Cute as a Button - Dinosaur Button Art!

Some friends and I got together to make this awesome Valentines decoration,

And while we were there we had three... yes THREE potty accidents.  Just too much fun with a bunch of friends I guess!

So by the time we got back, Mr. A needed some loving' and attention!  Mr. C went down for his nap before we got home (we were like 2 minutes from home! :D ) and me and Mr. A got to work!

First we found a dinosaur that Mr. A liked,

(Sorry he's upside down!) Then we cut him out of felt.

Next we got to work glueing the buttons on!

We started by going around the dinosaur's outline

Then filled in the rest!  We also layered the buttons a bit to cover holes and add extra dimension!

Next we took it outside and spray painted the buttons!

Green for the body,

Blue for the spikes!

While the paint dried we painted a canvas with a palm tree and sun!  I simply found a palm tree I liked online, printed it, cut it out and filled it in with paint!  Where the tree went over the edge I painted around the corner so if you see it from the side  it continues around the edge.

Finally, we glued on the dinosaur and his spikes!  

Mr. Dinosaur now hangs over Mr. A's bed!

Cute as a button!

This guy we did basically the same way!  I cut the heart out of burlap first (quick tip: I actually found a heart I liked online first, printed and cut it out, then cut it from the burlap!  I didn't trust myself to make a symmetric heart!).  Then I glued on a bunch of miscellaneous buttons, then spray painted it red, just like the dinosaur.  On the canvas I marked then painted some black lines and then the 'forever' on the bottom.  (you could also do 'you + me' or 'love' or any variety of things!)  Once the paint dried I glued the heart on the canvas!

A bag of only red buttons ranged from $3-$10 so we opted for a $1 bag of random buttons, thus the red paint.  I was concerned that I would end up with a flat, one color heart, but I didn't lay the paint down too thick so the shade of the original buttons came through enough that I ended up with dark, medium, and light buttons in the heart.

Enjoy!  Share pictures of your button art!

How to Clean Copper - You Won't Believe How Easy it is!

My mom gave me this copper bow while we were visiting over the Christmas holidays.

She has had it for a while and it had become tarnished

I did a little research and found the easiest fix you've ever heard of!

I almost guarantee EVERYONE has this ONE ingredient to clean the tarnish off copper

Ketchup

That's right, ketchup!

All you do is wipe ketchup on the tarnished copper surface and let it sit.  No scrubbing, no rubbing, just let it sit 10-15 minutes.

Now rinse it off and...

I'm not kidding!  No scrubbing, just the patience to let it sit, then rinse!

This bow now hangs above my sink next to the window and it sparkles in the sun!

See what I told you?  Couldn't be easier!

Easy Bird Feeder

 I was cleaning off the top of the fridge the other day and came across a box of OLD Cherrios... I mean like, I-think-I-opened-the-box-before-we-moved-to-Arizona-OLD!

But rather than throw them away I decided to use them for two other - no-eating - things.  The first,

Bird Feeders!

This is seriously one of the simplest ideas ever!  First, string some cherrios on a piece of wire and wrap the end around.

Then string on a bunch of cherrios.

Then, wrap the end around the beginning and bed into a shape!

Finally, hang them somewhere outside for the birds to enjoy!  Seriously, it is that easy!

You could even use pipe-cleaners, but I didn't have any of those handy.

Enjoy!

One-Pan-Chicken-Dinner!

 This is some serious-yummy!!!  and sooooooo simple!

Simply line up some chicken, chunks of potato, and frozen green beans.  Then I sprinkled diced onion and minced garlic across all of it.  Some salt, pepper, and paprika across everything.  Finally, a drizzle of olive oil!

Then Bake it until the Chicken is done at 400F (20-ish minutes, depends on how defrosted the chicken is!

 When it is just a few minutes from done sprinkle cheese across the potatoes and put it back inuntil the cheese is melted.

Serve and enjoy!  We liked this so much there were no leftovers for my husband's lunch the next day!  Enjoy!

Dartless Balloon Game

I recently was called to lead the music in Primary in our LDS ward.  Now if you're not familiar with this calling, it essentially means I am in charge of leading the music during opening exercises and then lead a 20 minute music set in which I teach the children (ages 3-11, which is somewhat unusual, often it is broken into Jr & Sr primaries at 3-7(turning 8) & 8-11) the primary songs, specifically songs for the yearly primary program in the fall!

This year has a beautiful line-up of songs, starting with a new song, If I Listen with My Heart.

It is a beautiful song!  

We've already learned verses 1 & 2 so this week we needed something new to learn verse 3.  So after some brainstorming with my husband he reminded me of this great idea to have a dart-less balloon game!  It was the perfect idea!  

No sharp things, but great incentive to sing!  Most kids love the idea of popping a balloon!

First, one foam-core board from the dollar store, the words printed out big, 12 balloons, 12 tacks, and the numbers 1-12 printed out big.

Next I rolled up the numbers and stuffed one in each balloon.

Then I measured out the board and drew lines that intersect 12 times.

The rest of this I waited until the night before so I didn't have sharp things hanging out at the house all week and balloons taking up way too much space!

Saturday night I poked the tacks through the board at each intersection and used masking tape to tape them down so they didn't fall out

Front of the board

I also inflated all the balloons.

Right before I did the activity (at church, between Sacrament meeting and singing time) I taped the balloons to the board.

They are taped so the tack does not touch the balloon, but is really close!  The idea is that when the child throws a beanbag it will push the balloon against the tack and pop the balloon!

Then when we were ready to go I put the word strips with the third verse on the board and we sang it through a couple of times, talking about the words and such.  Then I let one of the sunbeams (ok, so it was Mr. A, I may have bribed him that he could pop one if he would go potty....) toss a beanbag, and on the second try it popped!  The kids thought it was the coolest!  Then we took the number that fell out and took down the corresponding word strip (12 balloons = 12 word strips)

Then we sang the song again (without the chorus) with the missing word strip.  If they sang it well (got most of the words, sang loud and 'pretty') we did it again!  Sometimes we had two people pop balloons to speed things up a bit.

We didn't get through all 12 balloons in primary, but Mr. A & Mr. C had fun finishing them off when we got home!!!

There are soooo many possibilities with this activity!  This could become your traditional Balloon Pop game, you could put candy in the balloons and it becomes a modified piñata, or you could use it to learn colors, for motor skills, the possibilities are endless!  Enjoy!

I love to share ideas!  Just one request!  If you want to put this idea on your blog too, please link back here to my blog, share the love!!

Winter Decorations!

When Christmas is over and all the Christmas decorations come down, the house just seems.... drab...  As if winter is hard enough sometimes, all the festivities are over, and the world becomes visually dull.  Especially if you live somewhere with snow and ice!  January/February can be that nasty month where it is just nasty cold and yet it doesn't snow so everything turns a nasty grayish-brownish color as the snow half-melts and mixes with the mud on the road and everyone has the same car color, salty-gray.

Now, in Arizona January has been beautiful so far!  Mostly clear skies and temperatures in the upper 60s-70 degrees! 

Just the same, January is winter and deserves it's own set of decorations!  Right now mine are really simple, I don't even have anything for our front door (I don't remember if I used anything last year, but I'm pretty sure the year before my star-wreath for Christmas stayed up until Valentines day....)  But I still like to celebrate the frosty blues and whites of winter!

This cube-vase sits in the center of my mantle between the pictures of my husband and I and our boys.  I actually switch out the contents for most seasons to keep things simple.  All I have here are some small blue flowers from my 'stash' (aka. former projects that I had leftovers from) and some pinecones the boys and I gathered from my in-laws' yard.  Now the pine cones I actually painted with a way-thinned down white paint, then brushed with glue and dipped in epson salts to give them a frosty-morning-frost, kind of look.  I thinned my glue as well, but I don't suggest it, my salt is falling of.

I also have this large vase full of pinecones (not painted) and a silver bow, sitting on my piano.

The only other thing I have is an 8x10 black picture frame with this free printable in it:

Only difference is I only have a B&W printer so I used my trusty markers to add some blue and yellow to it (traced the letters mostly and filled in a few)

I desperately want more, but just haven't found the time, motivation, or frankly, inspiration.  

I am thinking maybe this Pinecone-cluster for the front door, with a blue or silver ribbon.  Maybe burlap/jute.

And I really want something to hang across the fireplace, maybe something like this:

in "Let it Snow"

I'm just worn out from the holidays and now potty training - I don't have the motivation to do anything too big!

Let me know what your favorite fast, easy, and cheap winter decorations are!  Any ideas to finish sprucing up my home for the month?  Comment below!

Potty Training - Carseat Saver!

We're working on round 3 of potty training right now - that's right round 3...  This time we are going 100% undies only! (well, pull-ups at night, I'm just not ready for that step!)  This means even when we leave the house, which is scary!

Now I'm not much of a fan of disassembling my sons car seat, even though Mr. A's is way easier than Mr. C's, and I really don't want to do so every time Mr. A has an accident in the car.  So, I did some looking into 'piddle pads' and decided it was a great idea that I didn't want to pay for ;)  So I looked some more and came across these two designs,

Here

and

Here

I downloaded the pattern from the first link and added some width and length to the bottom of the pattern.  

Then I cut it out from a table cloth from an old project, an old towel, and two from some cotton flannel.

I layered them, bottom to top, towel, table cloth (right side up), Flannel (RSU) and Flannel (RSDown)

I sewed around, leaving an opening, turned it right-side-out, then top stitched all the way around

The next step is where the second link came in.

I made a arch shape and sewed the same layers as before (minus the towel) and followed the same steps.

I then sewed a looooong button hole and attached the arch from the back to make a protecting flap for the middle buckle

All done!  It fits nicely and is easy to remove.  I made two (and hope to make one or two more) so that if it is needed I can pull out the old one, install a new one and move on with things!

The hope of course is that any pee will be absorbed by the towel and flannel and the tablecloth will block it from getting to the carseat cover.  Depending on the quantity of pee, it may not absorb everything, but I am hoping that the tablecloth can keep it contained (it goes up the sides a titch and up the back.)  Good luck!  Be sure to show me how yours turns out!