Old to New Cufflinks

A while ago i was sitting in church and i saw a man wearing some cufflinks. They were these huge fake diamonds and even though I'm about 100% sure his wife bought them for him i could be wrong maybe he likes them. All i know is my husband wouldn't be caught dead in them so i thought why not make my mtn man some manly cufflinks.

Kori found an ugly pair and bought them for me and I've waited till closer to Fathers Day to do something with them.

I used a wire cutter and cut the top off.

I took 2 parts off of this bracelet.
 
I had to hold it up as it dried. After they dried i added a bit more to make it even more secure.

The one is not completely centered i hope i don't have to take it apart. We will see how it works.

Now what to put in here! Since my husband moves dirt for a living i thought about filling it with dirt and putting a clear coat on the outside. What do you guys think? What fun things are you guys doing for the men in your lives?

A Quick Gift

So I bought a few necklaces and I had full intention to borrow Kori’s soldering iron(i hope i spelled that right) and make my own mini picture frame to add to them
 
As i was trying to find the little glass i was looking for I came across a new product that Hobby lobby carries and I will be honest I went a little crazy! I bought a bunch almost 1 in each size.

It was so easy to just print out a cute picture, measure it out and cut it.

Each frame easily opens and my favorite part is that I can change out the pictures.

Here is the backside.

I added it to my necklace and that's it!

I’m not the biggest jewelry fan but I love my new necklace. I cant wait to wear it.

I even made one for my husband but used the bigger one and instead of a necklace I made it to hang from his rear view mirror. He loves it!
The little picture frames are so cute and were only $2.47 so it was money well spent.

I Dig Dino’s

My son loves Dinosaurs and he loves to play in the sand boxes where they dig for dinosaurs. I thought how easy it would be to make one for our own.

I used an old pool kids pool that had a small hole in it. Instead of throwing it away we use it as a sand box.

 

I bought this bag of brick mortar and i only used about a third of it. We mixed it in an old 5 gallon bucket and used a small shovel to stir in the water. It was very easy!  

I wanted the bottom to be smooth so we made the first batch really thin. My husband helped me mix it. We used a cement thrall (i hope i spelled that right) to make it smooth and then i used my index finger to smooth the edges. I idnt have any latex gloves but they would be a good idea since the motar does have chemicals in the mix. Make sure everything is very smooth you don't want to cut any tiny toes or fingers as the kids are playing 

  

I added a lil note for my son and made sure i put the year i made it.

As we let the first part dry make sure you clean out all your tools and buckets.

After the bottom layer is almost dry i took a cut out of a dinosaur i googled and laid it on the mortar. I drew the out line and then i knew where to add the next mixture of mortar.

I took small handful an formed the dinosaur head. if you have cracks in the mixture just dip your hands in some water and tap it to smooth it out.

I made a nose an eye and teeth. We were going to add a horn on the nose but i didn't want to keep messing. It isn’t the best dinosaur but my 2 year old will love it

 

We added a few backbones and that was enough for us. We wanted to keep it simple.

If you look it was only an inch or so high so it doesn't have to be anything to complicated.

 

Add a bag of play sand an some sand toys and your good to go. I need to get my son an old paint brush but i forgot to grab it at the store.

Here he is just starting to get uncovered.

Well I hope you liked our Dinosaur sandbox and it inspires you to do something fun for your kids this summer.

Grocery Flash Cards

If any of you get the Rachael Ray Magazines you probably know they have some of the cutest kids stuff. I love looking at this section in the magazine and wish i had the self control to get on the websites to look. I don't because i know i will buy stuff i don't really need. Well in the newest issue they had a Food Flash Card set and i thought that is perfect for my son. He is really starting to talk and is learning new words everyday. He also gets very bored while I’m grocery shopping and i thought this would be a fun educational way to keep him busy while i shop. Instead of spending $20 plus shipping i decided i would make my own. Wanna see?
Okay so I started out using Picnik. I took a picture i had already saved on there and just changed the exposure. I turned the picture white. I did have to make a few changes using the clone button but i have done this for other things and had one saved. You can use word or any other program your familiar with.

I kept it simple for the cover. I just added font and tried a few different covers.

This is a picture of my magazine showing the cute cards. I loved how they did a letter and a bunch of fruits and veggies that started with that letter but as i was thinking of stuff to use i kept getting stumped. I figured i would keep it simple for my almost 2 year old and do 1 picture for each letter. Below are some of my cards I made up quickly.  

I was only able to do part of the cards cause my husband and i got stumped on F, H, Q, U, V, X, and Z



This is what i have so far and tomorrow i will make it a little bit more sturdy and add colored cardstock but since the move I'm still unpacking and cant find some of my craft stuff. I will add a different color to the back of each picture. Also I’m going to take out the second ring. As we kept printing each letter and putting them on the second ring was just in the way.
This is a work in progress and i need some help thinking of things to add for those other letters. Any suggestions?
-Tara

Lucky Streak/ Brag it up!

So this last  few weeks have been GREAT for Tara & I. Where to start, I guess the biggest one is Tara was able to move in to her BRAND SPANKING NEW HOUSE!  She is so excited to be in and get unpacked so she can get back to crafting!

For me, Not the new house (dang!) but the Hubs did purchase this little beauty for me…Oh Yeah! A Nikon D3100  My 1st every DSLR, I can assure you I have thought of stealing Tara’s for many years. Now I don't have too! So no more crappy pictures from me, wait rephrase that, If there are any more crappy pictures I assure you it is strictly person operating it!!

Oh and have I mentioned we WON, our first giveaway!!! Seriously I was so excited when I received the email from Kim @ Today's Creative Blog. We won a $50.00 gift certificate to

We also have another Secret  Announcement to add, just waiting for the go ahead on it too… Good things to come!

And last but certainly not least Notice our Sponsor list to the side, It is growing!! We have some super fun and exciting Giveaways coming up soon!!

Are you all so excited We shared? Do you guys have any news you want to share leave us a comment! We love to hear good news or just brag about something fun!

~Kori & Tara

PB & J Doughnuts

With me and my little family in the process of moving its really hard to do craft projects. Most of my stuff is packed up so that's why all my recent posts have been food. I will have an area all to my own for crafts but for now i wanted to share a treat i made for my man.
After reading Simple Sweetness and seeing her post on Peanut Butter and Jelly Cupcakes it reminded me of an episode on The Best Thing I Ever Ate. They showed these doughnuts from The Doughnut Plant that were a PB & J doughnut. The owner said it was a top secret way to get the doughnut filled but i thought it cant be rocket science. I decided to make a treat for my husband and since he loves Peanut Butter i thought i would try to make my own PB & J doughnut. Do you want to see my top secret way to fill a homemade doughnut?
  
I used a recipe that my mother had for doughnuts. We tried both a cake doughnut and a yeast one but the yeast doughnuts were so much easier and they turned out so much better. Im sure most of you have a doughnut recipe any recipe will work. If anyone wants the one i used i will be more then happy to share just let me know.

We used her doughnut cutter but they puffed up on us so much you couldn't see the hole but this cutter saved us a lot of time.

After we cooked and let the doughnuts cool i used one of those frosting tubes but filled it with strawberry jelly and stuck it through the doughnut and injected it with the jelly. I used a longer skinny tip and inserted it twice just opposite from each other. In the same hole i ejected the jelly on two sides. I hope I'm explaining this right I basically made a v shape and then turned the doughnut to make another v shape so the whole doughnut had jelly running through the inside.

Now it was time for the fun part! We made a peanut butter icing. We just used a simple icing (powdered sugar and milk)recipe and added a lil bit of warmed peanut butter. We didn't measure that we just added according to taste. We dipped each doughnut in the warm icing.

They looked pretty good knowing the fact that i have never made a homemade doughnut before.

I grabbed one of the doughnut holes and quickly ejected it and dunked it in the icing so i could open it up to show you and to taste them. They tasted so good basically a sweeter PB and J sandwich

My husband was in heaven! He wants me to make them for his work so i will be making them again soon. I hope you enjoyed it and let me know what you think!
-Tara

Kids Art Shirt

Okay this is the last of the Kids Art posts. I should have made this before the Kids Art but i wasn’t thinking and to be honest i think my son had more fun getting covered in paint then actually painting. Anyways Kori and I ran to a thrift store a couple weeks ago and i bought this shirt. My son wears a 2t and i bought a 4t. Its big but not to big. I added an “I” on the back and some pockets. I’m a lil embarrassed to show you my sewing skills but lets be honest we all know you’re browsing the blog world just to get ideas. At least i hope you don't take my skills(if you can call them that ha ha) and do the same thing.

I had bought some material a long time ago so i just used that. I know this shirt is going to be covered in paint and markers and glue so i didn't want to spend a lot.

I just printed an “I” on a piece of paper and used that as a guide

I just laid the material on the outside and sewed around the edges. It looks rough and like a 3 year old sewed it but hey it works and it will look so cute on my little guy.

I hope my sons shirt that took me a total of what 5 min to make gives you some good ideas on what NOT to do. I would love to hear how you would decorate an art shirt. Maybe give me some better ideas for the next one!
-Tara