A Bow Affair...

Wow, I can't believe its been over a month since I last posted! July flew by with our Cruise, Birthdays, and my new job!!! I have had time to be a little crafty, but not much.. and with my father in laws 60th birthday party around the corner.. there will be many more projects and alot more blogging!!

This will be a two part blog....With 5 nieces I've gotten the hang of making cute bows and outfits for them all. This is a very fast tutorial on how to make the headband I made for my niece Gabbys first birthday photo shoot that I did with her this past weekend.. Boy was she cute!!

Everything in this photo I bought from Hobby Lobby (love, love, LOVE that store).. The headbands are normally .99, flower stems .99 and the gems were 3.99 a pack, hair clips were 1.99 a pack ..and the roll of ribbon about 1.99.. have in mind all of these were 50% off when I bought them.. thats one good thing about Hobby Lobby you don't ever have to have a coupon and its always on sale :)

Start by pulling the stem off the flower....they should come detached very easy..

Then, remove the center part of the flower.....

I like using two different colors to add dept to the bow and make them more fun...

Be sure to glue each layer of flower to one another, and then glue the gem into the center of the flower...

Take the ribbon and hot glue around the clip (I find that its easier on the girls heads rather than leaving it without the ribbon, but its simply your choice)

After your finished with the clip, glue it to the back of the flower and as gabby would say "TA DA" you have a beautiful little flower, and its now your choice to attach it to the band or just clip it in their hair!!

Easy, Fast & Cheap, my kind of project!!!

I'll leave you with a picture of Miss Gabby and one of the photos I took at Bicentennial Gardens in Greensboro, tomorrow I will do the tutorial on the tutu, and should you the Abby caddaby invitations I made for her party on Microsoft Publisher!! Sooo Cute!!

http://signatures.mylivesignature.com/54488/125/BA510B75390D6C4365E04A58CBE23B50.png

Thank You Good Housekeeping!!!

No I'm not thanking my housekeepers for their good work (as if I could afford a good housekeeper ha) but have you seen this months issue of the Good Housekeeping magazine?? They have fabulous July 4th crafts and decorating ideas... one being this beautiful, easy to do wreath on the front door...

I just had to have one for our front door, although we will be in the Bahamas celebrating!!! I went to the dollar tree and picked up a styrofoam wreath and bought the American flag toothpicks at partycity, I had to buy 4 packs for the 14" wreath and they ended up being $3 a box, a little more than I wanted to pay but that was the only place I could find them, and a roll of ribbon I had left over from another project...

This was probably the easiest wreath I've ever made I basically just cut the ribbon and made a bow to attach to my wreath hanger...and stuck the flags in the wreath randomly..

I stuck them upside down and all around..

and here is the finished product....voila!!!

Hope everyone has a safe and wonderful 4th!!

http://signatures.mylivesignature.com/54488/125/BA510B75390D6C4365E04A58CBE23B50.png

Bridal Shower on a Budget :)

Wow I've been behind!!! My best friend is getting married this Saturday and I've been caught up in all that jazz :) I helped throw her a bridal shower back in April, and I was in charge of decorations. We had it at a country club and since those prices were so steep I knew I needed to make whatever I could and as cheap as possible!!!

I made these super cute centerpieces out of a large green bean can and about a 1/4th roll of navy yarn and my super, duper hot glue gun...

I pretty much just took the yarn and wrapped and hot glued and wrapped and hot glued and wrapped and hot glued and well you get the point..... and I continued to do so until I got to this point...

I then took some white ribbon and hot glued it around the middle of the can.. like so..

and finished it off with the bride-to-be's soon to be last initial... and pasted onto fuchsia card stock

and a close up of the flowers because that last picture didnt do them justice!!

for favors I bought these cute little bags from the dollar tree (12 in a pack) and pretty much just hot glued and pasted like I did the centerpiece.. sorry no tutorial but its pretty much self explanatory and cheap, cheap, cheap :)

they were used for our miniature candy buffet....

I bought these super cute frames at the dollar store and just spray painted them blue and the others I just left white, they turned out cute and I put their engagements pictures in as well as framing her shower invitation... I got a great deal on the invitations at Michael's, they were normally $30, but I used a half off coupon, and got 30 invites for $15... it also came with thank you notes for the bride to use..... here are some close ups..

the votives I got at walmart for .50 each and just hot glued the ribbon and tied a bow..

These badboys came from Sams Club.... let me tell you they are the BEST cupcakes ever and you can get 30 for $13!! I added the pink sprinkles and I got the cupcake liners off of Etsy.

The wonderful food...

here is her gift from me.. I bought a bunch of offs and ends of her registry and wrapped it in the basket.. then went to the dollar store and bought the white frame and put the scrapbook paper I used for another project below in the frame and hot glued the tongs and wrapped with ribbon and I found the B monogram at Michael's for $1... it was bright orange so I spray painted it, I think it will be super cute in their kitchen maybe on their window.. or a key hook...

I found this idea on marthastewart.com, and went to hobby lobby and bought 12 x 12 scrapbook paper and trimmed them down to fit into my printer.. and I printed off these cute little "words of wisdom" for the guest to write for the bride... super easy, super cheap!!

I know this was like the worlds longest blog... but I was so excited to share everything with you, stay tuned for next week!!! I am planning my father-in-laws 60th birthday, and we are throwing him a surprise luau and I have sooo many great ideas!!!!

Easter Weekend Winddown...

Another holiday has come and gone... somehow this year I just let Easter creep up on me and before I knew it there was only two days left to decorate before the Holiday was here!! Ohhh Boy!! The things I get myself into...I used the norm. moss bunny on a stick and then attempted to make my own speckled eggs that I've seen everywhere on blogtown and I think next time I will buy the eggs :) Heres a few pics of the decorations I threw up and then had to take back down not even a week later ha I did learn my lesson.. better late than never right??

Heres my eggs before I speckled them..

and after the speckling (remind me to not attempt to do this at 2am again :))

Check out CraftySisters and see the right way to make beautiful eggs

I bought this wreath not to long ago on Clearance at Micheals and I just felt it needed something a little more

Im all about some big wreaths so....

Grapevine wreath to the rescue!! I think it looked so much better and all I did was take a small piece of twine and tied the two wreathers together...

These were my very quick (oops I forgot to decorate) table settings

Along with the table centerpiece and my speckled eggs..

as for the living room I just threw eggs wherever I could fit them... on the coffee table

and in the Apothecary Jars...

and last but not least we cant forget

The moss bunnies on a stick

(these were all the rave last year ;)

oh theres another one :)

and last but not lease I thought I'd share with you this little cutie, my niece Gabby

She's such a good sport, and by now she knows that when she comes to her aunties house, she will have something ridiculous on her head and lots of pictures taken :)

Hope you all had a FABULOUS Easter!!

http://signatures.mylivesignature.com/54488/125/BA510B75390D6C4365E04A58CBE23B50.png

Show and Share :)

Birthday Celebration Wreath

Heres my first shot as a giveaway (wish me luck) I lovee crafts! I mean Im a craft junkie! So when it came time for my little nieces 6th birthday party I just knew I needed something to spruce up the front door of my brothers house.. so my mind went to spinning and I decided on a birthday wreath.... not out of the ribbon like I've seen on some blogs but out of BALLOONS!! (Boy am I a genius :)


I started off with a dollar tree styrofoam wreath and cut it so I could wrap rubberbands around the entire wreath (I used around 40 rubberbands) ... after the rubberbands were placed I hotglued the wreath back together and started my transformation with balloons (150 to be exact)







I took the balloons in groups of 4 random colors and placed them under a rubberband and continued to do so until the wreath was full...





After attachin all the ballons I took the pipecleaners and wrapped them around the wreath once and twisted it tight and took the rest of the cleaner and wrapped it around my finger to make a spiral design and did this randomly around the wreath (I thought it looked super cute like this)



Next I simply decorated with party favors and birthday stickers and the rest is history.. I want to make several more with maybe a little more favors added, however, my time was very limited and the favors and stickers I used I just had on hand...and a little ribbon up top and you have yourself a very adorable wreath!

Now hope on over to Just A Girl for show & share... :), and V and Co for her link me party
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Lets give this a try :)

So after months & months of stalking in the blogworld .. I thought I would give it a try myself :) I have fallen in love with sooo many blogs out there I can hardly keep track of them all now.. so hopefully I will stay devoted to this and continue to keep everyone up with our daily journies, craftiness and my loving family :)

Stephanie (Now I need to learn how to make one of those swanky signatures everyone out there uses ;)