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Polka Dot and Plaid 4th of July Printables, for Celebrations/Cookouts

June 18, 2012 By Laura 6 Comments

Free printables for you!

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2021 NOTE – WE’RE SORRY, BUT THE FILES TO THESE PRINTABLES ARE NO LONGER AVAILABLE.  ๐Ÿ™

I have been having fun designing some 4th of July printables to share with you, to add a fun red, white and blue themed touch to any cookout or celebration you may have planned, with family and/or friends. (Or, you can even print the cute Bitty Pennants out and string up in your home!) These are the little details that make hosting a gathering so fun to plan, and also the details that impress your guests, and make them smile. So I hope you like them! I tried to design them with simple direction right on them, to show you how easy they can be to prepare.  But I will give you some printing tips, at the end here as well, after you look at the previews of the printables in this post.  But first . . . . . .

*IMPORTANT NOTE:  *Do NOT save the images of the printables you see below,but rather use the download links after the images at the end, for the full size printables.  What you see here are just low resolution previews, and not suitable for printing.

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I must say, I think these Bitty Pennants are adorable!  I gave them some tabs, so they can be folded right over some thin ribbon or string, and then just secured with a little piece of tape.  If you choose to download the pennants, please note that you will need both Part 1 and 2.

cupcake-wrappers-free-printable These wrappers, designed for cupcakes, could possibly also be used around the bottom of those short clear acrylic cups, filled with fruit treat ideas like these.

red-white-blue-dish-name-cards-free-printable How cute would these little cards be, sitting tent-like on your food table in front of each dish, letting guests know what’s on the menu?

4th-july-free-printable Lastly, these cards I actually designed last year, but decided to offer them all to you again. They are a bit bigger cards, and print as a full 8.5 x 11 sheet. All you need to do is cut on the solid line, and fold on the dotted. You can hang them to spin on strings, put them tent like on the tables, or slide them under a glass table top. They are like birthday cards for America, and really remind everyone the reason for celebrating, and the gift that our freedom is.

Printing suggestions:  I recommend printing any or all printables at least on some good cardstock, as opposed to regular printer paper.  Be sure for each download you choose of the links below, that you choose the correct orientation for printing, as well as your highest quality printing setting!  Also, if you’d really like to get vibrant colors closer to what you see on your computers, try printing on matte photo paper.

With that, here are the download links, for the actual full-size printables. Just click on the link, and when the image comes up, right click, and ‘Save Image As’, to where you will be able to a location where you will find them on your computer. (Again, do not save and print the images above, or they will look terrible, and waste your ink and paper.)

Bitty Pennants-Part 1

Bitty Pennants-Part 2

 Cupcake Wrappers

Dish-Name Table Card Tents

America’s Birthday Cards

I hope you enjoy these, as well as your celebrations of fun, food, family and friends!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, AMERICA!

4th-fourth-of-july-free-printables *******End of Post*****
This long single image below for Pinterest pinning!  : )


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Filed Under: Celebrations, Crafts & Creations, Free Printable/Downloadable, Free Printables, Home Decor, Seasonal Home decor, SUMMER Crafts and Creations, The Big Picture Tagged With: 4th of July, 4th of july free printables, 4th of july party decor, 4th-of-July-celebrations-decorations, 4th-of-july-cookout-decorations, american party decor, free-printables, red-white-blue-decor

Our Halloween Decor! (Indoor-Outdoor-Photos Galore!)

October 9, 2011 By Laura 22 Comments

BOO, People!! So excited here, to show you all around! I had a goal this year (2011), to have our whole homestead Halloween decor done (known as the 3-day Hallowtide, to us) by October 1st! That way, we could enjoy it all the whole month of October.ย  I also wanted it all blogged no more than a few days later. How long can it really take, to photograph, edit, and blog it? Apparently….9+ days.ย  With my kids busy schedules, I’m in the driver’s seat, in gyms and on fields, more than in my computer chair these days. (Enjoying it, although behind in work to say the least. But my kiddos come first!)

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Now, I have to explain real quick, that I have been trying to ‘find my place’, with Halloween decor, for years.ย  From a spiritual/Catholic point of view (always where I am at), I don’t like to stray too far from the true meaning or Christian roots of any holiday, including Halloween. This is why we have always extended our focus to Hallowtide = All Hallows Eve, All Souls’ Day, and All Saints’ Day.ย  (You can see more about that, and how we roll, HERE.)

On a completely unrelated note, but tying in with the theme, I personally am a big baby, some may say. I do not like scary/gory/terror/evil anything.ย  My kids laugh at everything they see, and I look away. I freak out inside a little bit, myself. Not to mention (ok, I will….), that I see zero value in all of it. So…. decorating has always been a bit of a reluctance / confusion for me, about what I wanted to do.ย  But I can say this year, I found my groove, and the game was on!
In that light, I hope you enjoy seeing our homestead, outdoors and indoors, that I have photographed for you all.
LET’S GO!

best Halloweeen decor Off the bat ( <—- <giggle!), I’d like to give huge props and thanks to Emily from Frosting & Ink Social Designery! <—- Click on the link to see her Etsy shop!ย  I purchased this Halloween Party Collection from Frosting & Ink, and used it for my home decor!ย  While I can design much of anything myself, I hardly have time these days. And besides, when I saw what Emily created, I was all over it!ย  So she deserves lots of credit here! I’ll be posting some her beautiful designs, and showing you how I used them throughout these photos. I actually have not used them all yet, but there is always next year!

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Got to warn you:ย  I handed the Hubs the cobweb stuff, to be in charge of getting that done, and he went crazy with it!ย  Even {O} giggled watching him and said, “I can tell you’re having fun with that stuff Daddy! You don’t want to stop!”

One more note:ย  I had fun editing these photos, with some little grunge effects, etc.ย  My house is not actually this grimy looking, inside or out!ย  Not that’s it’s perfectly clean either.ย  If anything, it gets more of the messy & dust-bunny kind of dirty. LOLย  ; )

So here is my very favorite Halloween creation, I made with a design from Frosting & Ink….

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My Halloween Parking Sign! That’s right, I’m the witch around here! Heee hee heeee! Some will agree with that, in a heart beat. ; )ย  Others will argue, “No000 sir.ย  She is kidding you.ย  She is the sweetest thing ever!”ย  Depends who you talk to. LOL. (Or the day? lol).ย  Just kidding.

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Anyway….I smile every time I pull the car into our driveway, about 20 times a day, and see my sign.ย  It’s something I made to be able to use every year, for years to come.ย I saw the whole thing in my head, the second I saw the design.ย  Michael made the jagged wood board for me, and we painted/distressed it, etc. It is weatherproof.

If you are wondering how, I do plan to do a quick post in the Crafts section, about how I made some of these Halloween decor things, sometime this week.ย  But this post is just about showing our decorations for now.

best Halloweeen decor I just have to show you the amazing and beautiful detail in Emily’s work!ย  I always loved that font used for ‘Parking’.ย  A band I love, Daughtry, uses that letter-style for their logo. It’s called Bleeding Cowboys, I think. It’s a perfect choice for Halloween designing.ย  Good call, Emily!

best Halloweeen decor

I was soooo on the fence (<—-another pun…giggle!) about getting this skeleton at Michael’s Arts & Crafts!!ย  I definitely am drawn to skulls and cross-bones and stuff, you know?ย  I have no idea why. They just ‘look’ cool to me. Yet I don’t really want to like them so much. LOL.ย  So….this is about my line, as far as decor goes.ย  See? Call me a wimp.ย  As long as we placed him humorously, was our/my decision.ย  I do like seeing him, hanging out there! (As long as it’s not dark out! lol)
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007_halloween-garden-home-decor Here is a wider view of our front-yard-gardens.
The flowers are pretty deadish now, which really kind of makes it all work!ย  Don’tcha think?
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Another perspective of our friend.ย  From Snap Peas to Skeletons!
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best Halloweeen decor I love my newly painted buttoned bottle.

best Halloweeen decor The potting bench.


best Halloweeen decor

Bats swarming our front door.ย ย  It was a popular idea last year, that I loved.ย  But I’m slow. : )
Details of how I did this will be in the Crafts post too.

best Halloweeen decor This chest Michael picked up free somewhere in front of someone’s house.ย  It’s super interesting inside!ย  Really old…meant for shipping clothing and goods, etc., I think.ย  There are all of these compartments inside.ย  BUT, when opened, there is a heavy mold/mildew odor (which I am immediately allergic to), that we can’t get rid of.ย  So, we’ll be tossing it, instead of doing anything more with it.ย  But I thought it would be cool to keep through Halloween out on the front deck, anyway.
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best Halloweeen decor

Through the glass of our front door here, you can see our Halloween wreath I made, with another design from my party pack from Frosting & Ink!

SO……that’s about it for our outdoor Halloween decor.

Would you like to come in??…

best Halloweeen decor When you order for this particular pack from Frosting & Ink, you are supposed to give her your last name, so she can customize this design.ย  I incorporated it into a wreath.ย  I’ll share more about how I made this later, in the craft post, too.

best Halloweeen decor The wreath is technically on the inside, because it is not weatherproof, in any way! Just turning it over here, so you can get a better look of it as a whole.ย  But faces outdoors.

best Halloweeen decor

Our Halloween Tree.ย  Yep….still have that stick tree there! LOL.

The Halloween lights and black crow were bought at Michael’s Arts and Crafts.

best Halloweeen decor

Some of you may know, I love making inter-changable fan pulls, for our all-season room.ย  (Anyone?)ย  I haven’t made one in a long time.ย  BUT, I did make one for Halloween this year!….

best Halloweeen decor Beads and this spider, from Michael’s Arts and Crafts.

best Halloweeen decor

How cute are the little ghosts??

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best Halloweeen decor

I did this kind of thing on our French doors, for Christmas and spring too.ย  I used the the little Cupcake Toppers and Party Signs, from the same Frosting & Ink Party Collection,ย  for what I call ‘Fancy Strands’, down my doors.

best Halloweeen decor

best Halloweeen decor

best Halloweeen decor

025_ A little over the top with the cobwebs, much?ย  It is a bit of an old family portrait now. Well, only 2-3 years. Time for a new one, although we’ll keep this one up somewhere in the house, too, anyway. But that’s the fam.

Well would you look at the time!….

best Halloweeen decor

It’s late, and I must get to bed.ย  I am sure we’ll have something more Halloween-ish to share, in the coming weeks.ย  We do plan to do something with pumpkins!ย  And as I said, I’ll be showing how I made everything crafty in this post, in a coming post in the Crafts section. So….we do hope you come again. (If you DARE!!ย  Because we’re wicked scary….right? ; )

ETA:ย  Here is the link for:ย  Tips, Tricks and How-To’s to our Halloween Decor ย in this post

Please sayย  “BOO!”….if you enjoyed this peak of our Halloween Homestead!!?

Feel free to share the post, or PIN any photos you’d like, as well!

Isn’t the Halloween season fun??

* * * * * *
creative Halloween decor




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Filed Under: Faith/ Catholic, FALL Home Decor, Holidays, Home Decor, Photography, Seasonal Home decor, The Big Picture, The Homestead Tagged With: Catholic-blogs, Catholic-families, Catholic-Halloween-decorating, Frosting-and-Ink-Social-Designery, Halloween, Halloween-crafts, Halloween-decor, Halloween-fan-pull, Halloween-home-decor, Halloween-tree, Hallowtide, indoor-Halloween-decorating-decor, Michaels-arts-and-crafts, outdoor-Halloween-decor, really-creative-Halloween-decor

A Peek at Our Easter Home Decor, and Finished Eggs

April 20, 2011 By Laura 3 Comments

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After sharing with you all the egg dying fun we had with the kids, I wanted to show you what we did with the eggs they dyed, and a little bit of the rest of the Easter/Spring decor around our home.ย  As always, our little holiday tree ( or, branch in a bucket of bricks…lol.) is decorated.ย  Mostly photos here – less chit-chat.
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{O} did this arrangement of some of our dyed eggs and raffia in a tall glass jar, all by herself. (She’s 8.) I was so impressed.

Next, you can see what I decided to do with some of those dyed pieces of lace you saw in the photos of the egg dying post….

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CALVARY.

This was a Lenten project & (Scriptural) lesson we did with the kids. Well, Michael really gave the lesson, and he did a really good job with the message, as they all worked, getting their hands really dirty.ย  It always warms my heart, to listen to the kids talk about their faith, so directly from their heart, and in such sweet ways. I took lots of photos of them making this.ย  I’ll share in time next year, and show you how it is done.ย  (If I’m still blogging.)ย  The whole thing will be going out in my garden.ย ย  I love it, for all it represents.ย  The kids put it together, seeded it, watered it every day, and grew it to this,ย  and all of that makes me love it even more.

JESUS’ TOMB.

I hope you enjoyed the peek.ย  : )ย  We won’t be blogging again until next week. Our family has a busy and focused rest of the week, that I’m really looking forward to, as we prepare ourselves for Easter.ย  So we just wanted to say to you now…


From our home to yours, wishing all of you, and your families, a blessed Holy Week, and a joyful Easter Sunday celebration.

See you again soon.

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Filed Under: Gardening, Home Decor, Photography, Seasonal Home decor, SPRING Home Decor, The Homestead Tagged With: Catholic-blogs, Catholic-families, decorating-with-dyed-Easter-eggs, Easter-home-decor, easter-tree

How to Make Beautiful Winter Ice Decor for Your Yard

January 20, 2011 By Laura 10 Comments

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In mid-December, I had decided that my yard was looking all too-blase’, for me.ย  There was snow, so that was a plus.ย  It just looks so bleak and dead, without snow at least. But it really needed more than just……white, everywhere. It bothered me more this year, because I had seen, what I was missing, before.ย  You see, at the end of 2 Autumn seasons ago, Michael and I had cleaned out the garden beds, and thrown down winter rye seed.ย  By the time the first snow had fallen that year, beautiful bright green rye was coming up out of the snow in all of the garden beds in the front yard.ย  I can’t tell you how much I enjoyed it all winter.ย  Three perfectly snow covered, raised rectangles,ย  elevated out of the blanket of snow on the ground, with beautiful, spring-green grass poking up out of it, everywhere. It always looked, just beautiful.

But this past Autumn, we threw it down the winter rye seed a little too late.ย  It was already too cold to germinate and grow.ย  I was so mad at myself, for waiting too long.ย  And I’ve suffered for it.ย  I haven’t looked at our front yard, without grumbling under my breathe about it, once this winter.ย  I miss the bright green rye.ย  It’s looked so….lifeless out there, without it.ย  Fresh fallen snow is always pretty.ย  But the rye just added so more.

The week before Christmas, I was thinking about how I could add some pretty out there.ย  So I decided to try and make some ice molded sculptures, adding pretty things to it.ย  Then I could place them about the yard, on railings, in my empty garden beds, and on the walls out back outside our school windows, where the birds spend the day coming and going.

ice decor I started with some store bought bags of cranberries, and some oranges as well.ย  The rest, I got from our yard.ย  (Alright….some from the neighbor’s yard too. But, we manage the property, and I was pretty sure she wouldn’t care. Or ever know. lol).ย  I found 2 kinds of berries on sticks.ย  Holly berries, and……what are those dark ones??ย  I’m not really sure.ย  If you know, maybe you can tell me.
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ice decor I also tried to gather a few different kind of pine branches and sticks, for variety.
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ice decor From the kitchen, I gathered containers in as many different shapes and sizes as I could find.ย  I was especially excited about the triangle pizza slice ones!ย  I also got some tuna cans that had been washed out, and put downstairs for the next garbage day.
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ice decor Then the fun started.ย  We sliced up some oranges, started pulling pieces of pine off the big branches, and started arranging things just-so in the containers.

Who is WE, all of a sudden?

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Me, and {O}.ย  She is always right there, no matter what I am doing, asking to help. “Would I be able to help?”ย  It’s her most used sentence, and it always has been.ย ย  She’s so nice to have around.ย  She makes my second cup of coffee every morning too.ย  She peeks in my first cup about 50 times, just hoping it is time to get me more.ย  Now the boys are trying to cut in on her morning gig, and she’s not having it.

Oh…I’m getting off topic I guess.ย ย  So….

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….she was really enjoying doing this project with me.ย  She was cutting stuff with the big knife, arranging every piece with love, and feeling like such a big girl.ย  Designing and crafts is her thing, anyway.

We had a lot of fun, trying to make each arrangement a little different than the others.
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As we finished each one, we put it out on the deck.

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They looked so pretty, all together, against the wet deck that brought out the grain in the wood.ย ย ย  I was more excited than ever, just imaging how beautiful they were going to be.ย  But they weren’t done yet.
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We had to fill each container with water, being careful not to disturb our arrangement too much.

Is it me, or are my old and vein-y hands making it into a lot of blog posts lately?

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Lovely!!ย  All that was left for them now, was to freeze!ย  So we left them right there, for them to do just that.

And we waited …. day, after day, after day.

Christmas came, and went, and they still sat there, unfrozen.

Yes,ย  a little technical difficulty in my plan.ย  One should check the weather report, before one decides to make a 100 frozen ice sculptured outside, huh?ย  A little warm front moved in, out of the blue, after weeks of being frigid cold out there.ย  Sometimes, they would start to freeze, and I would get all excited.ย  This would be about 2:30 a.m., when I got up to put more wood on the fire, and I just had to run out there, and check if they were freezing yet, in my nighty.

But the next day, the temps would climb back up to 36 degrees or so again, and it was back to square one.

(Sigh.) ย  The round tin pans were starting to rust!!

But then finally, they froze enough….

ice decor Taking them out of their containers, one by one, was like opening a gift, every time.

Each one a unique surprise.

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I thought they were so beautiful.

Don’t you think so too?………

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This one was still partially unfrozen, but I didn’t mind much.ย  It was still pretty, so I laid them in the garden beds.
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Many of them filled my flower box.
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Others I just plunked in the snow, on the railings.
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I loved the pitcher ones.ย  I put those in my garden beds too.ย  The spring greens sticking up looked like it belonged there.

They brought comfort and a smile to my face, and relieved my longing for the sight of my winter rye.

When it’s warm enough again, and our ice creations melt away, the little critters around that we enjoy so much, will be delighted with the berries and oranges our ice left behind.

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I hope you’ll try making some yourself, if your climate allows. (I do recommend checking the weather forecast – unless you just happen to live where it is always bitter cold this time of year.) ย  It really is another great, easy, and fun activity to do with your kids.ย  Or alone! Please send us a photo if you make some!!

I think we’ll make some more soon, too.ย  It really is enjoyable to do.ย  I’d like to experiment with some other natural ingredients.ย ย  Maybe strawberries, raspberries, blueberries…..oh, pinecones!! Those would look nice.ย  Do you have any other ideas?ย  Let me know.ย  I bet we could get quite creative with this.

Ice is so pretty as it is.ย  I could get obsessed with this.



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Filed Under: Gardening, Home Decor, Seasonal Home decor, The Homestead, WINTER Home Decor Tagged With: how-to-beautify-winter-yard, how-to-make-ice-decor, ice art, winter yard decor, winter-home-decor

Heart Strings / A Valentine’s Craft

January 17, 2011 By Laura 49 Comments

If brilliant colors make you happy, and you love fun projects, then this Valentine’s craft is just for you!  We’re showing you just how to do it, step by step today!

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While my home is not completely decorated for the upcoming ‘month of love’ just yet, I knew it was time to get to some Valentine crafting! I happened to see this craft from Martha Stewart Living, and was inspired to try it ourselves, with a spin or 2 of our own on it.  By melting crayons in between wax paper, and cutting out hearts, some very cute Valentine’s decor can be made!  That Martha is a clever one, huh? ( Or, her creative team – whatever. lol.)  You can make this craft as quick and simply. or as involved, as you choose, and I am going to tell you the ways how.

Supplies needed:

  • Crayons, with paper removed (This craft is a great way to use up those old broken crayon pieces!)
  • A sharpener with a fat hole.
  • *Wax paper
  • Clothing iron
  • Brown craft paper, or brown paper bags (Just a protection layer for ironing.)
  • Hearts stencils or cookie cutters (2-3 sizes is nice.)
  • Pen or pencil
  • Scissors
  • Scotch-like tape

*  DO NOT substitute parchment paper for the wax paper. It is not the same thing, as parchment paper has teflon in it.

Other optional supplies, depending on what you want to do with your crafts decoration:

  • White cotton twine and food coloring. (Simplified option:  thin ribbon in white or any Valentine color.)
  • A clothing hanger, or a long tree branch

I intended to hang our hearts once they were done.  So instead of using some satin ribbon (which is simple and faster, if you want to go that route), I had this vision of hanging our hearts on dyed string, that varied in color.  So, with a roll of white cotton twine, and some food coloring, this is how I did it:

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heart-strings-valentines-craft-1 In a plastic container, I added some red food coloring to some water, deep enough to soak the roll on it’s side to the cardboard roll core. I just let it sit for awhile, while I did other things,  until I thought it soaked through all of the layers of twine.  Then, I made orange and yellow soaks as well, letting a different side of the roll sit in each.

heart-strings-valentines-craft-2 I loved the results!   How pretty is that?

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I knew as the twine was pulled off the roll, the layers would get lighter, but that too would only help the variations in the string colors.  Now, all of this string is not going to dry on the roll all the way through, any time this year, but that’s o.k.  You’ll be able to use the string damp just fine, and it’ll dry hanging.

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-4 But while the string roll was soaking in various colors, the kids and I got to making our hearts.

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Pull off a piece or 2 of wax paper, fold in half to make a good crease, and then open back up. . . .

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-5 What size piece you use depends on how many hearts you’ll want to make.  Remember, you’ll only be able to get hearts out of one half, as it will be ironed together soon, with crayon shavings in between.

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-7 Grab your old peeled crayons, and start choosing some great colors for Valentine hearts.  No need to stay with strictly traditional colors, such as red and pink.  Try some purples, raspberries, and even oranges and yellows!

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-8 Now, if your old crayons have been kicking around together for some time, as ours have, they are going to have yuckity-doo-dahs all over them.  Even as a kid, with me and my sibling’s bottomless bucket of crayons, I hated this.

So because I have had particular issues, long before I was a blogger, I have had a trick for this crayon problem.  And since you came to this blogger with issues blog, I’m going to share it with you.  : )

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-9 Just lay the crayons down, one by one, on some scrap paper, and rub the yuckity-doo-dahs away!  I found this is also a good way to test what the color really looks like!!  Some crayons when used, do not look anything like the shade of the actual crayon!  So deceiving.

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-10 Old crayons, like new:  Yuckity-doo-dah free!

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-11 To make crayon shavings, you need a sharpener of some kind.  Our little hand pencil sharpener did not have a hole big enough for a crayon, so we used my make-up one!  Thanks Lancome!

Now….you’ll need to iron on your table or other flat surface, so I highly recommend putting down some crafts paper to protect your surface, from both melting crayon, and the heat from the iron.

On top of the protected surface, lay your open wax paper pieces.

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-12 Over only one side of your wax paper piece, sharpen your crayons and let the shavings fall onto the paper.  Each of my our kids did their own, and had their own unique colors combinations, which was going to make for a nice variety of colored hearts.

heart-strings-valentines-craft-13 Some of our crayons were metallic ones!!  So that was adding a whole new element of pretty!

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-14 Make sure you cover the whole side with shavings pretty well.  Brush any pieces in from the very edge though.

heart-strings-valentines-craft-15 Fold over the empty side of wax paper, onto the side with the shavings.

Now, Martha’s directions say to fold up each open side some, to keep the melting crayon in.  But, I didn’t want to waste any space, as we wanted to make lots of hearts, and some on the bigger side too.  So….I just made sure I was working on my brown paper bag.  (We also had other craft paper taped to cover our surface under that.)

heart-strings-valentines-craft-16 Now, after putting brown paper on top of your waxed paper and shavings, you can start ironing.  What setting?  Good question!!  See, Martha said on a ‘medium setting’.  But guess what?  Our iron doesn’t have a medium setting!  So I set it between silk and wool, ; )  …. and adjusted the heat up or down from there.

As you can see, some oils from the crayons may seep through the wax paper and the brown paper.  It doesn’t cause any problems. Just make sure you clean the surface of your iron off when you are done with this craft, so it doesn’t transfer to your clothes!  What a hot mess that would be!   (Note to self:   Clean surface of iron from crayon craft!!)  (By the time I decide to iron an article of clothing, I’ll have forgotten I ever did this craft with it.)

As you iron, you’ll want to keep peeking,  to see if there are more shavings that still need melting in areas.

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-17 Heavy in crayon wax…..but nice!!

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-18 The next kiddo went with a lighter layer of shavings, for a new effect.  Or, his hands just got tired from sharpening the crayons.

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-17 They were looking good!!  Just holding each of them up to the light, I could tell this was going to look super cool when we were done.

heart-strings-valentines-craft-18

I couldn’t wait to see what this one was going to look like, all melted.

heart-strings-valentines-craft-21 LOVE!!!

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-22 Now, you may notice some bubbling or wrinkling in areas.  I’m not sure why this happened sometimes.  I was guessing maybe it was too much heat at times.  But since this was a fun crafts class, and not our Science class, we weren’t going to waste time running tests, to figure it out.  We decided it was a cool effect, and embraced it.

Next, came tracing hearts onto our waxed pieces, and cutting them out with scissors.

heart-strings-valentines-craft-19 We used simple heart shaped cookie cutters that we had, in 3 different sizes.  Just trace them using a pen or pencil, and then cut out on the heart shaped line.  I used a pen, and because I was using it on wax paper, it wouldn’t really write, which I preferred anyway.  I was able to see the tracing indention well enough to cut, just by tracing it a couple of times.    * I did not take photos of tracing and cutting.  I have faith you get the picture.

Nor did I take photos of exactly how we did the rest of our crafts.   BUT……Once your hearts are all cut out, there several things you can do with them:

1)  The easiest thing you can do, is just put them on your windows much like window clings, using a little transparent tape!  The hearts have a stained-glass look, and they would be beautiful  with the light coming through, and the colors so radiant.

2)  Another option, is using pieces of thin cut ribbon, tape one end to the back of each heart, and tie them to a clothing hanger at different lengths.  Instant Valentine’s themed mobile!!

3)  You can take it to the extreme, like we did…..

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-23
Michael went out and found us a really long and fairly straight tree branch, that would meet the length of our sliding glass doors.   Then, to work in a comfortable manner tying our hearts on it, we set 2 chairs very far apart, and rested each end of the stick on the top back of each chair.  Using long pieces of our dyed string, we wound one end around the stick a few times, and taped the dangling end to the back of each heart, at different lengths.

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-24 Yes, you could just tie it on quickly, but I knew I would love the look of our pretty, hand-dyed string, wound around this rustic tree branch.  And I was right.

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-25 It was worth ll of my efforts.  It may not be worth it to you.  Also….my girls helped with this some.

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-26 If you’re wondering how we hung this long tree branch adorned with colorful Valentine hearts up high and across our slider glass doors, I’ll tell you:   Michael screwed a long screw into the backside of the stick on each end.  Then we simply used those little tight-clamp thingies, and clamped them to the curtain rod bracket.  See?  No permanent damage anywhere.

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-27

They colors really look beautiful, hanging there, even as I look past them, through our window into the snowy scene behind them.   There are often squirrels out there frolicking in the snow (o.k. …finding the fallen bird seed), and birds at the feeders, eating.

We think the critters rather appreciate our Valentine decorations on display.

heart-strings-valentines-craft-28
I love coming in our front door, and seeing them swaying in the breeze across the room in front of us.  I can feel the love in the air.  It makes us smile.

 

heart-strings-valentines-craft-29 The colors of love are a beautiful thing.

Let them shine, shine, shine.

(Love this craft idea?  Share the link on your Facebook!  Your mom-friends will love it too! Or….*pin it* to one of your boards! ; )




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Filed Under: Crafts & Creations, Holiday Crafts, Home Decor, Kids Arts and Crafts, Tutorial, WINTER Crafts and Creations, WINTER Home Decor Tagged With: crayon crafts, February-crafts, February-projects, heart shaped crafts, heart-crafts, heart-strings, heart-strings-tutorial, kids crafts, Valentine-crafts, valentine-decorations

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