Cabochon Crazy

I love the Resin Flower Cabochons showing up on jewelry designs everywhere. I wanted to learn to make my own.  But, when I realized all of the steps required and the different chemicals & dyes I needed, I became a little intimidated. Then I saw this on sale for $4.99.

Sculpey Pluffy Clay!  It is a modable clay that you bake to harden. There are easy baking instructions on the box and this stuff is really fun for kids too.  Anyway, I thought I would try making my own Cabochons, the simple way-with clay.  First, I needed some molds.

I found these HERE on etsy and I started creating. 

Using an old cheap ring I found drowning in the bottom of my jewelry box, I glued this Cabochon on top and created a brand new look.

Belle got a few new embellishments on some boring hair clips.

Earrings too!  Pluffy clay does not come in silver or navy, but by painting some white Cabchons the color possiblities are endless.  Again I used some old earrings (circa. 1985) to make them new.

I think the blue and silver flower are a definite improvement to the big gold heart!

You can even roll the clay into balls to create your own beads.  My son had a great time rolling the beads.  They aren't perfect but they have personality!

I stuck toothpicks through the beads before I baked them. Obviously, this makes stringing them together much easier.

With one package of sculpey clay you can make at least 100 Cabochons. As you can see, you can use them in lots of different ways! 

Olivia Pig Birthday Party

My sweet princess turned one last week. Unfortunately, she was sick on her big day.  We went ahead with the celebration, just without guests and not a lot of birthday excitement from Belle.

The Clothes

Her outfit consisted of red & white legwarmers, a red tutu, and a 1-sie!  Ironing Heat & Bond onto some coordinating fabric, then cutting out the number one and ironing it onto her onesie is how I created this shirt.  I also embroidered around the "1" with some red thread and sewed on a bow.

Tutu Tutorial

Legwarmer Tutorial

The Cake

Strawberry cupcakes with red and pink frosting topped off with Olivia on a lollipop stick.  I went online and found Olivia paper plates for sale. I then copied the image into a word document and printed a few dozen on cardstock. Notice my cupcake stand is sitting on top of a cupcake wreath that I made for Valentine's Day.  In fact, many of the decorations were recycled Valentine's projects.

Cupcake Wreath Tutorial

The Decorations

A little hard to see with our jungle of a backyard in the rear but the bunting says, "Happy 1st Birthday Harley Belle!"

With cooridinating black & red table cloths I decorated with Olivia books and red flowers.  I made these cone tress with some fabric and tissue paper rosettes.

Cone Trees Tutorial

Umbrella Wreath

A paper drink umbrella wreath just in time for summer.  My wreath is actually hanging on Belle's bedroom door, hence the fuzzy picture. The hallway is a little too dark for picture taking.

Basic Supplies: 

I had to break the umbrella sticks in half because they were a bit too long.  Then I just stuck them into my foam,  added a ribbon to hang, and a flower to make it even cuter.

Dinosaur Party

Last weekend my oldest kid Ethan turned 7!  He wanted to have a dinosaur party and so... here are some of the ideas that we did.  It was so much fun and now we are exhausted!

The Decorations

I used a banner from my father in laws Green Bay Packer party and my sister wrote Ethan's name on a set of small pennants from the same party.  We got green tablecloth's from the dollar store and crate paper and balloons to put around.   My favorite thing was the dinosaur puzzles.  We found them at Michael's for $1!  We painted them with acrylic paint and then as we built them we used a little wood glue.  We just used a little paint on a card and wrote the kids names for the dino's to hold.  All the kids got to take these home at the end of the party. 

Games

Jurasic Time Machine

This was Ethan's idea.  He wanted to have the kids go into a time machine and turn into dinosaurs.  We did this as the kids arrived before they played the Dino Tar Pit game. I made this with a hula-hoop from the dollar store.  I just found the break in the Hula hoop opened it up and with my camo material I just folded it over and sewed a casing to tread the hula hoop through.  Then I threaded the hula hoop through and put the hula hoop back together. We just pinned the sign on with safety pins.   

 Dinos in the Tar Pit

We played this game at the begining as we were waiting for all the guest to arrive.  This is a game that is like musical chairs.  Put out a table cloth or rug across the floor.  I used a table runner.  Put the music on and have the kids act like their favorite dinosaur and as the music plays they have to walk across the "tar pit" table cloth.  When you stop the music the kids who are stuck in the "tar pit" table cloth are out.  We just started it again until the all the kids got to the party.   

(sorry that we don't have any pictures of this)

Pin the bones on the dinosaur

 My sister found this game at a party store for $5.  We blind folded and spun the kids around.  It was funny you can always tell which kids cheat. 

Homemade Lava

 This was Ethan's favorite part of the party.  I found a tutorial to make slime here. We just called it Lava.  I made the one with clear glue and I cut the recipe in half for each kid.  It made plenty.  We put it in small disposable containers and made sure the kids knew not to eat it. (It looked a little too much like red jell-o!)  This is a little messy so make it in a place where you can clean up easy. 

Palentologist bags

I sewed drawstring bags and used yarn as the drawstring. Then, I used a cricut and freezer paper to stencil on each kids name with orange acrylic paint. We went to home depot and found a bag of paint brushes and painted them with a few coats of acrylic paint, used sharpie to write each kids name on the handle and put ribbon through the handle. Here is a tutorial for those.  We also found the dust masks at home depot. I found the magnifying glasses at a party store. Other party favors that we put in the bags at the end were chocolate dino suckers, dino bubbles and dino stickers.   

The kids are now ready for a Dino-Dig!

It was a rainy day so we had to bring the sand box in the house. Maybe it is because we rent but we are a little crazy like that. We hid plastic dinosaurs, dog milk bones, toy solders, and a few plastic snakes. The kids used their paint brushes and shovels to find things.

Dino-Egg Hunt

 

Since Ethan's birthday is around Easter it made it easy to find eggs for an egg hunt.  I found these camo eggs at the dollar store.  We put little plastic dinosaurs in them and hid them in our playroom.   

Dino-Egg Relay

Using a few of the eggs and large spoons the kids did a relay.

Mento and Coke Geyser

Ethan's aunt sent this for his birthday.  We bought a few 2 liter bottles of diet coke and shot this off at the end of the party.  It was awesome!   

Food

For Lunch we served Dino-nuggets, tatertots and fruit Kabobs
We also made Jell-o jiggler dino egg's. I used the jell-o beans mold. It was easy and the kids really loved them.  We made red kool-aid as Lava juice.   

The Cake

I cannot take any credit for the cake.  My husband made it and I think that he did an awesome job.  He made two round cakes and one bundt cake.  Then he stacked all 3 and put a cup down the middle and frosted it.  For smoke he used dry ice and a little water. 

That is All!  Happy Birthday Ethan!

Book Bag

Another Mother's Day Idea

Materials:  Table Runner (Clearance at Target), 2 Fabric Napkins or Coordinating Fabric, Thread, Heat & Bond, and about 2 hours.

Step 1.  Cut up a napkin into several equal strips.

Step 2:  Sew them all together.

Step 3:  Fold this long tube in half, right sides together and sew down the side to create an extra long tube of fabric. After sewing turn right side out.  It should look something like the picture below. Well, except maybe not heart shaped.

Step 4:  This long tube of fabric will be your handle.  Lay your table runner right side up and fold one end  about 2/3 the way up the fabric. Then sew along sides.

Step 5:  Attach handle by pinning along the side of the table runner like so, and then sew to attach.

Step 6:   Turn the table runner right side out.  The top will poke out a little bit because of the handles.  Glue them or sew them to get the fabric to lay flat.

Step 7:  Using the other napkin cut out a strip of fabric 6 x 12 inches and a strip of Heat & Bond the same size.

Step 8:  Iron the fabric onto the Heat & Bond

Step 9:  If you do not have a Cricut, write your letters on the back or the paper side of the Heat & Bond and then cut them out with scissors.  If you have a Cricut, with paper still attached to fabric, use a Popsicle stick to thoroughly adhere the fabric, paper side down to the Cricut cutting board and cut out your letters. When finished line up your letters on the flap of the bag like so...

Step 10:  Iron-on and you are finished. 

Note:  I would suggest using a darker colored fabric than I used for the letters. The white washed out after ironing and made the letters hard to read. 

Pearl Ribbon Necklace

Mother's Day Idea

I made this necklace for a friend's birthday this past weekend, but I was thinking that it would also make a great Mother's Day gift. 

Unfortunately, the pictures I took while making this necklace, the same pictures that would be most helpful in explaining the process are HORRIBLE!  Therefore, I will attempt to use words alone to describe the process. Good luck!

1. Cut an extra long strip of ribbon. I would "guesstimate" that the ribbon should be twice as long as your desired necklace length.  Note:  my ribbon was really fat so I folded it in half.

2.  Burn the ends of the ribbon to avoid fraying.

3.  Using an especially long piece of thread, thread your needle and make a knot in the end.

4.  Starting about 1/4 of the way down your ribbon, pull your thread through from the back until the knot catches.  Now thread a pearl onto the string.

5.  Pinch your ribbon to make a fold and thread your needle through the fold and then onto another pearl. 

6. Repeat until you are satisfied. 

7. When you get to the last pearl, instead of pinching and folding just string your thread to the back, tie a knot, and cut. 

Now that you are sufficiently confused.  Here is a pretty similar tutorial, but guess what,  she actually has pictures!