Mother's Day Quote

I think I may be addicted to pretty quote printables. I pin and pin them. I'm a visual person and I love seeing inspirational words displayed in such a pretty way.

I have fun making my own, too.  I love the cheery yellow of this one (it's my favorite color).  The adorable yellow flower "paper" comes from Citrus and Mint.  Love her designs.

As I was designing this, I asked my 5 year old if he liked it and if he thought it was pretty.  His response, "Well, yeeaaaah...if I could figure out what it is!"  Ha!  I just love that boy and I love being a mother.  I hope you all have a great Mothers Day!

Glasses

My whole family wears glasses.  I started wearing them when I was 17 and couldn't see the chalkboard very well in my chemistry class at school.  I don't wear mine all of the time, but I'm finding that I have to wear them more and more these days.  Man, getting older is lame.  :)  I really like my latest pair, though.  They make me feel trendy.  :)

My husband wears contacts (I absolutely cannot handle contacts in my eyes.  It weirds me out.  Anyone else like that out there?).  My kiddos even started wearing them as little bitty babies.  See?

Over the years, I have bought a lot of pairs of glasses.  (Ever tried to keep one-year-olds in glasses?  Man, we were buying new pairs ALL the time when they were little.  Fortunately the older they get the less often they destroy them.  :)    I've tried to buy glasses cheaply--we're all looking to save some money, right?  I was recently introduced to GlassesUSA.com.  With all the pairs of glasses my family buys, I may just have to try them out.

This cute pair is quite similar to the eyeglasses I'm currently sporting, but for at least half the price I bought mine for!

 

They even have a fun Virtual Mirror where you can virtually try on various pairs of glasses to see how they look on you.  Here are a couple of the pairs that I tried on:

These are the ones in the above picture.

Or I could go a little more hipster with these.  Ha!

Try on your own online eyeglasses with their Virtual Mirror.  You can pick the pair you look best in or just have fun trying on hipster glasses like me. :)

Use the code Blog10 to take 10% off any order of prescription glasses.


Disclosure: I was compensated for this promotion.  All opinions are my own.

Squid

My son is super into squids right now. He wants to be a marine biologist, specifically studying the Giant Squid. He has decided upon his major, college choice, and future graduate work. This is awesome. Especially since he's 10. :) Granted, I picked my major when I was 12 (and got my degree in it) so it's entirely possible he'll see it through.

For now, he is constantly drawing squids, his pinewood derby car was a squid, and he and his best friend design submarines at recess everyday.  So, when I needed to come up with a birthday gift for him that could be made cheaply at home, I thought it'd be fantastic to make a stuffed squid for his bed. 

To say that he LOVES it would be an understatement. 

Personally, I'm rather proud of myself for thinking to use polka dot fabric for the suction cup sides of the arms and tentacles (he informs me that they're not all tentacles, only the long ones are). 

I didn't have a pattern, I just sketched out what I thought the squid should look like, added 1/2 inch seam allowances to my sketch, and cut it out.

 

It was a great scrap buster.  I used leftover polka dot fabric from this dress and gray fabric leftover from the Dumbledore costume from a couple Halloweens ago.  The eyes (one on each side) were made of felt I had in my stash. 

 

 

I sewed everything right sides together and stuffed it.  I basted it together as I assembled it, as working with all those arms was rather complicated--too complicated for pinning. 

 

 

I really love how it looks sitting on top of his green bedspread.  I'm proud of my little squid.  :)

 

We Matter

In case you haven't noticed, I'm a Mormon.  And this weekend, my church is holding our twice-a-year General Conference.  It's 4 general 2 hour sessions of talks from our leaders and our prophet.  I LOVE listening to the inspired words and feeling the holy Spirit.  If you'd like to watch it with me, you can watch or listen to it here.

My favorite quote so far comes from Sister Elaine S. Dalton, "Our part matters because WE matter."  So, of course I had to make a printable to pin to Pinterest.  :)  So, here it is:

Ducky Birthday Party

Perhaps you have noticed that I have scaled way back on my posting. I realized near the end of last year that this blog, and all the cute craftiness that went with it, were taking my focus away from where it should be.  I was becoming guilty of craftiness for craftiness' sake, something I said here that I've always disliked.  Not only does it take away focus from my family and other priorities, it's also expensive!  So, things got a bit sparse while I was busy.

But, I don't want the blog to disappear, so I decided I'm going to occasionally write some posts about parties and projects that I did before I started this blog.  There's no law that says my projects have to have been done right before I blog them, right?  :)  Plus, I have a few projects coming up that I'm doing because I want to or need to, rather than as fodder for the blog, so I'll be posting a bit more often.

The party I'm posting today was my youngest's 2 year old birthday party (he just turned 5...).  It's probably the cutest party I've ever thrown.

At the time, he was WAY into ducks.  Duck books, duck toys, duck songs, he loved it all.  So, what better party theme than rubber ducks?

The centerpiece of it all was this cute duck cake.  I modified this tutorial from Betty Crocker to make it.  

I made a bunch of cute garlands by punching out blue and yellow circles with a punch and then sewing them together on my sewing machine.  Seriously the fastest thing ever.  I just pedal-to-the-metal-ed it with my machine pedal and stuck a new circle under the presser foot each time the previous circle moved through.  

I also picked up a bunch of cheap and cute rubber duckies to sit around as decoration.  My little guy has thoroughly enjoyed having a bath full of duckies ever since.  :)

The blue punch (I think it was Blue Raspberry Kool-Aid) was so cute with little duckies floating in it!  And, I was so excited to find out that Target's store brand's generic "goldfish" crackers looked like little ducks!  

The birthday boy and his guests were all just toddlers, so the entertainment was low-key.  I gathered every duck book I could get my hands on, from our bookshelves and the local library.  I read them all a story, and then let them peruse their own books.  

And, in a slightly crazy move, I actually let them all play with rubber ducks in an actual bathtub.  I mean, how CUTE is this rubber duck bathtub?!  I put a plastic tablecloth underneath and only an inch or two of water in it, and it actually turned out fine.  No spills.  

 

 It was such a fun party.  Now if only my little guy was still that little!  :)

These boy party ideas were also featured on Spaceships and Laser Beams.

Valentine's Quote Printables

Since Valentine's Day is this week, I thought I'd make a couple of fun quote printables for the blog. As I've mentioned before, pinning good quotes with a pretty presentation is one of my favorite things to do on Pinterest.  I had some time last week to play around with photoshop, so I put together a couple quotes for you.  Enjoy, and Happy Valentine's Day!

 

My Favorite Posts of 2012

I had a lot of fun being creative this year.  Here are my favorite projects from the past year.

 

ModCloth Dress Tutorial 

Baby Dear Baby Shower



Weeping Angel Costume

 

 

Entryway Makeover 

Upcycled Card Holder

 

 

Envelope Clutch Tutorial

 

 

Mother Quote Printable

 

 

 The Pillow Chair

 

 

 Bored Board Revamped

Trip Fun Binders