Necklace Hanger

I got crafty again last weekend and made a necklace hanger I saw on Pinterest with the help of my awesome, handy boyfriend. :)

Here's my take on it:



Sorry for the not-so-great photo. It's hard to take indoor photos at night with a cell phone. ;) I'll try to get a better one soon with Daphne. :)

On to the next Pinterest craft!

Element Monogram

I followed this tutorial today to make an E monogram for our dining area after I saw the photo of it on Pinterest earlier this week. It's the first bit of decor for that wall. :) The only thing I did differently was I used the Avenir font for ours instead of Helvetica.

Cameron's Baby Advent Calendar

I really wanted Cameron to have an advent calendar this year. I have fond memories of using my own. I can't remember exactly what it looked like but I remember each day, I would open a little flap and see a new little picture. It would be one of my favorite things about December. I should really find out if my mom still has it.

Anyway, I knew I didn't want Cameron to have candy every day, because that is a no-no around here. I found an idea online somewhere that suggested cutting a tree out of construction paper and using foam stickers, one for each day. He loves putting stickers on things right now so I knew it was perfect for him. As a scrapbooker though, I cringed at the thought of construction paper and foam stickers. ;) So I decided to develop it into my own little project.

I found a cute little tree template here, cut it out, and traced it onto the back side of my CTMH Mistletoe paper. I didn't like how small that tree stand was, so I cut a larger one out of Cranberry cardstock. I didn't use a template or anything for that, just eye-balled it.

Every day Cameron will add an "ornament" sticker to this tree.



After that I cut out 6, 1 inch circles using my Fiskars Shape Cutter and circle template. I cut them out of 4 of the different patterned papers from the Mistletoe Level 2 pack. You could use a circle punch though. :) After that, I ran them all through my Xyron. Voila! Ornament stickers that match my tree! :)



And I cut them up and put them in a sandwich bag so Cam can randomly pick one every day.

I adhered my tree to my Colonial White cardstock cut to 8.5x11 and added some embellishments from the Mistletoe Level 2 Assortment.



(I apologize for the bad photos. It was crappy outside and they were taken with my phone. ;)

I also sewed in between the embellishments because it looked funny without anything else up there. At the bottom, I have added "Christmas 2010" in Cocoa cardstock cut out with my Cricut. I am sure there will be a better photo taken of this as we go through December and I'm working on our December Daily. :)

What kind of advent calendar do you have for your kids?

Supplies:
CTMH Mistletoe Level 2 Paper Pack
CTMH Mistletoe Level 2 Assortment
CTMH Neutral Embroidery Floss

Originally posted to my Cameron Crazy Mom blog. Brought here courtesy of me. :)

Holiday Handprint Ornaments

For my craft project, I decided I wanted to do a handprint ornament since it was Cameron's first Christmas. Starting out, I was only going to make one for our tree, but after some thought, I decided to do some more for some other family members.



I found an example somewhere on the internet of how to make these, but now I can't remember where it is at. It's neither here nor there since I pretty much winged it anyway. :) So here is what you will need for this project...

• Crayola air-dry clay
• Paint (I used Making Memories "Daiquiri" and some regular white craft paint)
• Paint sponges and brushes
• A paper plate
• A sheet or two of foil
• A sharpie and ink pen
• Ribbon
• A super cute little assistant

Ok, so first thing you are going to want to do is take some of your clay out and put it on a sheet of foil. The first time I did this, I did it on my craft mat. It worked ok and was easy to clean, but it was hard to peel the clay off once I cut out my shapes. I used foil the second time around and it worked awesome!

Since I don't have a circle cookie cutter, I used a mug to make my circular shapes. Now, I will warn you this was almost too small of a circle for my six month old son's hand, so if you have an older child, I would recommend using a bowl and making a plaque instead. Still cute, and the grandparents could keep it out all year 'round.

After you get your ornaments cut out, you'll need to lasso your assistant and get his/her handprint embedded into that circle. I went ahead and peeled off my circles before I got Cam's handprint. To actually get his handprint I held the clay in my hand while I pressed his chubby little hand down onto the clay. If you have older kids, it will probably be easier. Cameron and I had it out on this part. He did NOT want to have his hand print put into this clay.



Here is what our ornaments looked like after we were done hand-printing them. Notice I put them on paper plates to dry. I also used plastic sandwich baggies. They worked equally as well. Ideally, you would use wax paper, but I didn't have any of that so I improvised. :) Also, I used the head of an ink pen to make the little holes that I put the ribbon through.

Cute, huh?! :) The clay container says to let it dry at least 24 hours, but I think I waited 2 or 3 days. They were nice and hard once I started to paint them. I used a sponge brush (is that what you call it? I'm not artsy...) to paint my base blue color on. After it dried, I decided the hand print just didn't stand out enough so I went and bought some white paint and filled in the handprint with that. Looked so much better!



I just die every time I see it. SO CUTE! (Even if I do say so myself!) And it really was THAT easy, I swear! It just took a little bit of time for them to dry.



I put the ribbon through the hole and then added Cameron's details on the back so we (and our parents and grandparents) don't forget! This is where my sharpie came into the picture. :)



If you have any questions for me, leave them for me in the comments or send me an email and I will answer!

Originally posted to my Cameron Crazy Mom blog. Brought here courtesy of me. :)