A Spring Baby Shower!

Spring is a very convenient time to have a baby shower - specifically, Easter time! There is such an nice selection of cute, pastel colored candy at your disposal! I had been inspired by pictures of arrangements, utilizing said candy, like the one found here: peeps flower arrangement

I really wanted to come up with a few very usable decorations that also doubled as practical gifts, rather than a bunch of throw-away things. This arrangement took two vases from the dollar store, one that fit inside of the other. I filled the area surrounding the smaller vase with m&m's. I used crafting wire to string the peeps together and secured them around the base of the flowers. So simple! (Bonus: the m&m's are *technically* still eatable since they're not touching anything!)

I had been waiting for an opportunity to make the dollar store tiered trays seen here: tiered trays

(side note: using a glue gun did NOT work. There is a reason she uses the glue that she does in this tutorial!)

I also LOVED the idea of turning items from a gift registry into decorations like these cupcakes found here: onesie cupcakes FYI I had to use extra large coffee filters as opposed to the standard size when making these out of blankets. I also used baby head bands to hold them together instead of plain ribbon.

Neon Duct Tape!!

Question: How many uses can I find for neon duct tape?

Option #1: Shoes (oh, you can definitely expect more to come)
I've been seeing so many pictures of spray painted shoes, and have tried a few of my own. However, I have been kind of struggling with the fact that once they are painted, it's pretty much a permanent change. I thought it would be fun to have a removable option. The duct tape seemed like a logical solution because it comes in so many fun colors. However, it is somewhat tricky to make it lay flat and uniform, so it's not obvious that it is duct tape! Test the shoes before hand, some finishes may allow the tape to be removed. However, the finish actually started peeling off of this neutral pair when I tried removing the tape - guess I'll be keeping them as they are from now on! No loss, they weren't in great shape and I hardly ever wore them, until now - because they turned out super cute!

Starting out with a pile of shoes, some duct tape and a pair of scissors! 

Let's see how this goes...

 This pair of baby shoes turned out ok, but it was tricky getting the tape to lay flat over the curve of the front toe. I found that this could be drastically improved by stretching the duct tape.

 This next pair of shoes is my favorite and I'm pretty excited how they turned out.

 Once I smoothed out the tape, i used some scissors, like a knife, to very carefully cut a smooth line along the base of the shoes - 

being careful not to cut through to the shoe its self!

 This last pair didn't look so great, 

so I peeled the tape off very carefully and left them as-is.

Old Ladders and Burlap = Love

As promised... the unveiling of my completed projects!

I am so excited with how this turned out, and could not be happier! My husband, on the other hand, is still a little weirded out by the ladder hanging on our wall. He just doesn't get it :)

I have included here, the pictures of everything put together. I went ahead and wrote up a separate tutorial for the wreath, which can be found here: Burlap Wreath Tutorial 

I must be up front with you. The whole ladder thing turned out to be way more work than I initially bargained for. I kept asking myself, is this really worth it? Of course the answer was YES! If you happen to have your hands on an old extension ladder or plain ol' ladder that is just one single piece, by all means, go for it! Hang it on the wall as soon as you possibly can! What I had, was an old step ladder with the two sides that fold in together. The issue is, it's old, and old things were made really well. This baby was riveted together. Rivets are a pain to remove. I didn't take real detailed pictures, so just go ahead and Google "removing rivets." I used a hack saw, a sawzall, a drill, a hammer and a flat head screw driver before those babies finally came off. The drill with a metal bit was a must. The sawzall may have done the job faster, but the battery died on me and I was, frankly, too impatient to wait for it to charge, so I continued on by other means. The nice thing is, if you're going for that rustic, antiquey look, you really don't have to do a thing beyond that! Seriously, I didn't even clean this thing (gross?), sand it or paint it in any way. I just left it totally as is! One thing I would suggest, is not going into a rivet removal project in your living room. If you must, at least put down a drop cloth. Otherwise, you'll be scrubbing up rust stains and tediously vacuuming up microscopic shards of metal from the carpet (not that I had to do that or anything).

And on the other wall... some new frames off the clearance rack at Hobby Lobby. So what if they were a little banged up, nothing a black Sharpie can't fix!

Burlap Wreath Tutorial

I spent a LONG time trying to recreate an exact replica of this wreath. I figured out in the end, that they must have used a much thinner burlap, and possibly took several extra steps. My way is super easy and I think it turned out pretty nice! I purchased about a yard and a half of burlap from Hobby Lobby. With a 40% off coupon, it ended up being about $2.50 a yard. I used an old metal hanger (literally, one of the last metal hanger in our house), and a couple sticks of hot glue. Total cost for this project: about $3. Now, if you aren't crafty or just REALLY like this particular wreath, here is the link to the Etsy site where you can buy this one! Burlap Wreath on Etsy Oh, by the way, it's $65 But hey, it's super cute!

*Check out my updated tutorial here!

First I formed the hanger into a circle. I cut the burlap into long strips, no more than 12" wide. Then, I folded these strips in half. I simply fed the metal hanger through the burlap, weaving it up and down, twisting the burlap on occasion to give it a more bunched up look. There really was no clear cut way of doing this. You really just have to play around with it till you get the look you are going for. I used the hot glue to poof certain spots and make it stay exactly where I wanted it. Then, glued the backside in various spots to keep the burlap from sliding around. Have fun!

*Check out my updated tutorial here!

Things to Come...

I have fallen a little behind in my posts lately, for which I apologize. I promise, I have many things in the works that I will be posting soon! Here is a sneak peak at what I am working on right now:

A scene from my living room! My husband nearly flipped when he walked in and I informed him that I would be hanging this ladder on the wall. This is also a picture of the burlap wreath I am working on. I have a recently fallen madly in love with burlap! How many uses for burlap can I find? We shall see, oh, we shall see. Here are some of the pictures I've been looking to for inspiration... oh the possibilities!!

Teal and Yellow Obsession

I Love these colors together! After seeing picture after picture of things like this on Pinterest...

I got myself some yellow spray paint and started painting everything in sight! These were once boring old brown lamps...

I spray painted the bases, then bought these plain shades at Target. I embellished them with rolled flowers. I used the tutorial for rolled flowers from this site: mysparkle.blogspot.com

I love all the little pops of yellow!