My Little Artist

Today we took a trip, outside of Pittsburgh, to pick up this little art desk that we found on Craigslist!

Alexander, my youngest son, absolutely LOVES creating! He is very imaginative and just loves to tell stories, paint, and color! I wanted to give him his own little creative space, and I always loved this desk made by Step 2. It has a place for all of his supplies and the top of his desk is a dry erase board that lifts up for additional storage!

Each side and the back of the desk has additional storage for his coloring books and tablets.
He spent the remainder of the day just being creative!

Here he is using the dry erase desktop! The best part was that this desk only cost $30 and it was in near perfect condition! There were no marks on it and it was super clean!

I think he is an awesome artist for only being three-years-old! Here is a picture he drew of me! He is drawing at the level of his older brother!

So while Ben is at school each day, this is probably where Alex will be spending his time! But that's ok, cause I like to be creative too!

Back To School Tree-Mini Tutorial

It is hard to believe that summer is almost over! My oldest son Ben starts Kindergarten this year and we're very excited! I wanted to celebrate this event, so I decorated a pencil tree in a "back to school" theme!
This will be my first mini tutorial. I guess it's not really a tutorial, but just some helpful tips to help you decorate your own back to school tree on a budget.

Here are some basic supplies. I forgot to take a photo of my ribbon. I used about two spools of ribbon. One that had polka dots, and the other, which is my favorite ribbon, looks like a ruler! Very cute for a back to school themed tree! :)

Besides ribbon, you'll need a box of chalk (12 count), 2 bags of mini chalkboard ornaments (found at Joann's), 2 rulers, and a white gel pen for writing on the mini chalkboards. You could also use white acrylic paint, but I found the gel pens are much easier to write with.

In the above photo notice the pink marks on the ruler. That is where my husband cut the ruler in three places. He cut right above the three ring binder holes. We cut it this way so we could skip the step of drilling a hole in the ruler to hang it from. This way is quicker and your ornament is ready to string with ribbon immediately!

In the photo below is the cut rulers, but really you only need about two. Each ruler makes three ornaments, and I found that six was enough to decorate the tree adequately. The rulers were $.50 a piece at Walmart. Just a little tip.... before you cut the ruler, use pliers to remove the metal strip that is along the long edge of the ruler.

I also made salt dough pencil ornaments to decorate the tree. A great recipe for salt dough ornaments can be found here. It's amazing what salt, flour and water can make!

This recipe was enough for about 10 ornaments. Plus I actually made two cupcake ornaments as well in the batch. So you can get about 12 small ornaments out of the batch. They were fairly easy to make. I just rolled a ball of dough into a log and pinched and rolled the end of it to make a pencil point. I then took a butter knife and made the groves of the pencil and stuck a wire in for hanging. They baked in the oven, came out cooled and then I painted them in about an hour! Easy peasy! :) Before I painted them my husband said: "They don't look like pencils!" I kind of agreed, but I had a vision in my head, and I'm sooo glad that I didn't abandon the craft! I love how they turned out! Very stubby and cute!

I painted them with several coats of acrylic paint and left them to dry. After they were completely dry I rubbed on a stain and then sprayed them with a clear coat of varnish. When they were completely dry (front and back) I tied on a ribbon to complete the look. I just love how they turned out!

I topped the tree with a faux apple that I got at Joann's, but you could also use the kind from the Dollar Tree. They are cheaper at the Dollar Tree and in my opinion the same quality. To get it to sit on the top of the tree, I hollowed out the apple with a pair of scissors. You could also use a knife, but be very careful. They are usually made of foam, so they are rather easy to hollow out. You don't need to make a very big hole, just keep trying it out and see what fits on your particular tree.

I also used this method with the small faux pumpkins that you can find around Halloween. They make a cute topper for a Fall themed tree!

The little chalkboards that I mentioned came from Joann's craft store. They are very inexpensive and come in a package of three for $1.49. They are 2"x3" in size and you can do soo much with these! I used six on my tree and wrote things like "1 +1=2" and "CAT" and the boy's names. The added bonus is that these are already ornaments and are ready to hang instantly! I love when I can accomplish something quickly!

Like I mentioned above I used a white gel pen to write on the chalk boards. I'm sure if you had one of those cool chalk pens you could probably do the same thing, but wipe it right off instead! I am sooo drooling over those chalk pens, I hope to buy some someday! I have used white acrylic paint in the past on the chalkboards, but it's a lot harder to write nicely with a paint brush! The plus side to using gel pens is that if you mess up you can quickly wipe it off with a damp papertowel!

Here is a look of the chalkboard ornament hanging on the tree.

I also mentioned that I used a box of 12 count white chalk. Yes this is real chalk. It's inexpensive and looks super cute hanging on the tree! A 12 count pack of chalk from Walmart is $.74! I just used ribbon to tie on it and make into an ornament! You could probably cut the chalk in half and get 24 ornaments out of the box, but I found 12 was sufficient enough for my tree. Here is the chalk and ruler ornaments.
Here is a photo of one of my salt dough pencil ornaments.
I put my pencil tree in a basket, covered the base with yellow fleece fabric, and threw in some faux apples to complete the look of my back to school tree! I think it would look super cute filled to the max with apples, but that would be quite expensive since each apple costs $1.00. These apples are from the Dollar Tree. I hope they also come back out with the tiny apple ornaments that they had last Christmas. Those would be a cute addition to the back to school themed tree!

Joann's had a box of mini apples that would have been cute as ornaments, but at $5.00 a box I thought I'll wait until the ones from the Dollar Tree comes out and save them for next year! I suppose that I could have used my 40% off coupon, but I left it at home! :(

And here is a look at the completed "Back to School"themed tree, lit up, and made on a budget! :)
School starts here on August 30th. Stay tuned for my "Back to School" themed dinner that I have planned for Ben! I have a lot of cute ideas!

I am linking up with some cool blog parties. Check out many awesome projects at House of Hepworths, Strut Your Stuff Thursdays at Somewhat Simple, Craft-O-Maniac Mondays, and Skip to My Lou.

Gnome Garden

I have a gnome obsession! I just love these little old men with pointy hats! They are sooo cute! I have a lot of gnomes. Unfortunately my bigger ones are packed away because they do not go with my current decor. Hopefully next summer I'll landscape with them outside and create something cute!

In the meantime I wanted to create a "Gnome Garden" on a smaller scale. A few months ago, Alex and I picked up a fairy garden kit that was unopened at the thrift store. He had so much fun painting the pot and arranging the little house and stones. We also planted seeds that came with the kit, but unfortunately they never sprouted. So for the last few months I had a decorated planter full of dirt on my kitchen counter! I was so sad, so I decided to make another for outside. And this time I bought real plants for in it! Buying real plants is much more satisfying. You don't have to wait days for your seeds to sprout!

Alex was uninterested this time around, so Ben helped me with the dirt! Here he is making it flat!
Here's a closeup of the sign that I made for the garden. I found this sterling silver spoon for $1 at a local thrift store. I used metal stamps to engrave "Gnome Crossing" into the spoon. I can't wait until the silver tarnishes!

Here is a closeup of one of the many mini gnomes in the garden. He's about 2.5 inches tall.

We even planted some fake carrots that I bought in the miniature section of a craft store! I think they add such a whimsical touch!

Here is a mini fireplace that was a tealight holder. I thought it would add a perfect touch to the gnome garden. I can picture the gnomes and fairies enjoying themselves in front of the fire! I added a flameless tealight so it's safe for the kids to play with.

I planted Irish Moss throughout the garden and used a little mini metal house and white picket fencing that I had in my craft stash.

You are now entering the Gumball Forest! I found this little metal mini gumball machine in the dollhouse miniatures section of a craft store. I thought it was soo cute, and bought it to save for a future project. I wasn't sure what I was going to use it for, so I thought it was perfect for this little gnome garden! A gnome can't be without his gumballs, can he?! And to the left of the gumball machine is a small plant that looks like a tree in a miniature world.

I used those small colored glass pebbles which are also found in craft stores. You can also use aquarium gravel as a path in your garden. That works well too! In our first gnome garden we used green aquarium gravel. It turned out very cute! You can also use small stones from your neighborhood. Use what you already have and have fun with it!

Here is another view of our magical garden! I also added some succulents, which you can see on the right hand side of the garden. I love succulents! They are my favorite plant, and are so easy to care for!

If you had a mini garden, what type of whimsical things would you use for decoration?

Last Day of Preschool & Teacher Gift

Today was Ben's last day of Preschool! My little man is growing up way too fast! Here he is with his wonderful teacher Mrs. Spotts! She is the best teacher ever, and I wish I could be five-years-old again so I could be in her class!
I wasn't sure what I wanted to do for a thank you gift, so I came up with this jar. I found several ideas online and just combined them all to come up with this!

I found this medium size jar at Walmart. It is basically sort of square and has a screw on lid. I liked it because it has a line towards the bottom of the jar, and it made it easy to line up my crayons straight!

I made two of these jars. This one is my first attempt. With this first one I used a hot glue gun and glued the crayons to the glass. I don't know if there was some sort of residue on the glass, but a few of my crayons popped off! This was very frustrating, because I didn't want to give a gift that was falling apart. So I used two rubber bands to help keep the crayons in place! I then covered the rubber bands with the ruler printed ribbon to hide them! My second attempt at this project, I skipped the glue and just used the rubber band to hold the crayons on! It also makes it easier so they can reuse the crayons and not have to worry about pulling the glue off of each one.
I found the faux chalkboard at Joanns and used White Uni-ball gel pen to create the "chalk-like" appearance. I was going to use that air-dry white modeling clay to make teeny tiny chalk to glue on the chalkboard, but I couldn't find any at Walmart, and I figured a small detail like that may get overlooked anyhow.

I then added a little tag that said: "Thank you for making me a smartie!" And I filled the jar with smartie candy! A medium jar like this took a bag of 60 smartie candies (which was also found at Walmart). My sister had to locate the candies for me, because I couldn't find any at my two local Walmarts. Oh and it took 57 crayons to cover the jar!

Yummy! Speaking of "smarties" have you seen the giant smarties candy yet? It's probably three times the size of a regular pack! How fun!

Hope you're enjoying your week! Mine has been a busy one!

The Giving Tree

Tomorrow we are picking up our new camper! We're really excited, but we need to make room for it! One of the things that we needed to do was cut down a huge tree on the side of our garage! As you can see in this photo, the tree is huge! Here is my husband standing next to the monstrous tree! We actually have four trees total that we need to remove. The reason we're taking them all down is because the majority of them are close to the house and the birds have taken over! Last year bird mites got into the one bedroom and that is something that we do not want to deal with again! Believe me, that's a whole other nasty blog post that I didn't even blog about last year! lol

It was so sunny today and with the sun I took some cool shadow shots! I love shadows (they make you look skinny, which is always a good thing)! Here I am taking the photo against the old tree!

Here's Chris' shadow, next to the ladder and the last shadow that the old tree will produce!

My husband is a control room operator at a Power Plant, but he really can do it all! He amazes me! He does electrical work, plumbing, building, and anything you can imagine! This happens to be awesome, because if I'm ever at a thrift store and something doesn't work electrically, I know he can always fix it! So it didn't surprise me that he decided to do it himself!

In our area it costs around $500 to take down one tree, and we have four! My husband knew with the cost of a new chainsaw, that he could do it....and he did! Plus, he said a $150 deductible for an emergency room visit is a whole lot cheaper than hiring someone! lol Luckily, he never had to go to the emergency room! Here he is with what is left of the old tree!

Here is one of the huge branches!

I like how it has a shape of a heart, sort of! This tree provided many years of shade when our golden retrievers were alive! It reminds me of the story "The Giving Tree!" And it really saddens me that it needed to be cut down, because it was such a wonderful tree! Knowing that it was going to be cut down brought tears to my eyes!

Here's Chris with part of the mess. There is soo much mess that I couldn't get it all in one shot! lol We couldn't finish cleaning it all up today, because unfortunately he was called into work!

Don't mind the ugly brown building (it's our second garage). It hold all of my craft supplies and goodies in the apartment above. I cannot wait until my husband creates it into a crafting studio!
But we all know that won't happen for a couple of years! We currently have a ton of other projects that we're trying to get done!

Here is a photo that was shot up above from our other garage! We really do have a mess on our hands and more firewood that we know what to do with! lol

I'll leave you with an excerpt from "The Giving Tree!" If you haven't read it you can view the full text here!

"I am sorry," sighed the tree. "I wish that I could give you something------ but I have nothing left. I am just an old stump." "I don't need very much now," said the boy. "Just a quiet place to sit and rest. I am very tired."

"Well," said the tree, straightening herself up as much as she could, "well, an old stump is good for sitting and resting. Come, Boy, sit down. Sit down and rest." And the boy did. And the tree was happy.

POTD: Candy Bouquet

Here is a photo of the "Candy Bouquet" that I had made yesterday for my nephew. He's leaving for basic training tomorrow, and I wanted to make it with a patriotic theme. It was my first one, so it's not the greatest, but I think it turned out cute!

I found some really cute mints with a flag wrapper so I added them in there as well as various red, white, and blue packaged candy. And yes that is "Chewbacca" from Star Wars in the center of the basket with a gun! My nephew is a huge Star Wars fan and when I found a Chewbacca dashboard figurine for the car, I knew it would be perfect!
The basket is a totally cute find from the dollar tree. I just made a bow and hot glued it to the front. I'm making a pink basket here in the next week or so for a friend...can't wait to share that one with you too! Have a great week!

Crafter's Withdrawal

I am totally going through some crafter's withdrawal or something! Especially spray painter's withdrawal (must be the fumes)! lol Just Kidding.

I'm not able to spray paint because of the cold weather....I hate this time of year because of that! I can't wait until Spring, so I can spray paint until my heart's content!

This week I'll share with you some projects that I finished, but didn't blog about! I can't believe that I didn't blog about them! That's probably because I was busy trying to get things completed before the cold weather hit! I have so many other cool projects that I want to complete, but they will have to wait until Spring!

So I've been going crazy because I've been so pre-occupied with the Holidays that I haven't had a chance to create! A few weeks back I was participating in "Make Some Art Mondays" over at Chrissie Grace, but she stopped hosting them for the time being. Also, I take a painting class on Wednesdays but they've been postponed after the first of the year. So I'm absolutely going crazy since I haven't created anything lately!

Tonight I was tired and didn't feel like anything but surfing the Internet. That's when I came across "Design Sponge" and spent the last few hours looking at before and after projects! My favorite one is this dog bed that was created from an old tv! You can read about the project here! Isn't this dog bed amazing?! And the dog is absolutely adorable as well! I think that Allie may just need one of these in pink of course!
So tomorrow I have decided to create something! That's my goal! There are so many projects inside my head, that I'll probably decide sometime tomorrow what I want to create! I'll make sure to post a photo! Have a wonderful night!

Make Some Art Monday

Today is week 2 of "Make Some Art Monday" over at Chrissie's blog: In His Grace.
Usually she has a weekly theme to go from. And this week I totally had an idea for the piece of art that I wanted to create. Unfortunately, I've been sick all week long and was unable to even start it!

I did however manage to make this simple little wall quilt for my sister's birthday. She lives out of state and loves "Americana" themed decor. So this is what I came up with. I used muslin for the center of the quilt, and mixed equal parts of acrylic paint with a textile medium for fabric. I then used a foam brush and brushed the paint on my boy's hands and pressed them to the muslin.

I really didn't have to use the textile medium because this probably will never need washed. But I used it anyway- just in case.
It is both machine and hand quilted. The only thing hand quilted is the stitching around the handprints and the binding is hand quilted as well using a blind stitch. This was a really quick project probably took no more than 4 hours total. It would have taken less time, but I totally forgot how to add the binding...so I had to add it once, take it off and then add it again!

It measures approximately 11"x13."

I used no pattern, I just freehanded everything....it's more fun that way! I have many more ideas for little wall quilts that I hope to share with you soon! This was soo fun! I forgot how fun it is to make a mini quilt!

I'm going to be busy over the next couple of days. So I will not post anything until at least Friday! Have a great week!

Pumpkin Cookies and Treats Bags-OH MY!

Benjamin's Halloween party is tomorrow, so yesterday I volunteered to bake sugar cookies! Why I always volunteer to make something that is complicated is beyond me! I mean it may not be complicated to some people, but with two toddlers, and coming down with a virus myself, it was way too much for me to handle!

So after I dropped Ben off for school yesterday, I went to the store and bought my baking supplies. I proceeded to make the dough and then bake the cookies. I baked at least three dozen cookies and then I had to go pick Ben up from school. On my way to pick him up, it popped into my head that I didn't add the salt to the recipe! And I had used unsalted butter! When I came home ,I tasted them, and they tasted "ok" but left a weird after taste! Ben said they were good of course, but you know how kids are....they find sand and dirt delicious! lol

So I looked at the recipe, and I realized that I left out the baking powder too! Where is my mind?!! I blame it on the Nyquil that I had the night before, but my friend had referred to it as "mom haze!" So I threw that batch in the garbage and started over again! By this time I was feeling really sick! My throat was raw and my body ached! But I knew I had to continue, because I may feel worse the following day!

Finally at 11:45 last night I was finally finished decorating them! This is only my second time working with royal icing, so they're not perfect! But I'm sure any 4 year-old will love them!

Today I woke up feeling even more sick! I could barely talk, my throat is still raw, and I have a bad cough! I'm just praying that I don't get a fever so I could go to Ben's Halloween party tomorrow!

Today I put together his little treat bags for his classmates. I'm not really big into giving my kids candy, so I wanted a treat free alternative! I decided to give each child a container of playdoh and a Halloween cookie cutter! I wanted to personalize the playdoh, so I put our own label on each container! At first I tried putting one on top of the playdoh label, but it looked like crap! I then decided to peel off each label...which was a huge PAIN! But here is what they look like 24 containers later! :)

A huge stack of playdoh fun!

Here is what the treat bags looked like with the cookie cutter inside! I really think they turned out cute!

Tomorrow is his party and I will try to post the photos either tomorrow or on Thursday! I'm very excited! If I'm feeling better, I will be dressing up! But I'm not telling what I'm wearing...you'll have to come back and see for yourself! Have a great night!

Make Some Art Monday

Today is "Make Some Art Monday" over at Chrissie Grace! Chrissie is a wonderful and inspirational artist! I just love her work! She decided to have an art blog party, and I just had to join in!

Unfortunately, I just found out about it a couple of days ago, so I had to brainstorm for an idea. The theme was "favorite quotes" and I knew if I was doing a mosaic...I needed a short quote. So I love the quote "Love is patient, Love is kind..." Here is what I came up with.

Please keep in mind that I need to grout in some areas again, plus I need to seal it and shine it up! I used a wooden cross that I had with an inset, part of a vintage rose plate, and some glass that I purchased from Youghiogheny Glass. I am very lucky that they make this wonderful glass right here in my town! If I'm ever in need of a certain color I drive on over, and get my choice of glass! It's great! This was soo fun to make! Hope you enjoy!

Here's a closeup of the saying! I used alphabet beads for the quote!

Have a wonderful Monday!
-Ruth Ann

Photo Wall Collage

I love photos! I love looking at photos, and I especially LOVE taking them! I even collect old black and white photography! It doesn't matter if I know the person in the photo or not...I still collect them! Photos to me tell a story...it doesn't matter who or what is in the photo, it's the story that the photo tells...the emotion that is captured in that split second! That's what's important!

Anyway, back to my photo wall! Awhile back, I came across a wonderful photography blog, and found this awesome photo wall collage! You can read about it here. I loved the idea, it made such a statement in that room! I just knew that I had to do it!

And this is what I came up with. My kitchen colors are aqua and pink, so I spray painted the outer frames in aqua and the inner frame in pink. The frames are actually cheap metal scrapbooking frames that I found at Michaels. They measure 12"x12" and when on sale you can get them for $5 each! Now that's a bargain! Hanging them however proved to be a pain....just ask my wonderful husband! :)

So you can get an idea of how large this collage is, here is a photo of my toddler standing next to it! Please ignore the cow pants! He's worn them for the last two days, and refuses to take them off! :) And keep in mind that we are nearing the end of our remodel. We have yet to add trim and other accessories, so right now it looks kind of plain!

Here's another view of the wall!

And yet another angle!

One tip if you plan to try this at home. We discovered that the hangers on the back are pretty much useless, and a royal pain! Since there are hangers in several places on the back, it's much easier to string each frame with wire and then hang it on the wall.

I hope you enjoyed seeing photos of my wall collage! So far it is my favorite thing in the entire house! When company comes over it's one of the first things that catches their eye! And we have received many compliments on it!

For me it shows the story of my family's past year and the many good times that we had! I plan to change it out each year to share our family's story with each guest that walks through our door!

To see other fantastic ideas, please go over to Kimba's linky party and join in the fun!