My first Sheet Music Wreath!

I have been looking forward to making a sheet music wreath for months. Today I realized I had everything on hand that I needed, to make it. Score! I thought I had to go rummage around an antique store to find old sheet music to use. Nope! I just opened my piano bench and found several books of Christian music from the 80's. I actually prefer that the pages are pretty white because they stand out more against our khaki wall. I also had been thinking that I needed really large sized books to make a big wreath. Hello, they stick out on both sides, so 8.5x11 pages are plenty tall enough. Earth to Angel. And the good news is I still have plenty more pages to make several more. I'm rethinking my Christmas crafting list. (but don't tell anyone...shhhhh).

I don't play our piano very often, but when I do, these aren't the books I open first. I figure if I ever really miss them, I can always buy them again. But for today I was super excited for the "free" crafting time and checking another thing off of my wishlist. Yay me!

Don't worry, I didn't touch my vintage books. Don't they just make you happy to look at them?

So while I broke out into song and burned myself with hot glue approximately 1,583 times, I put this big fella together in just over an hour today. I even stuck some subliminal messages in there too.

This wreath took about 50 pages to make.

I still need to perfect this craft. I found it difficult to roll the cones to get a tiny end and mine certainly does not look as lovely as Miss Mustard Seed's. But that's ok. I followed this tute first and then found this one when I had trouble making my first cone. Using her technique, I had the page numbers on the side closest to me so they would be inside the cone and not noticeable on the wreath.

Coming Soon...A Chrstmas Stocking Tutorial

I'm almost done with one of my final custom orders for the year. And it was just too fun (and timely) not to make a tutorial out of it. Especially since I figured it out as I went along. ;)

Those are some of the most fun projects. Right?



And I'll share a few little tips on how I made the matching pillow cases too.



All these little beauties will be on their way to Italy, hopefully tomorrow.



Enjoy your sneak peek, Jen!

She's leabing...

Happy Haloweeeeeeeeen!

This was the first time I've ever made Halloween costumes for my kids. I'm so glad I did! I hope to never do store-bought again. It was a whirl-wind of 2 days but now I am "that mom".

Since no one was going to look very closely at these and I had so little time to make them, I skimped a lot on workmanship. Sam's vest took all of 20 minutes and I drew it on the back of the fabric with a sharpie first, based on a sweater vest from his closet. His hat came from the dollar store last year.



Allison's started as a $12 shirt from Sears' boy department. It took me forever to find a plain white shirt to work with. I love that she has red sequin trim on her shirt and that it matches the fun hat we found at Target. I though about hot gluing the trim on, for about 3 seconds, and then realized I had to hand-sew it on so it could be machine washable. These clothes will stand up to lots of dress-up play. I have no doubt they will get a lot of use.



The cow print has been in my stash for years. I think I was going to recover an ottoman at one point and I don't even have an ottoman. LOL



Emily's bonnet we already had, I just added red velvet ribbon and bows to tie it in with the red dress. I forgot when we were picking out fabric that it needed to go with her already pink bonnet. Oops! I ran out of time making an over dress for her, so it turned into a 10 minute apron instead. No top-stitching here! And everyone has room to wear a sweater under their costume. We got lucky in that it wont' be too cold tonight. Love the metal pail I picked up at Home Depot too. She loves her outfit and next year wants to be Mary Ingalls instead of Laura.



Sam's shirt was found at a used kids clothing store for $3. I just took a red sharpie to draw in the lines to make it look more like the real deal.



Do you remember last year when we came home from vacation to find our neighbors willow tree had fallen down? Well that was after the leaves were already gone. So imagine our surprise this year to find a beautiful red tree gracing our new view.



What a gift. Love it!



And so the trick-or-treating begins. Hope you all had a fun night!