Quiet Book

 This is a blast from the past quiet book I made for my oldest about seven years ago and we have loved it! They are quite time consuming but definitely worth the effort.

 Braiding the lion's tail page

 Gathering sheep, I found this sweet coloring page in our church's library and traced it, the sheep snap on and off.

 Moses in the bull rushes

 Of course I had to make the baby removable, my kid's love this page.

 Jonah and the whale

 Don't forget to say your prayers, this is another coloring page from our library.

 

Paying tithing page.

 Noah's ark

 I found these animals at a little shop on my way home...it must have been meant to be cause the little town I found these in consists of a gas station, fabric store and salon and that's about it...they just happened to have these in the salon...weird huh?

  This page was fashioned after a quiet book I played with growing up.

Same with this page...I can remember poking my little fingers in to make a beak.

 Moroni and the Gold Plates

Button flowers on me and see how pretty it will be.

I used a medium weight pelon for my quiet book pages and a heavier weight for the cover, you can find pelon at most fabric stores.  I traced my pages with a sharpie and used acryllic paint mixed with fabric medium to color them.  For the pages I sewed around three edges leaving the bottom open and trimmed with pinking shears.

I am planning on making a new farming quiet book for my boys, so I will make a more thorough tutorial with that one when I get it finished.

Linking up with www.craftyconfessions.com

Shirred Waste Shirt Makeover

Last Christmas my husband went out on a limb and bought me clothing. He did a good job considering he grew up without sisters and doesn't care about clothing at all.

He bought me this....    

bless his heart, I felt like I was wearing a potato sack.

 

Granted after baby number four it has taken quite a while to get even somewhat close to back to normal..but I think my waste is coming back to visit for a while so I'm gonna take advantage of this time.  I have shirred a couple of dresses for my girls in the past and thought it might work on this shirt...I was rather pleased with the results.

Easy fix...this took me about 15 minutes

This would be great for making maternity clothes as well, if you added the shirring just a little higher. You could also add it to the bottom for a different look.

You can find my tutorial for shirring here.

Just mark your waste and add a few rows of shirring, I did about 10 rows spaced a 1/4 inch apart.

Linking up with Crafty Confessions 
Coastal Charm

DIY Chalk Board

It's Back-to-School time...I absolutely love this time of year!  Even when I was in school it was fun, mostly because I love buying school supplies.  Anyway..I thought it would be fun to post this chalk board we made a while back.  My kids have absolutely loved this thing for playing school, my oldest pretends to be the teacher and my two younger kids have learned a lot from her.  I use it when we do preschool with my three and five year old, it makes it fun and a little bit more official.

 I found this cute little bucket in Target's dollar bins...when I saw it I knew it had to be mine but I didn't know why.  It works perfectly for keeping the chalk and eraser...see I really did need it ;)

I think the teacher has been having trouble with a certain boy in her class...he tends to be very wiggly and likes to bring food to class..like that huge bag of chips he's holding.

It ties in nicely with our Airplane Hanger we made last year for hanging artwork on.

These little airplanes go with the airplane hanger I just mentioned, they are a great project for preschoolers.  You can find the tutorial here.

Written Tutorial

Sorry if you are a visual learner but I didn't take any pictures while we were making this, but it is quite simple.

We used an old piece of scrap bead board that was about the right size (1/4" MDF board).  Paint it with chalkboard spray paint, I got mine at home depot. We also had some scrap trim leftover from another project and cut our pieces with straight cuts. Sand any rough edges then glue down to your chalkboard piece with construction adhesive.

Secure with staples from the back (make sure they are short enough to not go through to other side).

I painted my trim pieces afterwards but you could easily do it before, whatever works for you.  I used an acrylic craft paint and did a couple of coats.

Super cheap and easy...or free if you hoard scrap wood like we do!