Valentine's Day Crafts!!

Better late than never!! This Valentine's day I made some simple, easy gifts for my friends at work, as well as for my students. 

I used some ziplock bags and added some fundip, toy, crayons, and other candy for a simple gift for my students. I stapled a little owl card at the top. For my co-workers, I put together some simple gifts I found on-line-thank you PINTEREST!!

Lastly, we put together these cards for the kiddos to give to their parents- LOVED how they turned out!! Again, Thank you, Pinterest!

Nothing Special, but I'm so happy I got to do something crafty!!! I missed out yet again on the Pinterest challenge over at YOUNG HOUSE LOVE/BOWER POWER, but I'm going to start planning for the spring one, so I can be ready!!

What did you give your Valentine???

Lots of LOVE,

Michelle

Easy Christmas Card Display

I really wanted a very clever way to display my Christmas cards this year, something that I wouldn't need to spend a single cent on!!! I decided to use these two cute clotheslines I ordered through Avon a few years ago. They have miniature clothes belonging to Santa and Mrs. Claus!! It's Cute!! The item is not available anymore but can easily be replicated with twine, string, or ribbon, and decorated with homemade ornaments, felt shapes, or colorful snowflakes. OR if you are really crafty you can make the clothes yourself with fabric or felt. The clothes are hung by these cute mini clothespins. Since I didn't want to spend any mula, I used regular clothespins I had on hand. I decided to pretty them up with left over Christmas scrapbook paper.

And since I haven't sent any of my cards ( BAD!!) I only have my sister's cards, but hopefully the rest will be coming soon! 

Here's a closer look- Isn't my sister's family ADORABLE!!

OH AND THE BEST PART!!!!! My brand new personalized velvet stockings from Pottery Barn- I love stockings and have wanted them for so long !!!  It was an early Christmas present and maybe one day we will expand our family and add more stockings! I think they are so elegant..

How are you displaying your Christmas cards????

HAPPY HOLIDAYS Y'ALL

Michelle

Xavier's First Birthday!!!

TWO POSTS IN ONE DAY---- WOWZA!!!!! My posts were long over due!! Chose to put up this post because today is my friend Cori's baby boy's 1st birthday!!!

Happy Birthday, sweet boy.. You are a wonderful blessing to your family and to us!! May God bless you...

Well this weekend Mr. Xavier had a birthday party... A monkey theme party for mommy's little monkey!!

My friend asked if I could make him a birthday hat. She bought some felt and other supplies and threw some ideas at me of what she wanted. I worked with felt before, during Christmas when I made personalized stockings, but this was my first try at making a hat. We started with a birthday hat, Cori got at the dollar store.. for... yes- a buck!! Don't you just love dollar stores?? Well anyway, when we put the felt on the hat, you could see the design show through the felt, so we put a plain white sheet of paper around it. It worked pretty good as a coverage and made it more sturdy. We then put the felt around it using our trusty friend- the glue gun!! 

After putting on the felt we decorated it with felt letters to spell his name and lime green feathered  boa to trim and top the hat. To make the monkey, I went on google and googled " monkey clipart". We picked the cutest one and that looked like the monkey she was using throughout her party decor. I copied and pasted it to a word document and sized it to the size we needed. I first traced the monkey head on the brown felt and then cut it apart and traced the face and ears on the tan felt. I put it together,, adding the eyes and using a piece of brown felt for the mouth . Wish I had pics of the process.... But here it is my very first birthday hat for Xavier's very first birthday...

Here are some other pics of Xavier's party..

Here are the centerpieces...Cori bought almost all the stuff at the dollar store and the balloons and dowels

 ( or whatever they are called to hold the balloons) at a party supply store. The mini palm trees were in the party section for a luau- themed party and the monkey plates were in the grocery section where they had the plates, cups, napkins, etc... This was all Cori's idea... The palm tree had a hole at the top so we slipped in the dowel, using a hot glue to secure it. We then sandwiched the dowel between two monkey plates. The balloons were added at the party.

The cake was ordered at a bakery, but mommy, aunt, and grandma lovingly made each cupcake. You can find instructions here.

Here's a few more shots of the b-day boy!!

Happy Birthday, little monkey!!

Michelle

Getting Ready for BACK TO SCHOOL!!!

Hi everyone...........crickets.......crickets.....
Well I have been MIA for awhile, with in-service training starting next week, I have been BUSY!!! I've been trying to finish my summer to-do list, as well as cleaning, organizing, and decorating my classroom. So I'm finally going to show you somethings I have been working on for my classroom.
I always find myself scrambling for certain things, like birthday crowns, my monthly calendar markers, and I find myself looking on the net for ideas for a certain theme or holiday, trying to remember what I did the year before or what idea I loved, but lost the website or sample....

Well I had this pink crate.. I bought three a few  years ago at Wal-Mart- this pink one, a lime green, and a blue... I love them!! They are durable and so useful. I slipped in some hanging folders that my hubby had- one for each month that we are in school. I then put in my calendar markers in to plastic ziplock bags and placed them according to month. I also put in activities for themes and holidays and put them according to month. For example.. I know that the back to school theme is the first 2 weeks of school, so I put activities with that theme in the August folder, along with first day of school projects, a supply list and Student info sheets- which I have the the parents fill out during open house. The birthday crowns are in the back, along with other important forms. My plan is to slip a birthday crown for each child according to month.

I used some Martha Stewart labels to label each folder.. I'm loving it and it will HOPEFULLY, FINGERS AND TOES CROSSED, keep me organized. If I happen to see an idea I love, I just slip it in the folder to use when I need to. I also worked on something that I've had on my to-do list for as long as I've been teaching. When my aunt Mary retired after 30 + years of teaching, I inherited some of her stuff.... one of them was this thrift store find. She used this box to hold prizes for the kids. It's octagon shape was perfect to make a treasure box.....

So I got a can of gold spray paint and got to work... I used this....

After the box dried I added some jewels I had from a Christmas project AAAANND..... 

thrift store box becomes treasure box!!

Seriously.. why did I take so long to do this- it was so easy. I couldn't wait to add all the great prizes, awaiting some very lucky, well behaved children, Well let's hope so... lol :)

Oh, I also downloaded these cute letter cards for my letter wall.  They are cute..I'm cutting them and laminating them as I speak type. 

You can find them here and they are F-R-E-E!!!!. I finished a lot this summer and I will share soon, along with my classroom and other back-to-school stuff when I get done. Just please bear with me!! Thanks!!

Michelle