Rubber Ducky Baby Shower

It's been approximately nine months since my last craft post, so how about another just for fun?

Last June my cousin's wife gave birth to her first child. The month before we threw her a rubber ducky themed baby shower. It turned out pretty cute (and was surprisingly frugal).

Maybe you have a baby shower coming up and you can get some inspiration from these photos of ours! :-)

I purchased the booklet at Hobby Lobby for 2.50, when they were half off. To the window I added a personalized insert I created with my Silhouette software. The rubber ducks and "bubbles" were scrapbook stickers also purchased at Hobby Lobby. It's just sheets of paper on the inside. We asked the guests to leave their words of wisdom for the new momma.



Sam's Club is our go to bakery for cakes. They are inexpensive and just as tasty as a custom cake. We just added the rubber ducky momma and baby to match the theme of the shower.

So, this idea isn't a new one, but it is cute!

Add sherbert to froth it up, and float a few rubber ducks.

 



Waaaaaay at the end of the table are some cute baby booty mints.

Next to the punch bowl are cocktail picks.

We cut the ducks using a Cricut and

added a cherry and pineapple below.

 

On the guest tables.

This U shaped table layout makes for great viewing.

 

The banner is made from a duck pattern cotton and a terry cloth yellow bath towel.

You can see the momma there in the upper righthand corner.

 



I love to browse the Internet for ideas for any showers we throw, so hopefully some of you reading this now can do the same with this post. Have a great rest of your Wednesday!

DIY: Big and Lil Elephant Appliqued Shirts

Well, hello craft blog. I've missed you. Therefore, I'm going to write a post for you today.

My mom's the crafty type...as I've mentioned before. She apparently has had about as much time to blog about crafting as I have in the last year (not much...).

So, this project is one of her's and I'm going to blog it for her.

In May we added a little guy to the family and my mom made Big and Lil shirts for each of my boys. I dressed the boys up in them for their first visit to the zoo together this summer.

The letters are animal print cotton fabric that have been ironed on. The elephant is a unique fabric. Quite ingenius if you ask me. It's just a good ol' grease rag (unused of course) she sneaked from my dad's plentiful stash in his shop. She used braided embroidery thread for the tail and a corner piece of the rag for the elephant's ear. The elephant body is simply ironed on and the ear is sewn on.

Cutting the elephant on the edge of the rag left him with toes.

My adorable guys showing off their shirts.

The jean shorts are covering up the GUY on my littlest.

A Frame for My Christmas Cards

Hello Followers! I'm back to the living!

Well, technically I never left the living....but I was very sick and just barely surviving the work day before coming home to crash in bed, then get up the next morning and repeat the process all over again. There was absolutely zero energy for crafting or blogging or anything else fun!

Being pregnant does that to this girl.

That's right. My little family of three is expected to expand to four in early June and we are ecstatic about it.

I'm finally out of the torturous first trimester and am getting some energy back and thanks to the miracle of Zofran not so nauseous all the time.

So, now that I'm feeling better I decided to pull out some random supplies to make a frame for holding the many Christmas cards I'm anticipating receiving this Christmas season.

I pulled it all together in about 30 minutes using an antique store frame, leftover paint used for the trim in our house, acrylic paint and glaze, and clearanced ribbon. Cheap this project definitely was!

The frame is 23"x35" and I purchased it for $1.00 at an antique store in a nearby town. I painted it white using leftover paint from when we painted the trim in our house last spring. Next, I taped the ribbons to the back and got them laid out the way I wanted. After confirming I liked the lay out of the ribbons I hot glued the ends to the back of the frame.

Then, after putting it on the wall and deciding I hated the crisp white frame with the goldish-brownish ribbons I took it back down and glazed over the white with a mixture of equal parts FolkArt Coffee Brown acrylic paint and Americana Staining Antiquing Medium. I painted it on and then wiped it back with a rag according to the instructions on the stain bottle.

I L-O-V-E the result. The glaze was definitely a good call.

So, how about you? What creative ways do you display your Christmas cards?

I hope the Christmas season isn't making you too crazy and that you all aren't putting too much pressure on yourselves with all the homemade goodness I'm sure you're whipping up. And, I speak for myself too when I say that! :-)

Linking up to these great parties!

Fall-ish Fabric Burlap Wreath

Fall-ish. Because Fall-ish is a word ya know. ;-)

Fall. Blogs have been talking about it coming for weeks. I refused to acknowledge any sense of a fall season until our temperatures dropped below 100. Well, guess what? They finally have! A cold front moved in Saturday and with it lows in the 60s and highs in the upper 70s. Absolutely gorgeous is the only way to describe the past two days. It definitely feels like Fall and to celebrate we spent a lot of time outside this weekend instead of inside. It was glorious.

So, today I have a burlap covered wreath to share with you that I made as a gift for a soon to be cousin in law. Burlap always reminds me of Fall. Actually to be more exact, it always reminds me of scarecrows, which makes me think of Fall. The fabric I chose for the pennants has some great fall hues too.

To create this wreath, I purchased a straw wreath at the dollar store and hot glued burlap around it. Then to embellish the wreath, I whipped up a small pennant banner, some fabric rosettes, added a couple of vintage buttons (that I wish I'd gotten a better close up of), and the monogram S, because her last name will soon begin with the letter S.

There she is. Easy-peasy!

In the center of the blue rosette is

one of those cool vintage buttons.

Pretty sure I'll be using the pennant fabric soon for some projects to keep.

So, what about you? Has Fall arrived where you live yet? I hope so. And, I hope you'll enjoy plenty of mild temperatured days before Winter arrives!

I'll be linking up to these fabulous link parties this week. Hope you have some time to check out all the other cool fall projects going on!

And, this party...which requires a direct link.

The Rest of the Bridal Shower Decor

Happy September fellow crafters! I cannot believe September is upon us. Soon I'll be diving into fall decorating. I'm two weeks into school and it's taking me a bit figuring out the balance between my school duties, home duties, and finding time to craft blog. My apologies up front if the posting is a little sporadic!

I'm combining the rest of the bridal shower decor I used for my soon to be sister in law into this one post. I've shared before about banners, guestbooks, and towel cakes, so I'd hate to bore with you with three separate posts on the same things!

I thought this bridal shower round they turned out even better than before.

First up....the banner.

I used muslin for the stenciled letters and then glued a dark teal fabric behind the muslin. I put my Silhouette to good use creating the stencils to trace on to the fabric and then hand cut each letter. I topped off the banner with a satin lime green ribbon. It definitely looks more amazing in person. Lime green can come off kind of weird on different monitor resolutions.

Here are some close up shots of the process and the individual pieces.

The muslin I cut at 5"x7".

The teal fabric I cut smaller at 5"x6".

Traced the stencils on backwards on the back side of the muslin.

There's the letter all pretty and cut, no black ink.

I sprayed the back side of the muslin with elmer's craft bond glue,

and then (very carefully) placed the teal fabric on the muslin.

I used a vintage pearl button in the center of the teal rosette.

Second up....guestbook.

The rings and Guestbook are scrapbook stickers.

I purchased the book of plain white pages at Hobby Lobby in the scrapbook album section for $3.00 during a half off sale. The last guestbook I made myself. Purchasing a plain book and decorating it is WAY easier.

Third, and finally....the towel cake. This was my FAVORITE piece at the shower. The white towels just looked so good with the dark teal and lime green accents. And, I got to use a vintage clip on earring which I've been wanting to incorporate into a project for a while now.

I clipped a vintage pearl earring on the black rosette.

It is by far the coolest element of the whole thing.

I'll be linking up to these great parties this week. Go check 'em out. Plenty of great ideas out there to see!