Sweet Dreams Felt Banner

I wanted to personalize our daughter’s room with all different types of artwork, not strictly the photos and paintings typically found in bedrooms. From the beginning I knew that some sort of 3D felt embroidery projects would be involved, as at the moment that is my favorite creative medium.

When I saw these fantastic felt letters last fall I knew I had found the perfect special project.


Being the rebel that I am I couldn’t do our daughter’s name. Instead I wanted to do something to create or inspire. I first made a “create” sign for over her desk (you’ll see a photo of that soon) and then set about making “dream” for over the bed.

When I finished “dream” I realized that it was WAY too small for such a large space as over her bed. So “dream” quickly became “sweet dreams” and I couldn’t be more pleased with the outcome.

If you too want to do this project, read Made By Rae’s Felt Letter’s post for directions.

Here are my deviations from her project directions, plus some additional helpful tips:

1) I used a 500 pt font (instead of the 400 pt that Rae used) for our letters; next time I may go even bigger.

2) When I printed out the letters I formatted them as “outline only” so as not to waste lots of printer ink (thanks to my friend Alissa for this great tip!). I also used heavy-weight card-stock instead of regular printer paper.

3) I then cut out each letter, pinned each letter outline on top of two layers of felt (to cut both the front and back sides of each letter at once), then cut out around the paper outline. (This way I skipped the time-consuming letter tracing step before cutting out the felt letters.)

4) I used embroidery floss instead of plain thread in bright, often contrasting colors (first I matched the embroidery floss colors to that of the felt, then I mixed up which letter got which color). I like the chunky look for the whipstich that resulted.

5) Be forewarned that this project is time consuming. Each letter took me between 30-45 minutes. Granted I was chatting with friends while I worked, so it may have been much faster had I just focused on the task at hand. I personally prefer having company while working on craft projects. Makes the time go so much faster, don’t you think?!

Have fun and good luck!

Glittery Clothespins

Remember the colorful photo banner we made for our daughter’s birthday?

Instead of taking it down and putting it away, we decided to move it upstairs into her room to hang along her bed so she could continue to enjoy the photo memories.

To add a little sparkle to the project, we decided to decorate the clothespins with silver glitter. (Similar to these gorgeous ones for sale on Etsy.)

First we covered one side of the clothespins with plain glue, then we placed silver glitter on top.

We let the clothespins dry for a few hours before covering them with glossy mod podge so that the glitter would stay on the clothespins instead of making a big mess in her clean bed. (At least that’s the theory. We shall see how it works out.)

Once they were dry, we brought them upstairs and re-hung the photo wall.

Super easy, cheap, and so sparkly and fun.

As our daughter would say, “Ta da!” Little girls can be so cute and dramatic.

Butterfly Girls in a Butterfly (Decoupage) Picture Frame

Two good friends, playing dressing up, captured in these darling photos and displayed in our homemade butterfly decoupage picture frame (a great rainy day project!).

We wrapped it up with a typed and handwritten note written and decorated by our three-year old.

A sweet present from one little girl to another, made with love.

For more information about how to decoupage picture frames, see our Picture Frame Decoupage post.

Valentine’s Day Cards

We do a very low-key Valentine’s Day celebration at our house. As far as we are concerned, treasuring each other and showing our love for one another is a daily activity.

This year we’re doing a handmade card exchange for the youngest member of the family. Although David and I don’t give each other cards (for any occasion, actually; more on this in a moment), we recognize that our daughter would love the giving and receiving aspect of this holiday.

(Instead of cards, David and I exchange phone calls and talk when we’re together. With at least one “I love you” per conversation, everyone in a ten foot radius knows how we feel. You should feel sorry for David’s coworkers. I call him five times a day. Yes, we’re that couple.)

Back to our card-making endeavors, the girls have been taking this card exchange very seriously and we’ve been hard at work.

As you can see, someone continues to teach herself to write. She also can multi-task! Look how she’s holding her baby doll in her baby sling while she writes.

I am not sure which of these two things I feel most proud.

Happy Valentine’s Day! Go buy yourself some chocolate and know that this is just another day regardless of how you spend it.

The Bobbin Winding Continues

We’ve been hard at work organizing our arts and craft supplies. Today I am focusing on our ongoing attempt at bringing order to our giant stash of embroidery floss.

We have been slowly and steadily winding our way through the enormous quantity of embroidery floss that my mother-in-law gave me for Christmas. (Have I mentioned how much I love that my in-laws own an arts supplies store and gallery?!)

Lucky for me, our three-year old daughter loves to help me wind bobbins.

I believe bobbin winding is a great activity to build hand strength. I’ve read about how cutting with scissors helps build hand strength in children, an essential first step towards writing. I believe that bobbin winding also helps with this as well. Both the winding of the handle and the holding of the string helps develop hand dexterity and strength.

We also added a color lesson to today’s bobbin winding activity. (I love how every day activities can be transformed into learning experiences!) We sorted the strands into piles of different colors:

We also giggled when we mixed them up, purposefully placing (throwing!) a pink floss in the blue pile, for example, which sent my daughter into a fit of giggles:

The kid loves adding chaos to my attempt at finding order.

We so enjoy these mama-daughter activities. We’ve found sorting floss and winding bobbins to be a calming, quiet activity to do together.

We only have a couple hundred bobbins to go. Piece of cake! I think it may take us all year.