Christmas Card Display Problem: SOLVED!

The last few days I've been stressing about how to display the inevitable loads of Christmas cards we will receive this year. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love getting them!! But after starting the Konmari method and reading The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up I just wanted to display them in a joyful way.

I scoured Pinterest for some ideas, and there are a lot of them out there!  I settled on this one from Thyme is Honey using washi tape. And then I realized that the only washi tape I had was some leopard print stuff leftover from one of my girl's art projects.

Uh, that's not very Christmas-y.

So I went to my trusty ribbon stash and found the perfect shade of green (seriously, I have a LOT of ribbon). I used some command strips, some leftover tinsel and a level to make the perfect display tree!  I even cut a star out of some gold fabric I had left over from Halloween.

Total Cost: $0

I love how it turned out and can't wait to fill it up with the season's greetings from our friends and family.

Bring on the cards!!

Speaking of which, I'm waiting for ours to come via Shutterfly so that I can send them out asap.  I keep a list on my Google Docs of all the addresses of our friends and family from year to year, so it's a snap to fill out the cards when they come.

I'm all about making the holidays as stress-free as possible!

It's filling up! 

What's your favorite way to display cards? Share in the comments below! 

~Patricia

Easy DIY: Trash Bag Spiderwebs!

Do you ever poke around on Pinterest, hoping to find that perfect craft to do? One that's not too hard, not too cheap-looking; one that will be done in the course of one afternoon without having to go to five stores to find exactly the right shade of pink or three different kinds of glitter?

Let me present to you: (drum roll please)......

Trash Bag Spiderwebs! 

They are perfect, perfect, perfect for Halloween: not to hard to make, easy to find materials (you probably have a giant box of black trash bags from Costco sitting under your sink right now), and definite decorating punch for the holiday season.

Sold? Me too.

Let's get started!

For full directions and for more info, see the source of this project: Howaboutorange.blogspot.com

Materials Needed:Large Black trash bag

Scissors

Tape

Black Sharpie

Start by cutting off the four sides of the trash bag, so that you have 2 giant squares of black plastic-y material.  I found it easiest to not unfold the trash bag the whole way, but rather cut off the sides while it's still folded up (soooo much easier!).

Then you'll want to fold up the one of the squares into a giant triangle, and tape the open side together, so it doesn't slide all around.  Each bag will make 2 spiderwebs.

Using your black sharpie, make the spider web lines that you want on the triangle (like those in the picture) and then cut those pieces out, leaving something that looks like the image below.

When you unfold it, you'll have a cool giant black spiderweb that you can hang anywhere in your house to give the kids (and Grandma!) a good scare! 

Spooky!!

Want to see the rest of our Halloween decorations take shape? Follow along on the blog via email or follow me on Instagram! 

Happy Decorating!
-Patricia

Pom-poms!

I'm off to bed here in a minute, but I just wanted to share a great craft that we did together (the girls and I) tonight that was fun and easy and didn't drive me crazy: making pom-poms!

I had actually forgotten all about the cool pom-pom makers I had bought off of Amazon a few years ago now, but they are so easy to use: just wrap, cut and tie. So simple. And the girls had fun picking out what size to make and what color yarn to use too.

Try them out!

5th Golden Birthday Party Details!

Last weekend my middle girl, Marie, turned the big 5! Since she turned 5 on the 5th, we had a very special golden birthday party for her. For those of you that have never heard of of a golden birthday, it's when you age is the same as the day you were born. (1 on the first, 10 on the 10th, etc) Some of our friends have heard about it, but many have not! 

Isn't it funny when something that you've grown up with, just isn't common everywhere? It's a funny feeling. Makes my world feel a little bigger. 

On to the party!

Here are some party details, in case you're wanting to throw a "golden birthday" too, or just wonder what kind of food is good to serve (mine was super awesome, if I do say so myself.)

Decorations: 

Gold spray-painted wooden 5 (picked up at JoAnn's)

fresh flowers in a vase wrapped with gold tissue paper (picked up at Target)

gold spray-painted horses (taken from our toys; we have a lot of horses!)

black paper roll with gold glitter tape (picked up at target; on the food table)

chalkboard banner with "Golden" written in chalk (from Target too)

Fringe Tissue Paper Background with homemade "Happy Birthday" Pennant Banner (I'm going to do another post about how I made this--see it below!)

Cake:

2 boxes of vanilla cake mix made into cupcakes, mini cupcakes and a heart-shaped cake

My mom used to decorate wedding cakes, so we used 2 cans of store-bought frosting, gold sprinkles, and a decorating kit to make them pretty. 

Games:
We played Pin the Horn on the Unicorn and the kids had a lot of fun with it! Click the link and check it out! A cheap, easy game and it came in 2 days with my Amazon Prine; I couldn't have asked for an easier game. The kids swam in the pool for most of the party so I only did one game.  Those that didn't want to swim could play in our playroom.

Food:

Baked Ziti (see below for recipe)

Fruit Bar:
Watermelon

Blueberries

Green Grapes

Apples (bought already cut up)

Cantaloupe

Strawberries

Carrots

Cherry Tomatoes

Potato Chips

Tortilla Chips

Salsa

Cheese Dip

Spinach Dip

Drinks:
Water Bottles

Juice Boxes

I picked up most of the food at Sam's club, it was perfect that they already came in a big size! (and bonus: there were leftovers for days!) The 3 dips came in a 3 pack, so that was easy too. 

Plates were gold-striped plates mixed with regular white plates.

Napkins were solid gold mixed in with plain white. 

I purchased the napkins all at Target, and the plain white ones were so much cheaper than the pretty gold ones, so I just mixed them together! 

I put a bunch of plastic forks in a blue Mason jar that I topped with some of the gold glitter ribbon. I picked up the jar at an antique store while shopping in Minnesota this summer, it's a joy sparker for me!

Every party that we have, I always wonder about what food to serve. The one dish that has always been a clear winner is the Baked Ziti.  I found the recipe a few years ago on allrecipes.com, and it's been our favorite since then!  Here's the recipe:

Baked Ziti II

Recipe By:BUCHKO, found on Allrecipes.com, modified slightly

Ingredients

• 1 (16 ounce) package ziti pasta
• 32 ounces ricotta cheese
• 1 pound shredded mozzarella cheese

• 1 egg, beaten
• 1 (32 ounce) jar spaghetti sauce
• 1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Directions

1. Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add ziti and cook for 8 to 10 minutes or until al dente; drain and rinse.
2. In a medium bowl, mix ziti, ricotta cheese, mozzarella cheese, egg and 1 1/2 cups spaghetti sauce.
3. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C).
4. Lightly grease a 9x13 inch baking dish and spoon in ziti mixture. Top with remaining spaghetti sauce, followed by Parmesan cheese.
5. Bake in preheated oven for 30 minutes; let stand for 15 minutes before serving.

Trust me, it's amazing! And it tastes even better the next day. 

Gift Bags:

I wrapped a bunch of candy in gold tulle circles (I got mine at JoAnn's) and put them in a basket that I spray-painted gold. Easy! 

Party time! See the cute fringe background? 

After opening all the presents, she immediately started coloring this backpack. Love her!

So, the party turned out awesome! We had a bunch of kids and parents swimming and then we had cake and presents and then everyone left! Seriously, everyone cleared out and the girls had the rest of the afternoon to play with all the presents. After a couple hours of serious playtime, and some clean-up, we all went to the movies to see Shaun the Sheep. It was so funny! If it's playing nearby, definitely go see it! We all enjoyed it, even my mom who was visiting.

It was a great day!

~Patricia

Festive, Easy, Fourth of July Skirts

Tonight I finished 3 skirts in 3 hours! (Less if you count that break for checking Facebook). I used an awesome tutorial for a simple skirt from Dana Made It, and it couldn't have been easier! I'll walk you through some basic steps, but head over to her site for the low-down on how to make an easy skirt in less than an hour!

My girls and I switched up our playroom yesterday, and moved my sewing stuff into the room, and moved about half of their toys out (and into a friend's garage sale---yes!). Since 4th of July is next week, I thought it would be the perfect time to try out my new space and finally put this fabric to use (it's probably from last year, not gonna lie). 

So festive! 

I'm pretty sure I bought this as a remnant, and I had just enough for 2 skirts for the big girls!

And (so proud of myself for this), I actually ironed and
added little touches like the top-stitching on the top of the elastic casing.

Double stitching on the hem (you can see where I started using up a bobbin of white thread here!).

After I finished those 2 skirts, I found this starry fabric quarter and decided to make a little skirt for my little daughter. She's 2 and I cut the fabric quarter the long way, so that I'd have a little extra length for her. 

After cutting 2 equal pieces with a pinking shears, sew together to form a large tube and press out your seams. (and I used my iron this time around too!)

I then ironed the bottom hem up a little bit.

I then used some leftover bias tape for the bottom hem.

To make the upper casing for the elastic, I first ironed down the top a small amount (like I did with the bottom already), then ironed down enough to cover my elastic. I ironed down about an inch because I used 3/4" non-roll elastic for this project. For the 2 skirts up top, I used 1" elastic.  Don't forget to leave a space in your casing so that you can pull the elastic through! 

Sewing the bottom of the casing.

 

Sewing the top of the casing.

Finally, I used a safety pin to pull the elastic through the casing.  I left it open for now, since I will measure the skirts on my daughters tomorrow, and then finish the skirts by sewing the elastic together and sewing the casings shut. Easy, peasy! 

And, it always helps to have a hot mug of tea to keep you company on late nights!  This is my new favorite mug, that I found while cleaning my house. It was a gift from a good friend, and the verse always reminds me of her! 

One of these days I'll have to do a post about my latest (and I think last) organizational method, the Konmari Method. I have gotten rid of so much junk that was just cluttering up my house; it's been amazing! 

Thanks for reading! Follow along to see the big reveal tomorrow and for other fun crafts and ideas! You can enter your email (look in the right sidebar on desktop) or "like" me (and a few posts) on Facebook! 

~Patricia

DIY Designer Frame

Do you love a quick easy project?

I do! I do! 

While browsing on Twitter, I found this awesome tutorial for a DIY Kate Spade-inspired frame that cost her less than $2! 

And I happened to have the exact same frame at home! (but it cost me $2--wha??)

So last night I got to making one of my own, and I can tell you that it is as easy as it looks. :)

For the full tutorial, check out the original post here: modpodgerocksblog.com  The original contributor writes over at Crafts by Courtney.  It's a pretty cool blog, check it out! 

Then run out to JoAnn's or Michael's and get yourself some supplies to make this cool frame.  You just need a frame, some polka dot scrapbook paper, a little wooden word or figure, extra fine glitter, some craft paint and modge podge to glue it all together--easy, right?

 I'm going to put it up in my freshly painted bathroom, can't wait to show you all that when it's finally ready! 

And now that I have some new gold glitter, I'm going to have to make something--stay tuned!

~Patricia

PS--If you're not following me on Twitter yet, you're missing out!  Click here to follow me!

The Baby Bib

I don't know about you, but I feel like everyone and their sister is having a baby!  I have been seeing so, so many adorable photos of babies on Facebook lately, I'm not sure what to do.

I do know that I've been invited to a lot of baby showers, and when I do, I love to throw in a little handmade gift with the obligatory wipes and dipes. Lately, I've been making what I like to call "Aunt Darlene's spaqhetti bibs," because I made the bib pattern from a bib my Aunt Darlene gave me for my first daughter.

This bib was awesome.  It was big, so it covered everything; it was double-layered, so it didn't soak through; I could easily throw it in the washer and it would come out clean; and it rolled up small so that I could take it with us wherever we went!   It was PERFECT!

Here's my little M with the perfect bib!

Since then, I've been making copies of that bib with PUL and flannel.  I've given them away to anyone who would take them because I love them so much! 

My well-worn template.

And because there are soo, sooo many different kinds of flannel and patterned PUL out there, the possibilities of cute baby bibs are endless! And yes, it's a big bib. But if you've ever had a baby, you know that as they get bigger, they make bigger and bigger messes!

So, I guess what I want to say is, "Thanks Aunt Darlene." That bib was awesome, and a lot of other moms have enjoyed having one too.   If you want me to send you one, leave a comment and we'll be in touch! 

Recent bibs! 

Most of the time I head to JoAnn's and get my flannel and PUL there (with a coupon or 2), but it's also fun to look at Amazon and see what kinds of new things are popping up.  Riley Blake has some awesome designs, like this adorable flowered one, or this basic black polka dots (which would be great at hiding stains), or with this 3 pack of Babyville PUL (you could get 3 adorable bibs out of this!).

So thanks Aunt Darlene, you've helped keep my kids cleaner and made my baby presents just a little bit cuter. :)  Later this week I'll be posting about another easy baby toy I make as a present too. 

-Patricia

Remember,

If you hate missing out on a new blog post, follow along by email or follow me on Facebook!

If you want to see what inspires me, follow me on Pinterest!

I'm also on Twitter! Click here: Follow @tshirtsandtulle

Thanks! <3
-Patricia

Easy 30 Minute St. Patrick's Day Pillow

Today I had the best afternoon!

My husband took our 3 girls to one of those inflatable bounce house places and I got some fabulous alone time with my sewing machine. It was glorious!  I've really been slacking in this area, and it was such a gift to be able to just sit and sew uninterrupted.

After sewing a baby bib (more on that in a different post), I came up with this adorable, super easy St. Patrick's Day pillow!

I decided to make it reversible, just because I love making things last for a long time. 

The heart on this pillow is actually 2 pieces of felt that were sewn together by my oldest. I wasn't sure what to do with it, so putting it on a pillow to keep sounded like a great idea!

Interested in making one?

Gather up the following supplies:
2 pieces of white felt (approx. 11 x 9in)

green felt and coordinating thread

pink felt and coordinating thread

scissors

pins

disappearing ink pen

That's it!

I free-handed the shamrock and then pinned it in place.  

I used a washable green marker to write the word "lucky" and then used my machine to sew over the lines. The washable marker worked fine, but I'd use a disappearing ink pen---if I could find mine!!  I'm sure the kids moved it...somewhere....

I pulled the thread to the back and tied them off instead of back-stitching. Because I can.

And this is a great project to use up scraps!  Perfect!  Then just repeat for the other side and you're done!

The best part was when I showed the girls and they gave it a big squeeze hug; it's soooo soft! I love felt!

Happy St. Patrick's Day everyone!!

~Patricia

Current Situation: Taking photos on the front lawn

So for a long time now, I've admired those bloggers with fancy cameras who take amazing pictures and post them on their blogs.  They look awesome! And mine don't.  Don't try and be nice, but they don't.  So, I recently decided to start trying to learn how to use my new phone (you, know because my kids lost my red point and shoot camera.... and they dropped the blue point and shoot we had and shattered the screen); so the phone it is!  

So imagine that you've just got home from dropping your middle child off at preschool and dropping off library books, when you realize your youngest is sleeping in the car.

It's 10:30am.

So you sit in the car for awhile, turning the key just enough so you can hear the radio, but the car is off so you don't waste gas and hurt the environment (or something). The windows are down, it's 75 degrees, because you live in Florida and it's only really cold for 2 days out of the year. You read a magazine. Search for coupons. Check Facebook for the 10th time that day. Anything on twitter? I'm still not 100% sure how Twitter works, so no go there. Instagram? Again...the beautiful photos!  Argh!!

So you decide that it's time to figure out how to take those great photos once and for all. You get out a white board for the base. a piece of white paper clipped to a magazine holder, and set it out on the front lawn.  You then proceed to artfully arrange a bunch of yarn balls and try to take their picture in the blazing sun while lying on the grass. You can't see the pictures you are taking in your camera screen because of the sunlight, so you blindly snap away, hoping at least one will turn out. Your neighbor across the street comes home. You ignore him, as you secretly hope he's ignoring you laying on your lawn in a skirt, snapping photos of yarn balls.

You realize you left the car windows open, so you go to close them and then you realize that you've left the key in the car, playing music for over an hour and now your car battery is dead. Ugh! And things were going so well too.

Ha!  So this was my day, a little ridiculous, right?  I mean, who takes a nap at 10:30am?  Poor little C's been getting up early with her sister to go to the bus stop (her idea, not mine) and she's getting over a cold, so that might explain the early morning nap. And while I'm thankful for naps, I kinda wish she's nap in her bed so I could get some work done inside the house, instead of hanging out in the car with her. 

The pictures of the dryer balls turned out pretty awesome though, if I do say so myself.  I guess the outdoor sunlight really does make a difference!  

I don't even want to show you my previous photos--scary!

Now, if someone would just buy these, it would totally make up for my laying in the yard and draining my car battery.  Thank goodness for having friends who are willing to come jump my car!  

If you're interested in buying them, check out my Facebook page here. 

Or not, that's ok too!  I've realized that I like writing and creating, so if no one ever buys anything, that's ok. But what am I going to do with all these dryer balls?!  That is the million dollar question...I already have a bunch more bouncing around in my laundry right. now. They are really fun to make, so I think I went a little overboard, ha! 

Thanks for reading! 

Until next time,

Keep creating!
Patricia

Valentine's Day cometh

This year the girls got their lists of classmates for their inevitable Valentine's day parties the week of Valentine's. Which is a little strange to me. The teachers know they are having a party, so why don't they hand out the lists earlier?

Now I have to scramble last minute to get Valentine's at the store, which will look something like this:

1. Go to Target, dragging kids who will ultimately get the case of the gimmies.
2. Walk to the back of the store, putting a few things in my cart that I "really" need in too.
3. Stop at Women's clearance, just to see if there's anything there for me.
4. Stop in baby clearance, you know, just to check.
5. Make it back to Valentine's area, spend too much time trying to decide which Valentine's to get...do I get them both the same ones? Why are they sold in packs of 16? Classes are generally bigger than 16. Tattoos or pencils? Stickers? $5?!?! These are pieces of paper for goodness sake.
6. Finally decide on something.
7. Wonder if I need to get the girls something for Valentine's day. Target seems to think so.
8. Get the girls something they ultimately don't need and will not be interested in a few days later.
9. Stop by the food clearance and that one clearance shelf by dog food.
10. Stop by girl's clearance, marvel at how I need to buy the next size up for G, she's getting so tall!
11. Stand in line for checkout, "No kids, we're not buying the little barbies, or mints or candy. Did you not see the Valentine's I just bought you? You will have plenty of candy on Friday. Relax."
12. Contemplate getting pizza from the in-store Pizza Hut.
13. Get it. Regret it, it's not that good. (Once they sold me breadsticks without the sauce.....I mean really? No sauce? Why even put them out if there's no sauce?)
14. Get everyone loaded up in the car, finally and head home. Whew!

And that is usually what it looks like!

But, this year, I held off going to Target until the last possible day. G, my oldest, couldn't wait to do Valentine's, so she made her own, all by herself, out of construction paper and some (probably old) candy she found in our cupboard.

I couldn't bring myself to buy Valentine's for M's class, so I ended up making those too. I figure, I have all these craft supplies, I should start to use them!

I think they turned out pretty cute!! And thank goodness for Pinterest, I would never have come up with that on my own.

And then when I picked her up from school that day, I realized she hadn't handed them all out.  She said she forgot to give them to the other class (there's only 2 classes), so I just left them there and maybe someone would help her hand them out on Monday. I know my kids; bringing home a bunch of little bubbles is just asking for a big mess and bubbles on the floor!

Here's a pic of Marie's Valentine's. Once I figured out how to make a nice looking heart, the rest was easy. Thank you Sharpie and random bag of little bubbles. I don't know why I have you, but thanks!

100th Day of School Ideas!

If you're like me, you realized at 8pm last night (during a Super Bowl party) that your 2nd grader has a "100th Day of School" project due. Tomorrow.

My daughter had told me when she brought home the assignment that she wanted to do a gumball machine and when she asked last night if she could have a gumball from her friend's machine.....everything clicked!  It was a late night / early morning, but she (we) got it done!

Whew!  Project completed!

I got the gumball machine from a free printable from PlumAdorable.com.  Here's the link: click here!  I loved the simplicity of it, but it was originally supposed to be printed as a 12 x 8 photo at a place like Costco. Ain't nobody got time for that at 8pm the night before!  I ended up printing it as a Google Drive document at 75% magnification, cutting it out and then gluing it to black construction paper and then to a flat canvas that I had lying around. G did a great job putting the stickers on and adding the title and drawing some money in the slot. The stickers are the kind you'd use in a garage sale to tag items. I think I got them at Target awhile back.

If you find you're in a jam (like I was), I found a bunch of awesome resources for 100th Day of School project in my search yesterday (apparently this is a big thing in schools), and I've put them here for you to look at and find the one that's best for you. I'm pinning my own post for next year! 

This list of 50 ideas from likemomandapplepie.blogspot.com

This list of the 25 best ideas from classymommy.com

These hat and t-shirt ideas from kindercraze.com

And this blog post from a teacher with fruit loop necklace ideas and classroom ideas! From kinder-pond.blogspot.com

Happy 100th Day of School!

Little sister had to do her own project too! 

~Patricia

A gift and a project completed!

You know how sometimes, if you just wait long enough, things turn out? 

I have been wanting to get my oldest daughter a dresser for the past few months.  The small IKEA dresser that we painted for her a few years back is just way too small for her "big girl" things.  Or maybe she just has too many clothes. 

I had been searching some local buy-sell-trade groups on Facebook to see if anyone had anything reasonable for sale. Whenever I'd find something good, someone else had always gotten there first, and there was still the problem of moving a dresser, since we don't have a truck. I also thought of going back to IKEA, but the nearest one is 2 hours away, and I didn't feel like putting an entire dresser together.

So....I waited. And then our friends called. They were moving and had a wicker dresser and side table that they needed to give away. For free. And this week. My husband wanted to know if I wanted it and I couldn't help but get super excited.....YES!! 

I was actually going right by their house the next night, without the kids (I am on a board for our local science center and we had a meeting), so I decided to take all the seats out of the van, and pick it up after the meeting. 

So the next day, the babysitter called to cancel. There was no way I could pick up the furniture with the 3 kids in the van.....so I called our other sitter and she was free. Whew!  Then I couldn't get one of the seats out of the van (the second row seats in a Sienna are REALLY HEAVY btw--I had to have the babysitter help me lift it inside the house!). So I just prayed that the rest of the back of the van would be enough to haul this all home. Please let it be enough!  

And it was! I didn't snap a picture because it was late when I got home and I had to have my husband help me trudge everything inside the house, so that I could put all the seats back, install a car seat and throw a booster in there too. 

The furniture ended up staying inside our living room, until I finally had time to go to Home Depot and get some spray paint.  The dresser and night stand were in really good condition, just sort of yellow from age, so I picked up 2 cans of this Rustoleum White Semi-Gloss spray paint (and had to go back for one more later), and it worked so well and so fast, I was really surprised! 

Some before shots! 

It was nice to get something on my to-do list completed!

I realize that these are just the before pictures of the nightstand, I had to wait until this weekend to paint the dresser since it was kinda heavy and my husband and I could bring it outside together.  It's also sorta hard to spray paint when it's windy.  Just saying.

So right now I'm just waiting for the dresser to dry, then we can bring it in and bring it upstairs.  We'll probably just leave it in the living room until I get G's room finished.  There are boxes of our junk to take out and wallpaper that needs to be removed (so not looking forward to that!).

And while in Home Depot, I picked up some paint for our master bathroom, since it's a disgusting brown color and I just can't.stand.it.anymore! I figure I needed to do something for myself too. :)

Check out more of my home improvement ideas on my Pinterest board: DIY projects for the home! 

That's all for now~

~Patricia