T-Shirts for Max

Finished Shirts!

I made these back in April for a friend of my daughters. He did get them on his birthday... I just haven't blog it until now!

I searched the internet for some graphics that would work on shirts.

 

I used freezer paper and then painted the design with craft paint.  

I think the shirts turned out looking just like the originals, although it was harder than I anticipated.

Of course it would have been easier to just give him 3 store bought shirts, but I like the idea that he now has 3 one of a kind items!

Edison Quotes

Finished Art

I made these three art pieces for my Dad's birthday which was in June.  He received them in August when we went to visit, but I'm just blogging about it now.  

I originally wanted to buy this from etsy, but the $70.00 price tag (plus shipping to Hawaii!) wouldn't work for me.  So I settled and bought this wooden board from Hobby Lobby to use for my quote.  

Each board measured approximately 8x10.  Knowing I was going to put this in a suitcase to take to Hawaii, I didn't want to get much bigger than this.  Because the 8x10 was a lot smaller than the original piece I wanted to buy, I decided that one wasn't enough and I bought 3 boards for 3 different quotes.

There were about $2.00 each, had wonderful edges AND the holes in the back for hanging!

I painted each board black.

I used the Outdoor Opaque, since he lives in such a wet climate, I wanted to make sure the boards were durable.

I used the silhouette, and cut out my 3 quotes with cream vinyl.

(The vinyl is not smeared or fuzzy, it's just my camera)

I was a little sad, that the vinyl didn't stick like I thought it would.  I don't know if it was the paint I used or the vinyl itself.  My dad said he would spray each board with a clear coat of some kind... something I didn't want to do before packing the boards in the suitcase.  

Quote 2

Quote 3: The original inspiration

My dad LOVED the gift, and each quote had a special meaning for him.

31

Finished Pumpkin

I saw this idea from Family Circle October 2011 issue.  I LOVED the white 31 pumpkin and downloaded the template for it from the Family Circle website.

I bought an off-white "Funkin" (fake pumpkin) from my local craft store.

I didn't have the specialty rub-on paper to make the pumpkin in an easy one step process, so I created a cheaper 3 step process...

1.  I printed out the 31 on my ink jet printer and was able to rub enough of the ink on so that I could see the number on the pumpkin.  I used a Popsicle stick for the rubbing.

2.  I tested my sharpie on the bottom of the pumpkin to check for any bleeding effects.  The sharpie worked great with no bleeding, so I used the thin sharpie to outline my rub-on.

3.  Using my thicker sharpie, I filled in the number 31.  I am loving the end result!

Bring on Halloween! 

Appliqued Shirts

Finished Shirts!

While browsing my favorite blogs, I found this post with a lot of really cute appliqued shirts.  I made these in July before my trip to Hawaii.  They are for my sister's baby and I wanted to take them with me, so I wouldn't have to ship them.  I knew the first one would have an elephant on it because my sister loves elephants.  

I found this clipart of an elephant

and changed the trunk a bit.

Into this.  

(I wanted to add a little heart above the trunk and thought this design would work great.)

I cut the entire thing out of blank paper before cutting it out of fabric.  This would give me a better idea of how it would look without some of the details on the internet version.  Sometimes I have a hard time visualizing the end product so this helps.

I used Wonder Under to attach it to the shirt and then zigzaged around the edges.

I added a button eye.

and here's the super cute tail in the back!

I love birds, and since I'm not an artist, I had to scour the internet for a clipart that would work. 

I found these cuties.

I enlarged the green bird and printed it out.

Here's the finished bird!

Of course when I gave these to my sister, I received lots of love, which is another benefit of delivering them in person!

Job Jars Redo

 "New" Job Jars

I made some job jars a few months ago.  I had one color for weekly jobs and another color for monthly jars.  Each day the kids would pick a weekly job to do and then on Saturday we would pick a monthly job to do. The problem that we had was children selectively picking which jobs they wanted to do, or forgetting the "normal" things they need to do daily like put away clothes or pickup toys.  So I came up with this redo.  

Each child still has their own jar, but these are the "new" sticks.  The sticks in each jar are daily jobs and must be completed before any playtime.  Doing all the items in the jar should take more than an hour, so doing them before playtime shouldn't be a big deal. The "Mom's Choice" stick is an idea from another blog.  The "Mom's Choice" might be a monthly job to do (green sticks) or to put away the recycles or take out the trash.  Some days it might even be a fun treat instead of a job.

These are for Ernest...

On the back of the "Job" stick is a list of his jobs to do.  Since he is here for only part of the week, he only has 3 jobs listed.

Here are Hannah's jobs

Here are her three jobs to do on the same days that Ernest does his jobs.  On the days that Ernest is not here, she will do his "Swish and Swipe" job.

I don't have a jar for my "jobs" (I think it would be too full!) I just listed them in my Google Calendar. I (and the kids) will do one house cleaning job a day, this way the entire house gets cleaned each week without having to dedicate an entire day to cleaning.

We still have the monthly jobs to do.  We will still pick one of these each weekend (this will be a "Mom's Choice") and we'll work on the job together.  This way the jobs that don't need to get done every week, will still get done in a timely manner.

I decided to keep them on my computer desk so that I see them every day and we won't forget to do them!!

4th of July Shirt

2nd Attempt (it's a keeper!)

I made a 4th of July shirt last year from the Makes and Takes tutorial.  UNFORTUNATELY, I did not test the red t-shirt fabric first, and when I wash it, the red dye transferred all over the shirt!

This year I wanted to make the "girl" shirt again, but had SO much trouble with the gathering and sewing the ruffles onto the knit shirt, that I finally gave up and made the "boy" design.

The button stars are perfect for the shirt.

Even though it's the "boy" design, Hannah loves it!

Recycle Bag Redo

"New" Recycle Bags

I made a set of Reusable Recycle Bags a while back and

 washed one of them soon after and it shrunk... BADLY!

I put off washing the rest of the bags as long as I could! 

Finally I could wait no longer and washed them all.

Due to the 2" shrinkage, the (once cute) arrows looked horrible.

I removed all the "old" arrows..

...bought some cute fabric from Brown Paper Packages

...and used that to create new arrows.

I love the fabric that says "love a tree", "good earth", etc.

I did add a couple special items to two of the bags.

This little "recycle" tag

and the little birdie perched on top one of the arrows.

I love how they turned out and that I can use them again!