Our children, age 4 and 5, just celebrated their 100 days of school and as part of the school celebration of the milestone, they were welcomed to make something that contained 100 items. Recently, my daughter has been fascinated with googly eyes and my son with Monsters...so I surprised them with this activity. 

Draw your monster on your letter sized piece of cardboard. 
If you aren't confident in your Monster drawing ability, feel free to use my Monster Template.
NOTE: Cardboard makes a great base for this. It is rigid and lets the kids actually play with these monsters afterwards .

Using your scissors, cut out your Monster.
NOTE: Cardboard can be hard to cut out so help out the young ones and be careful .

Use acrylic paint and any paint brush you have to paint your monster.
NOTE: Focus of our activity was counting , so I painted these for them but they could have easily painted these themselves.

Using simple white glue, let the kids go wild and add the eyes!
NOTE: We made counting out the eyes the focus of our activity, counting one by one, by fives, by tens, etc. 
They really got into it and they enjoyed it! Once we made sure we had our hundred, they glued them on.

There you have it, four easy steps to make a 100 Eyed Monster! 

Although these were made for a school project, it was such a fun way for the kids to practise their counting. 
I think this would make a perfect activity for a gloomy day or a snow day, of which we have had many this winter! 

Let me know if you try it...I'd love to see your results!

There is a wonderful place I know called Oh My Handmade Goodness. It is a wonderful online community for creative entrepreneurs that I came across almost two years ago and I am so grateful that I did! The most notable aspect of this community is how welcoming they are, no matter how small or big a business you have. I must admit that I kept a little quite in the beginning and "lurked" more than I "spoke" but once I did,  they welcomed me with open and supportive arms.  This community has allowed me to grow my creative connections, challenged me to push my comfort zone and presented the opportunity to collaborate with some amazing people and artists. 

This last point is the thing I am most excited about right now! Earlier this year in the OMHG forums (such a valuable place to be) an idea was presented by Tif of Stubborn Press & Co, for a collaboration amongst the members to put together a monthly letterpress calendar for 2014. It sounded like an amazing idea and it was certainly something I would love to be a part of. The theme of the calendar was appropriately set to 'Community' and the task was to create something that described what community meant to each of us. So I took a deep breath, gathered some courage (there are some seriously amazing artists in there) and I officially became July.

Now after months of planning and work within the community, I am officially sharing the news of the pre-sale! 
Take a moment, head on over to Oh My Handmade Goodness and check out the 2014 Community Letterpress Calendar. The pre-sale starts today and is set for a limited edition run of 200, so order yours today…I just ordered mine!!

Two weeks ago we celebrated my sons 4th birthday and we celebrated it with a Pirate themed party. 
I will have a post about the party up soon but I thought I would start with a tutorial on 
how to make a Pirate hat in four easy steps with no sewing required!

Fold foam sheet in half.
Cut a 12" opening down the middle crease.
This will fit most heads from age 4 - 13.

Draw the pirate hat outline while folded in half.
Use chalk if you have it (pencil is harder to see).
Then cut it out while folded.

Add a quarter size drop of Fabric Glue (hot glue will work too) just beside the end of the opening you cut down the middle, fold it back up and let it dry.

There you have it, four easy steps to make a pirate hat with no sewing required! 
Let me know if you try it...I'd love to see your results!

It's December and the count down officially begins. As the month rolls by, time seems to tick faster and the next thing you know it's office parties, kids parties, schools out and you are scrambling about to get the little things done. In such times it can be easy to jump out and buy 'whatever' at 'whatever' cost. Handmade may not be your first thought but handmade doesn't necessarily mean time consuming, sometimes it can done relatively quickly and at a low cost. 

These little packages contain homemade chocolate cookies, wrapped in wax paper, packed into brown paper bags, embelished with ribbon and mini ornaments. They tasted good (you have to taste test them don't you), looked good and the total wrapping costs was $5.00. 

There you go, exhibit A on handmade done pretty quickly and at a low cost. 
These were made with co-workers in mind. What do you think, would you like them?

I've been asked a few times where I purchased the storage bins in my studio. The truth is that most of the bins are from the Dollar store. Take these for example, great little containers...6 of these babies for $2! They are frosted, stackable and the lids are white, which is my preference in my studio. Perfect indeed, especially for those small left over craft supplies that can end up pilling up or getting stuffed into a drawer and forgotten.

Take those perfect, affordable containers, add my trusty label maker and I keep those little supplies organized, identifiable and easy to find. 

Ahhhh....I love structure and order....now if only I could structure and order my toddlers!

My little boy is officially three years old. Where does the time go! With the end of summer here, my big girl saying good-bye to pre-school and prepping for Kindergarten and with my little man's party...it's been busy around here. Like many three year olds, my little one is a huge 'Cars' fan...he would probably watch that movie a thousand times if we let him. So what better theme for his party this year then Cars.

I love to throw the kids their parties but as I have said before, I try to do it using what I have and without breaking the bank. My best deal found this time around was the large decal that covered almost the entire sliding door; found it in a little run down local party shop for $5! With a little time, some bargain shopping and creatively using existing items, I think the place looked pretty good. 

The kids loved it, he especially got a huge kick when he woke up and found the house decorated with all things Cars! More importantly we were in the company of our amazing family, we celebrated another milestone and we made him smile...now isn't that really what it's all about? 

We've always enjoyed Canada Day but since having the kids, it's so much fun to go all out for them. This year I was inspired by the Oh Canada post by Squirrely Minds to make Canada Day t-shirts with the kids. The original post did it a little different but since my children are only (almost) 3 and (barely) 4, I modified things a little bit to ensure I'd get pretty close to the desired result. So here is what I did and I think it worked out well.

The next day, we hit the Canada Festivities and had a wonderful time. The kids were so good, they listened, they had fun, they walked over 4 miles (aprox 6.5 km) on their little feet (one took the stroller on the way there and switched on the way back) and we got so many compliments on their Canada Day gear most especially their shirts! It was a wonderful day and we can't wait to do it again next year! I hope all my fellow Canadian's had a wonderful Canada Day!

Oh how I enjoyed reading about all the amazing people that attended the oh-so-amazing Altitude Design Summit. The pictures and stories alone were enough to inspire me. Thankfully and much to my delight they also have the Alt Channel that provides inspiration and education all year round. I have taken a few of their classes already, Blogging 101, Advertising for Bloggers and DSLR 101. I have learned quite a bit from these classes and even met quite a few other bloggers out there that I may not have met otherwise. The classes not only opened my mind to the possibilities out there but also opened the door to networking.

I am now looking forward to the pictures and stories that will come out of the upcoming Alt NYC in August. It is going to be a one day event on the 23rd at where else but Martha Stewart Living headquarters...oh la la. Thanks to the search engine bing Alt NYC is now a reality but they didn't stop there. Thanks to bing I get to enjoy something too!

Thanks to bing the Alt Channel is offering 2 free classes to folks like me - whoo-hoo! I have signed up for my classes and am excited to expand my mind and my network even further. Alt SLC and Alt NYC may be out of my reach right now, but thanks to bing I am just a little closer. 

Check out THE BING SUMMER OF DOING and get your summer of doing started...I have!