Birthday Balloon Wreath

I'm starting to prep for my son's first birthday party in April! I have a pretty long list of crafts I would like to accomplish - not sure I will get to them all, but I will sure try. I took a nice big trip to Hobby Lobby this morning (and thanks to the Hobby Lobby iPhone App, I got some good deals) and stocked up on supplies.

I've been obsessed with making wreaths since moving to Colorado. So, the first project is a birthday wreath. I have plans for a wreath that goes with the birthday theme, but I also wanted a generic birthday wreath we can use year after year.

The balloon wreath is simple and the perfect project for a few snowy, cold days. I started with the largest bags of cheap latex balloons I could find (Walmart and Hobby Lobby were the big winners), a large bag of floral pins, ribbon, a straw wreath, and a glue gun.

I started by wrapping the straw wreath, with the plastic still on, in ribbon. This is helpful so the back looks nice and if you don't cover every space it is not as noticeable. Secure the ribbon with hot glue. I always have trouble attaching the hanging ribbon at the end, so this time I attached it first, using hot glue to secure it,

Next put on a movie and start sticking the balloons into the wreath using the floral pins. You should quickly get a grasp of how close together you need to place the balloons for good results. Then spend the next 20 nap times repeating this step. Seriously, this takes forever.

But in the end, you will have a cute and festive birthday wreath!

Playroom Art Area

It's nearly the end of January and I am still in a holiday crafting slump! I did finish the basement art area - spurred by the immanent arrival of dear friends and their three children. I wanted them to have plenty of space to play while they were here, and it's been on my list to finish for a while.

The art area has lots of space for drawings or inspirational pictures. Old frames from our local frame shop (they gave them to me, since they were going to toss them) found new life with a coat of spray paint. I found some smaller frames on Etsy through TheBumbleintheBee. Some fun binder clips from Target hung on nails provides a way to clip all sorts of items into the frames. 

We ended up with two rather large frames. One was filled with a piece of leftover board from our garage organization project, which I painted with MANY coats of chalkboard paint. It works great - as long as you use a wet cloth to erase the chalk and not an actual chalk eraser. 

The other frame was filled with a piece of sheet metal from our local Home Depot. (Thanks to all the nice folks who helped us find the right kind of sheet metal - i.e. walked around the store with us trying out different magnets!) We covered the sheet metal with a piece of fabric before gluing into the frame. 

And of course there is the crayola project and the dog painting. (The dog painting was completed at a girls night with Paint the Town .)