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100 Days of School Shirt Idea

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Do you remember being in elementary school and celebrating 100 days of school?  I do, I can remember it just like it was yesterday.  One of the teachers wore the same shirt every year.  Her shirt that had 100 sequins that she has sewn on.  The sequins looked just like these!  Oh, the memories.

The week that surrounded the 100th day of school was filled with fun counting projects.  I can remember a paper chain we made that had 100 links in it.  We of course counted out 100 pennies too.  I miss the innocence of elementary school sometimes.

Nowadays I’ve noticed, via Facebook friends, that it’s customary to wear a hundred items on your shirt.  My elementary school teacher had it right all these years!  While I’m homeschooling and don’t find it necessary to craft a shirt just for one day for only my immediate family to see I thought I would share this cute 100 day of school shirt idea that my friend made for her daughter.

100 Days Shirt

She just glued of a 100 googly eyes and wrote on it.  Simply adorable!

It says, “All eyes on me.  I’m 100 days smarter.”  I just love it.  Mainly because I have an unexplainable love of googly eyes.  On second thought, maybe I’ll make this shirt for my daughter after all.  And one for myself. 🙂

ReUse, ReDesign, ReStore

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Recently, I tried my hand at refinishing and reupholstering a side chair.

The sad, little, throwaway chair was scratched, dented and had a broken seat.

I set my mind to creating something useful and pretty, so with persistence and a lot of patience, I worked hard to turn out a sweet pink treasure!

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Being a Southern girl and very much a girly-girl, you will notice that I indeed added a monogram and a bit of pink and sparkle. 🙂

I have had the privilege to volunteer at my local Habitat for Humanity ReStore for many years. I work along side of some very creative friends, with an eye for possibility and a lot of imagination we take the donated items reimagine them, rearrange them and remake them into new creations for the ReStore to sell.

We also use many of the donated items to style “rooms” so the customer can get an idea of how they might use the items in their own homes.

Did you know Habitat for Humanity Restores are nonprofit home improvement stores and donation centers that sell new and gently used furniture, appliances, home accessories, building materials and more to the public at a fraction of the retail price?

Each ReStore is independently owned and operated by local Habitat for Humanity organizations. Proceeds are used to build homes, community, and hope locally and around the world.

I can’t begin to tell you how much fun it is to volunteer with my amazing friends. Each of us is humbled to know that our small contribution of time and talent goes a long way in helping to provide homes and hope for needy families.

One of our favorite Redesigns has been converting a small entertainment center into child-sized “kitchen”.  

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If you haven’t visited your local Habitat for Humanity ReStore, I would highly recommend that you put it on your To Do list or if you have gently used furniture, home accessories, building materials or gently used appliances, please consider donating to this non-profit organization. Better yet, offer to volunteer., you just might find you have the gift of reusing, redesigning and restoring.

Knitted Baby Dress Pattern

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Knitted Baby Dress Pattern

Today is the second day of our 31 Days of Knitted Gifts!  Our previous two projects can be found here.  This sweet knitted dress is perfect for fall.  Just picture it paired with leggings and baby boots.  Absolutely adorable!  Oooh, and if you added stocking and gold shoes with a gold hair bow it would be perfect for Christmas!

Needle and yarn
Needle:

US 7 – 4.5 mm

Knit Picks Swish Worsted

Pattern: This free pattern can be found on Ravelry.com.

Notes:

Followed the listed pattern through row 27, doing seed stitch instead of ribbing between the leaves. On row 28 did 25 stitches in seed stitch, bound off 31, 50 seed stitch, bound of 31, 25 seed stitch (last stitch knit 2 together). Couple more rounds of seed stitch…then I knit 3 rounds in st st, one round of purl, and started Flora dress with 9 repeats of chart A.  I knit one round then 3 rounds of seed stitch to finish.

Baby Apple Hat Pattern

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Apple Hat Pattern

Today is the second day of our 31 Days of Knitted Gifts!  To see our previous project, go here.  This little apple hat is adorable for newborn photos or family fall pictures!

I love to see babies in hats!  Well, babies are always adorable but when you put one in a hat they are overwhelmingly cute.  So cute that women will have to make some sound when they see them.  Either “awww”, or “oh my!” or the ever popular high pitch squeal.  I hope this apple hat will bring your babies lots of compliments.  Be sure to bookmark this tutorial to share with them when they ask where you got it…because trust me, your little one will be so cute, they’ll have to ask!

Needle and yarn
Needle:
US 4 – 3.5 mm
US 8 – 5.0 mm

Apple – Malabrigo Yarn Merino Worsted in Ravelry Red

Stem – Cascade Yarns Cascade 220® in Straw
Leaf – Malabrigo Yarn Merino Worsted in Lettuce

Pattern: Both patterns used in this project are from Ravelry.com and were free!  The apple hat pattern can be found here and the leaf pattern here.

Notes:

I only own two 12” circular needles: size 4 and 8.  I prefer these over DPN so I used the 4’s for the ribbing and 8’s for the rest. Switched to DPNs when I had to. Used a little scrap of cascade 220 for the stem and scrap of lettuce malabrigo for the leaf.  This hat took less than 3 hours total to make. Even on size 8’s it seems tiny. I hope it fits her!

If you like this hat, please pin it so others can find it.

31 Days of Knitted Gifts

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31 Days of Knitted Gifts

This month I’ll be sharing a DIY knitted gift idea with all the details for making them.  I hope you’ll follow along with me.  {I’ll be posting the first one later today after I wake up a bit. tomorrow after I get some meds in me.  I hate being sick, I’m sorry!} 🙂

Knitted Booties Pattern

The first knitted project I have to share adorable little knitted booties to cover itty bitty little sweet baby feet!

Needle and yarn

US 2 – 2.75 mm

Knit Picks Stroll Solids, Heathers & Twists in Eggplant

In addition to the eggplant Knit Picks yarn there was a little hand-spun yarn (from a fiber festival) for the contrast color.

Pattern: From Ravelry.com (This one’s free!)

Notes:

There are lots of ends to weave in, but cute and easy.  I made the large size and they are still very tiny.

Here’s is the master list of 31 Days of Knitted Gifts:

Day 2: Baby Apple Hat

Day 3: Baby Dress

13 DIY Kids Halloween Costumes

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13 DIY Kids Halloween Costumes

Halloween will be here before we know it! Some of my best memories as a child are dressing up and going trick or treating, and now it is my turn to share those memories with my kiddos! I have been on the hunt for some great DIY kids costumes and I came up with a great list, so I had to share! This list has it all, from Disney princesses to super heroes. What do your little ones want to be this year? Tell me below! I am always on the look out for more great ideas! Be sure to pin, tweet, and share! Happy costume making!

  1. Disney’s Brave (PICTURED)
  2. Baby Lion Tutu (PICTURED)
  3. Magic Man (PICTURED)
  4. Where the Wild Things Are (PICTURED)
  5. Minnie Mouse (PICTURED)
  6. Mister Rogers & the gang
  7. A-Team
  8. Minions
  9. Mermaid
  10. Mega Blocks
  11. TMNT Tutu
  12. Scuba Diver
  13. Super Hero

DIY Chandelier Planter

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Chandelier Planter

A college friend of mine, Megan, showed me this chandelier planter that she created and I absolutely loved it.  She gave me permission to share her work of art with you and was kind enough to write out how she did it.  I’ll turn it over to her now.

I used an old brass chandelier that was laying around our basement.  I had my husband remove the electrical wiring and elements.  Then I glued a terra cotta saucer and pot to each other, and on each of the chandelier’s arms. I used Elmer’s Pro-Bond Advanced Glue. It’s supposed to work on any material, and it worked for my terra-cotta to metal combo!  I hung the chandelier when dry and painted with a paint/primer combo (Valspar Tropical Oasis). I finished mine with a clear enamel spray paint because I had some left over from another project, but I think a specific sealant spray would have been better. Super easy! I only had to pay for the pots, which are pretty cheap at Lowe’s, and a can of spray paint!

There you have it folks!  An easy, cost-effective way to add a little DIY charm to your home.

If you have a creative party, recipe, or DIY and would like to be featured on Embracing Creativity we would love to see it!  You can submit your creativeness here.

Patriotic Clothespin Wreath

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Clothes pin patriotic wreath

This Independence Day, Jill Bauer, QVC’s Home-Savvy Hostess, has the perfect patriotic décor tips to help celebrate America in style and she’s allowed me to share her easy peasy tutorial with you all.  I don’t know about you but I can’t wait to make this craft!  I think it will be one that my little girl will like to help me out with!

To make this Red, White and Blue Patriotic Clothespin Wreath, you’ll need:

  • – 12” wire wreath
  • – Red, white, and blue spray paint
  • – Clothespins
  • – Cardstock
  • – Starpunch (I might use foam stars with my daughter)
  • – Hot glue gun

To assemble:

  1. Spray paint the wire wreath white to hide the metal frame.
  2. On old newspapers or a drop cloth, line up all of the clothespins. Spray paint them red, white, and blue. (I did an equal amount in each color.) Let them dry for 1 hour.
  3. Meanwhile, punch several stars out of the card stock. If you didn’t use white card stock, just spray paint the stars white and let them dry.
  4. Clip the clothespins onto the wire wreath, alternating them between the second and third rings. (I started with the red clothes pins, then did the white, and finished with the blue.)
  5. Hot glue the stars over the blue clothespins.

Patriotic Mason Jar

To see more crafty goodness visit Jill on QVC.

Here’s another easy patriotic wreath:

Patriotic WreathPatriotic Wreath

Preschool Letter Craft – F is for Flower

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Because I’m a preschool homeschooling mom I’ve been told by countless mamas that I need to do letter crafts with my daughter.  I say that she knows her letters, their sounds, and can even sound out small words on her own.  They tell me that I still need to do this so that is what I’m doing.  Reinforcing the alphabet!

I probably should have started with the letter A but we had pretty silk flowers just sitting around waiting to be used so I jumped ahead to F.  The order of the alphabet isn’t too important at this age anyway, is it?

For our letter craft we added flowers to the letter F!  It’s self-explanatory really but here’s what we did.

Grabbed our tube of flowers.  We got them from Amazon here ages ago and they have lasted and lasted.  A good craft investment!  Gathered, paper, glue, and a marker for Mommy to write the letter F.

1.  Freehand the letter F.  If you’re OCD, like I have a tendency to be sometimes, I’m sure you could make a letter of humongous proportions in Word or Google for an F template.

2.  Let your kiddo pick out their favorite flowers.  Layer them, arrange them.

3.  Let them loose with the glue and voila!  Oh, and you might want to mention somewhere in there that flowers start with the letter F.

Happy crafting, ya’ll!

F is for Flower

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100 Days Shirt

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