Last Minute Mermaid Birthday Party

This past Saturday we had a last minute birthday party for my beautiful niece Samantha. We had about a week to prepare for this little party so I immediately started ordering supplies on Etsy in the color scheme we were working with. Sam, loves The Little Mermaid, so we wanted to have a really cute mermaid party for her without all of the Ariel overkill—I’m not a big fan of having a characters face on everything. However, we did need to have the presence of Ariel at the party to make our little one happy so we went with an Ariel crown purchased from Party City, some Ariel figures for her cake, and an Ariel shirt to go with her tutu. Oh! and there were also some Little Mermaid balloons, too. I purchased a few of the meringue cookies for the sweets table from Trader Joes, and the rock candy was also purchased from Party City but everything on that table was made by my younger sister, Melanie. Isn’t she so talented? She made cake pops, cheese cake bites, chocolate dipped oreos, macarons, pastry bites, and cake pearls. Everything tasted so amazing! I was glad Samantha had fun at her 3rd birthday party, and I’m glad I took a few snap shots of everything so I can show them to her when she’s older. 

Also, don't forget to follow me on instagram @unifyhandmade. I love to share behind the scense photos of what I'm doing. Here are a few shots I took while I was preparing for the party and during the party, too: 

Card of the Week, and Lawnscaping Challenge No.64

I recently made this mini-greeting card; namely, because I’ve been feeling like it’s been so long since I made a card just for fun—and it was about time I did! Sometimes I forget that I need to step away from making things for my shop, and make something for myself that can keep my creativity flowing. I feel that, that is an important thing to do—especially if I want to keep on creating new things for my shop.

I also noticed that Lawnscaping is currently hosting a fun challenge where you create a card using distress inks, and since I have a few distress inks I thought I’d give the challenge and try. I’m not too sure that I’ll win though, because while I did use 3 different distress inks you can’t really notice it that much. When I was making this card though, I just had fun and didn’t worry too much about how much or how little I was using distress ink—I mainly just wanted to have some fun. 

So, as you know I’m a huge fan of Lawn Fawn so of course I had to use my LF: stamps, paper, and twine! Here’s how I made the card: I cut a piece of card stock at 9 1/2” x 3 1/2”, and scored it length wise at 4 3/4” and set it aside. Next I cut a piece of yellow pattern paper from my Pink Lemonadepetite paper pack by LF, and cute it at 4 3/4" x 3 1/2" and set that aside as well. Next I grabbed my LF stamp sets: a birdie told me, say cheese, and critters in the forest and stamped out two of the Polaroid image, one fox, and one small text bubble on a piece of white card stock. Next I cut out the picture part of the polaroid image on one of the two images, and stamped the stump, and the tree as the background. Next I stamped the same images onto a piece of post-it paper and cut those out to use them as a mask so I could apply my distress ink colors, Broken China, and Peacock Features. Next I used a LF stamp and the distress ink to apply the stars in background. Once that was finished I removed the masks’ and colored in the tree and stump. Next I colored in the fox image, and the text bubble, then cut them out leaving a white boarder—I also cut out the full size polaroid image, too. Once all of that was cut out I adhered everything together, and applied some, Antique linen distress ink all around the polaroid image to make it look a bit vintage. Using the same Antique linen ink I grabbed a camera image from another one of my LF stamp sets and stamped that image three times at the bottom of the pattern paper to emphasize the polaroid picture. Next I wrapped some mint LF twine around the pattern paper, and adhered the image to the yellow panel using some foam adhesive, then adhered the whole thing to my card base, and it was finished!

Once this was done, I was so happy with it. I can’t wait to give it out. Isn’t it cute?

DIY Chalkboard To-Do List Frame

I’m definitely one of those crafters that is obsessed with the popular chalkboard theme; and, a while back I’d purchased some of the Martha Stewart chalkboard paint in hopes to create a cool blog post with it. But days, weeks, then months went by without making anything with it because I kept thinking about the dry time and the mess it would make—so I kept that post on the back burner. But! When I was at Michaels last weekend I noticed that they had chalkboard cardstock, and I was so excited to try it. To me, this Chalkboard cardstock made this post ten times easier, and there was hardly any mess.

What I love about this idea is that it’s super cheap. The total project was under $5.00 (but I had most of the tools needed to make this) for me, but if you don’t have some of the items I’m using to make this ‘to do list’ it will definitely cost more. I purchased the 5x7 frame from the dollar store, but you can use a frame that is any size. Now that I’ve tried this I really think I’d like to make a bigger one (but not go over the 12x12 size of course). 

The tools: 5x7 frame, chalkboard card stock, white embossing powder, heating tool, white ink pad, paper towel, stamps, versamark ink, and paper trimmer. 

1. I took my chalkboard cardstock and cut it down to a 5x7 piece, using my paper trimmer. Next, I removed the faux picture from the frame and tested out my chalkboard piece to ensure it was a perfect fit.

2. Next, I grabbed one of the banner stamps from the Lawn Fawn stamp set, Bannerific (click here to view the set), I placed it on my acrylic block, applied some versamark ink, and sprinkled some white embossing powder over it. Next, I heat set it using my Martha Stewart heating tool. If you've never embossed using powder, versamark, and a heating tool click here for a beginners tutorial--I just Googled and found this great video. 

3. To add the sentiment I used an alphabet stamp set by LF, Smitty’s ABCs (click here to view the set); and, repeated the embossing process. 

 4. Once that was finished I thought I’d grab another LF stamp set, Let it Snow (click here to view), and add a few star bursts’. I LOVED how it came out!

5. Next, I took my, Hampton Art, white pigment ink and used a paper towel to rub on my faux chalk distress markings. I’m hoping that when I need to completely clean off the words I’ll write on this chalkboard frame with water, these pigment ink distress markings will still be there, since this ink is supposed to be permanent, but we'll see. 

Once that was completed, it was basically done. I placed the chalkboard to do list into the frame, and added the glass in as a backing—to make it even sturdier (oh, and don’t forget to include the original backing as well) Now it’s ready for me to use, and I can’t wait. I’m going to have this on my desk for sure!

On the weekend this is what it’ll say ^^ hehe. 

Hot Pink Mini Fox Cards

It feels like it’s been so long since the last time I blogged. I've been meaning to blog every week but my shop has been keeping me so busy these days—and that’s a good thing. I’m so grateful to have orders coming in every day. When I first started my business I always wanted to be at this point, where orders would come in every single day, and I was always busy and always having something to do. At times, being a one woman business can be a bit stressful but it’s all worth it because doing what I love all day every day is what keeps me happy.

I've completely gone off subject but back to this post. I recently had to run over to Paper Source to purchase some white embossing power for a big order I was working on; and, I had planned on going in and only buying this one thing but, yeah right! Once I walked through the doors the first thing I grabbed was a shopping basket and I starting filling it with things. Two of the things that I chose to share today is this awesome Neon Pink Ink by, Hero Arts. It’s not a new product but it’s been on my wish list for some time now, and I thought I’d give it a try. The other thing I purchase was this super adorable fox stamp. It’s a wooden stamp (something I’m not fond of these days) but the image was just too cute to pass up. I thought this image would be perfect for creating mini note cards—especially cute for my shop. At first I wasn't too sure how a hot pink fox would look on a card but, oh my word! It’s so cute, and I love it so much. 

Now that I've given this hot pink ink a try, I’d definitely like to try the other colors in the neon ink collection. I’m definitely going to be trying different stamp images on plain white card stock  and adding them to my shop very soon. I’ll also be adding these mini cards to my shop shortly as well—so if you’d rather not make them you can purchase them in my shop! You can email me if you’d like a 15% off coupon code. I’m always willing to offer discounts to readers! I hope you've enjoyed this post, and I’m hoping to have the time to continue blogging. My orders are piling up, and I hardly have time for much of anything else lately. I think I just need to get better in the time management department of my life.