Pipe Cleaner Painting

For today's project I twisted up some pipe cleaners for some painting fun.
First off we headed to the dollar store for supplies.

Poster board - check!
Paint - check!
Pipe cleaners - check!

All for less than $5. I love dollar stores!

The paint was a little on the dry side so I just emptied the paint into some plastic cups and mixed with some water.

I then took color coordinating pipecleaners and twisted them together to make a star looking thing.

From there let the kiddos paint. :)

They turned out really cute!

Until next time.
C.

Salty Fireworks

The kids have been asking to do projects every single day.  So today I finally got my butt in gear and set one up.  I thought we better stick with a 4th of July theme.  I have been itchin' to start on Christmas projects.  I have already started on my Christmas Binder.  I have ordered several gifts and started on planning.  Crazy I know. Christmas in July will begin in the next week or so and I am so excited.

But that will have to wait.  We are working on 4th of July!

You will need:

Black construction paper

white glue

salt

food coloring - red and blue

straw or medicine dropper

small cups with water to add food coloring to



Start by drawing your fireworks with the glue.

 

Cover your glue with salt.  Make sure all glue is cover and be very careful when pouring off the excess salt.



Next you will need to use the straw/dropper to suck up the colored water and drop onto the salt.  Do this until you are satisfied with the colors.

They look like crazy colorful spiders!  LET THEM DRY!!  Very important!

 

Finished products!  These are pretty neat.  The kids had a blast making them!  

Weighted Blanket

So here I go again sounding like a broken record but we have been so busy!  After work we head to the baseball field and are there until almost dark and then home for baths and bed and really not enough time for anything else.  If you were to walk into my house it would look like a bomb went off.  Having a hard time catching up on things.  Baking is on the back burner until I have more time.  Hoping(fingers crossed here) to have some things cooking this weekend. Dinners the last few days have been super quick and easy and I have already shared them.  :)




Today I am going to share with you something I have been working on in between everything else, a weighted blanket. :) RAD has been using a weighted vest at school since last year and it seems to help him and he liked it.  A few weeks ago his team said they were going to try a weighted blanket for him and went ahead and ordered one for school.  His OT suggested that since I am a crafty person to see if I could make one for him.  So off to Pinterest I went in search of tutorials.  So many different ways and suggestions I sat down and drew out how I wanted it to turn out. 

That weekend we went to Wal-Mart and found some fabric but no poly pellets. I wanted this blanket to feel like a blanket and not just a sack of beads.  I chose flannel and a Cars fabric and some batting for the middle.  Looking for poly pellets were a bit difficult with our limited access to craft stores. 

Ebay to the rescue again!  I found 10lbs of virgin poly pellets.  I needed exactly 10lbs so this was a perfect fit.  The shipping was free and I received them in 2 days.  Fantastic!!  These little pellets are so much fun to play with. :)



I set out my fabric and batting and began to sew together when I quickly noticed something wasn't right.  Can you see in the picture below?  Told you I was tired!



I still can't believe I did this.  I sewed 2 sides before I figured it was wrong.  Not a happy mom.  I put it down and came back later.  I then layered the fabric correctly. Flannel, Cars and batting.  Then sewed around 3 edges making an inside out sleeping bag.

After sewing turn right side out and iron the edges. 

Since I had 10lbs of pellets I didn't have to weigh out the exact measurements for each square. 

The easiest way I figured to do this was to see how many cups of pellets I had and from there I measured out the blanket to see how many squares I would have.  Totally confusing so sorry!  I had 30 cups of pellets.  I measured out the blanket and figured 6 squares by 10 squares with a 1/2 cup of pellets in each square.  Does that make sense? 

First I measured out the blanket and sewed 5 tunnels going down the length of the blanket.   In each tunnel I poured 1/2 cup of pellets and pushed them all the way to the bottom of the blanket.  I poured the pellets between the cars print and the batting. I then sewed across the top to secure them in their own little square.  I continued this all the way until you get to the top of blanket.    

Finish top of blanket and trim off all excess treads and you have a weighted blanket.

I am no where near perfect with this.  I bought 2 yards of each fabric and trimmed them up.  I measured out the squares as best as I could with those little pellets moving around in there.  I think this came out great and am very curious to see how he does with it.  We shall see tonight. 

Until next time.

C. 

*Posted from my other blog: duranbabies.blogspot.com

Shorts Update

Shorts are coming along. I have had a bit of an issue with sewing on the fabric strip due to the fact they are small shorts! :) on the smaller shorts with the black fabric I sewed the legs together. Twice!! :)

I think they are turning out great! I have 3 more to go.

Until next time.
C.

Shorts Project

No not a short project but a shorts project.  I don't know about you all but my kiddos grow like little weeds.  We have a hard time keeping them in pants and shoes.  There is nothing I can do about the shoes but there is something I can do with all those pants that become high waters.  Turn them into shorts.  I found this tutorial from a genius woman!  I have followed her blog for years and she has some great ideas.


I went and cleaned out BAD's drawers and found 5 pairs of jeans that are either too short on her or have holes in the knees.  So over the next week I will be posting a play by play of how they are turning out. 


Until next time.
C.

Don't forget to check my other blog for some gluten free goodies!

Bed Side Table

I have been searching for a bed side table for RADs room for a while now. He needs it because I am tired of finding water bottles on the floor. Well that might not be the whole truth but it is partly true.
Last week I came across a yard sale on a Tuesday. I found that strange. :) Anyway I found a small table for $5. Happy mom!
It was not the color I wanted. I forgot to take a before picture. But I did remember while painting primer. It was that out dated fake wood kind of table. So I painted it black. Not glossy but flat. I spray painted the handles a silver. It came out nice. Not perfect by any means but it fits right in. No more water on the floor!

Until next time.
C.