An easy yet personal baby shower gift

The other day I attended an open house for a friend of mine who will soon be welcoming her fifth child into the world. I love trying to make something by hand for my expectant friends, and this time I really had fun with it.

I purchased a package of white Onesies then went to town decorating each one.

This stork silhouette was found online then printed onto inkjet transfer paper and ironed on.

The kids and I were watching "James and the Giant Peach" while I was making these, and Mr. Earthworm became the inspiration for this one. :)

Does he look familiar? That's one of my trusty ol' birdy designs from my shoe making days.

And of course, this will be a proud reminder of her baby boy's lucky number.

This one was my favorite, but I was so excited about it that I muffed the first try by ironing it on upside down! First I found the image of the ticket online, then used Photoshop to add the text and printed it onto transfer paper. The fix came by printing another image, ironing it onto a small bit of white fabric then stitching it over the upside down image on the Onesie.

I tucked a flannel receiving blanket down into a thrifted basket then added a pair of Diddle Dumpling baby shoes and surrounded them with the Onesies.

A little ric-rac tied around the basket for some color, and I think overall the effect is charming!

Planning the tree

It's true- I haven't decorated my Christmas tree yet. In fact, I haven't even put it up. Though, to be fair, we may actually be getting a real tree this year (for the first time in 9 1/2 years!) so I've been putting off dragging the fake one in until we've decided.

BUT I do have a plan for the tree, fake or fresh. It's going to have a woodland theme with a cranberry/green/bronze color scheme. I am soooo excited! I've started collecting both outdoors and in stores. Here's some of what I've got so far.

From outside...


milkweed pods


I'm trying to figure out how/if I can make a star shaped tree topper with some of these...


A few red berries.


Some very sharp, very poky but pretty thistles.


I don't know what the heck these are, but they're cute.


And of course acorns. I LOVE ACORNS!


Last night I made a batch of cinnamon ornaments using this recipe and tutorial from Martha. They smell like Christmas.


I bought the bronze (even though it looks gold on here) glitter at Michael's. It's also from Martha- heh. Weird.)


Michael's also provided me with some pine cones, fake birds and nests, and some cranberry and moss green glass ball ornaments. I'm also hoping to add some faux eggs, feathers, ribbon, burlap (for the skirt) and other pretty woodland-y items. There will be more cinnamon ornaments made, more critters, maybe some bugs this time. I don't know. But it's gonna be pretty!

A little more wall art

Here's the rest of the wall decor I've been working on. Just hung it up a few minutes ago and I am really liking how it all came together. I scored those two giant hoops on my last thrift store hunt and knew they'd be perfect for this project. The hoop on the far left is some beautiful Amy Butler fabric that I totally adore and left as is. The L.O.V.E. idea came from another crafter, though for the life of me I can't find where I got the image to give her credit. I always think that when I save an image I'll remember where it came from. Anyway, for the record, that is not my idea!

The oval hoop contains more Amy Butler fabric that I embellished with some appliqued swallow silhouettes. I know, you've seen that bird shape before, but I just love it! And then the last two hoops are simple appliques cut from the left over Amy Butler fabric.




That giant blank wall in our dining room had been staring me in the face for over a year. I'm so glad I found a good (and cheap!) way to dress it up. If you decide to do something like this, one little tip I have is to not glue your fabric to the back of your hoops if you think you might want to change your decor someday. I probably won't luck out and find 18" hoops for $1.50 ever again, so the big ones I left loose so I have the option of changing out the fabric if I want to. Just trim the fabric leaving about 1", then use your iron to press it flat so it lays against the wall nicely.

Wall Art

Lately I've felt the need to cover some of the empty spaces on the walls of our home, so I thought I'd share a couple of my latest projects with you. What's really neat about these projects is that you probably have everything you need to make them already!

First I wanted to show you what I ended up doing with the my kids' silhouettes. I'm not sure how much I like it, though. I think I want something that stands out a bit more. Maybe I'll try a dark paper on top next time.
This project is very simple. All you need is paper, an Xacto knife (or very sharp scissors) and a frame. You can find more detailed instructions in the post titled "Simple silhouettes".





Again, another super simple project using just paper, a photo and a frame. This time I wanted to display some 8"x10" photographs of our kids with their grandparents, but the frames I wanted to use were 16"x20". So rather than spend a bunch of money on mattes, I bought two rolls of clearance wrapping paper at World Market and cut them to fit the frame. Then I used some plain coordinating scrapbooking paper and cut it to 9"x11", making a perfect 1" border behind my photo. I then layered everything using double sided tape and now I've got some very pretty, very custom art in our guest room.



Yesterday I felt the need to go on a thrift store hunt, but with a specific goal in mind: find some sturdy, cheap wood frames and a bird book. I have a thing for birds lately, so my idea was to find some nice illustrations and frame them as art. I know, not very original, but it turned out quite nice, don't you think?

I actually came home with 4 books then went through them page by page and cut out each one that had a picture I liked. Now I've got a good stack that I can use how I want. This little guy is just so cute. I might end up painting the frames someday, but the wood matches the frame of my giant bulletin board, so I'll live with them as-is for a while.

And lastly, this project was also mentioned in my silhouettes post. I don't think mine turned out quite as cute as the original, but that's okay. I did it a little differently, though. Instead of painting paper then tracing and cutting out the animal shapes, I just printed them onto colored cardstock and then cut out the images. If you do it like this you need to remember that your animal will end up facing the opposite direction that you print it, because you'll need to flip it over when you're done so as not to see the printed ink. Keep this in mind especially if you're using one-sided paper like I did with the elephant. I accidentally printed onto the red side the first time, only to realize that the back was white.

Instead of printing the French text provided in the original instructions, I chose to write the lyrics to 3 lullabies that I sing to my babies. It makes this art project just a little more personal and special to me. Do you recognize the words behind the birdy? Not exactly a lullaby, but they don't mind. :) I've got a couple more ideas for some wall art that I'll be trying out soon, so I'll be sure to show you the results (if it works out!) right here. Hope you'll give some of these ideas a try!

Simple silhouettes

I don't know about you, but I've been seeing a lot of silhouette art around lately. A LOT. It's very eye-catching and I've wanted to give it a try for some time. I found this image in a Pottery Barn Kids catalog and it really has some cute ideas for what you can do with silhouettes.

Luckily I tore it out of the magazine and pinned it to my bulletin board, because now I can't find this image on their website.

Anyway, here are a few more pieces that I found inspirational:

Totally smitten with this trio of children's silhouettes from this talented gal on Etsy.

Also loving her alphabet silhouette prints.

And here's a link to an adorable nursery art project that I'm definitely going to try out.

Love these silhouette sewing projects from Martha.


I could fill this entire post with inspirational sihouette images, but if you want to find your own I suggest just doing a search on Etsy for "silhouette" and be prepared to squeal!

So the other day I decided to give this artform a try. I found a photo of my kids that I thought might work and started experimenting. Here's what I came up with.



TWO silhouettes and only cutting ONCE! Wanna know how I did it? Okay, I'll show ya. (Keep in mind that there are PLENTY of paper silhouette tutorials out there, but I think this method is the least time-consuming because it doesn't involve any tracing and you only cut the paper one time to produce two silhouettes.)

Here's what you'll need:
digital camera
photo editing program (like Photoshop)
printer
cardstock (whatever color & texture you want)
Xacto knife
cutting mat (or something to protect your cutting surface)
archival glue stick
background cardstock (again, whatever you like)

First find or take a photo of whoever or whatever you want. I chose to do my son in profile for a classic silhouette portrait.

Next, upload the image to a photo editing program. (I used Adobe Photoshop.) Begin erasing the background, coming as close to the edges of your subject as possible without getting rid of any details. I purposely erased Hakan's monstrous bedhead, but you get to decide what to keep and what to erase.

When you've gotten most of the background erased, it should look like this.

Next, change your image to "grayscale" or black and white.
Then flip the image horizontally, making it face the opposite direction that you want your final product to face. (I want my final silhouette to face the right, so I flipped the image to face left. I'll explain why later.)

Adjust your image size to whatever you want. I'm planning on putting this in an 8x10 frame with a matte for a 5x7, so I made my image about 4x6.

Print onto cardstock. (I chose a textured white cardstock, but feel free to use one that's smooth, colored, or even something that has a print.)

Take a close look at your printed image. If there are any areas where you have a hard time distinguishing your subject from the background, use a pencil to draw in a defining line. The shine of the pencil will be visible without being permanent or bleeding through your paper.

Using a very sharp Xacto knife, begin cutting around your subject.

When you're finished cutting, flip your two pieces over and tada! TWO silhouettes. (This is why you reverse your image before you print it. Once you turn the papers over your silhouettes will be facing the right direction. And the reason I erased the background was a.) to save my precious printer ink and b.) so you don't have a big grey square on the back of your paper that may show through if the areas are really dark.)

Now the hard part- choosing how to display your beautiful silhouettes! The possibilities are endless.

Here's the full sheet of paper with black cardstock behind, which creates a traditional looking silhouette portrait.

Or you could choose something a little more fun and colorful like this one.

Then of course you've got the piece that you cut out, which can also be mounted on whatever you want!





Whatever you choose to do with your cut pieces, a simple glue stick is all you need to adhere your image to its backing, though an archival adhesive is probably best.

So go nuts! I know I'm going to. :)