There are two people in my house that love to wear socks, and there are two of us that don’t. My husband and oldest son are the sock wearers. They seem to go through socks so quickly. I am not a fan of socks, and only put them on with sneakers, or in the winter. The rest of time I am barefoot, as is my youngest. I rarely wear out a pair of socks, usually the elastic goes before I wear holes in them. This is not the case for our resident sock wearers, they are constantly wearing through socks. I have been saving them because it seems such a waste to throw them out.

I am also an avid recycler. Pants, shirts, doors, milk jugs, new socks and now even the holey old socks in our house gotten a new lease on life. Meet our newest house guest, “Sunday” the sock snake. He is constructed of mainly of my husband, and eldest son’s holey socks. He is named Sunday because one of the pairs of socks said Sunday on the bottom, so I though that it was fitting. He is also the only snake that I know that has a mustache, or many mustaches.

If you are interested in giving your old socks a new lease on life, check out this tutorial from Grosgrain. I made a couple of alterations to the tutorial with the main one being using quilting batting instead of stuffing. I learned when making sock monkeys that it’s really hard to get the socks stuffed with out having big lumps, so for the snake I used batting. Here are some pictures of my battle with the batting. It was a full body workout to get Sunday stuffed. Now I will need to make a second one because I still have a pile of holey socks.

Whenever I get out crafting supplies one of my kids asks what I am making. When I told my oldest that I was making crowns to give as birthday presents for a couple of upcoming parties, he requested one. I had a crown pattern drawn with stars on it and when I showed him he requested more points and to change the stars to diamonds. So this project was designed by my oldest and sewn by me. He is my biggest critic, greatest source of inspiration and the king of the castle. At least one of the kings of the castle, my youngest is challenging him at every step. No one around here wants to be the dirty rascal.

My youngest is yelling to the neighbourhood “I’m the king of the castle you are the dirty rascal”. He is also sporting his superhero cape and his love shirt.

If you are interested in making a crown here is a pattern. If you are interested in buying one here is a link to my Etsy store.

Image provided by Megan

One of the moms in my son’s class had the brilliant idea of hosting a party for 40 kids graduating from Kindergarten. It was an opportunity for all of the families to meet and a chance for all of the kids to get together on the weekend outside of the school environment. There were a group of moms that got together to plan the event. We rented a “block party” trailer from the city which included chairs, tents, tables and games. With 40 kindergarten children plus their parents, and siblings we ended up with just over 100 people in attendance. With a group that large we opted to book a local park with a playground. We ordered party platters of fruit, veggies, cheese and meat to compliment the chips, popsicles and cupcakes. There was also two surprise guests from the movie Frozen who made a special appearance.

The weather was fantastic. The turnout was amazing. And my kids were exhausted and that is the sign of a good party. I volunteered to bake the cupcakes, all 100 of them. It was a bit of an undertaking but it was a challenge that I eagerly accepted. If you happen to be planning a graduation party these cupcakes were a hit.

Ingredients:

• boxed cake mix
• eggs
• vegetable oil
• canned frosting
• fruit rollups
• mini peanut butter cups
• chocolate covered cookies
• m&m’s

Instructions:

1. Bakes the cupcakes as per the box instructions and let cool

2. Place chocolate covered cookies upside down on a tray (so that you can put them in the freezer)

3. Put a dab of frosting in the middle of each one

4. Place the small end of the mini peanut butter cup in the frosting/cookie

5. Place the try in the freezer to set for 15-20 minutes

6. Cut the fruit rollup into 1/4″ x 1 1/2″-2″ strips

7. Remove from freezer once stuck together and flip all of the cookies over so that they are standing on the peanut butter cup

8. Put a dab of frosting in the middle of each cookie to adhere the tassel and M&M

9. Place the fruit rollup “tassel” and them the M&M in the frosting and place the tray back into the freezer to set

10. Ice the cupcakes

11. Place the graduation cap (mortarboards) in the center of the cupcakes

12. Refrigerate or freeze (because we were having an outdoor party I froze the cupcakes so that the chocolate hats would melt slower. We had them out for an hour and only had a couple break before eaten)

What do brain tumours and photography have in common? Probably not much. But having been recently diagnosed with a brain tumour has prompted me to yet again have family photos taken. When I told my husband that I wanted to have photos taken his response was “really AGAIN”. It has only been a year since the last batch and I understand his point but I played the brain tumour card anyway. You never know what the future may bring, so while I can get some family shots taken I went for it. Scroll to the bottom to see the lovely pictures that Nicola at Lily and Lane took for us.

We don’t have a lot of family pictures of all of us, there are a pile of the kids, and lots of my husband with the kids. I am almost always behind the camera so just in case something goes wrong and Timmy the tumour wins (which is highly unlikely in my opinion) my family will have some new shiny pictures of me. Until that dark day (holy morbid) inevitably happens sometime in my late 90’s I plan on enjoying the photos. Which means that they need to make their way out of the computer.

Step 1 is getting the photos, Step 2 is getting them out of the computer and into some form that you can enjoy. Hint, hint nudge nudge. I stumbled across this fantastic INEXPENSIVE, EASY, AND QUICK way to display photos. In the image above there is a mix of pictures taken by three different photographers (myself included). In the top row the 3rd and 6th images from the left, and first and fifth images in the bottom row I mounted on wood artist panels. It’s really rare that I come across any DIY project that is all three, so I am pretty excited to share this one with you. This project cost $2.00 for the wood artist board at the dollar store, $3.00 for the 8×10 print, $1.00 craft paint to paint the edges from the dollar store.  I already had a jar of modge podge and a paint brush, but neither of those items will break the bank.

What you need:

• 8×10 photo
• modge podge
• Canvas or wood artist board
• A paint brush/foam brush
• craft paint to paint the edges
• Exacto knife

Instructions:

Step 1 – paint the edges of the canvas or wood board and wait for it to dry. Have a glass of wine while you wait.

Step 2 – Apply a second coat of paint if needed and wait for it to dry

Step 3 – Apply a coat of modge podge to the canvas/board and lineup the photo making sure to remove any air bubbles, wait for it to stick

Step 4 – Trim around the edges of the canvas/board

Step 5 – Apply a coat of modge podge as evenly as possible over the entire photo to seal it. A foam brush is better than a bristle brush.

Photo Gallery

My oldest graduated from Kindergarten this week and I couldn’t pass up the chance to bake some cupcakes for the celebration party. In the process I learned that you can make and ice about 60 mini cupcakes from a standard boxed cake mix and tub of frosting. These bathing beauties were vanilla cupcakes with cream cheese frosting, dipped in light and dark brown (sand) sugar. Topped with a strip of fruit roll-up for the towel and a gummy bear. Garnished with a paper parasol these were a hit with the kiddies.

Ingredients

• Boxed cake mix
• eggs
• oil
• Tub of frosting
• gummy bears
• light/dark brown sugar
• fruit roll ups
• paper umbrella

Instructions

• Bake the cupcakes as per the box instructions
• Ice once cooled
• Roll iced cupcakes in the sugar
• Cut the fruit roll up into towel sized pieces (I did 1″ pieces for mini cupcakes)
• put a dab of icing on the top of the cupcake to attach the towel (fruit roll up)
• Put a dab of icing in the middle of the towel and attach the gummy bear
• decorate with a paper umbrella

I have a problem. Even though I am working towards a masters in business I still feel the need to learn more, and make more. I have exams that I should be studying for but I just can’t help myself. I enrolled in a cake decorating class. I feel the need to constantly be learning something new. Just over a year ago I took up crochet, the year before that I learned to knit, now I am into cake decorating. Learning a new skill, craft or hobby for me is relaxing. I love making something out of nothing.

The problem really is that with each new hobby I add to my roster, I don’t give up the old ones. I am a hobby horder. With the hobby’s comes the supplies, and I have my fair share of crafting supplies. So much so that I can usually make things without going to the store. When I registered for the cake decorating class (2 hours before it started) the woman on the phone told me that I needed to bring 6 cupcakes. You might find this hard to believe but I already had 6 cupcakes in the fridge, I had to scrape the icing off but other than that I was ready to go. Here are some of my practice cupcakes all decked out with the fancy icing techniques I learned.

I can’t believe the school year is over, maybe it’s because we got a late start due to a strike, or maybe it’s because this was my oldest’s first year of school. Either way it’s over and summer is officially here. Along with the graduation cupcakes, and the vacationing bear cupcakes I also made some teacher’s gifts. Last year I made watermelon tea towels with some lovely ladies, but this year it was a last minute race to get the presents done on time.

The cost of this gift is in no way related to the thanks I have for S’s amazing teachers this year. I am hoping that the thought and effort outweighs the $1.25 that I spent. Honestly if I didn’t tell you that I spent $1.25 you would never know. Being that I have a overflowing closet of crafting supplies I didn’t need to buy paint, but even if I had needed to the total cost of this project would still be less than $5.00. If you happen to have a pile of kids, celery, and a dollar store near by this might be right up your alley.

Supplies

• scarf – $1.25 at the dollar store
• Craft paint – $1.00 per colour (dollar store or craft store)
• textile medium – $2.50 at a craft store
• paint brush
• Celery – if you eat celery then you probably already have what you need
• paper towels

Instructions

1. wash and iron the scarves

2. Lay the scarf out on a flat surface, and place paper towels under it so that you don’t ruin the table or get the scarf stuck to it

3. Chop the end off of a bunch of celery, and cut one stalk in half for the leaves

4. Mix the paint and textile medium as per the bottle instructions

5. Paint the end of the celery bunch and stamp it onto the scarf

6. Repeat step 5 until you have a desired pattern

7. Paint the end of the celery stalks to make the green leaves, and stamp onto the scarf

8. Repeat step 7 until all of the roses have leaves

10. Once the scarf it dry iron it to set the colours

Being that the project cost me so little I made one for me too. I don’t usually take selfies, so I could use a little practice. But you can see how the scarf looks when finished, and I really don’t think you could guess that it cost me $1.25 to make.

I haven’t posted anything in a little while because I have been on a baking frenzy and I am supposed to be studying for exams. I write the first exam of three on Wednesday of next week. I just can’t let a holiday pass by without some sort of festive treat. We had a party on Canada Day to celebrate the birthday of our fantastic country and I made a cake, no real surprise there. I also made some festive cupcakes for the kiddies, I will reveal those tomorrow. We had a great time and the kids had a blast with water guns, and water balloons. Here is little L sporting his new Canada Day shirt for the occasion.

Historically I have made a sheet cake frosted with white icing, and decorated with strawberries in the shape of a Canadian flag. I thought that I would mix things up a bit this year. I have wanted to try making a cake with more than 2 layers. So I made a red, white, red layered cake to resemble the colours and pattern of the Canadian flag. It was more like pink than red but after a few drinks who could tell the difference. I did my best free hand maple leaf on the top. My free hand technique could use some work, but the taste is the same regardless of drawing ability.

For our Canada day celebrations I made beaver cupcakes for the little cannucks, or at least that is what they are supposed to look like. For some reason when I made them they did actually resemble the animal, now looking at the pictures I wonder how much wine I consumed while baking. Either way the kiddies ate them up.

If you want to take a run at them this is what I did, perhaps you can improve on it.

1. baked and iced cupcakes with chocolate frosting
2. for the tails I used lady finger type cookies cut in half
3. the flag is helping the tail stand up
4. ears are M&M’s
5. eyes are fondant with brown food colouring dots
6. teeth are white fondant
7. the nose is the last step and it a red M&M

I have been writing about some heavy topics lately and I thought that I would lighten it up a bit with felt dryer balls. I have been using a bounce dryer bar but they have become difficult to find, and after checking a number of stores I gave up and made some dryer balls. I was a little skeptical that they would work but after a couple of weeks of using them I am converted. When I made the switch from dryer sheets to the dryer bar I no longer needed to remember to put in a dryer sheet with every load, nor did I need to fish out a dryer sheet at the end of the load. There are a few added benefits of felt dryer balls the first being that there is no garbage and the second is that there isn’t any chemicals. They are also so easy to make, I made these three one night while I was watching TV.

Instructions

Step 1 – using 100% wool wrap into a ball (mine are about the size of an orange). I used yarn for the entire ball but you could also use an old wool sweater.

Step 2 – once the balls are wrapped put them into an old nylon/pantyhose and knot after every ball as pictured. Wash in the washing machine in the hottest water possible. They can be washed with a load of laundry or alone. I sent mine through two loads. After they are felted cut them out of the nylons and dry them in the dryer.

These are the finished dryer balls. I leave them in the dryer most of the time occasionally the kids steal them and play which is something that they couldn’t do with dryer sheets. I am going to experiment with adding oils into the balls to make the laundry smell nice.

At the end of August my youngest turned three just a couple of weeks after I had surgery. We still managed to celebrate multiple times. When my parents were here we had a little family celebration complete with store-bought cupcakes. On his actual birthday we had a store-bought cake. There isn’t anything wrong with buying cakes from the store but I use every occasion as a reason to bake.

The baker in me was having a really hard time but I was not in any state to be baking. I was still recovering from brain surgery. But that didn’t go on forever and when I was feeling better we threw a birthday party/Timmy the tumour eviction party. We asked friends for donations to the Brain Tumour Foundation instead of birthday gifts. That might seem mean but we have so many toys he really doesn’t need anything else. Can you find him in toy mountain?

The theme for the party was robots because now that I have a titanium plate in my head I am part robot. But really it’s what my little boy asked for. In keeping with the theme we made a robot pinata. Unfortunately when I took the robot outside for a photo-shoot one of my assistants closed the front door which locked behind us. Even more unfortunate I had to call my husband at work 45 minutes away to come and let us in the house. It was just before lunch and the kiddies were hungry thankfully my husband rescued us before we needed to smash the robot for lunch.

By the time the party happened I was four weeks post surgery and I figured that I was fine to start baking. Which I would have been if I chose to make a less detailed cake. After completing the robot cake I needed a nap.

The birthday boy said that it was the best day of his life and of course that makes all of the effort worthwhile.

I haven’t posted any craft related projects in a very long time but I am always working on something. Here are a couple of pictures for my most current project. I am knitting a chunky king size blanket. It’s the perfect season to make blankets. This one is almost done, I just need to knit enough to cover up my toes. When I am finished the pattern and finished pictures will be posted!

Halloween is one of my favourite days of the year. With little ones it’s easy to get caught up in all of the excitement. Here are a couple of projects that we made for the holiday.

Mummy Cupcakes

We went to a Halloween party and brought these mummy cupcakes as dessert. They are chocolate cupcakes with white icing, and red M&M’s for eyes.

Pumpkin Rice Crispies

These treats went to one of my boys classes for a Halloween party. I found the instructions here. I took some liberties with the recipe and added pretzels for stems and green frosting leaves.

Halloween Wreath

I copied my own idea from last years Christmas wreath and made a similar wreath for Halloween with orange and black washi tape.

As a pretty passionate maker you might think that I would be making the kids halloween costumes but I don’t. The reason why is that it’s just too expensive. I do however make my own costume every year. This year I was little red riding hood. I didn’t make it into any of the photos this year :(

There is a chill in the air and all of the trees have lost their leaves. Fall is here. My youngest has begun to point out nests in the naked trees. He tells me that the birds are snuggled in their nests making candies. If only that was true. He has been making nests around the house and snuggling in with his stuffies. I am taking my cues from him these days and fluffing up my own nest.

I spend too much time browsing on Pinterest! I saw a picture of chunky knit blanket that I had to make. The problem was that I couldn’t find knitting needles long and thick enough. I wanted to make a king size chunky knit blanket and I wasn’t about to start knitting with 3′ long needles. Although come to think of it I probably could have tried knitting with the kids light sabers!

I wasn’t going to let something as trivial as not having the right size needles stop me, so I made a pair. Using a pair of purchased 50mm short knitting needles (pictured) I cut them down drilled holes in the ends, tapered the cut ends, inserted and glued a rope, taped the rope to the needles and voila circular needles long enough to knit a king size blanket.

This was the biggest knit project that I have ever attempted. I learned a few things in the process. First off this project worked my arm muscles! I was sore after knitting because the blanket and yarn are so heavy. It was next to impossible to knit sitting in a chair because the blanket was so big it would spill over onto the floor and then it was really hard to get the tension right. Sitting in bed was the perfect place to work on this blanket so that the weight could be spread out over an even surface. It is only a little luxurious to knit and be warm and cozy under your project at the same time.

Pattern to follow

On the second day of Christmas my true love made for me two types of reindeer treats, and a veggie tree.

Reindeer Cupcakes

Reindeer Cookies

This is one of my favourite things that I have made for the kids. I made these 3 years ago when my oldest was 3. Surprisingly they are still all intact. On the third day of Christmas we went fishing. Link to felt fish.

On the fourth day of Christmas four little monkeys came to play. I made a batch of these last year to give as gifts, and these little guys stayed to live with us. There are four of us and four monkeys so they kids play family with them. Because I made them all a little different they fight over who has stripes and who has dots.

Here is the full post with instructions to make your own.

On the fifth day of Christmas I was decking the halls with a felt banner. Santa, snowmen, reindeer are mixed with snowflakes and candy swirls to create this holiday banner. The banner is made from felt and ribbon.

It’s no secret that I love a good craft project. I dream up crafting projects, I copy things I see on Pinterest and I make crafts from kits. There are many great crafts that come from kits, they are cut and ready for assembly. Crafts from kits are particularly great to do with kids. Typically everything that you need comes in the right size and quantity and all you need to do is put it together. If you are short on time or crafting skills it’s still possible to impress your friends with a little homemade project. In my mind making crafts from kits is like baking cakes from box mixes (which is the only way I bake). I won’t tell if you won’t, it will be our little secret.

This is the perfect time to buy holiday crafting kits because they are most likely on sale, just in case you are inspired.

As luck would have it the sixth day of Christmas is also the release of the new Star Wars movie. I was talking with my mom the other day when she mentioned that if I needed something for the 6th day of Christmas she had a few projects. My mom sent me the picture below of the Star Wars finger puppets she had just finished making for my 6 year old who is obsessed with Star Wars. Grandma has magical crafting skills and amazing timing.

She also made a set of Paw Patrol finger puppets for my 3 year old. She really nailed it with these for the kids. Who would have guessed that crafting, Star Wars and Paw Patrol could have been combined?

It’s well past the seventh day of Christmas and it has been a busy few days. On the seventh day of Christmas I did some baking, about seven dozen treats in under four hours. In an ideal world I would have a day to bake and a clean kitchen to do it in, but in reality Christmas baking was crammed in after an exam and before my helpers had to go to bed. I do like to get the kids involved in the kitchen which often proves to be a challenge. This time I put them to work smashing candy canes.

We made three different treats:

1. Peanut butter cookies with Hershey kisses. The recipe was on the back of the peanut butter jar, simple. When the cookies were hot out the oven I put a kiss in the middle of each and popped them into the freezer so that the chocolate didn’t melt everywhere.
2. Peppermint Brownies. In an effort to be fast and efficient (read lazy) I made brownies from a box mix complete with frosting. The kids smashed candy canes which I gingerly placed (read dumped) on top.
3. Gingerbread people. These were made from scratch, the recipe is here. I sprinkled powdered sugar on some of them, decorated the six in the photo but in truth most of them are naked in my fridge. They may or may not get all spiffed up before we gobble them up.