Pocket Calendar Cover

Hi blog friends! Can you believe that my baby is 2 weeks old already?!?!?! I just can't believe it! Time flies with a newborn! Even though those sleepless nights seem never ending, LOL! Well, we are slowly adjusting around here. Quinn is starting to sleep a little better at night which is nice. Hopefully we'll get onto some sort of schedule around here soon. I actually had a moment the other day to do a little paper crafting project. It's nothing fancy, but I thought I would share it with you here.

But first, a photo of Quinn at one week old:

{Love her!}

Now onto my project. I don't know why, but I always have to have a paper calendar that I can write on every year. I do have a slight obsession with calendars. And with lists. I'm a nerd like that. Maybe it helps me to at least feel like I'm organized! Well, I like the monthly kind of calendar where you can see the whole month at once. I have an iPhone, but I just can't seem to get into the calendar on it. I think because I can't see the whole month at the same time. Anyway, I always buy one of those cheap pocket calendars with the plastic cover on them. You can probably find one for $1 at a dollar store, but I got this one for not much more than that at Target. A lot of them aren't very cute either, but they're cheap & a great size for my purse (or now, diaper bag).

I like to make a new cover for my pocket calendar, though, to make it so much cuter! This is so fast & easy too & yes, it's not necessary, but it's just so much prettier when I pull it out now! All I do is take the calendar out of the plastic cover. I open it flat & measure it onto some pretty designer paper. Then I cut the paper. I add an embellishment to the front cover-in this case I just stamped my initial & punched it out with my circle punch & then layered that onto a scallop circle that I punched out & glued this onto the cover. Then slip the cover & the calendar back into the plastic case-done!

So fast & easy & look how cute it is:

These make a great little gift too, especially for teachers!

Handmade Christmas 2011: Shopper Tote

Here's another handmade Christmas present for ya! Can I just say I am so thankful to have Pinterest in my life this year? I have just found some amazing handmade gift ideas & tutorials. Thanks to everyone who is willing to share their awesome ideas on there! So I saw this shopper tote on Pinterest & you can find pictures & the full tutorial at The Crafty CPA. I love this style tote bag! So great for a teacher gift too, or for anyone who loves a good tote bag really. I think next time I would actually make the bag a bit larger & I would make the handles a tad shorter, but it's still a great bag. I did make one change which was that I only measured in 2 inches when boxing the bottom corners & I think the tutorial said to go in 5 inches if I remember right. I love that this bag has 2 outside pockets, one on each side, in between the handles too (it's hard to see the pocket in the photo).

And here's a shot of the inside of the bag:

I always like to use a lighter color lining inside of my bags, just so it's easier to see what's in there. I also love to add 2 large pockets, perfect for your phone & other small items you want to keep handy. Thanks again to The Crafty CPA for the inspiration for this one!

Teacher Totes

Well, yesterday was my daughter's last day of preschool! {I can't believe I'll have a kindergartner in the fall!} I made these totes for her 2 awesome teachers on Tues, finishing them just in time! I bought these super cute corduroy fabrics a while back knowing that I wanted to make her teachers some simple tote bags for end of the year gifts, but I totally procrastinated. Even though I rushed through these I really love them. Luckily they are just super simple totes, lined with cute polka dot fabrics & a pocket inside too. Nothing fancy, but perfect for teachers to tote around books & papers.

Here they are:

I love the linings too:

I hope that they get a lot of use out of these!

Tab Top Can Treats

So I was really hoping to have this posted before Teacher Appreciation Week, but life happens & blogging didn't! I'm sure you've probably seen this idea before & you've probably even seen the awesome tutorial that Our Best Bites had on their blog by now, but I still want to share it here in case you need a cute little gift/treat at some point.

Here were my treat cans for my daughter's preschool teachers:

Just click here to see the whole tutorial from Our Best Bites on how to make these & they even include free printables for the front of the can. So easy & they look super cute!

Here's what I put inside of mine instead of M&Ms:

Even though the cans are pretty small, I still fit 10 pieces of bite-sized candy bars in there. I wanted there to be a variety of candy in there since you never know what people like.

This was so easy that I even made one for one of the girls that I teach every Sunday at church & gave it to her for her birthday. I just used one of my stamps & some punches to decorate the front of this one:

I will definitely make these again!

Thanks to the ladies at Our Best Bites for sharing!

Handmade Christmas: Fabric Gift Card Holders

Did you see this Gift Card Cozy tutorial over at Make It and Love It a while back? So stinkin' cute! I decided that I just had to try these out this year for my daughter's preschool teacher gifts. They were so easy & I think they look pretty cute too! In case you're wondering if my photo is off, it's not, the holder on the right is slightly wider than the one on the left. It just worked a little better for me. I added the yo-yo flower to the one on the left too (I need to try some other types of fabric flowers too) & it just looked darling! I used my Big Shot & my ribbon trim die to cut the scallop out of fabric to make the scalloped border for the one on the right. It looks really cute, but I wish I had some red fabric so it stood out more.

A little holder for their Starbucks love:

Then I sewed a quick little gift bag out of this cute red polka dot fabric to hold the gift cards & they each got a desktop calendar too, of course!

Merry Christmas to our wonderful preschool teachers!

2011 Desktop Calendars

*To receive your calendar by Christmas, please order by December 10th!

My 2011 Desktop Calendars are here!

And this year I've gone digital. I made them completely in My Digital Studio & I just love how they turned out. I am so excited to offer these to you again this year for purchase. Mostly because I've been able to cut the cost in half since the digital calendar just simply uses less supplies. Awesome right? This year they are only $7 each (last year they were $15). Now you can afford to buy one for everyone on your list this year-family, friends, co-workers, teachers, etc.

The calendar will come packaged as shown in the photo above. You will receive the calendar pages (12-one for each month of 2011), a clear plastic frame (4" x 6" size) & pretty red striped ribbon. Each calendar page is professionally printed as a 4" x 6" photo at a photo processing center & then you insert the current month into the clear plastic frame. This size is perfect for sticking on top of your desk or on a bookshelf or on the counter by your phone. And the ribbon holds it all together, with the extra months pages behind the frame. Plus it looks pretty for gift giving!

Here's a close-up of one of the calendar pages:

Each calendar page has the same layout, just the colors & images are different.

Here are the designs for each month:

Are you ready to order?

Just email me any time!

They are $7 each

(add $3 for shipping)

I accept cash, check, credit card, PayPal

Back to School Teacher Gift

I knew that I would be needing a back to school teacher gift soon, but just didn't come up with anything creative on my own. I've been seeing everyone in the crafty blog world giving decorated bottles of hand sanitizer so I decided to make one too. Well, actually, they had this ginormous (40 oz) bottle of hand sanitizer at Costco a couple of weeks ago for only $2.50, so that kinda made this gift an even better idea! {wink, wink} So I peeled the front label off, used a little Goo Gone to remove all of the leftover sticky gunk & then I glued on my own label using the new & super adorable Stampin' Up! Play Date designer series paper. I added a pretty red polka dot ribbon at the top & attached a cute little tag as well so they would remember who it's from later.

Here's the tag:

And a close-up of the decorated bottle:

It's not a fancy gift I know, but it is very practical. And at least now it will look cute in the classroom while helping to keep everyone healthy!