Finding Inspiration for 2015!

Happy New Year! I'm so excited that 2015 is finally here and I can take some time to focus on re-balancing my life:) I'm determined to get more creative in 2015 - I miss it so much - so I've signed up for photography classes and I've also signed up for the amazing Donna Downey's Inspiration Wednesday classes (Donna's blog here!).

Some structure will really help me put time aside to invest in my creative journey and Donna has always been such a positive catalyst for me. I'm excited. Happy New Year and I hope that you are putting time aside for whatever it is that you love too!

Diaper Cake

A baby shower is a great excuse to make a diaper cake! It was my second attempt (and first for a girl) and I was really happy with how it came out :)

To make one you need about 100 plain white diapers, ribbon, a cake board, cake dowels to stabilize the whole thing and lots of elastic bands. Oh and about 4-5 hours and lot of patience :)

I didn't follow any kind of pattern - I just found building groups of 9 or so easiest...

Once you are done with construction, you can cover the elastic bands with ribbons and hair accessories and some fun turrets and flags...

It looked lovely on the cupcake table :)

Getting back into the zone :)

It's been a long time since I did anything remotely creative and I miss it so much! I did embellish a couple of T-shirts for Maddy though last week. I thought they came out really well :)

Maddy's shelf

Maddy has done such a beautiful job of her desk shelf decorations for her bedroom...

 

 

So cute!!

Memory Mason Jar

Maddy made this adorable little project at the weekend. It's a mason jar with a decorated tag and colored post-it notes inside with her favorite memories so far for the year. At New Year she plans to open it up and read them:)

Maddy's Pillow



Maddy is so creative! She found this idea on line and did such a beautiful job of it first time!

 

 

She is full of creative ideas for her bedroom. This year is going to be exciting - I'll keep a camera handy:)

My painted owl pumpkin :)

I love all things Alisa Burke at the moment :). Her blog is jam-packed full of creative inspiration (link here!) and I was lucky enough to attend one of her classes a couple of years ago and she's a really nice person too :). She did a fantastic post this year linking past pumpkin tutorials (link here!) and they are all so totally gorgeous! I really like the idea of a pumpkin that lasts a bit longer than just for Halloween so I painted one this year and I'm going to see how long it survives as a table decoration outside.

Mike gives it a week :)

Cards and more cards...

Been making tons of new cards lately...

 

The pinwheels are my favorite!

No sew knotted blankets

Inspired by her cousin, Ali, Maddy wanted to make a fleece knotted blanket. Her very first one turned out so beautifully...

 

...that she couldn't wait to make another one with Mya...:)

 

Great job girls!

Bleach painted shoes!

Maddy and I found this craft idea on the amazing Alisa Burke's blog (link here!). I was really thrilled with how mine came out!

 

It was really simple. I bought some imitation TOMS at the local drugstore...

...and doodled on them with a paintbrush dipped in bleach...

 

 

I love them!!

 

Getting my Donna fix!

It's been way too long since I had a class with my artist she-ro Donna Downey (Donna's blog here!). I was so happy that she was going to be in Florida and booked two classes at She Scrapbooks in The Villages to get my fix while I can :). The first class was "Paint like an Artist"...

 

I was really nervous about this class in particular - blank canvases and group settings are really outside of my comfort zone - but I knew Donna would be great as always and help me through...:). 

 

 

The whole process of adding layers upon layers was really fun and I went from this...

 

 

...to this!!

 

 

I love my piece and the experience was really rewarding and liberating. I can't wait to try this out with Madison and it's a great way to repurpose old canvases too :)

 

 The next class in the afternoon was "PanPastel Painting"...

 

 

This class was really different and I got to try out a whole new medium. PanPastels will definitely be something I'll work with again. I love how they blend and the colors are so vibrant...

 

 

Thank you to my family for making arrangements to make sure that I could be there and get my creative fill. And of course to the amazing Donna for being a constant source of inspiration :)

Happy Father's Day!

Weekend Craftfest!

I had a great weekend with Madison making art for her bedroom. She made this absolutely beautiful tree and I added the word...inspire...

 

I was also inspired by how much I don't want to spend $180 on art work from PB Teen and I thought I'd have a go at this one myself...

 

 

We picked the word "dream" (since we have a stamp for that:)) and filled a canvas that we had painted white...

 

 

We painted the middle section with some more white, and brushed the dust off the cricut and used the letters as a stencil...

 

And for the third picture we used a deer stencil inspired by the fabulous Christy Tomlinson (Christy's blog here)! We arranged the final collection on the top of Maddy's desk. Look how fantastic it looks!!...

 

 

Cheaper, better and so much more rewarding than a trip to the mall. And great bonding time too. Such a lovely, craftsy day :)

Recycled cards!

I'm determined to make all of the family birthday cards for this year. For the latest batch I used exclusively offcuts of paper - I always feel so proud when I've been able to make treasure out of trash and I love how these came out :)

 

Home sweet home...

I love our new home and can't beleive it's been six months since we moved already. On the one hand, I feel like I've lived here forever - on the other I still walk around in awe that I am lucky enough to wake up every day in this beautiful home. I really need to start putting art on the walls now that most of the basics are taken care of - but before I do that I wanted to make a little something to remember our first proper home by. The place where our baby took her first steps, where we danced to Frank Sinatra on Saturday mornings. My soft place to fall for over 12 years...

I got the idea from somewhere on Pinterest - can't remember where so forgive me for not giving proper credit where it's due. It's a cute idea, right? I'll never forget you Tremont Drive:)