Crafty time + Crayons = Happy Girl

I saw this project on one of my favorite blogs and knew that I HAD to make it. Apparently this melted crayon art is all over Pinterest, which I have yet to play on because I know I'll never leave my laptop.

Last weekend, I headed to Wal-Mart for a deal on Crayola Crayons, because they are the only acceptable brand of crayons. If you are a parent who shops for school supplies, please don't send your kid to school with Rose Art supplies ... they just don't do the trick! Jill came with me because she saw the link and also wanted to make some art for her classroom!

We each bought a box of 64 and an additional box of 48 for this project. We picked out the pretty colors ... who knew there are so many versions of brown in a box of crayons?

Jill went with blues, purples, white and a few reds. I went with a rainbow of colors, primarily pink. Are you surprised? After we picked out enough crayons, we carefully hot-glued them to the canvases. I had canvases left over from a previous crafty project that I ended up hating. The canvases were about 18x24 inches. We used painter's tape to line them up straight when gluing. About 1/4 inch was left between the top of the crayons and the edge of the canvas.

LOTS of crayons ... glued on our canvases. At first, I thought I wanted to glue my crayons with the color names facing out, but Jill & I decided that the Crayola label facing out added some interesting graphics to the art.

And here comes the hard part. Get a friend to hold your canvas upright. Use your hair dryer on HIGH heat and LOW air flow to heat up the crayons. The papers will start to glisten & then you'll see the tips of the crayons start to drip, drip, drip onto the canvas. I started on one side and melted about 8 crayons at a time. They will start to melt, and you can get them to melt more or less depending on how much you put the hair dryer on them. The entire canvas took about 35-45 minutes to get it looking the way I wanted it.

Then, it was Jilly's turn. This was when she said to me, "Betsy. Even your hair dryer is pink!" :) Her crayons were glued onto the canvas vertically, so she wanted them to drip a bit more/longer than mine did. We realized it is boring to be the "holder" of the canvas, but it is a lot of fun to watch the crayons melt right before your eyes.

My finished product! I'm pretty pleased with it. That brown-looking crayon in the middle of the oranges is actually gold. It didn't look as pretty as I thought it would :( Oh well! It's the first time I've done this.

I took it to school on Monday and hung it up in my room. My students oooooh'd and aaaaah'd over it. Lots of fun & I have a feeling a few of them might tackle this project at home, too!

Craftpalooza

Kathryn, Jill & I planned to have a crafty weekend. Jill worked on her dishcloths for her giveaway contest. Kathryn came to create a cookie sheet calendar similar to the one I made a few years ago. Here is a picture review of the process!

Ta da! All done! It took me an ENTIRE Spring Break to complete my calendar and with our hard work, we finished Kat's in just under 4 hours. We even have an idea for our next crafty project. Love craft time with the girls :)

Tie-Dying is NOT for perfectionists!

What? You don't think I'm a perfectionist? I guess I don't think I am either ... but when it comes to crafty things, I don't have a lot of patience with a difficult learning curve.

When I want to start a new craft, I jump all in! I buy all the materials at once. I think this new craft will become my new favorite hobby & it's okay to spend all my time and money on it. P.S. DON'T ever look in my craft closet at all the yarn, stamps, scrapbook supplies and paint that haven't been touched for months.

When Mom taught me how to knit, I learned, but that was it. Just knitting. Don't ask me to turn my stitches around to purl. Don't ask me to read directions. Don't ask me to follow a pattern.

Then I thought I could easily pick up crocheting in a short amount of time to make a baby blanket for Molly when she was already about 5 months pregnant. I became so frustrated with my hands that were stuck in knitting mode and I almost stabbed myself with my crochet hook. That was the end of my crochet craft time. It's a good thing Mom convinced me NOT to buy the yarn & pattern books I wanted to when I first walked into Michael's.

And here we are to the new (to me) craft portion of this story.

Jill mentioned that she had tie-dyed some t-shirts with her yearbook students as a fun end-of-the-year activity. She then bought a few tie-dye kits since summer was quickly approaching. I've never tie-dyed before ... or if I have, I don't remember it.

We FINALLY found time to get together for a belated birthday BBQ and to try out our dying skills. Adam was our resident expert since he was apparently a tie-dying fool in his former life :) Jill pulled out all the dyes and a giant handful of rubber bands. And we were off!

Jilly & Mitz working hard to get the perfect twists & bands on their shirts.

Adam & Heather, doing more of the same.

Here I am with finished product #1. Leggings for Ellen. My title refers to the fact that I had a VERY difficult time understanding that there is no right or wrong way to band up your fabric. There also was a serious amount of dye mixing! COLORS MIXING UP! Me no likey! I like things to be just so! I used yellow & blue on her pants with the hopes they would mix up just a bit to form some green bands.
This is the second shirt I made, and I did a bulls-eye pattern for Jill's shirt.

Here's all our equipment. It was messy ... also something I don't like. Good thing Jilly came prepared with gloves. That is my other tank top in the ziploc baggie on the bottom left of the picture.

Jill was dressed for the evening. This is the shirt she made with her yearbook kids. She had great tips for us after seeing how her first shirt came out: wet your shirt, because the dye seems to soak in better, and continue to squeeze dye on the fabric, even when you think you are done, because the insides need to get color, too! This picture also shows her breaking Adam's cardinal rule ... and cutting the rubber bands off BEFORE her shirt had dried! She gave it about an hour.

I think it came out great! She then was able to hang in on their clothesline to dry over night.

Here are my finished products:

Ellen's leggings. I'm hoping she'll grow at some point in the future so she can wear them! They are pretty cute with the ruffles on the bottom. I wished I had picked other colors, because I didn't realize the yellow would be that bright. I also thought the colors wouldn't mix as much as they did. The biggest challenge will be finding a shirt to match these pants.

And here's the tank-top I made for myself. I haven't washed it since it's dried, but I LOVE the way the pattern came out!

Not too bad for my first attempts at tie-dying, huh? Who wants to join us for round two?

DIY project to stop the cold from coming in

Have you heard? It's cold in Kansas. REALLY cold. So cold, that some of the high temperatures this week are in the single digits.

I have an entire wall full of windows in my dining room. In the summer, the late afternoon sun beats in and my condo gets quite hot. In the winter, I've noticed there is a draft that comes through the windows and cools down this first floor of my condo.

Just last week, I folded up some fleece I had left over from Minnie's Fleecy Toys to cover the drafty spots. I should have done that earlier because I think it has made a difference. Then, I got an itch to make something ... as I often do. I wanted to make my own cute, draft blockers.

Molly had the great idea to use fun, patterned tights ... and that would make this project a no-sew project, which is always a good idea!

So, with $10 worth of tights (2 pair from Marshall's for $5 each), $12 worth of rice (4, 5-pound bags of rice from Deal$) and about 30 minutes, I have 4 new window draft blockers. I did buy another pair of tights to make 2 door draft blockers, but I ran out of rice. Who knew that it would take so much?

Here are the pictures that show the process:

Here is a link to the directions & details that I uploaded on a DIY instructional site, WIDWI - What I Did With It: http://www.widwi.com/widwi.php?item=203

No pictures! No pictures!

Ellen is already aware of the paparazzi ... now that she's famous!

In case you didn't hear, Ellen was the Grand Prize winner of the Kansas City Star's Cutest Costume contest. Say that three times fast. Molly got the call early today and by the time we got home from shopping & running errands, they had already posted the news online!

Check out this screen cap. There is our little salmon sushi roll ... on the front page of the KansasCity.com website! The other winners had some GREAT costumes, too!

Thanks to all of you that voted for her online. I'm not sure how Ellen will top her first Halloween, but I bet Molly already has some idea in the works! :)

Best Sushi In Town???

Okay ... that's not really what we are voting on, but we are voting on who was the Best Dressed Kiddo in KC this Halloween!

Miss Ellen is one of the 166 entries in the latest KC Star contest.

She would LOVE to win and she's begging you for her vote! :)

Here's the scoop:

• She is submission #139 out of 166 of KC's best dressed kids. {You should seriously check out her competition. Some of the pictures are so blurry you can't even tell if it's a pic of a child or a magazine picture! Ellen has a real chance to win!}

• The winner is the photo with the most number of votes. Voting is open from Wednesday, November 4th at 5:00am - Friday, November 6th at 5:00pm CST, once per day. {It's not too late to get a vote in today!}

• You do have to register on the site to vote (wah, wah, wah). Be sure to check the box to not send any unwanted emails. After the contest, you can send an email to privacy at upickem.net to remove your email from their list.

Here are the links you need:

Click here to REGISTER (it took me a while to get my confirmation email ... don't give up! It will come.)

Click here to VOTE!

The extent of my fall decorations

My glitter crafty project started with the glitter acorns I saw at Curious Sofa last week. I saw them and thought, "I can do that!" as I do quite often. Well, that night, I collected a bag full of acorns from Molly & Erik's backyard.

Then ... I was sick for a week. I didn't have the energy to deal with the acorns I brought home. When I finally opened the bag, I found that all of the acorns were moldy & went straight in the trash.

So, I found pine cones on the ground during my walk with Minnie. I started with just 6 ... and then went to pick up 10 more ... and then found a bag of plastic pumpkins, acorns & squash at Michael's today.

I think they turned out really cute!

I then went in my storage closet to find the rest of my Halloween/fall decorations and they were all housed in that cute Trick or Treat box. So ... I set it all out. I'm not a HUGE fan of Halloween decorations, but I do like these. AND, my fun glitter decor can stay out through Thanksgiving (I think) with maybe some new turkey-inspired decor. Anyone have any ideas?

It's happened so fast!

Tomorrow marks the day that I officially report back to school. This weekend is my 10 year high school reunion. My students (26 this year!) start on Monday. Next week will be crazy while I try & get settled into a routine and then before I can blink, we have Meet the Teacher night on Thursday.

Basically, what I'm saying is that if I didn't see Ellen today, it wasn't going to happen for almost 2 weeks :( She's at the point now, that she's changing so much and doing so many new things ... I don't like to go too long without seeing her because I'll miss something. I know how lucky I am to be able to live 15 minutes away from my niece. My friends that have family across the country ... well, I don't know how they do it! I think Ellen is really starting to recognize me, which makes a really long, crappy day a zillion times better! It may have something to do with the high-pitched, "Ellen! I've missed you! How's my baby?" that I give her every time I walk in the door. That is also paired with waving my arms above my head and clapping for her! Surely she's thrilled to see ME ... not the dog & pony show ... right? ;)

So anyway, tonight Minnie & I went over for dinner, a bit of crafting and to hang out.

Look at this big girl! She doesn't look like much of a baby anymore :(

And look at why she was smiling so big! She's standing up ... almost all on her own! No, she's still not a fan of tummy time, rolling over, or thinking too hard about crawling ... but she seemed to love this! We know that Ellen is the perfect product of her two parents because of her large head & short body. You can't really tell this is the case when she's laying down or sitting up. However, when she stood up for the first time, I couldn't stop laughing because she looks like a little lollipop ... big round head on tiny torso and legs! :)

Here she is chewing on her gums. The poor thing is getting a tooth & you can tell she's feeling it!

Ellen is finally to the age where she likes to hold onto a lovey. She even gets one in bed with her. Molly, if you aren't too careful, she might grow up sleeping with a baby blanket far into high school ... and college ... and her adult life! :)

So excited to see Minnie that she just about flew away! You should have seen her bounce & wave her arms & giggle! Ellen is so stingy with her laughs ... of course, Minnie was the one to get her to squeal time after time after time!

Now you get to see the two of them in action! We know that the girls have played very well together this summer ... however, now Ellen has a love of grabbing things around her. {You should click through to the link above, I'm amazed at how much Ellen has changed in just 2 months!} It's one thing when it's sunglasses or earrings, but Ellen's Mommy was starting to get worried when she was grabbing & pulling on Minnie's muzzle. She's got a pretty strong grasp. We tried to split them up and after a while, Minnie was pretty cautious about getting too close. I guess it's MUCH better that Minnie be afraid of Ellen than the other way around.

Thanks for a GREAT night, Molly, Erik & Ellen! It was the perfect end to a long day ... and it helped me relax before the next few full work days! Hugs & Kisses!

Crafty project for my classroom!

I found that one of my neighbors was getting rid of this rolling shelf, and since I'm an elementary school teacher, I like free stuff that I can use in my classroom. Free furniture is even better!

I went to get some fun contact paper at Home Depot yesterday and then started covering it to make it look a little fresh & new.

About 2 hours later ... and I have this fun piece of furniture to take to school in August! You like?

One of Minnie's favorite field trips

I don't know how she does it, how she knows where we're going ... but as soon as we pull off the 75th Street exit from 69-Highway, Minnie starts panting & standing up to look out the windows. She KNOWS that we are heading towards Aunt Jilly & Uncle Adam's house.

I don't think it's all about visiting her friend, Gracie, but I bet she thinks that one of these days Gracie will actually come out to play. {Keep dreaming, Minners!}


When we turn on one of the back streets to get to their house, she really knows where we're headed and starts with her high-pitched squealing! She is quite obnoxious! Adam & Jill are nice enough to put a water bowl out for Minnie & they don't mind (or at least don't say anything if they do) when she climbs on the back of their couches like a cat.

Today we got there and Jill heard Minnie crying when we were still in the car out in the driveway. She actually tried to jump out of the window I had cracked open about 6 inches. She was so excited that she could barely wait for me to open the car door.



Minnie DID, however, get into a little bit of trouble with Aunt Jilly today. You can tell that she knows she's in trouble because her ears lay back against her head. Minnie likes to jump around from couch to couch at their house and today she continually jumped OVER Jilly's fancy Apple laptop. She hasn't quite figured out that computers are expensive & we stay away from them!

Part of the reason that she was jumping around was because Minnie's boyfriend, Adam wasn't at home yet. She ran in the house to look for him, and he was nowhere to be found! :( Then, he called to say that he was on his way home. We said to her, "Adam is coming home. Where is he?" and she promptly sat on the back of the couch again to watch out the picture window for him to pull in the driveway.

Below is the greeting she gives him EVERY.TIME.SHE.SEES.HIM. I don't even get a greeting like this! Yes, I know the video is sideways. I can't figure out how to turn it, so if anyone knows, let me know. I tried Windows Movie Maker, but Blogger won't upload those videos. You'll just have to turn your head this time to watch!


I hope you all enjoyed your Saturdays, too! This is the beginning of my Spring Break (woo hoo!) and so far, it's off to a great start!

It's that time of year!

Last night was the Annual Cookie Decorating Party for the Wagner family. They've had this party for family & friends for 19 years and I've been lucky to be a part of it since my freshman or sophomore year in high school!

The rules of the party are quite simple. Decorate sugar cookies using any of the many colors of icing you want and any or all of the sprinkles provided! I've won many awards in the past for great cookies:

My "Teacher Set"

I won the Lifetime Achievement Award for this beauty below in 2006.
Here is Miss USA, complete with coke under her nose and a beer bottle in her hand. I've learned that if you decorate a cookie as something big that happened in the news that year, it might hold up in the judging. I also know the judges well (Emilie, Mr. Wagner, Em's bro-in-law & cousin and Mr. Tobin), so that helps.

Last year I won the People's Choice Award for this OK Magazine cover! It took me FOR-EVER! I used toothpicks to place each one of those tiny sprinkles.

Other good cookie entries have been a Plaza skyline, complete with lights, and I've also had great competition. Kristin always goes all out with one cookie that takes her most of the evening. She's made Priest Holmes, Napoleon Dynamite, Coach Mangino, Cat in the Hat, etc, etc, etc. First time contestants are also notorious for winning: Mark's billiards balls & cue, Sandy's 3-D tree, etc.

This year, I came in with very few ideas, which was my problem to start. My entry (see below) made it into the top 20, but then, I was out of the contest. I guess I need to start thinking of ideas for next year's party!

Here we are after all the decorating and awards have come and gone.

This was my one good entry. I also made a gingerbread man missing a leg. There were a few other Obama logos, but mine was the only one with the motto on it.

This is Megan's 1st place winner! Megan is also quite the decorator. She's had many awards in the past with Fruit of the Loom characters, a to-scale KU bball court, and McDonalds fries & burger.

This was Kristin's winning entry for this year. She took my idea to the next level. I think she won 2nd runner up.

Here is a sampling of some of the cookies. Look closely at the Miss Pac Man in the top right, the Mexican-themed entries (this year's party has a Feliz Navidad theme), the other Obama log, and on the bottom right is a hand in a popcorn box.

Here are Kristin, John & Meg decorating.

And Julie pretend eating Mike's 1st entry. This was his first year at the party, and Julie's come-back after several years of being OOT. Mike decided just to pile as many colors of frosting and sprinkles on the cookie as he could.

Kristin was the one who got the pinata to finally crack! No surprise there!

And this is at the end of the evening. I was taking Julie & Mike home, and Matt asked if he could have a ride, too. I told him, "Sure, but I'm not sure that you'll fit!" Turns out, I wasn't too far off. This is why I am never asked to be the driver. Poor Matt was practically eating the windshield and Julie and Mike were packed like sardines in the back seat.