How to make: Hair Bows

Upon purchasing my fair share of hair bows, flowers, butterflies, and headbands; I decided that I might be better off in the long run if I could just learn how to make some of these things. The first thing I wanted to learn was hair bows; 1) because I don't have very many of those, and 2) because it seemed easiest.

Upon reflection I have 2 insights for you before you start.
- floppy grosgrain is a great ribbon to learn on
-you can do just about anything with hot glue

You will need:

• ribbon (about 1 yard) -I find I like 1"-1.5" ~ 31 cents/ yard
• a hot glue gun ~ around 2.99 if you don't already own one
• a lighter -if you're using grosgrain ~ 99 cents for a 3 pack
• thread~ who doesn't have this? you can get it al the dollar store for a bunch of colors!
• small alligator clips~ $2 for a 10 pack
• patience!!!!~ priceless

Start by getting all your stuff out and your glue gun warmed up.

Tie the very end of your ribbon in a knot. Don't pull it all the way tight, leave it with that cone shaped triangle bit in tact.

Cut the knotted end off and set it aside, run the ends of the big piece through the lighter flame to seal the ends. Don't catch it on fire! Fold the ribbon over kind of like a breast cancer awareness ribbon leaving one side much longer.

This is the part that takes a lot of patience and practice!!!
Wrap it around itself losely so the front and back look like this

Back

Front

Straighten it out a bit and scrunch the center together. (This also takes practice and patience)

Bind it REALLY tight with your thread to hold it. Bind it enough that the thread can hold itself in place. The flip it front side and put a dot of hot glue on the top.

Glue the flat side of your knotted piece to the top of the bow.

Put a dab of glue on the back and put down your alligator clip and run one end of the knotted piece through the clip. You may need to glue that down or if your clips were like mine they have a slit through the center so the glue holds down your ribbon as well.

Trim the excess ribbon and wrap your other end around and glue it down.

The finished product might resemble this!

Some people like to start with big bows, they say it's easier. I prefer smaller bows from the floppy more forgiving ribbon as I learn. My bigger bows still don't look like the store bought ones but I think they still look pretty cute!

I saved around $2.50/ bow by making it myself. I found a website that will sell these for 79 cents but the colors can be limited and even if I went that route to buy all my bows I would still save around 29 per bow by making it myself.

Over the Top Baby trends

How do I feel about HUGE oversized hair accessories and frilly dresses?

Most of you know that I love them. If you knew me as a kid you might remember that I have always loved the over the top girls' fashions.
There are those in my life who for the life of them have never understood this love I have and that's ok. Some are betting that Faith will rip off her hair bows and ruffles the minutes she's old enough to do it and that's ok too!
I have 2 other children, their styles even though they are young are not always my style. I know that as soon as they start picking out their own clothes they develop preferences and favorite from what they have. I love little boys in overalls and my almost 4 year old absolutely HATES overalls. He doesn't like how they fit him and he doesn't care how cute they look. My 2 and a half year old has a thing for baseball caps. No one in our family wears many hats but for him it's something he just feels super good in. I don't know if it's a comfort thing or what but the kid always has a hat on and he shows strong preference toward baseball caps; you can't just give him any style of hat.
So yes, I do realize that my daughter is no exception to developing free will and her own sense of style. As long as she stays within our family modesty and morality standards I have no problem with what she chooses.

Here's the beautiful thing though; I have about 2.5 years give or take to do WHATEVER I want to her! After that I  can still influence what she wears and how she dresses because she still has to pick from what ever I have provided for her. I figure this gives me 2 years of free reign and 5-7 total years of influence and  wonderful over the top frilly clothes and accessories. Obviously Davin wears hats and Cole is rarely seen in overalls so I do recognize and respect my kids' preferences but I also know that they have picked up some of what I would hope for them and I figure on some of the same thing for my daughter.

I don't have all the answers and I am SO new to the world of little girls but I know what I like and for now that's good enough. My ruffly butt, huge hair bow, giant flower, colorful headband, cute hat tastes and preferences are here to stay.... at least until she's old enough to take them off  ;-)

new found gift ideas

I recently had my baby shower!
I can't begin to tell you how blessed I was by everyone who made us feel so loved! The shower was last week and I'm still kind of over-whelmed by it all. From helping hands to the cutest outfits and accessories to homemade gifts; our needs have been provided for and then some.
While and am SO thankful for the support of everyone I was amazing at some of my homemade gifts and I will be stashing them away in my mental list of gift ideas. I wanted to put them here too; not only for you to enjoy but also because I seriously don't have very good mental listing abilities and these things need to be written down! So without further delay here they are in no special order for your own refrence as well as mine!

The Baby Wreath-

I actually made this one for someone else. I saw an idea online and I kind of ran with it. I saw other online versions using diapers but I made mine with
-2 recieving blankets

- ribbon

- socks

- baby toys

- something snuggly

- wooden letters

First I got a wreath form, these can be found with all things styrofoam in any craft store. I also purchased the ribbon and wooden letters at the craft store. I took my recieving blankets and wrapped them around the wreath using thin ribbon to bind them. I got some various baby things that are cute and useful and attched them as I thought they looked good. For finishing touches I tied a big bow and added the wooden name letters which worked well since this particular baby has a shorter name.

The BIG Hooded Towel

A friend of mine made this for me, it's super and I will be making more for my own family as well as using it as a gift for others.

She Used:

-a really big, soft, fluffy towel

-a matching hand towel or wash cloth

I'm not exactly sure how she trimmed it but essentially she folded the hand towel in half leaving some room to attatch it and sewed the 2 short sides together to make the hood then she centered the hand towel in the center on the wide edge of the towel and sewed it on. It's full size which is nice because this can be used for kids not just babies since babies often outgrow the store bought hooded towels unless you order them especially in kid sized. It's a really thoughtful and creative homemade gift!

Diaper Cake

Most of use have heard by now about these beautiful and fabulous baby gifts. I was lucky enough to get one at my baby shower and the only down side is that I REALLY don't want to ever take it apart! I have also heard that similar things can be done for weddings using kitchen towels and such and decorated with household "must haves".

For the diaper cake you will need:

- a TON of diapers (cloth or disposable)

-rubberbands

- Ribbon

- baby "must-haves"

-and a couple of baby bottles

The sky is the limit here so you can do as much or as little as you are able. The diapers alone are a great gift and with a little presentation who ever thought that diapers could look so pretty?!
You will need to roll up your diapers and wrap rubber bands around them. Then bunch them around a baby bottle to make the circular bottom layer. I think my diaper cake has 3-4 rings of diapers in the bottom layer to make the base wide enough. The bottle maye be tall enough if you are using disposables to use the same bottle for your next tier. a bottle of sparkling cider would also work and provide more length for the core. Same Idea, less circumfrence for each tier you make. You can do this for as many tiers as you want to. Each tier on mine is held together by a big thin elastic headband and then that was covered with thick cloth stip. You could use ribbon for that part if you want to. Alot of people attatch various baby items. SOme cakes are really loaded. Mine was simple and cute and decorated with fabric lolly pops. The top tier was made of embelished burp clothes. Which I'm going to list next. She topped it off with those spinning pin wheels. It is SO cute!

Embellished Burp Clothes-

***Please note***: I took these instruction right off my friend's blog. Although I had seen these done before I have never come across instructions for how to do it and she really did a great job. The blog I lifted this from is The Hot & Sassy Housewife

Here is what you need:

1. A package of Gerber cloth diapers (they come in a 12 pack)

2. 1/4 yard of six different coordinating fabrics...

(this will provide enough to make two cloths from each fabric)

3. Thread

4. Scissors

5. Iron

Here is what the cloth diaper package looks like along with the fabrics I used...

You can pre-wash and shrink your fabric and diapers but make sure to iron them. When you get the fabric it will be in a long, skinny strip. Fold it in half and cut it at the fold. These will be your two strips that you sew onto the diaper. Take one strip and fold the shortest edge over 1/2 inch and iron it, then do this to one of the longer sides. At this  point I lined my straight-edge-measurey-thingy (you know, the one that comes with your standard rotary cutter and mat in a kit?) up along the long folded edge and then flipped the fabric on the other side over the top and then slid the straight-edge-measurey-thingy out and ironed again. I could have just measured but this seemed easy and it was the perfect size.

This is what it should look like (yes, you leave the very end unfolded)...

Trim your corners...

Take a cloth diaper and center your fabric in the middle of it and pin at the corners. Be aware that the ends of the diapers are very uneven so just line it up best you can but they won't be straight. In hind sight I would have folded the long edges first and the short edges last and flipped them over the end of the cloth diaper. Oh well. 

Make sure you pin your fabric RIGHT SIDE up because this isn't something you are flipping. Pin everything but that unfolded edge you left at the end. The reason you leave this edge unfolded is because the cloth diapers can vary in length. When you get to this end fold it to the correct length and pin it too. Then you are ready to sew. Just start at one corner and go around the edge or the rectangle, backing up and sewing each corner a couple of times.

They come out looking like this...