Valentines Felt Heart "Wreath"

I love using felt. It is so easy and makes such a statement.

This is my valentines "wreath". The reason it is not a real wreath is because I kind of just made it out of cardboard.

I started with a yard of felt, hot glue gun, white fabric scraps and some cardboard.

I drew my heart out and cut it with a utility knife. BE CAREFUL! To see what happens if your not, click here.

I then wrapped it in some scrap fabric. Doesn't have to be pretty, just cover the cardboard.

Start making your roses. You can see a tutorial here.

Lots of roses later....

I made three size roses; large, medium and small. It gave it a bit more depth.

I added a pick ribbon to the back and hung it about my fantle.

I love it!

Happy Birthday Mom!

Happy Birthday Mom!!!!

You are Queen of the day!

A BIG kiss from me to you!

This is my mom. She will be 30 today. Wink, wink!

My mom has many roles in life.

Here she is as a traveler.

She and my Dad are snow birds. They travel where it's warm and stay there for about 6 months of the year.

Grandma. She has 15 grand kids.
This is her with the youngest of them, my little Danika.

Painter.

Wife.

Artist.


But I love her the most as my mom.


The BEST mom around.


Happy Birthday Mom, I love you!

My Valentines Fantle

This is my Valentines Fantle (faux mantle).

I live in Las Vegas, so no real mantle for me.

Last month I decided to make my own mantle, you can see how I did it here.

I am just figuring out how to decorate such a large shelf, so be aware.

The square metal piece is a permanent fixture.

I added the felt rose heart to jazz it up a bit.
The Petersen thing is also always there.
I made some cute pinwheels (non moving) and a felt rose ball.

I added a super cute picture of my kids kissing. It is a few years old but soooo cute!

I also found some glass vases at Savers for a few bucks.

I replaced some pictures with cute printables I found.

I had an empty pink frame that I am planning on hanging it in my daughters room at some point.

Not to bad for my first decorating of my fantle!

Celiac disease or Gluten intolerant

WHEAT

Looks pretty doesn't it.

Well not for my daughter, at least we think.

For the last several months my daughter has been having stomach pains. She will wake in the morning and the first thing out of her mouth is that her tummy hurts. It then progressed into her begging for snacks. She thought that food would make her feel better...it didn't.

So last week I took her to the doctor where they ran a full spread of blood work. I was sure it was a food allergy or even Celiac disease.

For those of you who don't know what Celiac Disease...
From WebMD: Celiac disease is a problem with digesting gluten, a protein in foods like bread, crackers, and pasta, affecting the absorption of nutrients. Symptoms include gas and bloating, weight loss, and fatigue.

My daughter in the middle of it all. The bowl is for throwing up, just in case.

Well the tests came back showing that NOTHING was wrong! Well that is not right! Look at her, she is not okay.

So I did my own research and found that people can be Gluten Intolerant. That means she may not have celiac but she may as well, because she has the same pains.

So we are starting a Gluten Free Diet this week. We will try it for two weeks. If after that time she is still in pain I will take her to a GI doctor.

I would love to hear from you. Your ideas, thoughts, recipes and tips.

CD Book

My daughter is three and has problems with her colors. She just can't seem to get them.

For Christmas my sister in-law gave us a CD book about church leaders. I loved it! It was so cute and so fun to look at.

So I decided to make one for my daughter to help her learn her colors.

Her favorite thing is Disney Princesses, so that was my theme.

First I went to Google Images and did a search for "Disney princess coloring pages". Millions of images were there for the picking. I picked my favorites, printed them out to the correct size and started coloring.


I could have printed them in color but I decided to color them myself.

Each princess was given a color.

Ariel-red

Jasmine- black

Cinderella- white

Fawn- orange

Tiana- green

Snow White- yellow

Rapunzel- purple

Belle- brown

Silver Mist-blue

Aurora-pink

I cut two paper circles for each princess color and put one circle on each side of the CD. Then I cut my coloring page out and put that on one side. So each CD has the princess on one side and her color on the other.

I used Mod Podge to adhere the paper. I made sure to give both sides a good over coat.

I know it looks homemade, but that was the idea. I think it turned out great and my daughter really likes it.

Knee High Boots to Calf Boots makeover

These are my knee high boots. I ordered them online several years ago, maybe 6. I had to order them online because you just can't find some shoes in stores in wide width.

I loved them! Then I had another baby.

You see, my feet grow a half size every time I have a baby. I used to be a 7ish, and now I am an 8 1/2. Not only did my feet get bigger but so did my calf's. I haven't worn these boots in about 4 years.

I was about to give them to Goodwill when I thought, "I wonder if I could make them shorter? If I am just going to give them away I may as well try. There is not harm!"

So I did!

These are not leather, some faux stuff. So I measured the boot, drew a straight line and cut.

(sorry... I forgot to take a before picture)

After.

The cut is pretty clean and it won't fray so I am not worried. I will have pants on anyway so it is not such a big deal.

I have to put some stitches in the zipper to keep it from separating but they are pretty much done!

It was worth a try, and it worked out!

What I got for Christmas

Look what I got for Christmas from my amazing sister in-law!

This one is the best...a CD book about the Prophets of my church.

Starting at Joseph Smith, each disk has one prophet and the dates he served. Ending today with President Monson and the First Presidency.
So fun! I think I enjoy looking at it more than my kids!

These are tiles with vinyl nativity characters. I need to get some plate stands to hold these. They will be perfect on my new shelf next year.

Sweet little apron for Danika. She can play in her little play kitchen with a sparkly new apron.

Oven mitt. I love the fabric, so cheerful!

Thanks Missy for the great gifts!

Kettle Corn

Do you love Kettle Corn?

I recently did a post on how to make my Homemade Kettle Corn.

Yummy!

Kettlecorn.co contacted me and added my recipe to their website.

You really have to check it out.

An entire website devoted to Kettle Corn....WOW!

I know what I am making tonight.

Floating Shelves Tutorial

Do you love the look of floating shelves?

I do!

They are just so darn expensive! Even at IKEA they are more than I am willing to spend.

So I decided to make some myself. I did a bunch of research to find the easiest and cheapest way to do it. I kept coming across one way,

Make them from a Door. Really, a door?!

My parents were in town for Christmas so I decided to use my Dad's help.

He is a cabinet maker after all!

So here we go!

Finished product. I just threw some stuff on it to take the picture.

Next Christmas will be MUCH better!

Empty...Sad ;(

I started with a plain door. I got mine at Home Depot. We decided to go with a 28"inch wide door. It was about $20 bucks. I will be able to get three full length shelves out of one door. Or I can cut them into smaller lengths.

THOUGHT: If you are going to cut smaller shelves you will need to get some decorative molding to cover the open ends of your door. Just glue or tack them on.

Home Depot will not cut doors, we begged but they refused, so we were going to have to do it ourselves. I do not have a table saw so we improvised. We got a 1x4 to use as a straight edge, clamped it down and used the circular saw to make a straight cut. This was a two person job, one to hold the door down and one to make the cut.

Here it is after we cut it. Inside of door and outside of door.

Sorry about the fire extinguisher in the pic. Safety First!

This is my Dad. Love him! We used a chisel to clean up the inside of the door. In these cheap doors the only thing inside is cardboard. It was super easy to break the cardboard out and create a space to slide the brace in. If you don't have a chisel a bread knife would do the same thing.

Here is my Dad pushing the cardboard in to create space. He also scraped away some of the glue that was holding the cardboard in place.

A bit of sanding to clean that cut edge up. Now it is ready for paint. I used a high quality black semi gloss spray paint. I sprayed about three coats to create a glossy finish. Sorry no pics!

These are the braces that the door will slide onto. My Dad cut these on the table saw at his house before he came to Vegas. He made them exactly the same size as the inside of the door, 1 3/16". That way the door slides perfectly onto them. If my Dad had not been able to do it before hand I would have got a 2x2 post and had Home depot cut it down to 1 3/16". Make sense?

This is hard to see but it is showing that we have measured, leveled and pre drilled holes in the walls where we want to attach the brace board. We went into studs only. Better safe than sorry!

Measure, level, draw level line.

We pre sunk our screws, you don't have to. Just make sure your screw is long enough to go through your brace, the dry wall and into the stud. About 2 1/2 or 3" screws. You will need a fully charged drill to do this. It took a lot of strength for my dad to get these screws through so many layers. I suggest you get some man muscle to help you out for this step.

Slide on the shelf. You can add some wood glue if you like. I didn't because we rent and I want to take this shelf with me when we move. Screw some tiny flat head screws to attach the shelf to the bracket.

My shelf is high enough that I am not going to worry so much about covering them.

DONE!

I can't wait to decorate it for the seasons!

Thanks for the help Dad! Love you!