Get Crafty: Christmas Swirly Paint Balls (or at least that is what I am calling them)

Looking for a quick and simple Christmas craft to do with your kiddos? Look no further. This is something that I used to do by myself before kids, but I decided to let M have a go at helping me out this year - and she loved it! All you need are some glass (or plastic) Christmas ornament balls and some craft paint. I got my balls online here and purchased some craft paint at the craft store (duh).

First remove the metal top of the ornament, then squirt some paint in there. Swirl it around and boom! You're done.

Well, it technically is that simple but I have a few tips and tricks.

1. Use only 3 or less colors of paint. If you use more, they tend to mix together and turn brown. No one likes a brown Christmas ball. Ha. 

M had a ton of fun picking out the color combinations
(see how this turned out below)

2. Use less paint at the beginning and then add paint as needed. 

3. Add in a glitter paint to give your ball a nice shimmer. Everyone loves something sparkly. 

4. Once you have swirled the paint around inside the ball so that all the glass inside surface is covered in paint turn the ball upside down and place on top of a plastic cup. This will allow all excess paint to pour out into the cup. 

5. Leave the ball upside down for a good 30 minutes, and then check on it. You might have to turn it around to allow paint to settle in a different part of the ball because sometimes when it is upside down for too long you might get some empty spots again. 

The ball that M started up above turned out to be this gorgeous
one in the front!! 

6. I like to turn my balls (ha- turn my balls :) at least 3 or 4 times because the paint will take 24 hours to dry and by turning it you can achieve different designs. 

7. Experiment with color combinations. Sometimes the oddest combinations turn out to be the most beautiful!

And the last step is to hang your balls!! Ok, enough with the ball talk. 

How to Create a Professional Looking Photo Shoot At Home

I cannot believe my baby Val is one year old today! I wanted to capture her sweet baby face on this day in a special way, so I decided to go all out and do a photo shoot unlike any I have done before. Usually I just stick the kids in some cute clothes and find some natural light, but this one I planned down to the time of the day. 

I wanted to share with you all how I went about putting together this "cake smash" photo shoot (there wasn't much cake smashing in the end, but I didn't care) so here is what went into this magical shoot.

Timing 
When I photograph the girls I shoot only with natural light, so I needed to figure out what time of day worked the best for shooting in my kitchen. I like to shoot in the kitchen because I have a wall of glass doors that allows a lot of light to come in, and there is a blank wall where I can hang backdrops or props if need be. Usually I shoot in the late afternoon, but Val is pretty cranky then so I didn't want to have to deal with a diva on my set. I had to try and time the shoot for within an hour of when Val got up from her morning nap, so I had everything ready to go for around 11:30 today. And it just happen to be a gorgeous sunny day today so everything seemed to fall into place perfectly!

Props
Fabric Banner: I have seen a lot of baby photos lately with this fabric scrap banner thing hanging in the background, so I figured I would give that a try this time around. I have SO many scraps of fabric in my studio, and had this shipment of excess scrap fabric from a fabulous fashion line called Moxie and Mabel that has been sitting around, so I was happy to finally put it to good use! You can check out their Etsy site if you are interested by clicking here.  The way that I made it is exactly like I make my "no-sew" tutus. I have tutorial on the blog, so click here to refresh your memory. The one I made for this photo shoot was about 4 feet long in length, and I secured it to the wall with thumbtacks.

Vinyl Floor Drop: If you are doing an at home cake smash photo shoot, I highly recommend investing in a vinyl floor/back drop. I got this one on Etsy last year and have used it for many photo shoots with the girls. Just throw it down on the floor, let the kid get messy and then wipe it off. So easy. No worrying about ruining your own hardwood floor with the dye from the icing. They are a little pricey, but are great to have if you take a lot of photos at home.

Cake: Oh the cake! I wasn't planning to make it myself, but I am the kind of person that thinks that if I put my mind to it (and find a tutorial online), I can do anything (crafty, that is). I did some research on YouTube and found an easy way to make an ombre iced cake:

I followed her directions for the most part, but didn't have a flat plate on which to place the cake, so I got creative at the bottom and just did dots (I guess that is the opposite of getting creative). This cake is 4 layers of 9 inch round cakes. In doing research on how to ice cakes, I did learn that you have to put a "crumb coat" of icing on the cake before you actually decorate it for real. This is basically a thin layer of icing that you put all over the cake, and then you place the cake in the fridge for a while until the icing hardens. This will give you a nice flat, crumb-free base to work with. This cake turned out a little lopsided, but I still think it is pretty great.

How cute is this cake!!!

Cake banner:
This I kind of came up with on my own. I have seen these before, but I decided to just wing it and create one without any help. I used Pixelmator to create the little pennant shapes with the letters in them, and then printed that out and cut out the triangle shapes. Then just backed them with some old Amy Butler cardstock I had in my studio, and finally strung them together using embroidery floss. I just attached the end of the string to some dowels I purchased at the craft store, and viola! Simple craft magic.

Wardrobe
What wardrobe? I had three dresses that I wanted to shoot her in, and decided not to use any as I really loved how the props looked together and didn't want any more distractions. I ended up just putting her in this floral diaper cover that I purchased before M was born 4 years ago on Zulily. Finally one of them wore it! And I think it was perfect.

At the last minute I decided to run to iParty and purchase some shiny pink balloons to throw on the floor, and they were a nice added touch before the cake came out.

I think one of the most important things to have when doing this kind of shoot is an assistant! I was lucky enough to have my babysitter help me wrangle Val, and M was happy to kick balloons at Val's head. Ha. But seriously it is a tremendous help, when you are shooting babies or kids, to have someone to make faces or say their name that is not you, as you should be focusing on getting the best shot you can.

Some advice - take a bajillion photos! Don't stop shooting, because some of the best photos aren't the ones that you set up. One of my favorites is of her crawling away with pink icing on her foot.

Here is a slideshow of the entire shoot (the colors look a little contrasty in this slideshow for some reason):


If you have any questions, please leave them in the comment section below as I am happy to help you create this magical set up yourself! I have actually already been asked to do this for someone's child, but don't think I will have the time to invest in doing this for other kids right now. Perhaps when summer is over, and M is back in school I will be offering my services to everyone though!

Get Crafty: Pinterest Crafts

If you are like me, you pin things on Pinterest daily, and never do anything with them. From the looks of my Pinterest boards, my life is pretty amazing - I am building a $5m shingle-style mansion that was interior decorated by India Hicks, I am baking and cooking 3 course meals every day, I am sewing my kids clothes, I am throwing lavish birthday parties, I am keeping my kids occupied by incredible home-made crafts, and I am dressing myself in the latest fashions. All of that is false.

Since I was about to host a house party that would have 7 kids running around my house, I thought now would be the perfect time to put one of my "pins" to the test. To my "Toddler Craft" board I went, and decided on the following two projects: a water color and glue creation, and an experiment with baking soda and colored vinegar (here are the original pins).

Source: sweethappylife.com viaJess on Pinterest

Source: indulgy.com viaJess on Pinterest

Both we experimented with before the party to see if they were even worth doing with the kids. The baking soda experiment was an instant success. It took M a few tries to actually get the hang of using the dropper (at first she would just squeeze it real hard and all the liquid would come out at once, instead of just drops like you are supposed to do) but once she figured it out, she was hooked. This was also a big success at the party (for some kids). I set up three little stations of baking soda in tupperware containers and had 8 different cups of colored vinegar (using food coloring) and the kids loved watching the colored drops bubble and fizz when they hit the baking soda.

The watercolor craft is still a work in progress. I didn't end up using it at the party, but we have done it twice at home. The idea is that you cover the canvas with water colors, then drip clear glue on it, and sprinkle with kosher salt. After two attempts, it still doesn't look anything like the original pin - the salt isn't doing much but just look like spilled salt, and the glue just looks like a mistake. Here are our last two attempts:

Still nothing great, but M enjoys using the watercolors a ton. So, out of the two crafts we tried, I would totally recommend the baking soda one to keep your kids occupied for long periods of time. Also, you can buy a gigantic container of baking soda at Costco for $5...so it is a fairly cheap craft!

Enjoy. 

Mom Brain in Full Force

This morning, while packing my daughter's lunch for school, I said to my husband as he was heading out the door to work, "today is the first day in a long time that I have nothing to do!" What was I going to do with my 4 hours of free time this morning while M was at school? Definitely catch up on my DVR'ed shows from last night (Homeland, Housewives, etc.) and maybe take a nap because Val didn't sleep so good last night...ah the possibilities!

But oh what a slap in the face I got when I showed up at M's school, to find all the lights off, no cars in the parking lot and not a soul in sight. Did I miss an email about school being closed today? Did something happen? What was going on?

And then I came back to reality and remembered that today was a holiday. Wow, did I feel like an idiot. I quickly got the kids back in the car so no one saw us fools standing at the door to a dark school on a holiday. M was pretty psyched not to go to school (not that she doesn't love it most days) but I was totally bummed that my lazy plans had been thwarted by the Veterans (no offense to veterans, just don't understand why our kids don't go to school today!)

So it is 10:30, and we have already played with everything in the playroom, we were outside on the swing set, we collected sticks, we ran around, and then we painted. Which means we have pretty much done what we can do at home - at least what M will actually do these days, as she has limited interest. Like with most activities these days, all of the aforementioned things lasted about 5 minutes. Painting took about 5 minutes to set up, and she only painted for about 5 minutes until she said "mom, I'm all done with painting."

Like usual she had me pour out a ton of paint and only used a fraction of it, so today I decided to use the excess paint and create something. And I think it turned out pretty nice so I wanted to share!! Just by simply using multiple colors on the brush at once and just the tip of the paint brush I created this masterpiece.

What am I going to do with this you ask? Well, my plan is to use it as wrapping paper! You can do this too with your kids paint (can be finger paint) and a crappy brush...just mix colors at random and jab the paper with the end of the brush...

Now M is laughing hysterically at the "squirrel" in Ice Age, while she runs back and forth in front of the television. It is going to be a long day. 

Get Crafty: Refrigerator Vase

 
When I was in middle school, my mom and I were browsing through a craft fair when we saw some refrigerator magnet vases. We both loved them and thought they were so delicate and sweet. "We can make those ourselves" she assured me (now you know where I get my craftiness from!). She got all the supplies and we made a few of them. There was one on the refrigerator in our house and one on our Cape house for years.

Get Crafty: Egg Crafts

These are a couple of egg crafts that H and I have done recently as we get closer to Easter. H is (still) obsessed with dinosaurs, so that's what we used for these projects but you could easily put little chicks or bunnies or candy into these eggs!
I apologize for the quality of all the pictures - my camera battery was dead so these were all taken with my phone!

Paper Mache Eggs

There's a great tutorial here on Not Martha using water balloons, tissue paper, and liquid starch. We used tissue paper, pretty cupcake liners, and mod podge.

But instead of putting in a little string to open the egg and reveal a prize, we took our inspiration from those sugar window eggs (I have no idea what those are really called! Here's a picture for reference). We cut out a hole, glued some moss onto the inside and tucked in a mini dinosaur. It still needed a little something, so we stuck some little jewel stickers around the opening. Then we strung some embroidery floss through a mini button, glued it to the top, and hung it onto a little Easter tree we found in the bargain section of Target.

Surprise Eggs
Not Martha also has a great tutorial on Surprise Eggs.

Of course instead of using chicks or candy on the inside we used more mini dinos. I also added a little temporary tattoo of whichever dinosaur was going inside the egg. And even though H made these with me - and watched me put each dinosaur inside - she still was delighted to crack them open and "discover" the little dino on the inside. And she still asking me when we are going to make more!

I'm hoping to put togther another post before the end of the week with suggestions for little crafts or non-candy items to put in your child's Easter basket. Stay tuned!

Get Crafty: No-Sew Tutu

M in her Yellow Tutu after 5 straight days of wearing it

Mama J here playing the role of our crafty Mama S today! I get asked all the time how I make the tutus that I am always photographing M in, so I figured I would photograph my latest creation from start to finish and share with all of you. Of course I had to make a yellow one, as that is M's favorite color, and she is now obsessed with all things Beauty and the Beast, but unfortunately yellow is a hard color to photograph, so the photos are not the best. I will try to do my best to explain the process step by step...so here goes nothing!

Since this is a "No-Sew" project, there aren't really a lot of supplies needed. For a toddler sized tutu I purchase about six yards of tulle to make an approximately two foot long tutu. You can do six yards of one color, two yards of three colors, etc.. For this one I chose two yellow tulles (one shiny and one matte) and then this tulle-like fabric that they had on sale that M ran over to and said she "needed." It wasn't ideal to work with, as it frays a bit when you cut it, but it worked nonetheless. You also need to choose a ribbon for the waistband. I always purchase two yards, but have a ton left over. You will need enough for the length of your child's waist, plus a foot extra on either side.  

So all you need is 6 yards of tulle, 2 yards of ribbon, scissors.

Get Crafty - Dinosaur Tail

The dinosaur phase is still going strong!
After stomping around in her dinosaur hoodie H asked the logical next question: "where is my tail?"

Get Crafty - Dinosaur Hoodie

H is all dinosaurs all the time right now. Over Thanksgiving she had found a stuffed dinosaur in the closet of my childhood bedroom. It's Little Foot from the Land Before Time movie and it's is a little more than half the size of her body. My dad had gotten it for me the Christmas after the movie had come out, to be a companion for my stuffed Fivel from An American Tail.

Get Crafty - Simple and Sweet

Dry Erase Frame
This is something I saw on Pinterest that I thought was just such a great idea.

I usually leave for work before H and my husband wake up, but I try to have everything ready for him so that all he has to do is get her clothes on and get out the door. But sometimes I wind up sending texts once I get to work with any little tidbits he may need to know. When I saw someone post this idea to Pinterest I thought "Brilliant! What a simple and pretty way to leave notes!"

This really couldn't be any easier. Get a picture frame. Cut some pretty scrap paper to size. Insert. Purchase dry erase marker. Done.

It sits right on the kitchen table and usually includes any to-dos or things he should know for school, or sometimes just an "I love you" or "have a great day!" I've also started including a "letter of the day" for H. I keep the dry erase marker tucked behind it. I was also thinking I might switch the paper up once in a while - maybe do themes for holidays. My only suggestion is that you probably want the pattern to be uniform and somewhat muted - otherwise it may become difficult or uncomfortable to read the writing on top of a busy pattern.

Get Crafty: Doorway Puppet Theater

Last year, my sister-in-law made a beautiful doorway puppet theater for my nieces using this article from Country Living. I loved it so much I had taken a stab at it and made one as a gift for a friend's daughter's birthday. I had always meant to make one for H, but never got around to it. Now that it's finally gotten cold here in Boston and we're stuck inside, I decided it was time to make a new one - but I wanted to make it the easiest and cheapest way possible.

Get Crafty: Fun with Canvas

 After all our holiday traveling across the country to Cali, back east and to upstate NY, a low-key weekend was just what we needed! After a trip to the library to stock up on some new books, H said the only other thing she wanted to do was paint. So on Sunday we headed to Michaels where they are having a sale on canvases – buy a value 2-pack of canvases and get another 2-pack for free!

Get Crafty: the Advent Calendar

A couple of weeks ago I was cruising through the craft store when I saw an unfinished wood advent calendar in the shape of a Christmas tree. I breezed by it at first but then found myself heading back to get another look. It had 24 little drawers with pull knobs. "How fun would it be to paint that...?" I thought to myself. At $25 it was more than I would probably spend on a finished advent calendar, so I decided to head home and wait for my weekly "50% off one item" coupon* to appear in my email box and then went back to buy it.

Get Crafy: Turkey Treats

Just a quick post for anyone looking for some fun treats for the kids on Thanksgiving!

Different versions of these oreo turkeys have been around for years (my MIL used to do them with malt ball bodies and raisinette heads). I saw these and thought they would be a fun treat for my daughter and nieces on Thanksgiving.

The link to Our Best Bites provides the detailed instructions. The picture above showed my quick test run the other night - they are very quick and easy to put together!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Get Crafty: the Play Room

 

We moved into a new house a couple of months ago and one of the big selling points for me when we looked at it was the extra room off the kitchen – or, THE PLAY ROOM. We’ve never had one previously but it was something I had often daydreamed about. I had always planned to make it gender neutral, but when it came time to decorate it I decided to let H do it. It is her playroom after all and I want her to enjoy being in there. 

Get Crafty: Carve a Cinderella Pumpkin Coach

Last year, knowing how much I love crafts, my mother-in-law bought me a copy of the Penny Whistle Halloween book. It's filled with all sorts of cute and quaint kid-friendly ideas for costumes, recipes, crafts, and pumpkin carving. When I saw the "carve Cinderella's coach", I knew I had to do it.

Lakeshore Learning Center: Where have you been all my life?

While taking an art class with M recently I asked the teacher where the center got most of their art supplies for the classes. She told me Lakeshore Leaning Center. What is this place? I had never heard of such a store before? Could there be an art store that I don't know of?

Yesterday I decided to go on an adventure with my mom and M in search of this mysterious place. After some online research I discovered that Lakeshore is actually a teacher/classroom supply store. I was even more excited for this adventure. I have always had thoughts about being a teacher (but then I remember that I don't like other peoples kids - except yours of course :) and have vivid memories of playing "teacher" with my little brother to the point of setting up a mini classroom in our childhood playroom. I love all things art supplies so I couldn't wait to get there.

I walked into Lakeshore Learning Center and said "I'm home!" Well, I didn't say that out loud of course...but I got so freaking excited the second I walked in the doors. I quickly ditched my child with her grandma, grabbed a basket and went on my own personal journey in search of crafty goodness. And boy was I in luck! You name it they have it...I got silk flowers, bags of foam shapes, cardboard cutouts of holiday shapes, paint, brushes...all of the fun stuff that I envision M and I creating with.

They have everything you could ever imagine for classrooms, both legit ones at schools and ones that you are creating in your house for your own child (what? Am I the only one doing this?) and it is all crazy reasonably priced.

They even have a large selection of toys, games and books for kids in this large colorful Mecca. You would have though I was teaching my own art class at home with the way I was busting through that store and piling things into my basket.

Lakeshore also offers drop in art classes on Saturday mornings, which we might try in the next few weeks and report back.

I am sure all you teachers out there reading this think I am totally crazeballs, but I was so pleasantly surprised with the selection at Lakeshore. I can't recommend it enough to those crafty moms looking for new at-home projects to do with their kids.

Of course as soon as we got home all M wanted to do was dump the bags of foam shapes on the floor and walk away, but we will get there. I will have her on Work Of Art in no time!!





- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Get Crafty - Fairy House

So the fairies that I made last week are pretty much an adult only project, at least as far as a 3 year old is concerned – although once the first one was made H began dictating when a new fairy should be made and gave specific instructions on dress and hair color. So I thought another way to keep H involved and take this project to the next level would be to make a house for the fairies.

*This project will not have the standard step by step instructions. At its most basic level, you just get a bunch of sticks and glue them together into a shelter like structure! But I will give a detailed account of how we made ours.

Get Crafty: Pipe Cleaner Fairies

There are 2 things that I always have on hand – one is pretty scrapbook paper and the other is silk flowers. Silk flowers are great for craft projects (in fact, I think all of my upcoming projects will use them!) and they tend to go on sale fairly regularly at craft stores. Another great source for cheap silk flowers is the dollar store.

So I’ve had this thought for a while that silk flower petals would make great fairy skirts, and I had a vague memory of seeing small fairies made with pipe cleaners and large wooden beads. So after a quick search of the internet I found this great tutorial on Treasures for Tots for making quick and adorable fairies: http://treasuresfortots.blogspot.com/2009/10/how-to-make-tiny-fairy-doll.html

I was thrilled to discover that I had all the supplies needed on hand and was even more excited by how easy they were to make – one fairy took less than 30 minutes!

Supplies:

• Pipe cleaners (light colors are best but anything will work
• Wooden beads
• Embroidery floss (I have a large multicolor pack that I bought on sale – I used off white for the “skin” and yellow for the hair)
• Felt for dress and wings – I used regular soft felt for the dress and stiff glitter felt for the wings. Treasures for Tots has a template but, as per usual, I eyeballed it!
• Ribbon
• Hot glue gun
• Silk flowers with medium to large petals (optional: small silk flowers for flower hats)
• Scissors

Step 1: Fold the pipe cleaner in half and thread through the bead

Step 2: Thread “hair” through the loop above the bead and then pull loop down halfway through the bead. Twist to secure

Step 3: Shape pipe cleaner into body

Step 4: Tie embroidery floss under the bead (around the neck) and begin wrapping the top part of the pipe cleaner arm – don’t worry if the pipe cleaner “fuzz” sticks out a bit!

Step 5: Once you get to the end of the arm, fold the wrapped and unwrapped parts of the arms together and begin wrapping them together, heading back towards the body

Step 6: Repeat process with the other arm and then make your way down the body, using the same technique to wrap the legs

Step 7: Cut out dress and wings – like I said, I eyeballed this because I knew the majority of my dress was going to be covered by flowers

Step 8: Silk flower skirt – be as creative as you want to be with this part! I pulled apart 2 silk flowers and cut out the petals and hot glued them onto the felt dress. I then tied a ribbon around her waist to cover the tops of the petals.

Step 9: Glue on the wings

Step 10: Finishing touches – I used a black permanent marker to draw a basic “two eyes and a smile” face and used the hot glue gun to glue the top of her hair to the bead and then braided it. Then I stuck a small flower into the top of the bead as a flower hat.

They have been a huge hit with H and she’s asked me to make more. She even took one in to school for show and tell.

When H asked me why they have flower hats, I explained that it’s so they can hide in the flowers:

Next week’s project: the fairy house….