More Crafts to Welcome Baby

Baby showers are so much fun! Here are some of the other little goodies I made in preparation for my friend's shower. I love making diaper cakes. I chose a pretty big topper for this one, so I used a whole box of Costco diapers. Do you want a little peek at what's inside? It's my secret weapon: a roll of paper towels! A large stretchy band keeps the diapers in place while I position them around the paper towel roll and then tie ribbons around each layer to hold them together. for the top layer I used an empty roll that I wedged inside the roll below to form a sturdy center for the top layer.

For favors, we made these pretty candles. The tulle rounds that you get in the wedding section wouldn't quite wrap around the whole candle, but my friend Heather suggested tying them with a little ruffle of tulle sticking up and she was right, they looked darling!

Mix and Match Phrases
One of my favorite Stamp sets is Ordinary Greetings. It is so versatile. To customize phrases further, I cut the words apart to make a whole new phrase! See how the original phrases were "Oh Baby" and "Welcome to the Family". I was able to stamp "To Welcome Baby," which worked perfectly for my cake tag. Gotta love unmounted stamps! I used the same greeting set for the candle tag, along with another versatile set, Mini Occasions. Between those two sets, you could make greetings for almost any event!

Quick N Easy Watercolor Pencil Tutorial

Semi-Hand-Stamped Strikes Again!
Are you the crafty one among your friends who gets elected to help with things like shower invitations? Of course you are! And do you love every minute of it? Sure, but, you are a busy gal. So start with some of Mabelle's beautiful stamps from The Angel Company. She has seven new sets! Her coloring is so beautiful. You'll definitely want to check out her colored samples and emulate her style for the card that will be presented with your gift.

Now, back to those invitations. You have to go Quick & Easy! Start with some inexpensive cards (like these) that you can run through your computer for the invitation details and add a special touch with Watercolor Pencils. They are really easy to use. Check out this video for some tips. (Click Here if the video doesn't appear.)

Get the Goods
Click on the item name and add these basics to your shopping cart:
Prismacolor H2O Pencils
Dove Blender Pen
Refill Solution
Gray Tombow Marker
Crystal Stickles

NEW! Special Delivery Stamp Set
The set used in my sample was discontinued (R2000 Special Delivery), but it is my favorite and I love it. (Check ebay!)

Are you loving the Semi-Homemade idea? Click here to see more!

Valentine Boxes

Do your kids make boxes to bring to class for their valentines? Here's what my girls and I came up with last night. Katelyn's is made out of a frozen waffle box and some extra cereal box for the rounded top. It's reminiscent of the street corner type mailbox. Isn't the flap cute?
{Instructions below!}





Lily's preschool class has six students, so this cereal box turned ipod is just the right size. Katelyn gave me the idea to make earbuds out of two foam hearts stuck together. Isn't she a paper crafting genius? I wonder where she gets that from?




So here are instructions on how I made the Valentine Mailbox:

Happy Valentine's day!