Keep on the Yellow Brick Road {Young Women New Beginnings}

I can breathe a huge sigh of relief today as our New Beginnings program is over. It was a really nice evening and there were great talks given. I am grateful to be able to work with the youth in my church and hopefully have some sort of impact on their lives.

For the program I made all of the decorations down to the name tags. It was time consuming but to see it all put together last night made it worth it.

The projects I made were:
*flag banners
*ruby red slippers
*bracelets
*name tags that went on the shoes
*the yellow brick road that went on the floor (not pictured, my phone battery died)
*picture of Dorothy

Click each picture to see larger version









We served for refreshments Aunt Em's Country Jam & Bread, There's No Place Like Homemade Cupcakes and Ruby Red Slipper Punch. I think we should have done more since there wasn't any food left at all!

Each of the Young Women leaders represented a different character in the Wizard of Oz (Dorothy, Tin Man, Scarecrow and Lion). We tied in a trait about each character to YW and Personal Progress. Here's how we did it.

YW President-DOROTHY (All YW): Dorothy represents all the Young Women as they seek to follow the yellow brick road of personal progress to find their way “home,” back to Christ as they find/strengthen their testimonies, create a relationship with their heavenly father and realize they are daughters of God.

Me 1st Counselor-LION (Courage): The Lion represents the Young Women having the Faith and the courage necessary to follow the path that Christ has laid for them as they go to church, go to mutual, work on their personal progress, and stay on the righteous path. The Young Women need courage to be able to stick to the standards and morals of the church and be examples to those around them.

2nd Counselor-SCARECROW (Brains): The Scarecrow represents the knowledge and wisdom the girls will gain when they work through their personal progress books. They will gain an education of many subjects, be spiritually enriched and gain a more eternal perspective.

Secretary-TIN MAN (Heart): The Tin man represents the testimony the Young Women will hopefully gain in the Young Women’s program and while they journey through the different aspects of Personal Progress. The Tin man also represents love, charity, and service.

I am so proud of our Young Women and all that they accomplish. It was a wonderful night. Thank you to all of the other leaders that helped make this night a success.

Dorothy's Ruby Red Slippers

For our Young Women's New Beginnings program we are doing a Wizard of Oz theme. I've made a TON of decorations for the night, which is in 2 days!! It's going to be perfect...I hope!

One of the things I made was the ruby red slippers like Dorothy wears. Let me just tell you that I made 34 of these things. 34!! These are easy to make but I got burned out really quick making these since I had to do so many.

These shoes are great if you are doing a Wizard of Oz party, Halloween or Princess party even.

I found my pattern at Skip to my Lou. The pattern was printed off and then shrunk down to 85% on a copy machine. The same things was done for the shoe lining as well.

Click on each picture to see larger version


The sparkle paper was purchased at Hobby Lobby when it was 50% off. I cut out my pattern and traced it on the back of the paper.


Then, I cut out what I had traced and folded it in all the right spots. The original pattern was used as a guide to make sure all the folds were in the correct spots. If you had a tracing wheel you could go right over the dotted lines on the original pattern. But, of course, I don't have one of those so as usual I had to do this the old fashioned way.


Once I had everything folded I used wood glue to put the shoe together. I used wood glue because it made the shoe more stiff and I figured it would hold better than a glue stick. All the flaps were held together with paper clips while the glue dried.



For the inside of the shoe I did basically the same thing.


I traced the pattern on the back of the blue gingham paper and then cut that out. Pay no attention to the darker lines on the pattern. I was trying to save myself a step and it didn't work.


I put the lining inside the shoe but it was never a perfect fit. Since I am a perfectionist I trimmed the portions of the shoe that were not matched up. I cut the extra off the toe part so that everything lined up. I used wood glue again to hold the lining in place.


And here you have it all finished and pretty. These will have candy inside and wrapped in clear wrapping to look totally cute.

I will be taking pictures on Wednesday so you can see how it all turns out.

This is The Life {$1 Wooden Sign}

About a month ago I was over at Nester's blog and I saw her post she did about the sign she had on her mantel. I loved it! I wanted it! I must have it!

Nester found out that the sign is made by an Etsy shop called Go Jump in the Lake. I was excited and went right over but to my shock the sign is $125! I don't have an extra $125 to spend on this sign. Plus, there is no way I could convince Matt that this was a logical expense. Sad!

Fast forward a few weeks and Matt started working on Levi's bed. He bought a huge piece of mdf wood for the trundle bed and there were some pieces left over. My excitement returned as my wheels started turning. The pieces that were left over would make the perfect sized sign.

So here's how I made my sign.

Click on each picture to see closer

First, I had to glue the two pieces of mdf together to get the size I wanted. I wanted a 30 x 30 sign.


In the above picture the two pieces of wood are already glued together and I covered the line with wood putty and some other junk my husband had in the garage.

Step one and two complete!


I then painted two coats of white semi-gloss paint on the board and let that dry for a few hours. I skipped the primer because we didn't have any and I knew I was going to be painting over the white with black. I wanted the words to all line up so I measured a two inch border around the whole piece. That is what the arrows are pointing to.

Step 3 and 4 done!


I then went to the computer and played around with the sizing of the letters I wanted. Once I got the size I wanted I printed them out on cardstock and cut the out. I then traced the letters on to contact paper and cut them out. The contact paper letters are the ones I used.

*Note* If you do have some sort of vinyl cutting machine then you can make this so much easier. But I don't have one so I have to do this the long way.

Step 5 done!

I put the letters on the board exactly where I wanted them using my border as a guide.


I then painted two coats of white semi-gloss paint over the letters. Why? Because I wanted the letters to be stuck to the board so that when I painted the board black there wasn't any paint that seeped through. The white paint "glued" the letters down for me.


Once the white paint was dry I painted two coats of black over the letters. This is one paint project that I didn't care if the paint was perfect since I wanted some of the white to show through the black.



Steps 6 7 8 done!

After the black paint dried for a long time I used a knife to pry up the contact paper letters. Now the white lettering shows through. Perfect!


But it was a little too perfect for what I wanted. So I took some sandpaper to the sign. Let me tell you, I've never intentionally destroyed a project so I was very nervous about this part.

But overall I'm pleased with how it turned out. I may take some more sandpaper to it to bring out the white under the black. I want it to have a worn look to it. You can't tell in the pictures probably but the letters are more "roughed up" than what they look.




Steps 9 and 10 done!

I think this will be part of my summer mantel in a few months. And this only cost me $1 for the contact paper from Dollar Tree. I love it!!

*Please visit Go Jump in the Lake. They have great signs available for purchase. I just couldn't afford the one I wanted.*

Linking up to:
Christina's Adventures
The Shabby Creek Cottage
Cheap Crafty Mama
Someday Crafts
Savy Southern Style
Domestically Speaking

Spring has Sprung! {My Spring mantel}

After I took down our Christmas decorations (the day after Christmas) I needed green in my life. Even though it was still December I was ready for Spring. Here in Texas our winter has been really crappy. We've had maybe just a few snow flakes. Wimpy wimpy!!

So I skipped winter and went straight to Spring. Here is my Spring mantel that has been up since December.

Click on each picture to see closer.






You want details? Ok!

All of the pitchers I found at Goodwill in one single trip. Lucky day I guess! I spray painted them white.

The plate with the number 5 on it is from Dollar Tree which I already had. I printed out the number 5 on my laser printer and cut it out. A little bit of tape later and it was done. I chose the number 5 because there will be 5 people in our family soon enough.

The flowers in the pitchers are from Dollar Tree as well. I think I spent about $10 total for the flowers. That's not bad since at Hobby Lobby it would have cost me twice that probably for flowers.

The placemats are from Ikea. I have really come to have a love for Ikea lately. The store is right by my doctor's office and the last few appointments I've been stopping in to explore. I think it would be dangerous if that store was any closer.

The candlestick holders and "nests" are from Hobby Lobby. I painted the candlesticks white as well. The "nests" are the grapevine wreaths stacked on top of each other with some reindeer moss shoved in there.

I would still like to find two tiny pitchers to fill in the blank space in the center but I haven't had any luck yet at Goodwill.

So there you have it! Spring has sprung here!!

Where have I been?

These last few weeks have been so busy! There are so many projects to finish up before baby gets here. Some days it seems as if the time left just drags on and on and on. Then other days it goes by so fast and I'm just left thinking to myself, "Holy cow. Only a little time is left!!"

I went to the dr this past Friday and everything sounds good. I go back in two more weeks and then I start going every week. Baby is so active all the time. Sometimes it's right when I want to sleep he decides it's party time! Ugh! That's just annoying!

Since my last post we celebrated Jaxon's 2nd birthday. He's such a big boy! I gave him his first hair cut too! That really made him look older. I have so many pictures that I need to post and pictures of projects we have completed too. I still need to post pictures from Levi's birthday and Christmas. I've said it before that I keep this blog as a journal for myself as well and it seems I've slacked off a bit here lately.

I think we have the baby names narrowed down to two but who knows for sure. This might be one of those situations where we have to see the baby before we can give him a name that is set in stone. I'm super excited to meet this baby though. I love him so much and just want to hold him in my arms.

Come back soon for pictures galore on the kids and the projects we've completed.