Flower Children to Welcome Spring!

Here's a little tutorial on how to make some sweet little flower children!

Last night we had a snowstorm...when I went outside this morning I was knee deep in snow...so you can well imagine that spring crafts are my only reassurance that the beauty and promise of spring is near.

You'll need:

some unfinished peg dolls

embroidery floss and needle

wool felt, (in colour of your choice)

paint and brush

 I never paint faces on my peg dolls...this is a first for me!

The lovely Mrs Bloom of We Bloom Here, (who incidentally is celebrating her one year blogiversary), assured me that I CAN paint faces on my peg people!  She is also hosting a peg doll swap...although sign ups are closed, you can go and visit her for some peg doll inspiration.  These little flower children are my contribution.  So...to start I painted some hair, eyes and a simple mouth.

Next cut some "tubes" to fit around them...I blanket stitch around the bottom edge, and then blanket stich them on in the back seam to hold them in place.

Please don't feel limited by my colour choices...you could do a rainbow of these little flower children!

Next, cut a little "collar" and glue it on.

Then add some petal caps.  I used this daisy template, and added a yellow center, (again use your blanket stitch...it looks neater)!  Do a gathering stitch on the underside of the petal and pull tight, until it resembles a hat.  Using glue I attached them to the peg people!

Now...of course little flower children are still sleeping in my part of the world...so they needed a little bed to slumber in.  Simply cut out 2 leaf shapes...I cut one of the 2 into 1/2 the size of the first.  Add some "veins" with embroidery floss...

Then attach it all together.  I did a blanket stitch all around, to make it look nice and neat.

And here they are enjoying a little flower children slumber party!

"And Spring arose on the garden fair,

Like the Spirit of Love felt everywhere;

And each flower and herb on Earth's dark breast

rose from the dreams of its wintry rest."

-Percy Bysshe Shelley

in the spirit of Spring!

xo maureen

                                               

Beautiful Paper Butterflies!

Here is a sweet and simple craft to bring some "Spring" into your home!

Inspired by the book All Year Round.

You'll need:

watercolour paper and paint

tissue paper

glue stick and scissors

First paint your paper in spring colours...let it dry.

Fold your paper in half and draw on a butterfly shape...

cut it out.

Turn it over and glue on some tissue paper over the "holes".

Now take a triangle of your watercolour paper...

roll it up and glue it onto the front of your butterfly, (this is the body).

Now hang them up in a bright sunny spot and enjoy this reminder that Spring is on her way!

Today was a cold and wintery day...I so needed this reminder that soon my soul will be nourished by Maiden Spring!! 

xox maureen

Mardi Gras Masks!

Karneval /Mardi Gras is a wonderful excuse to to pull out (or create!) the masks, the beads, the crowns, the face paints, the costumes and have a party!

Here are some felt flower masks we created to help celebrate
Mardi Gras & our *soon to be arriving* spring!

To create you will need

Felt

Silk flowers

Ribbon

Glue (we used a glue gun)

Sequin trim

To begin cut out your mask (To measure I held the felt up to my girl's face and drew an outline with erasable marker)

Pull your silk flowers apart, fold them in half and glue them on one by one in what ever pattern suits your fancy!

Next glue on your sequin trim around the eyes

Glue ribbon on to the back of the mask for tying on around the head

Add what ever extras you desire and voila! !

Ready to celebrate!

In Joy

~ Shanti ~

Blossom Fairies to Beckon Spring!

There is so much to enjoy in winter ~ sunlight sparkling on a fresh snowfalls, cold kissed rosy cheeks, gliding around a glassy rink, evergreens heavy with snow, sliding and squealing down big hills,  glowing wood stoves greeting frosty fingers, snowflake glittered eyelashes...

I confess though, my yearning for spring has been slowly awakening and whispers such sweet promises... wriggling my bare feet into the deep dark earth... letting the warm sunshine saturate me... feasting my eyes the baby bright green of new life...

I am hungry for the sweetness of spring!

Recently these blossom fairies sprang to life, ready to coax out spring in all her splendor!

These were inspired by the gorgeous work of wee folk studio.  We played to see if we could come up with a simple version that little people could create.

To create some fresh flowers faces 

here's how it goes...

Supplies to gather

* silk flowers *

* felt *

* wooden doll pin and stand *

* glue *

*pipe cleaner *

*roving *

* acorn cap*

To begin, cut out a square of felt just big enough to wrap around your doll pin. Glue your felt around your doll's body. (I used a glue gun but if you want little hands to create these, craft glue would work as well.)

Decide what flower colors you want for your skirt. 

Pull apart your silk flowers. 

 Fold them in half...

and cut the hole in the center just big enough to accommodate the felt covered doll pin.

Slide on your colorful skirt!

For the arms ~ cut a piece of pipe cleaner the length you want your arms to be (bent around the back), add some glue in the middle and stick on.
For the wings ~  cut the petals out of your silk flowers and glue on over top of the pipe cleaner (hides the back of the arms quite nicely ;).
Glue on some roving for hair.
Glue on her sweet hat!

These blossom fairies found themselves some lovely girls to play with..

and go home with!

Awaiting signs of life and looking for joy in winters embrace
With love
~ Shanti ~

Letter writing kit!

Have I ever mentioned the abundance of paper clutter in my house...everywhere I look there are stacks of random papers piled up...these piles are also on the floor...under furniture...and in every room in the house!

Now that Ruby is a certified letter writer, I knew that I had to have some system for dealing with all the cute stationery, envelopes and assorted other "paper" things that come along with letter writing! 

 Enter the pretty letter writing kit! 

So, using one of those paper folders, with the pockets as my template, I simply traced onto felt.

I sewed up some pockets...for cute stationery on one side, envelopes, pens, stamps and addresses on the other.

(and yes, I am aware that I "just" could have used the paper folder...but that just doesn't give a mama that same crafty feeling of accomplishment as doing this)!

Backed with pretty fabric...

and some ribbon to "tie" it all together.

Voila!

Now I'm not a great sewer, but this took about 20 minutes to whip up.  I just decided that it didn't have to be perfect, but it did have to be pretty!!!

Thank you everyone for signing up for our kiddie pen pal club!  It's been nice to hear from parents how excited their kids are to start writing letters.  Truly this has been a joy to put together.

I should have everyone matched up by Monday...if you haven't heard from me yet, or if you're waiting to hear about a sibling, please be patient...I'm hopeful that every child will be matched!

xo maureen

Envelope Tutorial...and the cutest free stationery ever!!!

here are some of our finished envelopes...

So with our penpal match up well under way, I thought I'd do a little homemade envelope tutorial.

You'll need envelopes of various sizes, patterned paper, (think old books, gift wrap, scrap book paper),

a glue stick, scissors and pencil.

Get your envelopes...oh this is just so simple.

Tear them open...this is your template...trace this onto your paper.

Using your template...make all the folds in the right places!

Now glue it together...

and here's your fancy and fun new envelope!!! I told you...so simple!!!

(you can either make your own address label with paper, or buy those stick on labels)!

Of course, you'll need some super sweet stationery to go with your super sweet envelopes...

go here!!! for the cutest stationery in the world.  You just bring up the image...click on it to make it bigger, and then right click to print.  Super duper easy, and so so sweet!!! 

Here is some of our stationery we'll be using to write to our new penpals!

Now, if you haven't already, you have until Friday the 25th to sign up your kiddies for our pen pal club!

Please go to the original post here and leave your children's ages, and your location, as well as an e-mail address...if I don't have your e-mail address I can't sign you up.  In the next week I'll be sending out penpal matches for your kids...I'm doing it little by little, so if you don't hear back from me immediately don't worry.

I am so thrilled to see the number of people who are signing up...yes it's a bit of a job to organize, but I just think of all of our kiddies writing letters to each other...actually writing, and mailing letters...it's like a lost art these days...and it makes it all worthwhile!!

xo maureen 

A Sunflower Cake to Celebrate Six!

~ for my sunshine girl ~

My Littlest recently turned six. Moms always say how fast your babes grow up ~ how true it seems. It still feels like yesterday that my Solana Fae was looking up into my eyes for the first time and I was falling madly in love!

For this birthday she informed me she wanted a surprise party. I wasn't expecting that request but agreed to go for it ~ this could be fun! 

 Luna and I thought about it and decided to throw her an indoor garden party. Being in the depths of a cold and long winter, we thought brining spring to life inside might be just the thing for celebrating!

We started our preparations by growing lots of (wheat) grass in baskets...

~ A beautiful taste of spring to have all that fresh green life in the home! ~

On the day of the party we set out the baskets and filled them with flowers to create our indoor garden. The girls then arrived one by one and choose their hiding spots to jump out of.

There was so much excitement as we eagerly awaited the birthday girls arrival...

and succeeded in surprising her!

(please excuse the blurriness of the photo ~ I couldn't resist sharing)

We spent the afternoon sharing tea in the garden...

doing garden inspired crafts ~ creating flower fairies, painting and decoupaging flower pots and stringing flower necklaces.

We nibbled on flower fairy sandwiches and other delights.

For her cake I wanted to create something that shouted summer!

I decided to do a spin off of my sun cake.

With this cake though, we baked an extra chocolate round cake for the center. We iced it with chocolate icing and Luna patiently and meticulously did a spiral of chocolate chips on top. We also added an extra set of cake rays to fill it all out.

It seemed perfect for my girl whose name means sunshine!

Big sister (oh so proudly) and papa carried out the cake...

and our birthday girl made her wish.

When I was Five,
I was just alive.
But now I am Six,
I'm as clever as clever,
So I think I'll be six now for ever and ever.

A.A. Milne

Grateful for another turn around the sun with this girl.

Here's to fleeting toothless smiles, infectious giggles, mischievious sparkly eyes and the JOY that our children exude!

With love

~ Shanti ~

p.s. if you haven't already checked it out ~ my co-blogger Maureen is organizing a wonderful kiddie pen pal club!

Deadline for entries is February. 25th

Come on over join in!

kiddie pen pal club! (continued)

So far we've had a tremendous response for our "kiddie pen pal club!"  I just want to remind people that you have until Friday February 25th to sign up your kids.  Sign up HERE at the first kiddie pen pal post...under the comments section. 

I also wanted to send out a reminder  that you

MUST leave me an e-mail address. 

So far I've been able to track most of you down, but there are a few of you who I can't find any e-mail addresses for.  If I don't have one, can't find one, I can't match you up. 

Also I need your children's ages, so I can match you up with an age appropriate match, and I'd like to know where you live, so I can match you with someone who lives somewhere new.    I can't give you all overseas penpals, but I'll at least try to get you a different state!!

I have to say that so far I have matches for almost every kid...dare I call it penpal serendipity!!??

I may start e-mailing people their matches early next week...so be prepared...get those pens warmed up and enjoy some penpal love!!!!

xo maureen