Birthdays!

Yep, I’ve been MIA for the last month. And it was nice. We had 4 close family member birthdays, Easter, several dinner parties (1 that I hosted), teaching preschool for a week, and a birthday party. It’s been a bit hectic. My little princes had a birthday, and wanted to do a Barbie butterfly popstar party, with purple, pink, and sparkly for the colors. Plus, she’s been really wanting a wedding dress for her and her Barbies. So, I’ve had a few projects in the works.

This dress is still a work in progress, but you can see her Barbie had a pretty dress too. I’ll figure out what to do and show you later.

So I got the main ideas for these dresses online. Belle was here, Ken jacket was here, wedding dress with train was here, wedding veil here, and the ball gown here. Poor ballerina, with only 1 foot.

Barbie even has a bouquet she can hold. Don’t worry, Ken is barefoot. I think he came with flip flops that have since been lost?

To prep for the party, I used a Cricut, with a brand new blade, to cut out bunches of purple & pink butterflies, and yellow stars. The dang thing ruined half of them! Argh, I get so frustrated with those machines! I hung those all up with fishing line and sticky tack on the ceiling.

We made flower balloons to hang up, but used push pins to get those to stay in the ceiling.

I used streamers from the dollar store, and cut out some big stars and spray painted them with metallic paint for the other wall.

We bought dollar store fairy wings for all the girls, and the 2 boy cousins got SWAT helmets. Tricky planning with boys!

For party games, I printed a Barbie butterfly picture at Staples, and had them do an engineering print. I only did 18”x24”. Then we colored it.

I picked up some jewel stickers and some foam butterfly stickers while waiting for it to print at Staples, and they were blindfolded and had to stick a jewel on the wings.

We decorated these cardboard butterflies I got at Michaels, and some microphones. If there were more reading kids, we would’ve done some Karaoke.

My cute husband was the star. He painted all the kiddos faces when they came in. Butterflies and Star Wars (for the boys).

He also made the Barbie butterfly cake. Let’s pretend I have a nice pretty tray for it, mkay?

All in all, she had lots of fun! She got even more Barbies too. Maybe I’ll post more now? We’ll see….

Chore Charts

They’re a necessary evil.  But, in my house, they make our days go a bit smoother.  Everyone knows what they need do before bedtime.

When my kids complain about their chores and call me mean, I just tell them, “I’m not mean!  I am teaching you life skills!  When you grow up and leave home you’ll thank me, because you will have had lots of practice doing {insert whatever they’re complaining about here}!”

For a long time, I used a chore chart like this:

When my boys finished their chores, they’d just wipe them off.  It works great!

Only….sometimes I forget to write their jobs down.  We also started an allowance system, where they get a nickel for every job they do without being asked.  That was getting hard to keep track of, especially since we were ERASING the chores as they were completed.

What to do?

Thanks to KidPointz I’ve got that one all figured out!  They have about a million different behavior/chore/exercise/homework/etc… charts to choose from. 

I chose four different designs from their behavior charts and filled them in with our chores.  (I only made four since Monkey is only two and doesn’t have chores.  Yet…) 

I laminated them so that they can mark their chores off with a dry erase marker.  Each chore is worth 5 points.  Five points=one nickel.  At the end of the week, they get the money they earned throughout the week.

You’ll also notice that these chore charts don’t have names on them.  I’ve numbered them 1-4, and each week we rotate charts.  This way, my kids get a variety of household chores!  Score!

This system has been working out really well for us.  My boys are loving the allowance.  I am loving the motivation they have to do their chores.  There’s also less fighting, because they know what they’re supposed to be doing.

You may be thinking “A nickel per job?  That’s it?!”  Don’t worry, it adds up, and their chores aren’t the only way they earn nickels.  They also earn them when I catch them doing good.  They can also lose them…

Whenever they want to cash in their nickels, I trade them for cash.  That way I’m not always running to the bank for nickels, and my boys aren’t carrying around 50 lbs. of change. 

If these chore charts don’t suit you, check these out:

Here’s a fun one Ash made a few months ago.

This Family Home Evening chart could easily be converted into a chore chart:

Anyway, there’s a few ideas.  What works for you and your family?

P.S.  KidPointz didn’t sponsor this post.  I’m just sharing the info and their site because it works for us.  Their charts are free, too!  Bonus!!

St. Patty’s Day Decor

Okay, I’ve had this all decorated since the weekend after Valentine’s day, but I’m just finally getting around to showing you. Without further ado, here’s our St. Patrick’s day décor.

My lovely vignette. Sarcasm heavy. It’s just random green things I had…

I pulled out my cauldron from Halloween supplies and stuff most of it full of plastic bags, then gold fabric, then just a few gold coins. The girls and I made the clay necklace and shamrocks from TP rolls last year on one of our crafty days. The green candles are from my closet, and the ombre green “I” was a mess up elsewhere, but we can pretend it’s for Irish, right?

I made this gumdrop wreath last year when I got a TON of gumdrops, which I don’t like, and decided to make them into a wreath. It was supposed to be for Christmas, but I didn’t like it, so it became a rainbow St. Patty’s wreath.

The green beads, tulle, flowers, wire shamrocks, ribbon, and stain glass shamrock are just things I’ve collected or made through the years.

I had made the LUCKY rosette last year with this rainbow:

Last year, the girls and I made a rainbow for the mantle, so I hung it up here. Half heartedly. It’s falling down. It leads to gold at the end…

My gold mirror… We cut out all the circles with this fun toy my husband got me for Christmas:

So fun….Then, the girls helped me sew them all together on the sewing machine. They thought that was fun.

I just kinda draped it on the mirror. By the mirror, I wrapped my lamp with some shamrock wire…

By the tree is a chair we don’t use and a leprechaun my mom found on clearance.

The girls like to play with him, but he kinda weirds me out watching me….

I still want to print off a cute printable, but haven’t gotten to it yet, so we’ll see….So there’s our décor. I know, you could hardly wait to see it, huh? Anyway, happy St. Pats day!

Little Handyman Tool Apron

I mentioned on Facebook a while back, that I had this fabulous book called

One-Yard Wonders: 101 Sewing Fabric Projects; Look How Much You Can Make with Just One Yard of Fabric!

This book is a lot of fun.  It has so many great ideas, and it also includes pattern pieces.  Anyway, I was wondering if it would be a fun or dumb idea to see how many handmade Christmas gifts I could make.  I got a positive response, so now I am re-stocking my fabric stash with one yard pieces of fabric.

For my first project, I used their Mini Craft & Tool Belt--kinda.  I tweaked my apron to my liking, so I’ll give you my tutorial, which ended up being very different from theirs.

Theirs:

Mine:

I wanted bigger pockets for my little handyman.  Theirs is also lined.  I had planned on doing that with mine, but then realized I could get two aprons (for Monkey and a friend) if I didn’t line it. 

So, for my apron, you need:

• two fat quarters in matching fabrics
• a roll of Extra Wide Double Fold Bias Tape (in a matching color)
• thread, scissors, sewing machine, etc…

Cut out two back pieces in this shape:

Cut out two more pieces in the same shape, only smaller:

That would be the brown one.

Next, cut out four square pockets in the same fabric as the back side of the apron:

Cut a 2” strip from the bias tape:

Use the rest of the bias tape for the waist ties.  Measure out what you’ll need for your little one.  Now you should have all these pieces:

You have a decision to make.  Do you want just one lined apron?  If so, then put the pieces together with the right sides facing each other.  Sew them together, but leave an opening so that you can turn the pieces right side out. 

Get it?  The two back pieces sewn together, the two brown pocket pieces sewn together, the four square pocket pieces sewn together…

Once they’re sewn together and turned right side out, press the pieces and topstitch around them.

If you’re going to do two aprons, hem or serge around all of the pieces; except for the bias tape.  FYI, I used my satin stitch rolled hem on my serger.

Okay.  Everything hemmed or topstitched?

Fandibulous.

Now you need to sew the 2” strip of bias tape closed.  Finish the ends of the waistband/ties.

Let’s work on the pockets next, shall we?  You need to do it in this order, or you’re going to be spending a lot of time picking out the pockets.  No fun.

Take the two pockets and the 2” strip of bias tape and pin them to the brown pocket like so:

Be sure to make the bias tape strip into a loop.  This is fun for hammers, wrenches, hairbrushes, or whatever else they want to use it for.  Pin everything down and sew it into place.  Leave the tops of the pockets open.

Line up the brown pocket to the back piece of the apron and pin it into place.  Sew around the outer edge of the pocket.

Let’s turn that one big pocket into two.  This is kinda tricky with that little center loop.  No worries.  I’ll show you how to deal with that.

First, find the center of the brown pocket and mark it with a fabric pen. pins, chalk, or whatever else you want.

Start sewing down that center line.  When you get to the loop, sew as far down as you can without sewing over the loop.

Back stitch then lift your presser foot, slide the loop past the presser foot, lower the foot and start sewing again.  Be sure you back stitch again.  Finish the center seam.

Still confused?  Let me show you how I did it with the pictures.  It should look like this:

Clip that little thread over the loop, and you should have this:

Perfect.

For the waistband/ties, find the center of the bias tape and the center of the apron. Place the top of the apron between the folds of the bias tape.

 

Line them up, pin them down and sew them into place.

See the seam at the top of the apron?  That’s what you should have done.

Now your apron is finished!  Woot!

For funzies, I sewed a decorative stitch around the pockets.

…and I made two matching aprons.

I hope Monkey likes his tool aprons!  Ssshhhh….don’t tell him.  They’re for Christmas!  :)