Love is in the air

I haven't decorated for Valentine's Day in a few years. Frankly I'm usually too exhausted from Christmas to even think about decorating again, but I was inspired this year by all the cute stuff out there. So, here is a sneak peak at one of the things I've been working on.

The first thing is this cute little "LOVE" display. I just love the way this turned out.


Start with a 4 pieces of plain wood.


Then I painted them all different shades of red and pink. I didn't have pre-mixed colors for this, I just took my red & white acrylic paints and mixed until I found the right combination.


Next, I cut scrapbook paper to fit, and picked out some really cute ribbon and embellishments. SO cute!






After it was all decorated and modge podged, it was time to find it a home.....that reveal is coming later in the week. Stay tuned.
Thanks for joining me,

see you soon
Kristen

For the boy who has it all

Hello Friends,

Well I know that Christmas has come and gone, but if you don't mind, I'm going to share with you today one of the crafts I did for Christmas this year (or last year, I guess)

My step-bro-in-law and his wife have been married for several years and had been trying to have a baby for a very long time and when they discovered that things weren't going to be as easy as, well you know just "doing IT" They found themselves going through several miscarriages and disappointing rounds of in-vitro. And just when they were about to give up......SURPRISE! "You're pregnant" Oh, what a joyous day for them and the whole family. 9 months later, they welcomed their precious baby boy!

Now, let me just tell you. This precious baby has been so wanted and so loved and so spoiled. So imagine my dilemma when one of my kids pulled his name for the kids gift exchange. "Aargg, what do you get for the boy who has everything?"

I'm all about educational gifts. Especially when kids already have tons and tons of toys. So, I decided I was going to make some alphabet blocks for him. Luckily, several months earilier I had found bags and bags of these wooden blocks for $.99 a bag at Goodwill. I knew someday they would come in handy.



I started by picking out #26 blocks that were all about the same size. Then I painted them.



I then used a square punch to punch out 52 pieces of white card stock.





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I picked up these precious alphabet stamps that came with a coordinating picture at Michael's for $9.99. I quickly got to work stamping away.






I cut out several strips of coordinating scrapbook paper to put on the other sides of the blocks, I attached all the paper onto the blocks with adhesive and then I sanded all the edges of the blocks. I did this for several reasons. #1, I obviously didn't want the block to have any rough edges, #2 I wanted to dull up the bright primary colored paint and #3 I wanted to "age" the sides of the paper. After I had finished sanding, I then took my brown stamp pad and a sponge and lightly "dry sponged" all the edges of the paper. This added to the "rustic" look I was going for.




I applied a clear coat of Modge Podge and let that dry. I found a wooden crate at Goodwill and painted it a barn red color and used my Cricut machine to print out his name in vinyl letters. I modge podged them onto the side of the crate and his custom Christmas gift was all finished.

**Sorry about this picture being flipped **

I absolutely LOVED the way they turned out and was even more thrilled when my nephew opened them on Christmas and loved them too.

I have a few more crafty projects I did this Holiday season that I will be sharing with you soon, and then its time for more furniture reveals. And then, follow me as I re-do my house one room at a time. Thanks for reading and
Happy Crafting!

Kris

Pep Talk

I had no idea that January is actually statistically the most "depressing" month of the year. Did you know that? Well, it is. And it has so far, proven to be no different for me. January is my birthday month..."yay, yippee" not really. Birthdays just don't have the same excitement once you hit 21 as they used too. Anyway, with the holidays over and all the built up stress done with, I have found myself in a "funk" kind of...well depressed. So, imagine my excitement when I actually read that it is normal to feel "down" in January. But I'm determined to turn my frown upside down.

I was talking to a friend yesterday and she said something very interesting to me. After several minutes of small talk, she asked if she could bring a meal over to my family. She knew I had been feeling under the weather with a horrible sinus infection and although it sounded wonderful, I graciously declined. I thought,"here is this mother of 4, who is just as busy as I am, and who is going through her own issues, offering to bring ME dinner." And that is when she said to me, "Please, please let me have the chance to be a blessing for someone else." She said, I've decided this year instead of "New Year's Resolutions" which I never keep, I'm going to make a "Personal" resolution to put my own issues aside and try to be a blessing to someone else." Wow, how could I possibly say No after that? What a wonderful thing to do, put your own issues aside and be a blessing to someone else?

So, whether I'm taking a meal to someone who is feeling blue, Taking the time to call someone who I know I should, or just saying hello to someone on the street, I'm going to try to put my own issues aside and be a blessing to someone else. Thanks friend for the pep talk. I needed that!