Paper Houses

Last week my sister and I embarked on what turned out to be one of the most fun crafty projects I have ever done! It was harder than I thought it would be at first, but totally worth the effort. Check out our paper mini-houses, made to look like our real houses!

Have you ever seen anything cuter than this? The yellow house is like mine (see the real thing here) and the brown looks like hers.

Can you imagine a whole village of these little guys?

The project took us a few hours one afternoon. We used Martha's templates to get us started but added our own twists like the vellum windows, a window box, and mini wreath and trees. My sister also has a dollhouse that looks like her real house so she had some supplies like the Christmas lights lying around. We used scrapbook cardstock for the house and roof and mostly used hot glue to hold it together. We used some E6000 to add the glitter to the roof and stuck the glitter to the ground quickly after we painted the base so the wet paint held it in place. The last step was hot gluing on the details (notice the little rabbit in the front yard!) and cutting a hole to place a battery operated candle inside the house.

Too freaking cute!

Vday Cards

Like I mentioned earlier this week, T.J.'s little sister came down for a visit last weekend and we made Valentines! We actually made our Valentines together last year too. I cheated a little this year and used store bought cards, but added my own flair with stamps, stickers, glitter, and decorative tape. Sophie went old school and made hers out of cardstock, then added the deco.

We had quite a spread of supplies. Sophie said she felt like she was in a meeting in a really cool office. :-)

V-Day Quilling

This past weekend I had some guilt free craft time when T.J.'s family came to visit. Last year they must have come around the same time because T.J.'s little sister and I made Valentines together then (see them here). I asked if she wanted to make some again this year and she agreed, we even did a little bonus project.

I had been wanting to try this paper crafting technique called quilling since my mom got Martha Stewart's Encyclopedia of Crafts from my sister a few years ago. Well I snagged my mom's book with the intention to try it and now I finally have. I think the project turned out cute! And it was easy enough to be fun for kids.

I think quilling hearts is probably the easiest of the things that can be quilled - for example, check out this "H" I pinned awhile back. It is so intricate! But the hearts were fun and simple.

Martha's Instructions

We used kabob sticks and pens for a variety of sizes. 

Here's how Sophie's turned out.

And here is where my quilled paper art is currently living. I am contemplating how much better it would look in a white frame, so I may have to bust out the spray paint next.

I actually have surprisingly little Valentine's Day decorations for how much I love pink and glitter, but my collection is slowly growing! Last year I made this heart pillow. Card post coming next!