mine to add interest.

 Use the end of a new pencil that hasn't been sharpened yet, wrap as shown.

 Then add hot glue to the bottom (DO NOT SKIP THIS STEP!!!!)

Then push it into the foam ball. Keep doing this until you fill up the whole ball, be sure to insert your dowel rod onto the bottom of the ball, it helps to know where your bottom is. :-)

Put some stones in for weight! Stamp or paint your dowel rod. When it drys hot glue it into the bottom part and the ball part, hot glue will make it stronger.

Hot glue on the rod three heart sayings. Add the white decorative filler and sprinkle some hearts on top of it. You could also add ribbon to the dowel too. Happy Valentine's Day!!!

Books I Plan to Read in 2012

Happy New Year Everyone!

Each month I am picking a few books that I would like to read, some are fun, some are for professional development and some will be for my Book Club. Enjoy! This was SO fun to come up with this list. I basically went "shopping" on Amazon.com and picked books that interested me. I am always open for suggestions for good books to read, so please comment. If you want to read more info. on any of these, I linked each one to the amazon for you :-) Happy Reading, so many books, so little time!

January 2012:

The Hunger Games (Book Club Book)

Wicked Appetite (Had a head start on this in Dec.)

What Got You Here, Won't Get You There (Had a head start on this in Dec.)

How To Make Money Using Etsy

February:

Keys To Success The 17 Principles of Personal Achievement

The Help

They Don't Teach Corporate In College

March:

Steve Job's Biography

Twenty Life Transforming Choices Adoptees Need To Make


April:

Parenting With Love And Logic

Time Management In An Instant

May:

Simplicity Parenting

Getting Things Done

June:

Playful Parenting

The Art of Racing In The Rain

Since I am in a book club, I do not know what the book of the month will be until that month. So I will update you as I go along. At the Jan. meeting I will know the Feb. book and in Feb. I will know the March book and so on. Half way through the year I will update July - December. One more to mention, I am also reading, along with my MOMS group at my church The Power of A Praying Parent. We are reading it from Jan. through June.

The other nice thing about having a plan for reading is that it gives me time to get ahold of the books, since I do not own all of these. In Jan. I can put the books on hold that I need for Feb. and so on. I am already looking forward to planning my June - December reading!

Metal Frame Tutorial

My MOPS group is going to decorate frames as part of the Adventures in Mothering theme, the Mom's are going to make a frame for themselves. The kiddos are going to make one too however theirs will be made out of the Foamies that are readily available at any craft store you visit.

I found these magnetic metal frames at Jo Ann's in the clearance section.
Buy paint that specifically says that it is for metal, this one did, if you read the bottle you can find out all sorts of nifty info on all of the different paints and same goes for the glues too. Buy some fashion jewels that have a flat back Learn from my mistake which is that my jewels are a bit too big for my frame and I actually have to go back to Hobby Lobby and buy the size down from 7mm, my 7mm only fit in the corners.
Take out the glass or plexiglass before you begin painting. Paint the metal frame and don't worry if you see lines in the paint it will dry nice.
Glue on your rhinestone jewels, mine isn't quite finished as I have to go pick up those smaller jewels I mentioned. And you will want to use a glue for metal to adhere the jewels such as E6000.

September in "High Gear"....

Wow whenever I realize I haven't posted in almost a whole week it always astonishes me how time really does go by so fast. I knew September would bring me to kick it in to high gear, however we were thrown some curve balls this week. The week got off to a rough start but now all is better. So with that said I will fill you in on the fact that I have finished A.'s first hat off of the knitting loom. She loves it! I will post a pic as soon as I find my camera and unload the memory card which is currently full. A is preparing to go to my alma mater pre-school, I am SO proud of her - he he he he. We are excited her first day is next week. It is a cooperative preschool so that means two things one I will be working frequently in her classroom and that also reduces the cost of tuition. She has homework to decorate a plate to look like her face - OK I am ALL over that one!!! Also next week my MOPS group is starting up too, we will be doing Shrinky Dink name tags which the MOPS magazine suggests that we do. Nikki over at WhiMSY LOVE did the same with her MOPS group and her site helped me in planning. This week was a little more serious than last week's birthday week, so I've changed my sidebar music some to reflect this week. OH I am teaching at my clay guild this Saturday too. Plus my Etsy shop is now empty, I AM VERY happy that someone bought my one and only bracelet but I have to kick it into high gear now with my inventory! Especially if I am going to do my regular list of fall craft shows as well!

Knit One, Pearl...

Uh, I mean loom two (he he). A friend of mine from my MOPS group gave me a knitting loom for a birthday present and I LOVE it. I LOVE this thing. Does my friend Wendy have my NUMBER or what!? OK here are a few great things, I can take it to my daughters drs., the museum etc. and knit and watch her at the same time, it is great. I just got it yesterday and I got a ton done already. I am making Ashley a hat. I don't totally know what I am doing yet but I will figure it out as I go.

Gifties...

Remember the placemat purses I did with my MOPS group and the one I made. Well my friend has gone great guns with these. Check out this AWESOMELY super idea....
She made all of these for her kids teachers, she has four kids. Each one has a pair of flip flops, sunscreen and a gift card to Barnes and Noble, plus you can see she put a cute little tag on each one! I think all of those teachers will LOVE their Beach Bag Totes!!!!!! Go WENDY!!!!! She even matched the flip flop colors to the purses!!!!

More Jar Gifties and a Dirty Little Secret

I had some of the MOPS over and we finished up the Jars I had and each person took home three more jars to give away. One is an M&M bar mix and the other is a Dreamsicle Mix.
After staring at these for weeks now. I broke down and made the M&M jar bar mix. It was pretty good, although the reason this is a little secret is because technically they were suppose to be given away. Well I DID give some of the bars away on Saturday at our Lemonade Stand that DD and I did, well they were 25 cents each, so we had help with them. I thought they were good but a bit crumbly, the mix was that way too. Still haven't tried the Dreamsicle one, the jar is just too pretty and MAYBE I can think of someone to give it to as a Thank You gift, just maybe...

My new placemat purse...

Here is my new placemat purse. I love it. I used some velcro strips to close the top and glued them in with Fabric Tac Glue, I also used a plastic type of placemat and cut it out to fit in the bottom, so the bottom will hold its shape better. I used grommets and rope for the handles. If you'd like to make one, just Google placemat purse.

Rope and grommet detail...

Gifts in a Jar and DD....

A. in some of her new digs, this dress is so cool it has a short sleeve sweater top that is attached to the skirt!

Getting ready for MOPS meeting and making Gifts in a Jar...
The jar above was the Dreamsicle Bar Mixture and it has Tang in it, sounds very yummy if you ask me! I'd love to try this one! The other one we made was an M&M bar mixture. We stayed away from nuts for two reasons, those with allergies and the jars only last for three months with nuts, without they can last up to six months.

Since I am the Crafty MOPS chica and it is my charge to come up with the craft for each month. So I've decided that with the end of the school year approaching everyone always needs a thank you gift for one reason or another, a teacher, teacher's aide, pre-school teacher, and so on. So we are each going to make a "Gift in a Jar" 2 to be exact and we will also be making two handmade thank you cards to coordinate. We will have two recipes for your jars, one is and M and M one and the other is a Dreamsicle Bar recipe which include Tang. Yum Yum and soooo fun. I bought jars then found out my mom had a whole bunch so I may be able to take the jars I bought back and use hers for free! Just need to buy the lids.
This is the picture of the book that I am getting the idea from. I'm not sure why it posted sideways.

Chit, Chat

Last night was my MOPS meeting and we did the placemat purses, how fun!!! People are so funny when you put them around a sewing machine and they haven't had any previous experience. It is really not that hard, I think all of the ladies were happy with their purses! I plan on making more I have left overs and I want to sell some in the Etsy shop. There are three new items in the Etsy shop too, my mom's Mary Jane Baby Booties and her thumbless mittens and one of my polymer clay necklaces too, so be sure to check it out and remember that Mother's Day is coming up too!

I am thinking about going to my Alumni weekend at my college. Now get this they have housing for cheap in the dorms - that will be interesting with DH and DD. They even provide the linens for you - hmmmm, maybe I'll bring my own. Now why don't I stay in a hotel you ask, well were are talking about Potsdam, New York here folks and that doesn't leave a lot of options and I am sure the Clarkson Inn is booked up by now, plus it would be WAY out of my price range anyway! I did get to stay there for work tho. that was pretty nice!!!