Tis the Season....for last minute projects

So, here's the thing with me....I Love Christmas! I love all the decorating,the shopping, the wrapping, the family time etc. The one thing that I'm not especially fond of is all of the Holiday fanfare at our kids' schools. I can't volunteer enough at their schools, but wow, there is a lot to remember at Christmastime.

Well, I knew we would have something fall through the cracks and it ended up being the "Handmade Card" the kids were asked to make for their teacher. It's Sunday night and my brain is saying" there's something I'm missing for the new school week". And then it hits me...YIKES, we forgot to make the dang "Handmade Card":) Haha!

It's a good thing that we forgot this particular project at Christmas because I always have a ton of goodies leftover from the year before. I had Hayden pick out the scraps and we went to work on the "Handmade Card". Yippee!

1.We used a piece of cardboard from a moving box since we still have stuff in boxes from our move. Actually we always have stuff in moving boxes, hopefully we will be in Corona Del Mar long enough to get them all unpacked this time:)

2. We used green scrapbook paper and elmers glue sticks to put the front of the card together.

3. We took the Christmas tree off of an old card from a couple of years ago and glued it to the front

4. We used scraps of ribbon from last year and stapled that onto the card. Haha, this part cracks me up.

5. We took the little beads off of those bead sticks you put into your tree as decoration. I can't remember what those are called:) And super glued them together, then slid them into the cardboard. I slit the cardboard first and then put them in. That actually worked awesome.

6. Hayden wrote on the card with a sharpie and then went over it with a glitter paint.

7. We painted the edges of the card with red paint and then went over that with red glitter paint.

We made popcorn as you can see on the floor in my photos. p.s. this is the perfect time to say that I know I am not a great photographer and always defer to taking the photos with my iphone. There you have it, not great photos, but great FUN!

I think Hayden's card turned out super cute! Sometimes the things you have to do at the last minute can be your favorite things. This is one of those things!

p.s. I did the tying of the bows for my little man and the gluing of the beads on the back. Don't you think Hayden's cursive is so awesome?

Hope the rest of you are surviving the last week of school before Winter Holiday! Good Luck to all!

Pg.

Upcycle Christmas

On Wednesday, well I think it was Wednesday, I woke up really wanting to create something awesome for our home for Christmas. After being on Pinterest a lot lately I have seen and been inspired by so many of the ideas and I guess this "Wall Tree" came about by merging a bunch of ideas together. I am also a huge fan of CB2 and West Elm and had seen a couple of different ideas for wall trees on their sites.

My family is in it's own "Economic Downturn" these days so it is with great Pride that I tell you I didn't spend even a penny on this project!! Awesome, right??

I did take photos as I was going through this but because it seems that everything in my life wants to break at inopportune moments, I do not have those photos to share. I will tell you that I am not the greatest DIY-er in the world and most things I create myself are done by the seat of my pants. Haha! There was no measuring, leveling or marking going on during this. There was a lot of EYEBALLING! That actually doesn't sound right, but it is true nonetheless.

So, here's the lowdown....

First, I laid out the ornaments on my living room floor in the order that I thought looked the best. It took me about 20 minutes to do this part because I am slightly OCD when it comes to how things look together.

Second, I picked out ribbon from my ribbon stash. I didn't need to cut to fit because it just ended up working with the lengths I had.

Next, I took and I don't recommend this unless it's all you've got. Just saying.... but I took those tape dots that scrapbookers use and I put those on the ribbon and stuck them to the wall. I put all the ribbon up first. Again, I just stood back and eyeballed the spacing.

Then, I used old, white flat tacks to put the ornaments up. Next time, I will use nails because I actually think the tree would look better with the ornaments away from the wall instead of resting against it. Especially the small star on the 2nd tier. At any rate, my motto is "There's always next year" so it works in this scenario. Ha!

Lastly, I stood back in awe:) I am in LOVE with this tree and I don't say that very often when it comes to things I have made. But, this....well it's just awesome, funky, Christmasey and exactly what I was hoping for. Merry Christmas to all of you!