2011 Year End Top Ten

I noticed a lot of folks posting a year end review around Blogland and thought I'd join in the fun. So here is a list of the top 10 Life in Wonderland posts from 2011 - enjoy!

#10 - Easter Bunny Lantern

#9 - Tale of Two Birthday Party Invitations

#8 - DIY Valentine's Day Cards

#7 - Turkey Lantern

#6 - Burlap Easter Basket

#5 - Superbowl XLV Decor

#4 - Bandanna Wreath

#3 - Fruity Valentines

#2 - I Heart Kisses

#1 - DIY Baby Shower Favor

Hope you have a fantastic New Years - looking forward to a ton of amazing crafting in 2012!





Linking up to:

Mrs. Claus Card

I thought it would be fun to make a card in honor of a woman who is routinely overlooked this time of year...Mrs. Claus!

Because I'm about out of fresh card ideas, I used the same technique as I did to make this card and this card. The one difference is that I gave Mrs. Claus an updated, blinged-out look by using red glitter foam paper.

I think Santa would approve!

Lollipop Turkey

There are going to be a number of young kids who will be feasting with us tomorrow, so I came up with a little craft to keep them occupied for a while...a lollipop turkey.


Almost too cute to eat! This is a super easy craft - here's what you'll need:
Lollipop
Googly eyes
Foam or construction paper (I used the following colors - brown, black, yellow, red, tan and gold)
Glue
Ribbon

Pre-cut the shapes and then allow the kids to glue them on.

I cut all of the shapes freehand - no need to be exact, just have fun with it!

Here are the basic shapes I went by:
The body of the turkey = Figure 8
The nose = Triangle
The wattle = Teardrop
The hat = Clay Flower Pot
The buckle = Square

To all of the US readers - hope you have a great Thanksgiving holiday!

DIY Turkey Placecard

I have a strange fascination with cookie cutters. Why "strange" you ask? Because I don't bake! But for some reason I still continue to purchase cookie cutters (that take up a fair amount of kitchen cabinet space I might add). I have figured out other ways to use them outside of baking - remember this, this and this? So, continuing in that tradition, I decided to make Thanksgiving placecards using cookie cutters.

I found this adorable turkey-shaped cookie cutter at my go to craft store (Hobby Lobby). It's a really great copper color which forced me to buy it.


I then found a copper colored piece of scrapbook paper and printed the names on it. After that I cut the paper into strips like this one...


Finally, I cut a small triangle at the end of each strip, gently folded it backwards and then attached it to the cookie cutter using glue dots.


Here's the placecard all dressed up with a place setting...


These are super easy to assemble and you can give the cookie cutters to your guests as favors - 2 for the price of 1!

Thanksgiving Turkey Lantern

I'm still in denial that Thanksgiving Day will be here in a couple of weeks! There are a ton of crafts that I was planning to make prior to the big feast, but it's not looking good. So, I decided to tackle the crafts that take no time at all to construct. First up: a turkey lantern...


You might remember the first time I made this kind of craft was for Easter - see it here. All you need to make this is a paper lantern, foam paper and hot glue. I used the cute little turkey below as a template, cut out the shapes and glued them directly onto the lantern. That's it!



Now on to the next craft!

My Halloween Drama

Halloween is a huge event at my house to the point where costumes are typically purchased a month in advance. However, for reasons I'm still not quite sure of, I didn't start shopping for costumes until last week - insert "eek" here.

My oldest son decided that he wanted to be a combat soldier - easy. And, after much thought, my youngest son decided that he wanted to be the Blue Power Ranger - even easier, or so I thought. The last time I heard about Power Rangers was the late 90's, so who knew that every store in greater Atlanta would be sold out of Power Ranger costumes this year! I looked and looked and finally located one at Party City. I couldn't believe my luck, until the guy handed me the package and then I knew exactly why the costume had not been purchased...


No mask? Really? I frantically called my husband for advice and he assured me that I had enough crafting mojo to make a mask. So, with new found confidence, I purchased the mask-less costume. Here's my best attempt at making my kid a Power Ranger...


Can you tell what the mask really is? It's Iron Man!


I first spray painted the entire mask blue...


Then I cut the shape on the mask out of foam paper and hot glued it on - much easier than I thought it would be!



My son is completely happy with his costume - crisis averted! Hope you all have a Happy Halloween!!

DIY Biz Card

Last weekend I had the opportunity to attend my very first blogger conference and it was a-mazing! I'm gonna devote a whole separate post about that event later this week because it deserves a serious shout out.

One of the things I learned prior to going to the conference was that I needed to be armed with a ton of business cards to share with all of the fabulous bloggers that I'd meet. Unfortunately the cards I owned only listed my website that is in desperate need of a makeover. So, the day before the conference, I decided to make my own business cards that listed my blog and Etsy store info. I knew this was a little risky given the fact that I'd never done it before, but I'm still in a "nothing ventured nothing gained" kind of mindset. So here's what I made...


I'd love to take full credit for this design, but it was actually inspired by this gorgeous card that I saw on Flickr.


I had to get feedback from my toughest critic (my 5 year old son), who quickly bashed the entire design. Here's how his critique went:
"Um Mom, why is the bunny on the front? Shouldn't it be the hat instead? If you keep it like that people will think your company is called 'Hare & Hatter'. I think you're confused."


Ouch! I tried to sell the design to my kid another way by pointing out how artistic it is to see the hat within the outline of the hare once you open the card. His response: "Yep, you're confused".


I'm not embarrassed to tell you that I actually spent an hour redesigning the card based on the input of a 5 year old. Seriously. However, at a certain point I realized that I didn't have that kind of time and went back to the original (some would say 'confusing') design.



I spent the rest of the night cutting out the silhouette of the hare by hand, but it was so worth it!