abc pencil wreath

Need something to jazz up your classroom door or wall? I saw this wreath in a magazine (I can't recall where) a couple of years ago.

I purchased the cork hot pad and pencils from the Dollar Store. I bunched the pencils into groups of three and got crazy with the hot glue gun. I finished the center off with some large scrapbook letters I had on hand. The wreath is mounted to the door with Command Strips.

This is probably the easiest wreath I have ever made. Happy decorating!

prayer and marriage

This framed verse was recently featured in an article I wrote for Ella Publishing eZine. I wanted to share a little bit more about where these verses came from. One of my favorite passages in the Bible is from Galatians 5:22-23 . . .which talks about the Fruit of the Spirit. Basically, these are ways that God wants us to act toward anyone we come in contact with. The passage I have written out has been tweaked a bit to make these traits specific toward our spouses. I pulled this passage from the book, The Power of Prayer to Change Your Marriage.

This book is for the couple who has a good marriage, but wants to make their marriage a great marriage and it is for the couple who is talking about divorce--and everyone in between. This book discusses communication, rudeness, forgiveness, depression, finances, addictions, infidelity, separation and divorce--just to name a few things. She discusses the issue and then walks you through a prayer that you can pray regarding that specific area of your marriage. She also backs up every topic she writes on with Scripture. You don't have to read the book cover to cover, you can just turn to the topic that applies to your marriage.

Another favorite book of mine that I have used for several years is The Power of a Praying Wife.

Before I started using this book, I would pray for my husband, but they would be pretty general prayers like, "Please help Tim to have a good day at work," "Help him to get over his cold soon," and "Please keep him safe as he travels on business." There was nothing wrong with these prayers, but this book showed me things that I hadn't thought to pray for often. Things like his affection, his temptations, his mind, his fears, his purpose in life, his choices, his reputation, his fatherhood, his past and his attitude . . . there are more too!

She writes a few brief pages on the topic and then she writes out a prayer that you can pray and insert your husband's name into the prayer. Who doesn't love a prayer guide? Prayer is not something that comes naturally to many people--myself included--and this book teaches you how to pray for the man in your life. If we aren't praying for our husbands daily, who will?

I can't say enough about how these two books have revolutionized my prayer life in the area of my marriage. Go and check them out!

ella eZine

Need some fun ideas that put your scrapbooking supplies to use outside your albums? Check out this article that I wrote for Ella Publishing that just went up on their site. I included a couple of my favorite decorative pieces and included some decorative work from Autumn and Kristen as well. Here is a sneak peak at one of mine:

My mom flew out last night for a spur of the moment visit. On Tuesday we are going to fly to Wyoming together for my grandmother's funeral. We are so happy to have my mom here for a long weekend . . . she'll be here to celebrate Paige's 7th birthday!

photo coasters

Need a quick and inexpensive gift idea? I put together this tutorial for the Ella blog. Head on over to check it out! Here is a look at the finished product. This project is really easy and takes less than an hour to complete.

Have a good weekend!

advent calendar

The first day of December is here . . . my kids are jumping for joy that they get to start the Advent calendar!

I made this two years ago for a class at Green Tangerines using all Making Memories product. This paper has been my favorite "Christmas number" paper ever! I used a cookie sheet (12x18") and spray painted it red. *Note: if you are going to spray paint a cookie sheet, don't buy the non-stick kind! As you can see, there are several paint chips missing on the edges from being stored. Paint doesn't stick well to non-stick surfaces. 

What I did for the number cards: I adhered them to thin cardboard (the cardboard that comes from Costco when you get a photo enlarged--I have a ton of it!) with Modge Podge. Let dry. On the opposite side (see below) I adhered green and red Bazzill cardstock with Modge Podge. Let dry. Then I sanded all the edges--this helps to adhere all three layers together really well so that little fingers can't pry them apart.

Another thing you might notice is that Seth is not included in the pictures on this calendar! Well, he wasn't around then. I don't think he'll notice this year, but by next year he will. So, I'll either be changing out the pictures or coming up with an entirely different Advent calendar . . . we'll see how I feel about that idea next year! This year I didn't have the mental energy for it.

And the backside. I adhered magnets to each piece and I tried to write down things that were easy to do on the spur of the moment. A few involve a little planning ahead. Just double click on the image if you want to read them.

What ideas or notes do you tuck away in your Advent calendar? I'd love to hear them, or leave me a link to your blog if you have them posted! I may be making a new one next year and could use some new ideas!

p.s. In response to my freezer cooking post . . . as I eat them out of my freezer, I'll take pictures and post the recipes. Yum!

frames within a frame

If you missed it, be sure and comment on my previous post to win Ella's latest ebook, Journaling That Matters. You have until Sunday at 7pm PST.

This is one of the projects I had my parents helping me with when they were here last month. It was inspired (or copied) by this post on Becky Higgins website. If you want to see more in depth details about how to mount the photos, her post does a great job describing it. I used "Picture Hanging Strips" at her suggestion--so easy! I will never go back to nails and a hammer!

This adventure was not without flaws . . . below is our step by step process.

Step 1: Put blue tape up where you think you want your frame to be . . . I left it there for a couple of weeks so that I could "live" with it for a while.

Step 2: Actually there are two steps here, just forgot to take a picture of one. Using a chalk line, chalk where the inside of the frame will be. Using a stencil (I got mine from Michael's with a coupon!), carefully and lightly adhere white stencil paint (it's a little thicker than regular acrylic paint). This is a slow and tedious process, be patient. My first stencil on the wall turned out horrible! The paint bled under because I had put too much on and pressed too hard. I quickly grabbed a wash cloth while the paint was still wet and was able to wipe it all off. My walls are textured which makes it easy for this to happen.

Step 3: This is my dad getting ready to sauder the hole he made in my water pipe that runs inside the wall. Tim and my dad used a stud finder to find all the studs . . . only problem was one of the "studs" was a water pipe. The first screw into the wall hit it and I had water spraying across the room. I think my dad just wanted to be able to play with fire and play hero to the rescue. HA! If you are wondering why we are screwing this frame to the wall--it is WAY to heavy to hang, especially with a toddler that can jump up on the couch and pull on it. That hole in my wall is now hidden underneath the frame . . . not sure what we'll do if we ever sell this house!

Step 4: This was actually Step 3, but I had already finished editing the photos . . . take cute picture of kids lying down inside the frame. This frame was painted before we hung it on the wall. We then had to fill the holes with filler, sand and repaint.

Here is another view of it "in the room."

I had trouble getting a great picture of it straight on because of the light issue I have on either side! Hopefully you get the idea. I originally wanted to do a more distressed looking frame like my friend Kristen did here. I was going for a darker look, but I just couldn't get it to look right. She gives a great description of how to get the distressed look. I ended up using a chocolate paint that went with the dark wood in this room. The frames match my white built-in bookcases.

Please be sure and share if you attempt anything along these lines, I'd love to see! And thanks to my dad for building this frame for me. I forgot to mention, the frame is made out of casing--the part you see on top--attached to a piece of MDF wood (to make it thicker). We got both from a crown molding store--simple and CHEAP! (Thanks for the tip, Amber!)

new home for albums

I mentioned that I was working on a  new home for my albums a couple of weeks ago. Well, the new home is finished! I am so excited! Here are the before pictures:

These "holes" on either side of the fireplace were meant to have a television and electronics in them, but who watches television on the floor? I felt like it was wasted space that was asking to be so much more! We've relocated the toy bin to Seth's room and the kitchen we have yet to decide on. Maybe it will move on from our home . . .

The albums in this cabinet are all pre-children. The drawers below are for toys.

This one's my favorite. It houses all our family albums (black), kid albums (yellow for Faith, green for Paige, and blue for Seth--not shown). The purple one is for all of their birthday parties and the red one is for our homeschooling adventures.

If you are local and need some cabinets built in, I was really happy with the guy who did the work. Fast and a nice guy. I'm still deciding on how I am going to arrange them and fill up the space. A little home decor is in order since the space will not be filled up with albums for quite a while. Now my linen closet is once again free . . . maybe I'll actually use it for linens . . . we'll see. Most likely it will be home to all of the homeschooling books that seem to be overflowing from the school room.

Have a great day!

jillibean soup

This past fall I was chosen along with 11 other fabulous gals to be a guest designer for Jillibean Soup. I rarely take the time to send my stuff in and was shocked and excited to be chosen. I just love this company's products! Thanks for the opportunity, Jillibean! You can see these same projects on the Jillibean blog today. Check out the other designers fabulous work while you are there!

I love my kids artwork, but I know I cannot save it all! This is my solution--take pictures of it! This layout was inspired by a layout my friend Kristen did awhile back. (She's a 2-page gal too!) The great thing about sketches is that you can flip them around anyway you want and get an entirely different look. I flipped this one upside down. I put my photos onto an 8x12 canvas in PSE and had them printed at Costco. Saved me a lot of time when I actually sat down to put together this layout. If you are unsure how to do photostrips in PSE, Kristen recently put together a great tutuorial.

This is our first year of homeschooling. Since I won't have the typical "meet your teacher" or "classmates" layouts, I wanted to document the different things we are studying this year. We learned all abuot bugs this month! The bugs are buttons with hand stitched legs.

Words cannot express how thanful I am to be married to this man. Here is my attempt. He is such an incredible dad to our three kids. I am one blessed girl.

These flowers are so fun and easy to make! I used my scallop circle punch and punched 8 flowers using double-sided paper. Stack all 8 flowers and poke a hole through the center. Insert a brad. Starting with the top layer, crinkle and fold each layer toward the center. Instant cute flower!

I cut this flower out of Jillibean's yummy Lentil Soup line.

Here's an idea of what to do with all of those beautiful scraps you have lurking around. Make a rainbow of color on your card! Inspired by a cool chic I know, Kinsey. I used a 5/8" circle punch for this card.

Another card with scraps of paper. This time I sewed a simple stitch to link them all together.

We are homeschooling our children and I thought this would be a fun home decor item to have hanging on the school room door. I picked this simple chalkboard up at Joann for less than $2.

Thanks for stopping by.

Check back tomorrow for Day 2 of Green Tangerines monthly kit! Have a great day!

christmas cards

What do you do with all of your Christmas cards? The first couple of years we lived here I lined them up on top of the REALLY long mantel that I have . . . but they were always falling over and it just wasn't working for me. Two years ago I had my husband install little eye hooks underneath the mantel and we painted them the same color as the mantel (I leave them up all year and you don't notice them). Each December I string green ribbon through the hooks the small clothespins that I spray painted red. This is how I hang my cards every year and I love it! (Now my girls get the mail everyday and hang them up for me.)

I love seeing how each family grows and changes every year. I leave these up through January to enjoy!

little gifts

What do you do for all of those little gifts that you give? Gifts to teachers, neighbors, people you work with, etc. This year I did something really easy! And it's something you can involve your kids in as well (my girls loved it!) Here is fill an ornament . . .

Cut 12"x0.5" strips of double sided patterned paper. I used Stampin' Up! paper for these ornaments.

Wrap each strip around a pencil and load the empty ornament (they will untwist as you load them). My kids loved to do the wrapping of the pencils! I used approximately 8-10 strips for a small ball and 12-14 strips for a large ball. I later tied a ribbon through the hooks.

You can purchase empty ball ornaments and Joann and Michael's. They are always on sale this time of year. I bought these last year, so I can't remember what I paid for them. It's an inexpensive, easy and thoughtful gift--my kind of gift!