Just Add Stickers

I don't usually start setting up my fairy garden until May or sometimes June, depending on the weather but this year we had an unseasonably warm April so I set it up early this year. Over the years I have shared the different incarnations of my fairy garden. This year it looks similar to other years that we've lived in this house. I like my little spot next to the front door. It adds some whimsy to the front of our house.  My new addition this year is this slate "welcome to our gnome" sign. I made a small slate sign that read "gnome sweet gnome" a number of years ago. It has survived through many seasons and has a bit of character now but it still looks good. I haven't decided if I am going to replace the little one with this big one or simply have two. Can you ever really have too many gnome signs? Oh, my husband says yes!  I made my new gnome welcome gnome sign on a slate shingle given to me by a friend. It used to b...

The week leading up to Easter this year we were all sick. We weren't much in the mood for decorating or getting ready for Easter. We're starting to feel better now so Easter Monday we're going to do some Easter crafts and have our Easter celebrations. For anyone else looking for some last minute table decor or an Easter craft this is an easy bunny napkin holder idea. What you need: •Empty paper towel roll  •White and pink construction paper •Eye stickers or googly eyes • Markers •Scissors and glue What to do: 1. Cut the paper towel rolls into 4 equal sections. 2. Cut one peice of white construction paper into 4 strips.  3.Cover the paper towel rolls with the white construction paper strips. Glue as you roll the paper around the roll. 4. Cut 4 bunny head shapes out of the other peice of white construction paper. Draw a bunny face complete with googly eyes and pink ears. Glue the bunny heads on the rolls.  5. Cut 4 hearts out of the pink construction...

I bought a new cookbook for Little Miss and I to cook from together, it's called  C'est moi le chef  (I am the chef.) There are a lot of fun easy recipes for kids and parents. One that stood out to us was a recipe for Lucky Charm cookies. It seemed perfect to make for a St-Patrick's pot-luck brunch we attended last weekend. To give it the look of a pot of gold I served them up in these black Corelle bowls. I accented it with yellow-gold napkins and wrote "pot-o-gold" in chalk crayon. The cookies were a hit and I will definitely make them again.  Happy St-Patrick's Day and happy baking! 

I got the idea for this St-Patrick's day craft from a Valentine's craft I made this year. I was inspired by a heart garland I saw online. It was a garland of hearts which were made of yarn wrapped around cardboard. I tried my hand at it and made a couple of multi-coloured hearts and hung them from the handles of my dinig room hutch. They were very fun and pretty easy to make. Little Miss and her friend had fun making some after school.  I was at the Dollarstore the other day and I found this green and gold yarn. I thought I would use the string technique to make some shamrocks to decorate for St-Patrick's day. What you need: Green yarn 2 equal peices of cardboard  Scissors and a pen What to do: 1. Draw a shamrock shape on the cardboard and cut it out. 2. Trace the 1st shamrock on the 2nd peice of cardboard and cut out the second shamrock. 3. Start wrapping the shapes with the yarn. Hold the end down, you can tape it down to secure it or go over the l...

Nothing says I love you like breakfast food with a face...right? The kids loved these cute food ornaments and I thought they would make a cute Valentine's tree! We used markers, mostly because they would dry faster but I also didn't want to paint over the faces.  Little Man chose the bacon, the egg and the fries, his favorite foods! Little Miss chose the ice cream, macarons and smores, everything sweet. That left me with the drinks and the taco, not a bad combination.  We coloured our food ornaments and I wrote food puns on the backs of the ornaments like, eggstra special, I love you smore and my favorite you bacon me crazy! We hung them on the Valentine's centerpiece that we've had for years. 

Valentine's day is the perfect occasion to DIY something special with the kids or as a surprise for the whole family. These are some of the Valentine's activities, decorations and gifts that we have made over the years. We loved making these countdow to Valentine's Day calendars.  These are a cute craft to make with the little ones. We made these Valentine's decor bowls when Little Man was 4 years-old. I remember it being a fun activity.  I made this Lego heart shapped box for Little Man back in 2016. For someone who us not an avid Lego builder, I am pretty proud of this creation and it is still around the house. This is a Valentine's letter association activity that I made with Little Miss before she started Kindergarten. It was a cute little activity to do together while practicing her letter recognition. 

Last year I read 15 books and listened to 45 audiobooks. I kept track of my reads in my Happy Planner. This year I decided to make my own reading journal and of course Little Miss wanted to make one as well.  We chose two blank notebooks. I chose a hard cover notebook that I got for my birthday. Little Miss chose a black and white floral notebook. We chose these three colours of vinyl to print out stickers and labels for our journals.  Along with my vinyl cricut stickers and labels I used old book pages as accents. This is the opening page of my reading journal. Some other pages that I added were: to be read, wish list, books read. One of my favorite pages has the quote "my weekend is booked" surrounded by book shelves with months under each one. My plan is to draw the number of books that I read each month.  Little Miss' reading journal is already well-loved. She has started colouring the journal, she makes lists in her reading jou...