Love Struck >> Arrow Bobby Pins Tutorial

Valentine's Day is tomorrow and we are all set.  Ivy's classroom Valentines are made, her box is ready to go and her hairstyle all planned out.   We looked up some Valentine's inspired hair tutorials on youtube and fell in love with heart braids.  It is cute to see Ivy {finally} get excited about doing her hair.  She even practices making her own hair tutorial videos in the mirror.   To add our own touch to her heart braids we made some arrow bobby pins to make the braids a Cupid's heart. 

To make your own Love Struck bobby pins you need just some tiny scraps of material >> ours are leather and felt <<  bobby pins and a hot glue gun.   To make two bobby pins you will need 3 small squares of material.  

Take the first square and cut it in half diagonally.  This gives you the two arrowheads.   With the second square, first cut a triangle notch out of the top.  Then cut the bottom corners off at an angle to make a point.  Carefully snip the sides of your square to give it a feather look.  Repeat with the third square.  These are your arrow tails.  All that is left is to hot glue the arrowheads and tails to the top of your bobby pins.

Have a cup of cheer.

Have you been loving all the chalk art that has been popping up?  Just when you thought the chalkboard was done, too.   I was patiently awaiting Rhonna Designs to release her InstaChristmas because I knew it would be perfect for adding some chalk art to my home for the holidays.   In fact the only thing I bought on Black Friday was InstaChristmas.  Well besides a trip to Voodoo Donuts I guess ;)  I have been adding it to my instagram photos and playing around with it in photoshop as well.  I really, really, totoally like it. 

Over at Rhonna's blog she is having a tag contest so I came up with a little gift tag that can be used lots of ways for gift giving this holiday.  Using a chalkboard background in photoshop I came up with this little guy.  Ivy has been walking around singing this song and I couldn't get it out of my head!

I made a fill page for the back side and was able to fit 9 of the 2.5x3.5 tags on a sheet of paper.  I printed it out on white cardstock and cut out each tag.  To give it a little bit more chalkiness I rubbed chalk over the whole design and then wiped it off.  Use a black ink pad to ink the cut edges for extra measure too.  

I think it would be a fun hostess gift to tie a tag on to a bottle of sparkling cider.  And even more fun would be to get those mini bottles and have them for New Years Eve!  Oh, man.  How cute would that be?!  

I've been wanting to try the sharpie mug thing so I decided to actually make a cup of cheer.  I got a mug from Target for $3 I think, and using a circle stencil and a bronze sharpie I put some confetti dots all over the mug. 

 While my mug was baking {at 350 for 30 minutes}  I made a pocket for a packet of hot chocolate.  I printed out the chevron fill page on kraft cardstock and then cut a library pocket like the ones I used for my advent with my silhouette.   I love seeing the design peeking out from the inside.  I backed my tag with some red striped paper and glued it to the front.  I tucked the hot chocolate, along with a mug rug and a box of chocolates into my fun new mug to give as a gift to add some cheer to a dear friend's day.  

I might even make up a couple more of these library pockets to stick some Starbucks gift cards in for quick gifts to give to friends and teachers.  So many ideas for one little tag!

EDIT!!
You can now download your own Cup of Cheer tags by following the link below.  And read about how you can maybe help with our adoption HERE

CUP OF CHEER PDF

PS you can check out the other instachristmas tags too!
For Your Mistletoes
Rock the Night Away

instagram photo strip bunting.

I love my instagrams.  But they stay on my phone.  I've printed out some of them using PostalPix before but wanted to come up a way to display a whole bunch in a smaller space.  I got to thinking that photostrips would be way fun!   And they definitely were the right way to go!

 I started making a template in photoshop but I got frustrated that it was taking so long.  So I turned to  my friend google and found these awesome templates from Blush and Jelly. She just happened to post these the very day I was making mine!  It was fate! Plus, I'm not gonna lie I love that people share their talents so my projects are so much easier!

Using her awesome templates I made ten strips of photos.  Then in photoshop I opened a new 5x7 document and lined up my strips.  I resized each strip a little bit bigger and fit 5 strips on my 5x7 template.  If you need help with math that means I made 2 5x7's.  I'm so glad I made them a little bit bigger because the pictures are way smaller than I imagined.  But I like the itty bitty-ness of them!  Since I was headed to costco I uploaded my two 5x7's to their photo site so I could pick them up there.  A 5x7 at Costco is 39 cents.  So for just about a dollar I was able to make a photostrip bunting!

Once I unloaded all my groceries from Costco I cut my 5x7's into strips using a paper trimmer.  Then using bakers twine and some clips I already had I hung them up on a window I have propped in our front entryway.  I stop and look just about every time  I walk by because its such a fun way to display our memories from this summer so far!  

The Friendship Bracelet Kit {with free download}

I have 8 nieces and they almost all have birthdays in the spring.  The younger girls were easy to get gifts for but the older ones needed something pretty cool.  Cuz I gotta be the cool aunty ;)  So I put together some friendship bracelet kits to keep them busy this summer!

They are quick and easy to put together.  You just need to head to the craft store armed with coupons and they are pretty cheap too. 

Since I made multiple kits I started with a huge value pack of embroidery floss that was about $10 on sale.  The pack had 150 flosses in it and I was able to make 5 kits.  I also got these awesome floss organizers that, after using a coupon were $2 each.  

I created a tag in photoshop {which you can download it at the end of this post!} and attached it to the lid with double sided tape.  I also added a bracelet that I made just for fun.  

I found clipboards at that one big huge store I don't like that has a ruler on each side which I thought would be perfect for measuring out floss and knowing how long to make each bracelet. I got it all tied up with some yarn and its ready to give to my nieces!

I've uploaded some tags if you want to print out for your own friendship bracelet kits.   Just click on the link under whichever one you want to download.    

Wouldn't these be awesome for road trips this summer?!

Pink

Brown

font: blackout

arrows: courtesy of Amy Morby

Arise and Shine Forth

We needed a new mutual theme poster! Each year our church picks a theme for the youth to focus on.  We loved having a poster of last years theme up in our young women's room so I made a fun and sparkly one for this year.  It is available in the Ruffled Sunshine Shop in several different sizes.  It is also comes in black.   

I hadn't really picked a "word" for this year but after putting this together I think I am going to go with SHINE.   It makes me smile and think of the sun, sparkly things and being a shining light to those around me.  Maybe even help me go out on a limb every now and then.   How about you.  Have you picked a "word" for this year?

Have a fabulous weekend!

Swimsuits Rack: DIY

{my little fish}


Hi friends!  How was your 4th?  Ours was super fun and I'm just getting back in to the swing of things around here.  But I'll tell you one thing.  We are living in our swimsuits these days.    Pool, Rinse and repeat it seems. And Ivy may or may not even sleep in hers sometimes.   I needed a place to wrangle those suits so we aren't scrambling to find them when its time to go.  I love my rack I came up with and as promised here's a quick how to!

SUPPLIES

board cut to desired length.  Mine is a 1x8x20

Spray paint

faucet handles {I got mine at Home Depot}

vinyl lettering

I found this board in the garage that was painted white and everything all ready to go! But I wanted pink letters so I decided on reverse stenciling. So I spray painted just the top pink.  I let it dry for about 10 minutes but wasn't too worried about letting it dry completely because I want it to be distressed.  

I cut out vinyl letters with my silhouette using the BEBAS font {one of my faves right now} and applied them to my board.  Then I had my helper paint the whole top white with craft paint.  Right over the top of the letters.  Just make sure you don't glob the paint on over the letters or it will seep.  Spray paint would work well too.

Let the paint dry for a couple minutes but not totally.  Then use some tweezers to peel off your letters.  If you want, use some super fine sandpaper to knock down the edges of the letters and distress to your liking. 

I spray painted my faucet handles with the same pink {rustoleoum 2xcoverage pink}, and let them dry completely.  Then I measured out where I wanted them and drilled holes in my board.  When you are getting the faucet handles make sure that you get the ones that have a knob on the back to help it stand off the board.  And Lowes did not have the handles so don't waste a trip.  Just head to home depot and ask where they are.  Then  find some screws in the garage and screw on your handles. 

Booya!  No more scrambling for {dry} swimsuits or lost bottoms!  Happy Swimming!

Glitter Hearts make me happy.

How do you like my newish digs {again}?  I can't help it.  I just have too much fun, trying out new stuff and the holidays just need to be decorated!  I've got a little valentine project to share, but I wanted to point out a couple of things real quick.  I've been cleaning things up and working on adding pages, so those big words over there will take you to things like how to get a hold of me, my shop, blogs I like to look at... stuff like that.

I also had a moment of crazy the other day and signed up for twitter.  I have no idea what I'm doing on there, but I would love for you to come and follow along with me, and I'll follow you too!  My handle{?} is @ruffledsunshine. Do you say handle in the twitter world?! See. Crazy.  I need twitter lessons.

+++

I'm slowly learning that Valentines Day is a holiday you have to get a jump on.  If you don't it sneaks up on you and then you are scrambling.  I got a little push the other day when I got to help style a  Valentines photo shoot.  I can't wait to show you how it turned out.  It was kind of really amazing. 

{oooh,  a sneak peak ; P }

 

Since there has been very little crafting going on here at this blog I thought i would share one of the little things I came up with. 

 Ready to get your heart on?

At Christmas we got a slice of a tree from Darin's Grandpa.  I got to brand it and everything.  It was all very exciting.  And now its perfect for the photoshoot.

  

I cut a heart out of vinyl on my Silhouette.  I didn't use the heart though, I used the negative space as a stencil.  Vinyl is awesome that way.  I love it when things pull double duty.  

Place your stencil on your wood, or whatever you are stenciling. Make sure and seal the edges really well, especially if you are using paint.  

I've been feeling all of the sparkly stuff lately so I went for mod podge and glitter on this one.  Paint your mod podge on pretty thick then dump on some glitter.  Joann's has started having some holiday colors of glitter in their dollar section.  I love it because I don't have to try so hard to save every speck of my $5 glitter.  Once it has dried a bit dump off your excess glitter and then mod podge OVER your glitter.  I know it looks scary but it does dry clear.  I promise.

After it dries, take off your stencil and you're done!  Its a simple project, but I love how the glitter and wood go together.  Two things that aren't necessarily supposed to be together, but get along so fabulously. 

XOXO.

See glitter hearts make you happy too.

Cupcake Ornaments {tutorial}

Sometimes I never learn.  I've been looking high and low for a cupcake ornament that I like since October.  I thought it would be a fun one to add to our collection this year.  Well, I don't know why I didn't just think of making one.  I mean, thats the obvious answer right?!  But with the cold and snow outside keeping me cozy inside, I finally had a stroke of genius and some time to make these little cuties with Ivy.

  

 They are perfect for the ornament exchange I'm heading to tonight, and I know you need a cupcake ornament for your tree too!

SUPPLY LIST

ball ornament

ribbon

glitter

mod podge

cupcake wrappers

 glue gun

twine, string or an ornament hook

Got it all? Lets make some cupcakes!

Step one: Remove the top thingy from an ornament and set it aside.  Take some ribbon and starting about a third of the way down from the top wrap and glue the ribbon, covering the bottom two thirds of the ornament.  I used brown to give it a chocolate cake look.  

 

Step Two:  Mod podge the uncovered part of your ornament and dump a bunch of glitter on it.  I used white for this one but any color "frosting" would be cute.  I think I'm going to have to get some pink glitter to make one for Ivy.  Glue together a couple of cupcake liners for stiffness, then glue your ornament in to the cupcake wrapper.  

Step Three:  Glitter the ornament top too.  {If you don't have one of those glitter trays I highly recommend it.  I got mine at Hobby Lobby for $2 or something.  The funnel makes all the difference.}  Then put that top thingy back on.   

 Step Four:  Tie with some bakers twine or string and hang on your tree.  Then step back and love how cute your cupcake ornament is.

Step Five:  Make a bunch more because it was easy, and you are kind of addicted to glitter now. ;)  I thought the patterned ribbon looked like some fancy bakers cups so I left them without the wrappers.  That mini black polka dot one is my fave, imagine that. How cute are they in miniature?!  I've been a purist on my ornaments but its funny how having a three year old changes that.  I hope you are having a wonderful Christmas week!

Happy cupcake making!

Happy Birthday Laney!

Did you know that we bought Greenies off of Craigs List?  Kind of a crazy way to buy a business, and it is all thanks to Darin's sister Ellayne.  She had been campaigning to get us to move to Tri Cities for years.  So when she finally found something that would work for us we took the opportunity and ran.  Ok so there is more to it than that but Ellayne set it all in motion.   She's awesome.  Ellayne's birthday was a couple of weeks ago and as soon as I saw this I knew it would be exactly the perfect for her gift.  She LOVES Christmas, couponing {crazy good at it too} and she has five kids- hence the planning ;).

What better way to spend a cozy evening curled up with your ads, writing your Christmas lists and planning your black friday attack than with a Christmas planner and some cute slippers?! Throw in some hot chocolate and Bing Crosby and its the perfect way to relax at the end of the day.  

Aren't these slippers so cute?  They are flannel lined and have some snowflake traction on the bottom. 

The rosettes just make me smile and almost made me keep them .

These Christmas planners are so fun.  The ribbon ties are key if you have little sneaks around.  Although you might need to padlock the ties if they are a little bit bigger sneaks.  

  

On the inside flaps there is one envelope for coupons and one for receipts.  

The planner has four tabs.  Starting with The List.  

1.  The List  2.  Calender  3.  Menus  4.  Notes

I found an awesome weekly calender and started it on November 1st and it goes all the way through January 1.   She won't miss a beat!  Happy Birthday Laney!

On another note, can you believe that we are already two weeks in to November?!  Does anyone have a good idea to slow down the next 2 months?