Jellyfish Paper Lantern Night-light

My daughter loves mermaids and seashells and jellyfish.

We had a paper lantern light hanging in her room that we wanted to do something under-the-sea-ish with, but we didn't know what.

Well, after a few crazy days with some boy cousins a while back (love those crazy boys!), necessity became the mother of invention.

I cut off the damaged portion and I attached some wiring inside (it ain't pretty but it works) and hung some sequins and wired ribbon curls.

Voilà, instant jellyfish light!

We use an LED bulb and it makes a perfect night-light.

Doily Cupcake Liners

Let's see how this goes.

You trust me, right?

I'm not exactly 100% confidant about remembering how I made these. I took these photos back in 2009 and FORGOT ALL ABOUT THEM. The only thing I can't remember is if I get two or three cupcake liners out of each doily. I am about 99% sure it's three. If you ruin one trying it out...I APOLOGIZE!

What I do remember is that I got 60 liners for about $4. A BARGAIN considering I've seen these types of cupcake liners for a dollar each.

Now, of course they aren't perfect but they are beautiful! And not terribly time consuming either.

First, start off with a 10 pack of 10 inch paper doilies.

Cut straight into the doilies. (Oops...I can't remember if I used to cut them all at once or one at a time. Start out with one at a time to be safe.)

(I am SO helpful today!)

Then cut around the edge where the "lace" ends and discard the middle. Now, cut the lace edge into (I think) 3 equal parts.

I like to use Aleene's Tacky Glue and just barely coat one edge of the liner. Wrap closed and press for a few seconds. (It bonds so quickly.)

Test your first one or two out with a cupcake cup just to be sure of the sizes. Ta-da! Instant cupcake glam.

Man...sure wish I'd remembered to take a photo with the cupcakes inside them. Actually, I think I did...but I bet they were some of the photos that were on my external drive that I hadn't backed up yet (I know) that crashed. No literally...crashed...off of my table and onto the floor and was unrecoverable. LUCKILY I didn't have too many files on it yet, but the ones I did lose were irreplaceable (nieces first birthdays and family photo sessions and such). :(

OOOHHHH...don't bake the cupcakes in these, by the way. Just use them as you're setting up the cupcake display.

Spice Mix Gift

Ummm, Christmas is over.

I know.

But I didn't get this posted in time and I figured I'd forget by next year for sure, so....better late than never?

Sometimes we get overwhelmed with sweets around the holidays. (Do NOT stop sending them over, though!) But I figured I'd gift something that didn't have to be used right away and wouldn't add to the holiday snacking guilt. (I'm always thinking of YOU my friend! Haha!)

This year, as a cute little gift for people I visit teach, I put my favorite spice mix in small jars. (I omit the thyme...not a fan.) I didn't mix it up, but layered it in the jar instead. It's pretty because the spices are Christmas colors. I use this mix all the time, for chicken especially, but it's also really, really good on grilled salmon and in grilled hamburgers.

I'm also posting the recipe printables. I inserted them into a table in my Word program (3 of each to a page) and then removed the table's borders. Like in this screenshot:

On card stock, print the front and flip it over to print the back and they should be double sided. (I didn't explain that very well but if you play with it on your printer, you'll figure it out.)

Here are the printables:

Firecrackers, Paper Lanterns, Balloons and a Last Minute Dragon Head

I was recently released as a counselor in my stake's Young Women program but I had been involved in the planning of the Youth New Years Eve Dance and had a lot of the decorations already made so, yay!, they let me continue helping. Normally I'd just post about this on the family blog, but since I made so many of the decorations, I thought I'd give a run down of some of the step-by-steps, or at least link to the instructions.

We wanted something elegant and pretty, and even though it isn't the Chinese New Year yet, we went with a "Year of the Dragon" theme.

I started out making decorations, with the plan that we were going to be adding larger paper lanterns that we would be buying to add to the ones I made. It was pretty time consuming but I really enjoyed it. 

First off were the firecrackers. Yes, they are supposed to be red, but my red paper was uncooperative and since I like to try to do things without spending money, I used some gold wrapping paper I already had, cut out 3 inch squares, stamped and embossed a dragon design and then just wrapped them up into a tube and hung them with sewing thread.

Next I made some hanging dragons, modifying a pattern I found here. I enlarged it to fit a full sheet of red card stock, printed it out in a light gray color to not waste ink AND so it wouldn't show through, and then painted over the printed pattern with a metallic gold paint (DecoArt Dazzling Metallics Splendid Gold.)

I sewed the body using this method, and then added gold glitter to both sides.

I LOVE how those dragons turned out, BUT they were pretty time consuming painting the gold on every one of them. And they're pretty small since you print them on regular 8.5 x 11 paper.


Moving on...this next decoration was so easy. I found a dragon pattern I liked on Google, cleaned it up a little bit in a photo editing program, and then printed it on red card stock paper (sorry the lighting in this picture makes it look pink). I set my margins really small with the design filling the entire space, and then after I printed them, cut the paper down to 8 x 11.

Then I took two pages, sliced them into sixteen 1 x 11 inch segments with my big, old school paper cutter, and keeping them in order, punched holes in the top and bottom. Add a brad on both ends, add a hanger on the top with thread and a Christmas ornament hook, and if you want, add a tassel or something else on the bottom and...TA-DA! Super easy, super cheap paper lanterns that fold flat for storage. Just fan the paper out into a globe shape and hang. Use a sturdy paper for this one or it won't hold the round shape. (You can also make a smaller "lantern" by using 1 sheet of paper, printed in landscape, or stamped with a design and sliced into eleven 1 x 8.5 inch sections.)

View from the bottom so you can see the paper strips fanned out.

Next I made tissue paper lanterns following these instructions. They were great instructions, but if I ever make them again, I will make some kind of form to hold the sections in, instead of using clay to support them so that it will go faster and be more uniform. One tip: it says to run glue along the sides of the craft sticks and that's fine but this way is faster and less tedious ... before I pushed them into the clay, I rubbed three sides into a puddle of tacky glue that I had spread out on a section of foil, taped down to the counter. (Sorry, you'll have to read the instructions to understand what I'm talking about.) I used the larger craft sticks, mostly because that is what I had on hand. I also didn't put the two sticks in the bottom for a tea lamp because I just hung it from the top hanging bar with some wire. They turned out really nice. I could have gotten more creative and painted something on the tissue paper or stamped it, but by this point I think I was getting a bit lazy. And I don't remember the instructions saying to do this, but I crumpled the tissue paper and then smoothed it back out before I glued it on.

I don't know if this next thing is something most people would tackle, but it really is quite easy and really inexpensive if you mess up and have to throw it away. I bought a two-pack of red tablecloths, 54" x 108" for about a dollar. I took one of them and sliced it in half lengthwise and then taped the two half sections together. Then I just found a font online that I liked and used it as an example to paint a New Year sign. Once I reached the end of what I was saying, I just cut off the excess....then it didn't matter if I misjudged the font size. :)

On to the dance decorating.....

Someone in the stake loaned us their balloon drop. I hadn't seen it before and when we got there and got it full of balloons, it looked JUST like a dragon's body, scales and all! What to do?....because now we needed a dragon's head!!! We strung Christmas lights and hung all the decorations on the lights, including about 18 large red paper lanterns. (I'm sorry, I don't know the exact size.) We reserved some of the lanterns for over the snack tables and added flickering battery operated tea lights strung with wire. (My Ryan has always been so helpful with the dance decorations!)

Of course that balloon drop looking like a dragon couldn't go to waste so I went home and painted up a quick dragon head, similar to the pattern above, out of paper and paint and wires. I made the dragon's goatee out of cut strips of paper streamers. Once it was all done, I thought it was SOOOOO worth it and it looks like we planned it that way all along!

Of course Ryan and Riley had to test out the Wii to see if it was fully operational! :)

Guess it was a good thing it wasn't part of my calling to stay and help chaperone anymore because I ended up going home and passing out before 10pm.

Hope you had a HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!!!!!!

Cute Birds and a Bathroom Update

A few months ago we decided to re-paint the kids (and guest's) bathroom. We found a shower curtain Rob and I could both agree on and then TRIED to find a way to decorate the bathroom without it being all match-matchy straight from the store ugliness. I painted one wall a silvery brown color on top of the chair rail and a darker chocolaty brown on the lower half. Then I decided I wanted to make a cute bird and an owl for in there...only by the time I finished painting everything else I wanted in the bathroom, the bird and owl just didn't go so they are now proudly hanging out on a dining room wall.

I LOVE the quotes and think they look über-cute in these dollar wood frames I painted from Michaels flanked by $2 heart plates I scooped up at Ross's.

Since the shower curtain has rectangle graphics we wanted to have shapes like squares and hearts and circles too, (also the other towels I have that go in here have circles on them but they are in the washer today.) So I had my husband cut out a round disk of scrap wood and I painted this little design and then roughed it up a bit.

Overall we like the final look of the bathroom and I love my new little dining room birds! Now I have about 300 more unfinished projects to tackle, eventually...!

Dot Art Sign

I made this cute little dot art sign for my Mom. It was so simple but it really looks spectacular in person. All I did was dip the ends of my different sized paint brushes and even pencil tips into the paint to create a random dot pattern, kinda swirly for the sun. Same thing for the edges. I used tiny black dots to make up the lettering. No talent required for this one, honestly.

Baby Quilts

I made baby quilts for my niece and nephew, both due in early April. I didn't have a pattern for either so I just kind of made it up as I went along. They are easy so a pattern isn't necessary!

For the pink and green quilt, I cut strips of I think 23 different fabrics in sizes that ranged from 1 1/4 inch wide by 12 1/2 inches long to 3 1/2 inches wide by 12 1/2 inches long. I made both side panels first and planned to stop once the length was 36 inches but it ended up being a little bit longer. Then I made the center panel, adjusting as necessary so no matching fabrics would end up in the rows directly next to each other. Once it was all pieced I squared up the quilt, cutting off extra length from the rows if necessary.

I layered the bottom fabric, the warm and natural batting and the pieced top and pinned it together. I want to try to baste it together next time and see if I like that better. I don't like the safety pin holes in the fabric.

To quilt it, I hand quilted different sized hearts all over the quilt. Then I folded the backing fabric over to make the binding and pinned and sewed it up on my machine.

Love it! My sisters said they were all putting in their orders for when they are married and expecting girls!



For my sister Hannah's son's quilt I wanted a different pattern. Although these colors would have looked great in the stripey pattern too.

I made 6 inch blocks by cutting two 6 1/2 by 2 1/2 inch strips and two 2 1/2 inch squares of the same fabric and then one 2 1/2 inch square of a contrasting fabric. I cut it all out before I sewed anything together so I could rearrange the fabrics until I got it just so. The 2 1/2 inch squares get sewn together first with the matching ones on the outside edges of the row and then the longer strips get sewn to the top and bottom of that pieced row. Easy! Just be consistent in your quarter inch seam!

I love how this one turned out too! Hope my nephew gets a lot of snuggles in it!

Old Stuff...

I made these forever ago but I just stumbled on the old photographs this morning so I decided to post them. I loved those dolls! I really need to make some more of these soon. It's so satisfying to make something you like even when you look at it 8 years later! I made the first doll for my sister-in-law on Rob's side, Erica. The other two were for my little sister, Holly. The wood plate, I painted for my mother-in-law several Christmases ago.

Baby Shower Invitations

My sister-in-law and I got together last night to put together some baby shower invitations. (Addresses and phone numbers are blocked out just because that doesn't need to be all over the internet...)

We kept it really simple, just printed our invitation on white cardstock, four to a sheet and then cut those out. Then we stamped two corners with a big flower, using pigment ink and a piece of scratch paper underneath since the whole stamp didn't go on the invitation. Immediately after stamping we sprinkled it with embossing powder and then melted it with a heat gun. We cut out larger rectangles of the patterned pink cardstock and inked the edges of both the white and pink papers with a cotton ball and black pigment ink and allowed them to dry before we used double sided tape in the corners to adhere them. Not pictured are the cute envelopes which we stamped in the lower left corner with a simple black flower (no embossing) using the same flower stamp.

When we were done we were sitting there saying, "Oh my goodness, these are SO CUTE!" It's nice when you can impress yourself! :)

Flowers...

For Valentine's Day I made candy flowers for the ladies I visit teach. Except for one elderly woman who is diabetic and got real flowers.

It's really easy to use wired floral sticks to wrap one end of the candy wrapper. Then cover that with floral tape and push it into a square of tissue paper to cover a styrofoam ball. Wrap a fabric bow around a clay pot and voilà! I also added a few beaded flowers to mine. So cute and so easy to let a friend know you were thinking about them.

In the past I've also used chocolate bars as flowers...which are a little trickier to wrap, because they're heavier, but worth the effort. Once I even glued chocolate to a big food storage can and made a "cake" for a chocolate loving friend's birthday. The effort makes a simple gift really cute.

Painted Rocking Horse

After many months of procrastination, the pink and brown zebra striped polka-dotted rocking horse I started for my niece, Destiny, is finished. Love it!

Thought Jars

In the spirit of trying to keep things simple this Christmas, I made little thought jars for my sisters and Mom. I took text from the talk "Unleashing the Dormant Spirit" by F. Enzio Busche and printed it on the white side of different decorative papers in a fairly large font. Then I cut the pieces up, folded them accordion style and piled them up in a jar. I tied on a matching decorative bow and placed them in a gift bag with a bag of Hershey's Kisses and a label that said "Warm thoughts and kisses this Merry Christmas!"

More Beaded Flowers

A detailed tutorial is here but I had to post a couple pictures of the pink and black beaded flowers I made for another wristlet. Too cute!






I also figured out how to wire the flowers fairly easily. I used a large safety pin, poked a hole in the center and then just made a cute loopy twist in the wire as a decorative way to hold the wire in place without having to poke it back through. It also eliminated some of the bulk underneath in the structure of the corsage.

Love it!