Spa Party Fun!

It's party time....oh, it's party time!

My Silhouette blogging buddies and I are at it again with this month's challenge -- Parties!  Not just birthday parties, any kind of party.  If you want to celebrate it, then it qualifies for this month's challenge.  18 participating bloggers let their imaginations run wild with decor, invitations, favors...you name it, we've done it.  The creativity is endless.

But before you get to the clickable link {below} to see the other projects, check out the great Spa Party birthday celebration my best customer threw for her sweet daughter's 7th birthday.

The party was held at a local spa party salon.  My customer loves to add a few extra special touches to her parties so she asked me to recreate a backdrop she found online.

Using foam core board as a base, I covered it with fabric and hot glued the flowers on top.  Each flower was made with cardstock paper {three 12x12 sheets per flower}, curled using a spatula {yup, a kitchen utensil} and glued together.  Lots of work, but worth it in the end, it really turned out beautiful!

Next on the list -- a birthday banner to cover a very large wall in the salon.  I found coordinating black and white stripe scrapbook paper and cut them into banners.  I then cut out the words in hot pink, lime green and lavender. Cute, right!?!

I made a few smaller flowers to create the party table centerpiece.  I really nailed the colors perfectly {smile}!

Birthday bundt cake from a local bakery.

Monogrammed cookies...yummy!

The girls wearing their party gift {personalized spa robes} and sitting at the nail bar.  They were so excited!

What fun!  Thanks so much to the Glenn family for allowing me to assist them in making this party so great and for taking all of the pictures as well.

Click your way to more inspiration below

My Silhouette Challenge buddies and I are all sharing projects on our blogs today, so peruse the projects below for a wealth of Silhouette inspiration!


1. Two Purple Couches // 2. Practically Functional // 3. Crafty Bonds // 4. Dragonfly & Lily Pads // 5. From Whine to Whine // 6. Simply Kelly Designs // 7. unOriginal Mom // 8. MamaSonshine // 9. Get Silvered // 10. Made in a Day // 11. Weekend Craft // 12. Little Blue's Room // 13. The Stamp Doc // 14. The Thinking Closet // 15. Cupcakes&Crowbars // 16. Where The Smiles Have Been // 17. DIYJustCuz // 18. My Paper Craze

{Heart} Dance!

Are you ready for a challenge?  A Silhouette Challenge that is!  That's right, it's 2015 and it's back. Another year of creative challenges that my blogging buddies and I are excited to share with you.   This month's challenge -- Print and Cut with a bonus challenge to include Hearts.  Yes and Yes!

27 bloggers have joined this month's challenge.  That's 27 ideas and inspiration just for YOU!  You can find a clickable link to the other projects below, but first let me share with you my darlin' little dancer.

When I saw what this month's challenge was, I knew I wanted to participate.  You see, I purchased from the Silhouette store this adorable little dancer file over the Christmas holiday when files were on sale and I couldn't wait to use her.

A trip to my favorite craft store and I found a wood canvas.  The perfect piece for this project.

Now it was time to work on the print and cut portion of the project.  Even though this isn't necessarily a Valentine craft, I was inspired by the season of love so I decided to make my "print" a song.  I chose Save the Last Dance for Me by The Drifters (what?!?  I have an old soul!)

Let's get cutting now!  Since 'hearts' were the bonus challenge this month, it goes without saying that my song would be cut into a heart.  Pretty, right?

I decided a solid red heart would make a great backing for my print and cut heart.  I made it slightly larger than the first.

My little ballerina.  There is something just so sweet about her.  Print and cut time.

I used white acrylic paint on the canvas, then used Mod Podge to adhere the pieces to the board and used it as a seal on top.  Patience has never been my best virtue but I left it alone for over an hour while it dried.

I used adhesive squares to adhere the printed heart.

Added the word 'dance' using vinyl and VOILA, Dance Love!  Cute as a button and I couldn't love it more!

Want to Check Out More Silhouette Projects?

My Silhouette Challenge buddies and I are all sharing projects on our blogs today, so be sure to offer them some bloggy love and tell them I sent you!


1. Clever Someday // 2. TitiCrafty // 3. GingerSnapCrafts.com // 4. My Paper Craze // 5. Simply Kelly Designs // 6. Little Blue's Room // 7. Mama Sonshine // 8. Small Stuff Counts // 9. Dragonfly & Lily Pads // 10. GiveMeAPaintbrush // 11. Please Excuse My Craftermath... // 12. Barb's Life // 13. GetSilvered // 14. Lil' Mrs. Tori // 15. Minted Strawberry // 16. unOriginal Mom // 17. Where The Smiles Have Been // 18. Persia Lou // 19. Silhouette School // 20. From Whine to Whine // 21. DailyDwelling // 22. Creative Ramblings // 23. Paper Garden Projects // 24. It Happens in a Blink // 25. Perfectly Fabulous // 26. Adventures in All Things Food // 27. Create & Babble

Monkey-ing Around

I was so excited to do this craft.  Not only was it for a fellow teacher, but it was going to be for my son's former first grade teacher.

Ms. J.W. is simply awesome.  She is young, vibrant and innovative and loves what she does.  She is structured and loving, just the right combination for a first grade teacher.  My son loved her and we were grateful for the amazing year he had under her instruction.  You remember my best customer Thasha?  This year her daughter is in Ms. W's class and believe me when I say they were overjoyed to get her as well.

One of the activities that Ms. W. does in her class to encourage writing skills is to have the children take home the class mascot 'Marvin the Monkey' for the weekend.  The children include Marvin in their weekend plans and they journal everything that happens.  Well over the years Marvin {and the bag he is carried in} has been loved by many, but so many trips to the homes of friends has left his bag a little worn.  Thasha and the other class mom decided a great birthday gift would be to give Marvin a new bag filled with Ms. W's favorite goodies.

After getting help from the little prince on which Silhouette file to use, I got to work on creating a new bag. I got lucky and bought the last bag Hobby Lobby had in stock and placed an order to Expressions Vinyl for the brown and cream htv that I would need.

I had to separate the file into pieces based on color.  Most of the monkey will be brown with a few cream and black pieces.  The words will be white.

The bag ready to be designed.

It is important when using a cut file with as many pieces as this one that you pay close attention to how the pieces go back together, particularly if you plan to use htv like I did.  I checked and re-checked the file before putting down each piece.

HTV is a wonderful medium to use.  It layered each piece with ease.  I was concerned that I might have trouble with it becoming "sticky" or peeling off due to repeated heat in an area but it held up beautifully.

How adorable is he!?!  I was so pleased with how well this turned out and I waited anxiously to hear how Ms. W felt about her gift.  I didn't have to wait long, Thasha sent me a pic of her loving her new bag {and goodies}.

Happy Birthday Ms. W and happy traveling Marvin!

A Year of Cards

Happy New Year! I don't know about you but I'm looking forward to 2015.  As a crafter, I have a long list of new things I'd like to try and I can't wait to share those with you.

But first things first, let's take a look at my year long commitment of creating handmade cards for my family.  I wish I could say that I was this awesome sister/aunt that remembers birthdays, buys the card and gets it in the mail on time but the truth is I pretty much suck when it comes to that...lol!  It's not that I don't love my family, I just have never been able to get my act together enough to get it done.  Well, a new year meant that I had another opportunity to change things and I'm happy to say that I did.

I made the decision in December 2013 to make each of my family members a birthday card for the next year -- not only make the card, but get it in the mail so they received it on their birthday.  I was successful in doing it for all but one.  Not 100% but certainly a win in my book.

Here is my year of cards review.

My oldest sister Linda's card

My nephew Nathaniel's card

My sister Denise's card -- she turned 50 this year
and she loves a good martini!

My niece Amber's card -- she loves purple!

My sister Gracie's card.  I made this card based on
a piece of artwork she made

My brother Terence's card

My niece Jasmine's card

My sister Sherry's card

My niece Vanessa's card.  This one was missing
the cupcake wrapper bottom but I think it
still looks okay

I was so proud of myself for getting these done that I'm planning to do the same thing again this year.  I didn't stop here though, here are a few others that I did as well.

A thank you card for Cindy, a friend of my sister Gracie

A birthday card for the mom of my co-worker Whitney

As the year ended, I wanted to take the opportunity to teach the little prince about thinking of others at Christmas.  With the help of my co-worker and friend Melissa, she gave me the names and addresses of some of our currently serving military men and we sent six people a little holiday cheer.  We hope that since they were unable to be home with their own families that maybe a little note from us would help bring a bit of Christmas to them.

This was fun and I love being creative -- can't wait to see what 2015 has in store.