Glitter Pumpkin Tutorial

I know, I know, I know, I have been slacking in the blogging dept.  But did you guys miss me?  I hope someone noticed I have been gone for three months. ha ha!  Well I am back.  I can't say how consistent I will be, but if I have something to blog about- I promise I will do it!  

In the meantime I have been doing a lot of Zumba, reading, playing with family and friends and I went on a mini-vaca with my high school girlfriends!! It has been a great 3 months.  I hope to share some of it with you soon :)

Well let's get to the point here... This week I hosted book club and had some of my besties over and we made glitter pumpkins. Everyone had such a good time and loved the pumpkins.  The ladies suggested that I post a tutorial on my blog.  It was a great idea, especially since I posted pics of them on Facebook and Instagram and everyone has been asking how to make them.  So here you go friends!!

Here are the supplies you will need.

• a pumpkin
• spray adhesive
• fine glitter ( I prefer Martha Stewart brand)
• metallic spray paint (optional)
• clear outdoor weather coating spray (optional)

Get your pumpkin and place it on a bag or newspaper and start spraying the metallic or metal finish spray paint all over the pumpkin.  This evens out the color of the pumpkin, then you don't have to worry about your glitter being perfect ;)

 Look how awesome this looks.  Last year I just kept some of my pumpkins spray painted without glitter and they looked great!  If you like this look then stop here!

 On the same bag that you used to spray the spray paint, spray the adhesive all over your pumpkin.  Now be ready to switch to a different bag or paper surface for the glitter immediately after.  Because if you glitter on this bag, all your excess glitter will stick to the bag and you can't reuse it (see, I'm always thinking ha ha)

 Put the pumpkin on another bag, preferably a flat one so that it is easier to put the glitter back in the jar and just dump that glitter all over the sucker.  Be quick so the adhesive doesn't dry.  Also if you want you can just glitter the top of the pumpkin-- ombre style.

 Then I spray painted the stem with the metallic color {after all the adhesive and glittering and moving it around so I don't have to grab the stem anymore ;) }  If you want here is where you can spray the weather coating clear spray.  I didn't use it last year and mine held up great but you may want to just for good measure.

Then you are DONE ya'll!!!  Super easy huh?? It takes like 10 minutes tops! 

 Here is mine that I just made (in the middle) along with Lola's on the right and the one I made at book club on the left.

 I used the copper and orangey glitter on this one to give it a richer color.

 Here they are on my porch.  I love them and they lasted for Fall, Halloween and Thanksgiving decorating.  I was really sad when I had to chuck them last year when it was time to decorated for Christmas, because they were still in great condition.  They are the perfect pumpkin in my book!

I hope you have fun making your own!  Let me know if you have any questions!

The Hunger Games-mania

Well you already know how I feel about The Hunger Games... I love it!!! My book club buddies {and good friends in general} and I decided to go to a premier showing the Thursday night before it came out, at 7 pm (thank heavens...we did the midnight show for Breaking Dawn and I was way too tired when Owen woke me up at 7 am the next morning.)  It was such a fun night!! My aunt's friend put it together and it was quite the event!  She had a ton of prizes you could win and everyone got lanyards and gift bags and a gift card for concessions.  We had previously decided that it would be fun get t-shirts made for everyone to wear but kinda spaced it so 2 days before my awesome friends- Amanda, Nichole, and Meagan handmade our shirts!! They turned out so much better than they would have if we had them screen printed elsewhere.  Thanks for your hard work ladies-  you are rockstars!!  Some of our hubbies came with us and they made shirts for them also. ;)

Here are some pics of the shirts and of our fabulous night! 

This was before Cheryl and I got motion sick ha ha We were in the last row in the first section... that was a little too close for us ;)  We ended up sitting in the handicapped stall on the floor behind everyone.

 Me, Amanda, Cheryl, Nichole, Brit, Meagan, and Jeanette

 Now you all know what BCB's stands for tee hee

 The couples in attendance. Our cute hubbies are such good sports, but I think their shirts are awesome!

All of us

Necklace Project

Lately I have been loving bib necklaces and wanted to make some of my own... so of course a few months later I actually kicked it in gear and made some.  There are still a couple more styles I would like to try.  But I stayed up way too late for having to be to work at 7am this morning!  The other ones will have to wait until later.  While I was taking pictures of the necklaces and such, Lola came up and said "cheese", so you get to see her beautiful face as well! {Don't mind the mess she created behind her!  You have to pick your battles.}

Floral style

Pinwheel style

Ladies with Mustaches

Last weekend Leslie and I threw Ashley a baby shower.  She had been in and out of the hospital and is since on strict bed rest.  So we weren't sure if this shower would happen, but she felt like she was up for it.  We made sure she relaxed and sat down the whole time and a friend of hers drove her down.  It was a really fun time and I believe it turned out well.  I always have so many ideas and images in my head but with time and money constraints I did what I could make myself.  Les and I made the food (with the help of my mom and sis on my part), I made the mustaches and pennant banners/pinwheels and Les put the favors together.  Thanks to everyone for coming!  Here is to Ashley keeping those babies in for as long as possible!!

 Apparently I don't know how to correctly hold my mustache...

Spring Headbands

Here are a couple of new headbands. I want to make more colors and variations of them today.

What do you guys think? Are there any kinds of headbands you would like to see in the shoppe?

Sewing Project #2

Today was my day off and I had an itch to try a skirt I have been wanting to make. It is definitely an easy project. But I am not going to lie and say I didn't have hiccups. It's all a part of the learning process. :) So with that being said, give it a try if you are looking for a project and don't make the same mistakes I did. ha ha I had the elastic in wrong so I had to flip it and re-pin it, then I did the 2ND, zigzag, reinforcement stitch wrong and had to unpick it. Ya I am that stupid... lesson learned!

I got the tutorial HERE and HERE. The first link is the original with pockets and the second link is without pockets and with a little more description on the steps.... I used the second.

Got my diet pepsi and supplies from Hobby Lobby and we are ready to go!

Cutting out the fabric.

Pinning the elastic, incorrectly ha ha

FINALLY DONE!!

I made Chris take this and he was complaining because I made him take it over and over, so I'm just stuck with this one.
Do you like the makeshift headband? Ignore the bare feet.

Sewing Project #1

I am extremely proud to say that this weekend I completed my first sewing project.... with a lot of help from my mom but I was learning after all. I loved making it and hope to keep sewing and become more independent and confident in my sewing skills. I picked a good place to start though... I got an "easy to sew" pattern, as seen below. But as I learned while deciphering the instructions and sewing, it must have been easy to a sewing pro, because it was NOT THAT EASY!! Thank heavens my mom is an old pro! Good news is- now I feel WAY more confident in sewing easier things like skirts, pillowcase dresses, etc. ha ha I am sure I will still need to take my good ole Husqvarna down to mom's every now and then for help or call her along the way. But I think I found my new hobby!!

Any advise for a beginning sewer, from you sewing experts?