Rock a Bye Baby

BEFORE

AFTER

I had such a blast coming up with the decorations for my cousin's baby shower!

Let's take a closer look...

 Lots of fans and tissue paper pom poms/flowers.

In the past when I've made the pom poms I've been so frustrated that they have turned out more as an oval instead of a circle.  I found a tutorial online that helped me solve the problem.  Cutting notches on both sides of your tissue paper for the string to tie around did the trick.

My aunt had purchased a pinwheel kit.  I used their paper as a pattern to cut out pinwheels from our papers.  After making several big ones I decided little ones would be pretty cute.  I reduced the size of the pattern on my copy machine but after a while of tracing I was able to free hand them...a pretty simple process.  I used brads for the center and just hot glued them to plastic straws since I wasn't wanting them to actually work...just look cute :)

 For the streamers I used Dana's tutorial from her blog, MADE.

I have a desk chair in my craft corner so I had the rolls of streamers on a pencil in my lap and then I would push myself off and let them unroll quite a bit.  Then I would pull myself back to the desk and sew until I needed to unroll some more.  It was kind of fun :)!  I ended up with miles and miles of ruffled streamers.

The banners/buntings were fun.  I can't believe I didn't get a close up shot of the paper banner (hanging on the front of the table in the second picture from the top) I made for the mantle with the baby's name on it.  When making these banners I love using the double fold bias tape and just hot gluing the tops of the triangles into the fold...so easy!

 The "f" was an unfinished wooden letter from Michael's.  I spray painted it and a thin decorative piece of wood.  I traced the "f" (backwards) onto the back of scrapbook paper, mod podged it on to the wood and then added the decorative piece.  Of course I sanded it up a bit too for a distressed look :)

I was excited to have an excuse to make a chalkboard!  I've been wanting to for a while now.  Michael's has 4 or 5 different styles of these beautifully cut unfinished wooden frames.  They're light and inexpensive ($7).  I had Andy cut a thin board to size and spray painted it with chalkboard paint.  I then hot glued it to the back of the spray painted frame.  It turned out awesome!  I primed the chalkboard and then played around with some different designs.

 This was such an interesting learning experience for me.  I saw some chalk art done on a local craft t.v. show.  I found out that to get the best results you should sharpen your chalk...just like you would a pencil.  Yikes!  You have to be willing to work past the screeching, hair raising, goose bump giving feeling as you do so.  Do you know the feeling I mean?  Then when I applied the chalk to my rough surface of the board it gave me the same feeling.  Not until after working with it for quite a while did I find out that lightly dampening the chalkboard before writing on it completely took care of that problem.  It softened it up and made it so smooth.  Not only was it a much more relaxing experience with the water but it totally brightened up the chalk.  As the board dried the chalk became much more vibrant.  It was a life changing discovery!

My first attempt at chalk art!

I have plans to make another framed chalkboard and use it in my holiday decorating.  I can see how chalk art could become addicting :)

I found some super fun bicycle flannel at JoAnn's.  (Sorry Mom.  I know it's not JoAnn's but it just doesn't feel right to leave the "s" off.)  I used it to sew one of the baby blankets that I love to make (from this post).

I paired the blanket with a couple of our favorite board books for her gift.

The women in my cousin's family have a fun tradition that I believe comes from the Native American culture.  We all bring a bead for the mother to be.  She makes a necklace out of them and wears it during labor.  It's supposed to bring good thoughts and wishes and strength from her female loved ones.

 (something like that...correct me if I'm wrong Amber).

Anyway, this was my bead for Josie...

 (It's kind of hard to tell but it's a cute little red elephant) 

I'm kicking myself that I didn't get more pictures at the actual shower but here's the front door.
 

The day of the shower was actually kind of somber.

That morning I attended a funeral for beautiful little conjoined twins.  They were the daughters of an old college friend.  It was a sweet and sad occasion.

One tiny little coffin for two pure and precious souls.

 It was a melancholy thing to mourn the loss of two babies in the morning and then celebrate the birth of another that same afternoon.

Thoughts turn heavenward and faith is heightened...faith that the Lord is over all and mindful of each of us.

More gratitude for my own sweet children was another side effect of my day.  I held them each a little tighter and kissed them a little more tenderly one extra time.

Each one a blessing from above.