A Baby Garland

Me and my little sister.  Much like my girls, the two of us were thick as thieves growing up.  

And here is my beautiful little sister now.  All grown up with a family of her own.  Love these four.  If you've read my blog for a while these aren't new faces.  :)  

I just wanted to pop in today to share a fun idea for a baby garland.  Carly (my sister above who I call Carbon Monoxide - long story) threw a baby shower at her house last weekend and made the CUTEST baby garland for the party.  I had to share it with all of you!

Isn't that adorable!?  And so fun and creative!?  I love it!  They are ALL random pics of my niece and nephew.   Every single picture is a different baby pic of these two:

I know.  They.  Are.  Adorable.  Claire is my girls' partner in crime and sweet little Jonah doesn't go anywhere without his pink blanket.  Love that.

(btw - this is my sister's house in the background.  She and her husband have totally  renovated their home over the past few years and it is so modern and sleek and cool.  I need to get out to visit again so I can take some more pics!  And so I can love all over these two.)

Anyway - back to the adorable baby garland!

Cut some party hats out of cute scrapbook paper and hang the pics on a string with clothespins.  So simple and easy and fun.  If you are hosting a baby shower with a room full of moms another idea is to have each mom send in a baby picture to hang up before the party.  Then everyone can guess which baby belongs to each mom.  :)  

Love it.  

And since we're on the topic of my sister and babies, here is one of my favorite pics of the two of us - 

My mom snapped this soon after Car delivered her first baby.  Happy times.

Sisters and babies and fun party ideas.  Good topics indeed.  

:)

Have a great Thursday!  

Rainbow Love

Hi everyone!  Hope you're having a good week so far!  I'm loving having my mom in town.  It's like having two me's around here.  My kids are getting ample attention, the house/laundry is in order, Kole is taking naps when he actually wants to sleep.  Plus we just have a lot of fun together.  I love having a bit of adult company during the day.  We've also been able to do a little shopping together during the girls' summer camps and I'm so excited about all of our finds!  Love shopping.  Love having help with my day to day.  Love my mom.  :)  

Ok.  Switching gears now.  A couple of weeks ago for Addison's graduation I arrived super early (Kenny came later with the kiddos).  I'm always the first one to arrive at events like that because Kenny and I like to shoot for the best seats in the house.  We're annoying that way.  Anyway, I was so early that I was able to help the teachers set things up and get the post graduation treats ready.  

They made the cutest little cupcakes topped with fruit in rainbow colors and the kids all loved them.

My girls and I especially loved them because we are big rainbow fans around here!

This was one of my favorite bulletin boards when I was teaching 1st grade.  (Excuse the terrible photo - it's a picture of a picture because I'm too lazy to scan tonight.)  Remember the tissue hearts we made for our Valentine mantel?  I did the same thing with my 1st graders for the rainbow.  The whole thing was made out of little tissues.  I set a center up in the back of my classroom and my little 6 year olds worked on it on and off for about a month.  I added a little quilt batting for the clouds and wa-la!  A beautiful rainbow for our "Rainbow of Wishes" display for the month of March.  I'm planning on making one with the girls when I can muster up some time to cut all of the tissue into little squares.

Here are a few other fun rainbow ideas I'm planning to do with my girls.  (Ideas from Pinterest of course!)  First a few fun rainbow snacks --

Source: flickr.com via Erin on Pinterest

Source: brandyscrafts.blogspot.com via Erin on Pinterest

Source: quick-dish.tablespoon.com via Erin on Pinterest

Source: tumblr.com via Erin on Pinterest

I thought this was so much more fun than a regular veggie tray.

And a couple of fun and easy rainbow art projects --

Source: belladia.typepad.com via Erin on Pinterest

Source: momscraftyspace.blogspot.com via Erin on Pinterest

My girls would love these!  They are perfect little projects for them to work on during our "down time" each afternoon while Kole snoozes.

And just to prove our love of rainbows, here are 4 beautifully illustrated rainbows that are displayed in my house at this very moment...

RAINBOWS.  We are fans.  :)

Teacher gift

WHERE has this week gone!?  First week of summer has definitely been a busy one.  Summer actually hasn't happened yet for my Addison.  This is her last week of pre-school and this weekend is her little graduation ceremony.  

For Ellie's teacher, I kept things simple and just did my standard gift card (always to either Nordstroms or Target - the two places I'd want a gift card to!) along with a personal card from me and one from Ellie.  But with Addison, we went a different route because she has SO many teachers who have had an influence on her during the last two years.  

First, Addison made cookies.  I hate to bake so I just turned it all over to her.  

 Kidding!  Kidding.  Kind of.  She did help a lot.  And yes, she's wearing a Halloween outfit.  In June.  Because that's the way we roll around here.  And once Addison is on outfit number 6 of the day - you just stop caring.  Ya know?

Kole was our official "cookie watcher."  He took his job pretty seriously pulling himself up to his post every few minutes to make sure the cookies were progressing to his satisfaction.   

Since Kole had everything under control in the kitchen, Addison and I got to work on our cards. 

Addison drew a picture of her with each teacher.  She is the one on the right with the curly hair.  :)  

I pulled up the shoe collage I made for Addison's birthday letter, added a little journaling in Photoshop and had it developed as a 4x6 pic.  Quick and easy.  

Last week I found some cute plates on clearance at Target and snagged about 15 of them.  They were perfect to hold our oatmeal cookies.  Which thanks to Kole, were cooked to perfection.

Then I just used some scrapbook ribbon and plastic wrap I had on hand to tie everything together.

A quick and easy gift with a personal touch.  My favorite kind.

We gave them to her teachers today and I couldn't help tearing up.  So did several of her teachers.  I am so sad to say good-bye to this second family of mine.  

 Even if it is just for a couple of years until my little "cookie watcher" is ready for pre-school.  Good thing that isn't for a while though - this little one is needed in the kitchen.

Christmas Cards

It's that time again! Time to be thinking about holiday cards! Actually, if you're like me, you started thinking about your Christmas cards early August. :) I love making my cards and that requires some early planning. It's always a goal to have the actual month of December be as stress free as possible!

I've received some e-mails with questions about my homemade cards so I thought I'd post them all together to give some of you ideas if you're planning to make your own this year. FUN!
**click on the picture to enlarge if you want to read the cards

{2004}

Our first Christmas card. Ellie was 11 months old. Not homemade because I don't make my cards during "the year of the baby." Photo shoot at the beach. After about two pictures Ellie rubbed sand in her eyes and cried for an hour. After the photo shoot I cried for an hour because I was sure we hadn't got one decent picture. It was a total nightmare! My first glimpse into the reality of photo shoots with little ones. Kenny said never again. Of course in my mind I heard never again...until next year.

{2005}

My first homemade card. It was simple. I wanted to make my own so I could share our news about baby #2 on the way.

{2006}

Enter baby #2 - no homemade card but a much easier photo shoot.

{2007}

Our Charger card. This was so fun to work on. I couldn't get too creative with the card design because I needed lots of space for all of the writing. A poem is a fun way to personalize a card and share something fun about your family.

{2008}

Decided to list each of our "favorite things" on the inside this year.

A look at the cards in the making. Half way done with 2008!

Just getting started on 2009 cards.

A few card details: I use Bazzil cardstock usually found on-line at or at a craft store like Michael's. The brown color I always use and adore is called oatmeal. Pictures are 4x6 on the front and 2x3 on the inside when I've included an additional picture. (I collage two 2x3 pics and develop it as one 4x6) My cards usually end up being a 5x7. Charger card was a bit bigger. I order my envelopes from Action Envelopes. And some friendly advice about making your own cards...of course it depends on what paper, etc. you use, but I've found that this is NOT a cheap way to go. I always spend way more money making my own cards than when I order them. All of the supplies add up fast so it's a great thing to do if you want a homemade personal card and love the process, not a great thing to do if you're trying to save money on cards. :)

{2009}

Last years card. Once again announcing the news of a new addition on the way. :) I cut these a little too close for comfort. Kenny and I went to Denver around Thanksgiving to see the Chargers play the Broncos and I was working like mad on these cards the whole trip! In the Denver airport, on the plane, in the hotel room... I think people thought I was crazy! (most people traveling bring a magazine and maybe a snack - not card stock and glue dots) Kenny said never again. I heard never again...until next year.

For the third and last time I find myself in "the year of the baby" and so I will not be making my cards this year. When I was trying to decide what to do instead Kenny said, you know, we could take a year off and just not send cards. {GASP!} Blasphemy! I told him I was going to pretend I didn't hear that and then continued to ramble on about possible card ideas. Haylee, a close friend of mine, is designing my cards for me this year. You can check out her beautiful work at her website heyhaydesigns.com or her blog www.heyhaydesigns.blogspot.com. She is so talented! A great person to contact for cards/announcements for any occasion. I'm so excited to send my cards out and start receiving cards in the mail! It's one of my favorite things about this time of year.

I started a little Christmas shopping today! Picked up a few things for the girls and a little something to me from Kenny. I know. He's lucky to have me. Christmas music was playing and I felt positively giddy! Decorations are coming out tomorrow. :)

Do you have anything in the works for your cards this year?

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Update with our 2010 and 2011 card....

{2010}

{2011}

We decided to embrace the stage we are in and roll with it this year!  

Not like we had much of a choice...  :)

Quick Addition

Quick addition to yesterday's post. Just got back from Michael's.

Told you I HAD to have that circle cutter. :) Also picked up this butterfly punch (because even though I have several butterfly punches, I don't have this size and it's only fair that I include a large range of butterfly sizes on my scrapbook pages - you know - to be fair and not discriminate) Also picked up some poster paper for a fun project in store for the girls. Anyway, I wanted to let you all know that if you go to this link at Oprah's website you can print off a coupon for 50% off one Martha Stewart craft item. Score! Love my paper cutter even more at half off! The coupon is only good for today though so hurry quick.
Shari and Car - I know you two are all over this!
(sister and friend who hate all things crafty - hard to imagine...right!?)

Happy Shopping! :)

A quick page

Just sharing a page I put together for Addison's Project Life book -

It was a quick one. I did it while Kole was sleeping and the girls were watching High School Musical for the first time. Opened a whole new can of worms with that movie!

Felt good to be scrapbooking again.

Happy Wednesday!

Blog Headers

Ok - I'm going to attempt to explain how I create my blog headers, but let me first warn you that I don't know "blog tutorial etiquette" so stick with me and I'll do the best I can. I use Photoshop 7.0 to make my headers, but you can use any Photoshop program. If I'm doing one with several pictures (like the summer header above) I also use Picasa. Picasa is a free editing system that you can download for your pictures. If you aren't using Picasa at all you should be! It's SO easy to use. I used to make a lot of my collages in Photoshop, but Picasa is so much easier and faster that I use it instead now. I could type a long tutorial on how to use Picasa to make collages, but Sarah from Clover Lane (love her and love her blog) has already explained it so click here to learn the first step.  You can create your whole header in Picasa if you want to.  I prefer to make the collage in Picasa and then jazz it up in Photoshop because I have so many digital scrapbook supplies to work with.  So here we go...

After I've used Picasa to create this:

then I save it as a jpeg - just like a regular picture. Creating the rest is just digital scrapbooking.

1 - Buy and download a digital scrapbook kit you like. I always use the kits because they come with coordinating paper, embellishments, and usually alphabet letters (those are what I use for my blog sidebars). Two of my favorite digital sites are Little Dreamer Designs, and The Shabby Shoppe.

2 - After you've chosen what parts of the kit you want to use for your blog, open them all up in Photoshop along with the picture collage you made in Picasa. Then I just play around with everything - (click, drag, crop, etc.) until it looks the way I want it to. (I'm assuming if you have a Photoshop program you know how to do this, but if you don't, it's easy to learn by just playing around with your sidebar tools - trial and error).


3- Once you've created your header, save it in Photoshop (in case you ever want to change or edit it) and then save it again as a jpeg. Once it is saved as a jpeg you can upload it to blogger just like you would with any header.

4- I also use Photoshop to make the words for my sidebars. First open up each letter (just like you did with the paper, etc. from your digital scrapbook kit) and open up a blank file (which is just a white background). Drag each letter for your word onto the white background and when you're done, crop it.

Save it in Photoshop and as a jpeg just like you did with your header.

5- Now that it is saved as a jpeg you can put it on your blog sidebar the same way you add a picture. ("Customize", then "Add a Gadget", then choose "Picture") Then you can move it where you want it to be located on your sidebar. (Example: the word "Topics" above your list of topics, etc.)

Here is a look at all of my headers (before and after jazzing them up in Photoshop) and sidebars in the order I created them...

So did any of that make sense? Creating the headers and sidebars is easy, explaining how to do it is a little tricky. Plus it probably didn't help that I was typing this post while I was watching the season finale of LOST (I know - I'm probably the only person left on the planet who hasn't seen it yet. Been a little preoccupied lately with the new baby and well...recovering from almost dying) ;) So now none of us are satisfied. I'm left with all sorts of questions about the show...still. And you're probably still wondering what in the world I do to make my headers. If you have specific questions left unanswered about how I make my headers, ask me in the comments and I'll try to answer them for you. If you have specific questions about LOST, join the club.

----------------------------------------------- (added later....)

(Had to start making my headers smaller because of the Blogher Ads from here on out...)

(Summer 2011)

(Fall 2011)

(December 2011)

(Winter 2012)

(Spring 2012)