Message board

My niece turned one this week and I got crafty and made part of her gift. Her parents have a space theme going because my brother-in-law does some kind of work for NASA. Don't ask me what because I can't even begin to explain it. Anyway, I picked up this great Toy Story fabric at the thrift store, not knowing what I wanted to do with it, but it was too cute not to buy. Later I decided on a message board so it was back to the thrift store to pick up a cork board. I got this really nice sturdy one and I planned on just pulling the fabric around the frame. However, a trip to Hobby Lobby later that day changed my mind when I saw some of the message boards they had for sale. I'm sorry this is the only pre-completed project picture I have. I get excited and forget to take pictures. Since this cork board had a good sturdy frame I really had to pound on it to release the frame from the cork. It's a miracle I didn't break the frame. I then painted the frame, put the fabric around the cork, and crisscrossed ribbons across the fabric. I also bought large push pins and mod podged fabric over the top and placed them at the ribbon intersections.

A closeup of the message board. I love that I found this fabric since Toy Story 3 is coming out this summer.

And a picture of the completed project. I'm excited to hear how my sister liked the present. They just moved into a new house not long ago and she said they don't have much up on the walls.

Dinosaur inspired Etsy treasury

I snagged another Etsy treasury last night. It features dinosaur themed items from Etsykids members. http://www.etsy.com/treasury_list.php?room_id=126051

My boys went to the BBC's Walking with Dinosaurs show last night with their aunt and they all loved it. Check it out if it comes to your city. It looked amazing and my boys who are 7 and 5 loved it.

A new shirt from a pillowcase

I love to thrift store shop and most of the "junk" I bring home gets turned into something else. I never know what I'll find at the thrift store so it's always exciting to see what I come home with. When I saw this post: http://bkids.typepad.com/bookhoucraftprojects/2010/03/project-55-spring-wardrobe-update.html I knew it was a project I wanted to do. In a nutshell, the link offers a tute on how to take an embroidery image and put it on a shirt. I was getting frustrated at not being able to find anything, but then stumbled across this pillowcase for a whole 50 cents.I used fusible hem to attach it to the shirt because that is what I had on hand and I'm too impatient to wait until I got the fusible stuff mentioned on the tute. It worked great. I can see the fusible hem when I look closely at the image, but if you didn't know it was there, you wouldn't notice it. I also sewed around the image as well.

My daughter was very excited about her new shirt. I am going to get a tank top for the other bird on the pillowcase. This was a fun and super easy project to do. Now I can't wait to go thrifting again and hopefully find some more cute images for this project.

Etsykids treasury

Tonight I was lucky enough to snag a treasury. Check it out before it expires. It is filled with just a small portion of the awesome work from Etsykids members.
http://www.etsy.com/treasury_list.php?room_id=125371

My niece is turning one on Thursday and she was the inspiration behind all the picks. The majority of the things I buy her are from Etsy. It's the best place to shop for gifts!

Custom orders

I am currently working on a custom order for someone in Japan. I love custom orders. I feel so honored that someone would pick me to create a one of a kind item for them. This order is actually a bodysuit I have in my shop and they also wanted a matching t-shirt. I currently don't have any t-shirts on hand, but this person asked and of course I was more than happy to go out and get one for them. So, if you don't see something in my shop that you want, ask! I'll do my best to fill the request!

A Lego birthday party

This past weekend we celebrated my son's 7th birthday. He wanted a Lego themed party, which was really fun to do. I made a Lego brick cake, decorated plain red and yellow gift bags to look like Lego bricks, and even the invitations were Legos. Everything was decorated in red, yellow and blue. For the first time I used gel food coloring for the frosting on the cake. For once I had frosting that was actually red and not pink! I will be getting some more of that in the future. I also found some cool buckets at the dollar store that we dumped all my son's Legos into. The kids had a blast putting together all kinds of creations. For the gift bags I put in the normal gift bag paraphernalia like candy and little trinkets, but I also found some fun Lego themed things as well.

The first was this soap from mommyslittlecritters. Find the shop here: http://www.etsy.com/shop/mommyslittlecritters

I also got these cool crayons from lilbooandco. Find the shop here: http://www.etsy.com/shop/lilbooandco

We had a couple of kids that couldn't make it so we had a couple of crayons and soap leftover to play with. The kids loved both products very much. They were hit a for sure!

Etsy treasuries

One of my favorite features of Etsy is the treasuries. If you're not looking for anything in particular it's fun to look through the treasures other people have found. I have found some really great items going through there. It's also fun to see some of the themes people come up with. There really is something for everyone on Etsy! Who knew you could make a whole treasury based on squids?

And check out this treasury before it expires on February 19th: http://www.etsy.com/treasury_list.php?room_id=113624
One of my bodysuits is featured! I love the baseball theme!