Mini Heart Bunting Valentine Cards & One For You

Each year the kids and I have fun making valentine cards to give away to friends and family and in addition to this we decided that it would be fun to participate in a valentine card swap this year as well that will provide us with oodles of mail which is just plain fun anytime.

What I hadn't anticipated was making 38 cards! Yes, that was definitely more than I ever could have imagined but creating things with the kids is always fun :)

I love making bunting and my daughter always wants to use my sewing machine so I thought I'd combine the two together and so our little mini heart bunting cards came to life :)

We started by cutting out little rectangles of burlap fabric slightly smaller than the face of our cards and pulled out a few threads from each of the sides to give it a frayed appearance. Then between the two of us we traced over 120 miniature little hearts onto the paper side of some Heat n Bond paper that we would later iron onto an assortment of red fabrics.

With our hearts traced, ironed onto our fabrics, cut out and then permanently affixed to the top of our burlap rectangles in a semi circle formation it was time to get stitching!

Using a nice bright red thread my daughter stitched on the string for our bunting so that it no longer looked like our hearts were just floating all alone finishing the mini heart bunting...

And then she took each of the finished burlap rectangles and stitched each of them to the front side of each of our little note cards. So much more simpler than mucking around with glue and then waiting for everything to dry! Plus getting to use mama's sewing machine is always such a treat :)

I just love how they turned out with their little red stitching from the sewing machine and I was so happy that my daughter had so much fun sewing them. Originally I thought that she would maybe make it through half of the cards we had to make but she just wanted to keep sewing and sewing which actually turned out to be a good thing because we now have extras to share with you!

So if you or your children would like a little surprise Valentine card sent to you in the mail just let me now in the comments below and make sure you leave me a way to get in contact with you for your address :)

The first five commenters will have one personally sent to you by my happy heart stitcher *grin*.

All of the Valentine cards have now been spoken for :)

Hugs,
Rosina

I've Got A Teenager!!

On Monday my son turned 13!!!
I can't believe I have a teenager in the house already. It sort of makes me feel old *grin*. On Saturday he had a couple of friends over for the day and we had his big cake, party food and presents and on Monday the actual day of his birthday we kept it pretty low key. I made his favorite meal of hamburgers and as a joke I stuck a candle in the top of one of the burgers and sang happy birthday to him as I brought it out to him for lunch :) You should have seen the grin on his face. I'm actually looking forward to his teenage years as it brings a whole new set of experiences and he is such a great kid that it can only get better :)

Today we all worked on our Valentine's day cards that we are making for a swap we are participating in. My daughter traced out hearts on some heat n bond paper and then we transferred it to the burlap rectangles above which are going to make the front panel of our cards.

I just LOVE all of the red fabrics and can't wait to show you how they turn out. Last year we made cute little handprint heart cards and we shared our extras with some of you lovely readers and we're going to do it again! So make sure and check back as I will have 5 of our new cards ready to hit the mail just for you :)

Hugs,
Rosina

Happy Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day!!

We celebrated valentine's day yesterday, a day earlier because my daughter had a date with the dentist again today. So we thought it best to have our party ahead of time so that she could really enjoy it :)

We had egg sandwiches and little cucumber and cream cheese tea sandwiches, asparagus rolls, ants on a log (the kids love these)....

and of course loads of yummy sweets :)

My special treat for the kids was one of the yummy-licious candy apples that the Rocky Mountain chocolate factory makes :) When we were in the city on Friday I took them all into the shop and let them stand in front of the giant glass case full of them and let them pick any one their hearts desired *grin*.

You should have seen them agonizing over which one looked like it was going to be the very best one to take home LOL.

A sweet treat for such a sweet day :)

Hope you all had a wonderful valentine's day to :)

Hugs,
Rosina

Valentine Sugar Cookies

We're getting ready for Valentine's day and making special treats :)

We always make a heart shaped cookie for our party and this time we made sugar cookie sandwich hearts with a yummy jam center. So good! I only know this because there may have been a little bit of taste testing going on as they were being made *grin*.

L was all ready to get down to business and had her new little apron that she made tied on and her hands washed even before I could ask her to do anything :) She loves to crack the eggs for me and run her hands through the flour *grin*.

I used my favorite sugar cookie recipe but halved the batch this time so that we didn't end up with mountains of cookies. You will need:

3 eggs

1 cup sugar

1 cup unsalted butter

1 tsp. vanilla

1 tsp. baking powder

2 1/2 cups all purpose flour

Cream the sugar and butter together and add in your eggs and vanilla beating until everything is light and fluffy looking.

Add your flour and baking powder and mix until just combined. Turn out your dough onto a sheet of waxed paper and top with another sheet of wax paper so that you can press down on your dough flattening it out towards the perimeters of your paper and then place it your fridge to chill so that when you pull it out again it will be nice and easy to roll and cut out your hearts on :) Bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for about 8 - 10 minutes or until your cookies are just browning on the bottom edges.

We used two different sized heart cookie cutters to create the tops of the cookies and then we ran a line of icing around the edge of the bottom cookie to create an icing dam so that our plum jam wouldn't squeeze out when we sandwiched the two layers together :) I make my jam without pectin so they are always a little bit runny and the icing works perfectly to keep everything in it's place *grin*.

I had to hide them out in the garage tonight to keep the kids from asking for more and so that I wouldn't sneak into the kitchen and nibble on them for a midnight snack LOL. I have terribly weak will power!

Hugs,
Rosina

Pretty Little Heart Garland

The last two little handprint valentine cards that we made the other day have been addressed and are waiting to be dropped into the mail to their lucky recipients in different places across the US and Mexico :)

In one of the emails while exchanging addresses we chatted about how we as parents have just as much fun with these little exchanges as our children and you know it is so true! My children are crazy about receiving mail since it isn't an every day occurence for them and I have so much fun making the swaps with them and checking the mailbox right alongside them everyday for packages to *grin*. So when I found out that two wonderful mama's wanted to send us cards in return I was thrilled! I can't wait to see their surprised faces when they find those envelopes in the coming weeks :)

I've been crocheting up a storm today. I found a great little heart pattern at A Foothill Home Companion and it is so nice and easy that you can whip up a heart in a matter of minutes which is a good thing if you plan on making a large garland *grin*.

I didn't have any natural colored yarn for the chain so I thought it would be fun to crochet up some raffia which if you haven't seen it before has a papery texture but is made from plant fiber :) I think that it will make a nice addition to our valentine tree this year :)

I was asked what yarn I used and I thought that I would quickly add it here just in case you would like to know as well :) It is Red Heart 'Luster Sheen' 2ply sport/fine weight and the color is Cherry Red #0915.

What valentine decorations are you making this year?

Hugs,
Rosina

PS. Looking for more crafty ideas or inspiration? Pop over to Natural Suburbia's Creative Friday and see what others are up to :)

Stitching Away

The potholders are coming along nicely :)
I decided to leave the more christmasy fabrics on the bottom and mounted them all onto the white linen background adding a red border with little linen squares in the four corners. I think it compliments the little birdies perfectly!

This may be the fastest that I have ever completed a swap. No I'm not done yet... darn close though *grin*. Both of the potholder tops are stitched and quilted to the heat resistant batting and all that needs to be finished tomorrow is to add the binding and whip up my ornament :)

I can't wait to see what my partner makes for me!
My mom was teasing me about putting so much work into a gift for a complete stranger but you know I have received some of the nicest things from ladies all across the globe that I have only met through emails :) It's like Christmas all year round to have little surprise packages of homemade goodness arrive!

Hugs,
Rosina

I'm Late, I'm Late, For A Very Important Date!

I have been literally counting the days until I could show you what I made for my Alice in Wonderland swap partner *grin*. I wanted to keep it top secret so that it was a total surprise so I restrained myself from sharing any hints! Today I received an email letting me know that it had arrived and she liked it and I'm so happy :)

From the information that I had I knew that she loved bunnies so I knew that the White Rabbit was a must do! The only problem was that I had no pattern *gasp*. I wasn't sure how I was going to tackle making a rabbit having never made one before.

I thought perhaps I would sew one from fabric but I was stumped. I'm a sucker for felt as you know so I knew I would have to use felt in some shape or form and then it hit me. I would create the white rabbit in a mixture of embroidery, felt & found objects!

I started by going completely high tech and sketched an outline of the rabbit onto my muslin canvas with a pencil *grin*. As I was stitching I wanted to give him the illusion of being furry so I made a hodge podge of irregular stitches all throughout his face and bottom so that he looked ruffed up and I think it turned out pretty well. If you're a pro at embroidery please don't slay me for bad form! LOL

Next was to tackle his clothing and give him a bit of a 3D effect so that he looked like he was popping off of the canvas :) Leaving the embroidery thread to just stitching on the pieces I made his tunic and collar from my felt stash. The sleeve on the right is actually sewn so that you can look right up inside of it and see his embroidered arm and for the collar I folded some blue felt accordion style and then snipped and tacked it until it fit just right :)

But he still looked incomplete. He needed a scroll and a watch since in the movie he is always checking it and yelling out he was late but I didn't want them to be flat pieces to my puzzle by using felt or more embroidery. So I hit the second hand shops until I could find an old wrist watch that was dainty enough to be his pocket watch :) I wrapped & glued some embroidery floss around a scroll made of some stiff handmade paper I had from scrapbooking and then stitched it and the dangling watch head beneath it to finish my white rabbit creation :)

I'm pretty darn pleased with how he turned out and the last little touch I added was to paint the ecru colored muslin with a bit of light blue paint in irregular strokes to give him a bit of a whimsical look. The kids actually thought that it looked a bit like he was flying and I thought that was perfect since Alice had fallen down a rabbit hole.... perhaps my white rabbit was on his way flying through his rabbit hole as well *grin*.

Such a fun swap!! If you want to see more of what others made for their swap partners you can check out the flickr group here and have fun watching the new Alice in Wonderland movie this weekend! We're definitely going and I can't wait :)

~ Rosina

Valentine Paper Bag Books

We're seriously obsessed with Valentine crafts this year! Today we made super easy paper bag books and filled them with little love notes :)

If you have never made a paper bag book you've got to try it and they can be used for scrapbooking, homeschool projects, personalized for special gifts like our Valentine's book and so much more. Basically all you need is standard paper bag lunch bags and a stapler. After that it's up to you as to how fancy or simple you want to make them.



We took 3 paper bags, stacked them all on top of each other with the open ends all at the same end and then folded them in half like one giant paper from top to bottom creating a little booklet. To secure them together I used my stapler and put 3 staples parallel to the fold down the length of the book.



I really cheated for the front of the book *grin*. The pretty red heart paper that it is covered with is actually a napkin! We picked them up at the dollar store for our upcoming Valentine's party and I opened one fully and cut off a square, gluing it on for the background. Worked out fabulously layered with the little red & white heart for the title of the book!!!

Gotta love cheap crafting *wink*.

Making heart templates using one of our cookie cutters we traced 5 hearts in white cardstock and 5 hearts in the red cardstock. I made sure to cut the red heart out about a 1/4 of an inch larger than the tracing line so that it would create a nice color contrast behind the white heart.

We glued in each of the layered hearts only on the left hand side of each set of open pages so that it created fun little spaces to draw happy pictures :)

A paper bag book made with 3 bags will create 3 little pockets on the edge of your book for hiding little notes or trinkets inside. Since ours is a Valentine booklet we decided to use the little pockets for love notes *grin*. Taking a sheet of white cardstock I cut it up into 3.5" x 4" rectangles and then we stapled on bright colored ribbons to the narrow end of the rectangle creating a little pull tab for our notes.

I just love how cute it turned out with the staggered ribbons hanging out the side of the book. And if I think it's cute then you know my 6 year old is over the moon with how it's coming together! LOL

The final touches were for her to actually write her little love notes to be tucked inside :) I helped her by writing down the sentences she wanted to write and then she copied them herself onto the card stock.

You'll have to wait to see her finished drawings on the little heart frames inside as they are 'top secret' and mama is not allowed to see them until Valentine's Day *grin*. Have fun making a little booklet of your own!

~ Rosina

Flickr Favorites ~ Hearts

1. Sweeter Love, 2. My heart is yours (365/280), 3. Ispahans, 4. Corazón partio (39/365)

Valentine's day is just around the corner :) We've been bustling around making valentine cards, little felt hearts with 'I ♥ You' embroidered on them and planning our valentine tea party that we have every year.



So much fun, and I was excited this morning because our little 'I ♥ You' felt hearts were featured on Sew Mama Sew's blog today in a Valentine craft round up :)

I'd love to know what special things do you do on Valentine's Day?

Want to share your flickr favorites to? Visit Mitsy over at Artmind and join in the fun!

~ Rosina

Valentine's Garland ~ 'Sew' Easy To Make!

We are totally into Valentine's Day mode around here! I know it's a little bit early but if we don't do it now we may not do it at all *grin*. I love paper garland and thought it would be so much fun to make a Valentine themed one.

I made some quick cardboard templates of X's, O's, hearts & kissy lips. Of course we had to have big kissy lips to go with our X's & O's which if you aren't familiar are for kisses & hugs. Perfect for Valentine's day :) I made the templates out of an empty cereal box and traced them onto construction paper and then my little crafty helper, L, cut them all out for me :) Kids and scissors just seem to go hand in hand so this was one fun project.

Then came the fun part for mom :) I took each piece, repeating them in a pattern and sewed them all together with the sewing machine. So easy!! I mean there is no work involved. The machine stitches through them without any trouble and as I finished each one I gently pulled it and the thread out in equal intervals between each piece.

Done :) We swapped the kitchen curtain and put up a fun red gingham one, hung our newly made valentine garland & added some cute little tin birdies that I attached to the curtain to :)

It is so stinking cute and anyone can make this! Have fun creating one of your own :)

~ Rosina