Trophy time

Here is a cool way to repurpose those participation trophies that your kids get at every recital or those old bowling trophies of your grandpa's.

For our Halloween party this weekend, I was recruited to come up with trophies for costume prizes. With a $3 kit of pipe cleaners, wiggly eyes and pom-pom balls and a hot glue gun, I was able to redesign six trophies for the contest.


The top photo shows two trophies, only their bases were the same before - a ballerina. Pretty sneaky for a spider, eh?

Slowly but surely...

A few posts back, I shared the white wingback chairs I bought at a flea market that I intend to recover. Well, I haven't done it yet. But I'm working on it. I've cut away the skirts from the white upholstery, because in the meantime, we're using them around the house. But when my mom came in this weekend, we got to go to Hancock's of Paducah, and I found this upholstery end for just $11 versus the $30-$60 price range if might have come in. It's just a yard, but this will likely be the seat on the chair that stays in our living room as an accent chair. It has the same colors as our rug (blue, green and brown), and will help add some texture since the rug is made of rectangles. Slowly, but surely, I'll get going on this project.

It's also hampered by the budget. Since moving, we've incurred many start up fees and such, so once our bank accounts aren't stretched to the limit, I'll be able to buy more materials and really get to moving.

Happy Crafting!

Farm-friendly invite

When I was home about a month ago, I attended a birthday party for my friend's son. And it was one of the cutest parties ever! He was turning 1, and had a farm theme. Amber made his cake, a Farmall red tractor, then made animals out of balloons, simply by blowing up round balloons and drawing faces on them with a Sharpie (the pink balloon, for instance, had a snout and pointy ears and a tail; the baby chicks were blown-up yellow water balloons. So cute!). Anyway, the best part of her party was her invitation, I thought.




She created these completely by scratch, as in using markers and drawing her own barns (notice the No. 1 for the silo?!). She even printed out her little boy's picture on her computer and put it in the invite. Even the language was fun!