I'm Back!

Okay, so I've taken a much needed break from this little hobby of mine. Not that I've taken a break from crafting, just blogging. I had a darling baby girl in December and life's been pretty crazy since!

My last couple posts were about a my December Daily Album. Well, I'm happy to report I did do it. I mostly finished it. Although it wasn't quite as complete as I wanted it to be. It started out really cutesy. Then the middle of the month is pretty bare.

The end just has a few notes thrown on the pages.That crazy project is done. Will I do it again? I don't know. I'll decide next November.
Maybe I'll do a Summer Fun Album.

So I have lots of ideas for this blog. I might be changing things up. But I definitely will be posting a little more regularly now.

Real Mom's dinner: Last night we got together with some friends. We had some seasoned chicken. mashed potatoes, homemade mac n' cheese, and strawberry shortcake. mmm....

My Daily December Album

First of all, my goal for this project was to not spend any money. Although I like my homemade album, next year I will probably go out and spend a few bucks on an actual album of some sort depending on how this year goes.

(For a more detailed description of project and samples go here.)

My favorite part of my homemade album is that I reused cereal boxes. It makes me feel a little green. :)

My least favorite part of my homemade album was the time it took. Yes, it did take a little time. But hey, it was free!

So my original idea was to have a 6x6 album so I only had to use 1/4 of a piece of paper. But then I thought and realized that however I bound the album would take up a little room. So I made the pages 6x7.

I used a sturdy cardboard box to make a cover...had to actually measure!

Then I used cereal boxes (had to raid my recycling bin) to cut the pages. Again, had to measure pretty good.


Then I took 16 sheets of coordinating paper (from one of those big blocks of paper) and cut two 6x7 pieces from each sheet. I then glue sticked them to the cardboard, cut down as needed, and inked the edges. The good thing about the 6x7 is that I have leftover coordinating paper to make backgrounds, pockets, etc.
I covered the cardboard with burlap, using hot glue to stick it on good. Then I cut out circles and used some brown alphas to create the dates.
Some sample pages...Then I embellished the front a little from my Christmas scrapbooking stash. And I'm pretty much done!

Oh wait, the binding. Ha ha.

So my intentions are to drill 2 holes in the edges and just use the loose leaf rings to hold it together. Haven't gotten that far yet.

I do have a stash of "stuff" to use when I'm ready to actually do every day. The original idea was to put your embellishments on each page BEFORE hand to lessen your work during December. But I think that would bug me. I can't just "adapt" my idea to the page format. I think it would less stressful for me! So I'm leaving "as is" until December.

I'm linking up to:
Tatertots and Jello
It's Fun to Craft


REAL MOM'S DINNER: Plan on having beef enchiladas. Not everyone will like those so we'll whip up some cheese quesadillas. :)

December Daily Album

I've mentioned before that my most favorite magazine out there is Scrapbooks, etc. There was an idea in the December issue to make these December Daily Albums. It was truly inspiring for me! Now for most people this would look like a total pain to add one more thing to an already crazy month. And I hope I'm not crazy taking this on myself, but I have reason to my madness.

Before I get too into explaining things, if you want a better idea of what I'm talking about then you need to check out these two blogs because I'm sure they explain it a whole lot better than me!
Ali's December Daily 2010Michelle's December Daily Album
The idea is to create an album to document your daily December life. To simplify things you create the album NOW before you get busy with Christmas. Then each day in December you spend a few minutes documenting that day. You could use pictures, children's quotes, recipes, memories, activities, etc. The idea behind this is that you have a tangible record (journal, if you may) of one of the funnest, craziest months for most of us! I love journals. I love scrapbooks. I LOVE this idea!

One of the reasons of course, I'm so excited about this idea is that we are expecting a new baby in December. Before you think I'm crazy I want you to think...wouldn't it be AWESOME to have a small daily record of the first few weeks of your new baby's life?!

I will show my homemade album here shortly. It's not quite done, but close.

I seriously challenge you to try this! The purpose of this album to JOURNAL, not to drive you crazy! So simplify it as much as you want. It doesn't have to be all cutesy like the ones shown. A simple 8x11 binder with page protectors would work! A 5x7 photo album would work. It would be so cool to have a record to pull out every year to see what kinds of things you did the previous year. Maybe keep a list on one of the days of what Christmas activities you didn't get around to doing that you'd like to do next year. Or keep adding to your holiday recipe collection!

Oh, the memories it could hold! The funny little things your kids say. Some pictures of their school art. The parties, traditions, and food that surround the holidays!

REAL MOM'S DINNER: Planning on having chicken drumsticks with Rice-a-Roni

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween!

I really have been alive...and crafting! I just haven't posted in a while. I did manage to create a couple new spooky crafts for Halloween. There were so many inspirational craft blogs I saw for Halloween projects, I wanted to do a lot more than what I did, but I'm happy that at 30 weeks prego I was able to get something done!

My front entrance alcove is now spookily decorated. This was actually a lot of fun to create!

I used a DI flower vase (which went from gray to spray painted black,) a branch (which was also spray painted black) and homemade paper bats to make a Halloween tree.

I used the old mod podge book idea to create a "SPELL BOOK." Just glued purple paper to an old book, rubbed tons of ink on it and added a few embellishments. (The back side of the book isn't even completely covered because I knew it wouldn't show.)

The wordage looks pretty cool, right? Well, I have to say this is my first craft I used my new Cricut on! My awesome hubby found on at his work's clearance sale for $25!

Anyway, the chain is part of a broken necklace that I stuck on and a then there is a random bat sticker. I wanted the book to have a little more height and thought about creating a little box to hold it up higher, but then decided to grab my little jewelry box to see how it would look. Turns out I really like it!

Then I threw up some spider webs and spiders and it looks pretty cool. (My daughter insisted the witch and pumpkin bear sit there. Ha Ha!) Best part...it was all stuff I had on hand and so it was pretty much free!

This next project was another freebie with things I had lying around. I have been seeing these Subway style word boards all over the craft blogs and wanted to try my hand at it. I didn't have a Cricut when I created it, but I what I do have is TONS of alphas! So I dug through my stash and came up with this. I already had the board, you guessed it, from an earlier DI buy, sitting in my "pile" of junk. I think it turned out pretty cool except for one part that I keep looking at and thinking I need to fix. Maybe I'll get around to fixing and maybe I won't. The biggest problem I have with this kind of project is I don't have many spaces to hang things like this from my walls. So it is sitting on a bookshelf right now.
Real Mom's Dinner: Italian Breaded Pork Chops (click here for the recipe)...it was a lot of work and was glad hubby did dishes after because I was feeling the Braxton Hicks come on strong after this meal!

Finally!!!

I've been working on this dresser for Little Miss...I had the perfect vision of what I wanted it to look like/function as. And it 75% turned out. But the last 25% that DIDN'T turn out is driving me CRAZY!!!
I can't seem to paint smoothly, choose the right colors, or mod podge to save my life!!! What is wrong with me?! Seriously, is there a trick to mod podging or am I just a retard?

Anyway...since I'm NOT ready (or wonder if I'll ever be ready) to publicly display Little Miss' new/refurbished dresser I really needed a CUTE craft that I could actually feel good about.
Anyway.,..

So I was at Robert's Craft a few months ago and saw those cool framed glass calendars. I couldn't believe they ran about $50!!! I realized how brilliant it was to use glass as an erasable surface and figured I could make something similar for a fraction of the price. But I never got around to it.

Then I started seeing the similar concept popping up on craft blogs. Well, I may be on the late side, but I finally made something that is so cute, cheap, and totally works for my needs!
It's pretty obvious what I did. I bought a cheap frame ($5) from Wal-Mart. Did a little math to see how wide 7 equal strips would need to be. Found scrapbook paper that I liked. Cut and gluesticked the paper to the cardboard back. Added a bottom strip of paper for the menu section, separated by a little rickrack. Added some alpha initials to the top and stuck it all back together. I thought about adding some buttons or rub-ons or something, but I've been learning that simple it good...sometimes simple is better than fluffy. So I kept it simple.

This way, at a glance I can see what my week looks like and what meals I have planned for the week. I have my planner for monthly things, but it is so nice to have a weekly visual reminder for me. I use a white board marker and can erase and rewrite my week the next week!

I am simply in love with it!!! And yes, it DID make me feel better about turning out such an awful dresser...temporarily. Until I finally conceded to another home decor problem I've been having...which I will talk about in my next post. Now I'm a little distraught and feel the need to once again revamp.

REAL MOM'S DINNER: Turkey steak, french fries, mixed veggies, and watermelon.

Fireplace T.V.

While I'm on the subject of mantels...I thought I would show off one of Hubby's pride and joys.

Our t.v.

Ever since we moved into our house he had wanted to put the t.v. above the fireplace. I kept saying no as I didn't know how he would do it without cords showing.
Finally last Christmas, I caved and told him if he could promise he would a) not let any cords show and b) finish it in a relatively quick amount of time and c) have it not cost more than $150 he could do it.He met all my conditions and we couldn't be happier with having our t.v. up on the wall. There is no t.v. stand for little boys to get their hands into, no ugly cords hanging down, and actually a great viewing area!
We found a great deal on this swivel wall mount. Hubby (along with his brother's help) figured out how to pull up electricity and cable to the wall. He made a box to fit the dvd player (and it will fit a WII also...whenever we get one.)
He said the scariest part was cutting into the wall to insert the box. Ha Ha! But it worked out beautifully!

Anyway, enough about a silly t.v.

REAL MOM's Dinner: Broccoli and Beef (click here for the recipe.)

Fall Pick-Me Up

I was looking at my favorite magazine, Scrapbooks, etc. and saw the CUTEST "BOO" banner. Something similar to this (courtesy of the Scrabooks Etc. com)...I decided it was too early for a Boo banner and thought a HARVEST banner would be fun and cute! Besides, I was really needing something crafty to do since I've been a little lackadaisical lately!
I wanted to try circles instead of pendant shapes for my banner. I simply traced a bowl and cut out circles from a couple of cereal boxes. Then I glued some harvest-y looking paper down. Next, I used my poor man's Cricut technique and printed out the letters HARVEST on my computer, cut out, glued more cute paper on top of those trimmed up, and glued on the circles. I used scraps and stickers to add a little texture and depth (I used hot glue to adhere those.) I then hot glued the circles onto some twine and added little flowers in the middle. And hung it up on my banister.

The HARVEST doesn't stand out as much as I wanted, but I love the splash of fall it gives the mantel! Hubby saw me hang it up and laughed and said, "Good luck keeping the boys from ripping that apart!" But to my delight they actually HAVE left it alone for the last 2 weeks!

REAL Mom's Dinner: Grilled Hot Dogs, chips, corn on the cob, fruit salad and rice crispy treats. Can you tell it's the end of summer?!!!