My Faith and Creativity

This past weekend I had the great privilege as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints to watch and listen to the leaders of our church speak to us as they do twice every year in a conference. The Saturday before we had a chance of women of our church to have a special meeting dedicated to the needs and issues we have as women. President Dieter F. Uchtdorf who is the second counselor in the first presidency gave a wonderful talk titled Happiness, Your Heritage. I think of all the talks I heard the past couple of weeks this talk has stuck with me the most. He talked so much about creativity so I decided to post a couple of thoughts from this talk here on my craft blog (since this is a blog of mine dedicated to my creativity) I'm just going to post a couple of my favorite snippets from his talk.

Everyone can create. You don’t need money, position, or influence in order to create something of substance or beauty.
Remember that you are spirit daughters of the most creative Being in the universe
Your spirit body is a masterpiece, created with a beauty, function, and capacity beyond imagination
The bounds of creativity extend far beyond the limits of a canvas or a sheet of paper and do not require a brush, a pen, or the keys of a piano. Creation means bringing into existence something that did not exist before—colorful gardens, harmonious homes, family memories, flowing laughter.
As you take the normal opportunities of your daily life and create something of beauty and helpfulness, you improve not only the world around you but also the world within you.
True words of encouragement require only a loving and caring heart but may have an eternal impact on the life of those around you.
As spirit daughters of our Heavenly Father, happiness is your heritage.

Apron Pics

Some pictures I sent to Kristyn for the boutique. Thanks Heather and Lacy for being my gorgeous models. I'm just getting more and more excited!

Making Wreaths

Heather had such a good idea to make our own Holiday wreaths. It was so fun! We went to Michael's while Lacy was at pre-school today and got all our supplies. I decided I wanted to make one for the cute wreath stand my Mother in Law got me and one for the front door.

For the one I put on the stand, which is on my kitchen table, we got plain stick wreaths and decorated them with berry garland, yummy smelling pine cones, little pumpkins, leaves, etc. I LOVE the way they turned out.

I took all the extra yummy smelling pine cones, and some other pumpkins I got and put them in this awesome parfait dish I got. I love the way it looks and props to me for thinking outside the box and using the parfait dish- now hopefully I wont suddenly have the urge to make a parfait for a few months!

The one I put out on the front door I copied from Andrea . The only difference was that when I was done I covered mine in modge-podge. I'm sure it doesn't look as good but I am hanging mine on my front door and I wanted it to withstand the heat, cold, rain, etc. I just thought it made it a little more weather-proof. Thanks Andrea for the cute idea, I told you I would do it... and blog it :) I also love the way this one turned out. Plus I put these two cute Halloween bells in the middle of them for the Halloween season.

I LOVE THE FALL!!!

Shout out!

I posted about the aprons earlier, but I failed to say who showed me the ropes and taught me how to make these beautiful fun aprons. I blogged about it on my blog... but not here. My beautiful, talented sister Chantal taught me all I know about sewing aprons. She is such a good and fun teacher and I am so grateful for her showing me how. When I went to Cali a couple weeks ago we had so much fun staying up late getting our craft on. Thanks Chantal for sharing your talents and not hiding your light under a bushel. You definitely let your light shine and you brighten the world around you! LOVE YOU!!

How to make your own dress form

I have been wanting a dress form lately, but they are super expensive! I found this awesome blog that showed how to make your very own. http://etsylabs.blogspot.com/2007/03/dress-form-tutorial-want-to-make-exact.html check it out! Well I've been making lots of little girl things, so I decided to start small and make a little girl dress form. Especially since I have a beautiful willing little girl.

Step 1: A Happy Model
Step 2: Put on a big T-Shirt you dont mind ruining
Step 3: Wrap up to the bust (not as important on a small child since they arent quite as shapely).. but if you are doing it on an adult woman, stop just below chest and then start taping vertically.
Step 4: Be sure to wrap around neck and arms. Try to keep it super tight with no gaps
Step 5: Make sure you have the back done nicely so you have a nice shape once its off
Step 6: With a permanent marker, mark the center of the front and back and around the waist.
Step 7: Carefully cut up the back and center of the form, cut the shirt
Step 8: Carefully remove form and re-tape up the back
Step 9: With cardboard cute out circles for the bottom, arms and neck of bust

Step 10: Make sure your model is happy
Step 11: Stuff your bust with old fabric, styrofoam peanuts, whatever!

note: I also took some cardboard and made a little neck. This is certainly not perfect but remember, it was my FIRST! The etsylabs tutorial is much better than mine. Thanks for the tips and tricks! I love that I now have an exact form of Lacy's size. It is going to make making halloween costumes, dresses, skirts, etc. much easier than measuring, fitting, sizing, etc. with this on hand!

Crafting with Clarissa

Clarissa and I had a couple of really fun craft days I though I would blog about. (of course!) The first day she came over and made bows for her little Avery and I sewed aprons for the upcoming botique. We had a ton of fun, as always. Lacy got to color on her easel, which she loved and Hugo played blissfully in anything we would drop on the floor. It was a wonderful afternoon of doing things I love with someone I love to be with!

This is one of my favorite little girl aprons I did that day!The next day we crafted, it started wtih Clarissa and I running lots of errands together while she waited for her car to be fixed. After running errands we had some time to kill so we did something else we both love... we BAKED! We baked some yummy red velvet cake in the shape of hearts. It was fun and both Logan and Shawn loved the treats we made for them. Lacy loves to bake too, cracking eggs, stiring and most of all, putting sprinkles on! Hugo took a nice long nap while we did it all!

Socks

As if you can't tell...

My main goal as a crafter is to be able to do all that I love, creativly, while still including my kids and making it fun for all of us.

I am trying to get things ready to sell all The Tattered Trunk Boutique (check it out!) coming up this November and have been having so much fun doing it. This past week I worked on these cute little socks my beautiful mother taught me how to do. This one is way too hard to explain. I think you need a mother/grandmother or friend to show you how! My grandmother always made these beautiful socks and I love keeping her memory alive by making beautiful things I know she would love.

To get Lacy involved this time I put some cheap big beads on sylcaone baking mat (so the beads would sit still and not roll all over the place) on a cookie sheet and some pipe cleaners and let her make some fun easy jewlrey. I love using pipe cleaners because the beads dont fall off- the fuzz keeps them on, and the wire makes it so your little one doesn't need a needle. We both had a lot of fun playing with beads making beautiful things.. and I got about 15 pairs of socks done!

Painting for the kiddos!

I was trying to get some painting done for a project I was doing and Lacy just was driving me nuts! She wanted into everything, as usual, to do what Mommy is doing... so I improvised. I had these 2 plain wood magazine holders, some washable crayola paints, and a sleeping baby. While Hugo napped I got a wax-paper lined cookie sheet and put spots of crayola paint and a couple paint brushes and let Lacy have at it. I knew all the paints would wash out if they got on the table, floor, clothes, hands, or pretty much anywhere else Lacy could think of. I love these paints- we have used them for so many things. Face painting, poster painting, etc. It was a fun craft and now Lacy has a new fun place to put the Princess magazines that Grandma gets for her.

Perfect! Plus I got some stuff of my own done and we could have some good quality Mommy-Lacy time while we painted together!

Freezer Paper Stencils

I found this awesome craft and it is SO MUCH FUN! Making freezer paper stencils and painting shirts. If you buy Reynolds Freezer paper, it actually has directions on the box. I thoroughly enjoyed it and will certainly be doing this more often!

The Freezer Paper comes in this HUGE roll so it will last a long time.
I actually cut 8 1/2 X 11 pieces and found clip art online (free at Microsoft online) and printed right on the paper. (the papery side, NOT the glossy side!) Then i took my X-Acto knife and my cutting mat and cut out the images i liked. Be sure to save the image and reverse image for 2 different looks when painting. Then get the image you want situated where you want on what you are painting onGet your iron nice and hot (and dry) and iron the paper onto the shirt. Be sure if you have printed from the computer that you use a sheet of paper in between. BELIEVE ME I learned this the hard way! The ink from the paper will get onto your iron and then onto your shirt and make a big mess. If you don't want to print from the computer you can just draw right on the paper any image you want!
Get some fabric paint and a good paint brush. If you don't want to buy separate fabric paint you can use acrylic paint. It will just make your fabric kind of hard. You can use a painting medium to make it the right consistency. Just be sure to heat set your image.
Voila- the finished product. I LOVE the way they turned out. It was actually a pretty quick process. I really enjoyed it. YOU SHOULD DEFINITELY TRY IT, You'll be hooked!

I'm going to take some buttons and other accessories and dress them up a little more. Maybe some leaves on the trees, who knows!

Be creative and have fun!

My Craft Cupboard

My mom always teases that my sister Charmaine has a messy house with beautifully clean, organized closets... and that I have a clean house with disastrous, un-organized closets. Well I have been wanting and wanting to get my craft cupboard organized for a long time and I just haven't had the motivation. I wish Charmaine was here to help me get organized. Well with my calling, my hobbies, all the things I'm asked to do and want to do.. it was time!! I had my mom and my mother in law both come over for a joint effort in getting me organized. I really wish I would have taken a before picture, because it was a huuuuge improvement. My cupboard was exploding to all parts of the kitchen.

I am soo pleased with the results. Everything is so easy to find and looks great. I have my fabrics where I can see them, all my drawers have themes, kids crafts, flowers, ribbons, baby stuff, beads, etc. I just love that I don't have to un-load the whole cupboard to find what I'm looking for.

Thanks so much for the help! I truly needed it!!