Directions for the crown:
Wrap entire headband with lace ribbon; glue as you go to secure ribbon in place. Cut out seven 10″ long pieces of tulle and Lark’s head knot each one onto the headband. Cut a 5″ piece of lace and create a small fan and glue that onto the front of the tulle. Trim tulle into a crown shape.
Directions for the feather wand:
Glue 5-6 feathers onto the top of the dowel. Cut three 4″ long pieces of tulle, fold in half, and glue at the base of the feathers. Cut 24″ strands of ribbon and tie onto the top of the dowel.
The wand is inspired by this one from Anthropologie. Most times, we rather make our own than buy, and of course, we needed to make a crown to match the wand. The girls say this crown and wand are perfect for fairies, so fairy wand and crown it is! We would love to make our version of this ruffle cape next.
Soul is our girliest of all. These playful ballerina-like dresses are just the type of thing she goes for. The minute after we made these crowns, she was itching to wear them. She’s the one who is very particular about her hair, says she loves fashion, and is changing outfits several times a day (oye!). While at the same time, her favorite Star Wars character is Luke Skywalker and sometimes she likes to dress like him too. She also loves to play with action figures. I guess you can say she a well rounded gal.
I’ve had this nasty cold/cough for a few weeks now and haven’t been feeling much like myself. I’ve been sleeping in (my body has been needing it), but I miss my 5am wake up and quiet time (my soul sorely misses it).
Oh … Kristin Chenoweth and Idina Menzel reuniting to sing “For Good” is really sooooooo good. Puts me in the mood to put on my Wicked musical soundtrack.
It’s playoff season in the NBA and we are enjoying cheering our Spurs on. #gospursgo
Any Colorado, Iowa, Nebraska, Wyoming friends here? We will be driving through on our road trip and would love any suggestions for things we must stop and see.
Being a mom is great, but let’s be real, there are lots of not so great days too. Today, I had envisioned adventures out to get ice cream to celebrate the end of standardized testing, but then it was raining, and I didn’t want to drive in the rain. Also, the girls had some schoolwork to finish and I had projects to catch up on, so we decided to stay home. I did say, “If we get everything done early, we can hop in bed, watch a movie, and eat ice cream.” I thought some movie watching and ice cream eating was a good way to waste away our Friday afternoon.
Well, of course, someone had to start fighting with someone, and someone didn’t want to share with another someone, all while I was trying to cook. Then, I join in and decide to be mad at all of them because they aren’t listening and everyone is pissed off. I took a break and went off in my room to get away from the endless crying. One was in her room crying over the silliest things, another was at the school table crying because everyone is mad, and number three is pouting and angry because I took away their light sabers (they weren’t sharing). In the midst of the crazy, the baby was sleeping (she always disappears to nap every afternoon), so she missed all the drama. I laid in bed, put on Netflix (and my headphones), and waited a little while until it was safe to come out of my cave.
When I finally emerged (after an episode of Daredevil), there was no more crying, the baby was awake, all the laundry was put away, one was downstairs sweeping, and another in her bed reading. One by one I talked to each girl and talked about how they were struggling to love others more than themselves (and how I was having a hard time with that too). Then they each prayed and asked for forgiveness from God for whatever it is they were doing wrong, and then they went to party they wronged to ask forgiveness from them as well. I had to ask them (and God) to forgive me for losing my cool too. All is well and peace has been restored to our home.
Despite the not so graceful moments, motherhood has plenty of great and magical moments too. Like earlier, before all the drama, I was joking around with the girls and we were playing ninja. I was pretending to do some fancy kick moves and we were all laughing at how silly I looked. Their eyes light up when we are all just having playing and being silly together. Those moments remind me to give my kids more silly. They need a silly mom just as much as they need a structured and disciplined mom.
All of this though, good and bad, need to cherished. The time is moving far too quickly and I already feel this season will all be over too soon. My heart hurts thinking about it, while I also get excited to see what our relationship will look like later. I’m not a perfect parent, but that’s why I trust in the one who was the perfect parent in my place, and I strive to point my kids to see Jesus too (albeit, I fail in that too). Parenting is definitely an adventure with lots of high highs and low lows, but I’m so thankful for all it. All of it is a blessing.
I texted Ben that the girls were driving me batty today. His text back … #HMD.
Supplies:
Wooden hoop (I used wooden bag handles, but an embroidery hoop works well too.) Braided cotton rope
Scissors
Sewing needle
Directions:
Cut several long strands of cotton rope. Fold each strand in half and using a Lark’s head knot, add them to the bottom of the wooden hoop. With the needle, fray and unravel each strand of rope. Braid some strands of rope together. Trim ends to desired shape.
If you don’t have time to learn how to macrame or weave, you could get similar effect with this easy wall hanging. If you have 15 minutes and some braided cotton rope, you should give this DIY a try!
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See other photos and videos by Christian and Reinna here.
True wrote a 10 before 10 bucket list, so we chose to spend her birthday in Vegas to be the backdrop to fulfill her list (will share a post on that soon). We were in Vegas for a few days, but left on her birthday, and had our mini-celebration at home. Actually, I brought her cake to Vegas with us (I baked it before we left), but instead of setting up her celebration in our hotel room, we really wanted to do it at home.
As soon as we arrived home, I put the cake together. I went the box mix route; my go-to box mix is by Miss Jones. I first used it for Soul’s 6th birthday cake (it was Star Wars themed) and I love the flavor and that there are no hydrogenated oils (rare to find in box mixes). I used two boxes of vanilla cake mix and two containers of buttercream frosting. It’s kind of a naked cake, since it’s lightly frosted, and I topped it with some artificial flowers from the Michaels. I put the cake on top of a cardboard cake plate and placed that on top of a tree round. The sparkler candles are from Tops Malibu. I think it definitely looked like a big girl cake, which was perfect for True’s entrance into the double digits.
We set everything up outside and when we were ready, we called True to come out. The other three and I were standing there with the balloons (from here) that said, “True is ten.” She came out and was giddy with excitement at the little party set-up we had for her. The girls had made presents for her (and they each bought her something with their own money), so it was a lot of present opening first. Ben and I love seeing the handmade gifts they make for each other; they make a ton of handmade presents and cards. True also made something for each person too. Ben and I got her some things on her birthday wishlist … Funko Leia bobblehead, a planner, Star Wars toothbrush, and Star Wars instax film. True says getting and giving gifts are one of her favorite parts of celebrating birthdays.
After the present opening, we sang a couple rounds of “Happy Birthday” and then we devoured the cake. The girls had fun digging into their giant slice of cake. Of course, the last thing we did together for her birthday was cuddle in bed and watch Star Wars: The Force Awakens. These girls are such Star Wars geeks. It was the perfect way to celebrate our first girl hitting the double digits.
The girls spent the weekend with my parents and Ben and I were able to enjoy some quiet time together. We had a memorial to attend Saturday morning, then we went off for a date together that afternoon. We tried a new poke place, Simply Poke, and our tummies were happy with that choice. Good thing it isn’t close to our house, otherwise, I’d be bugging Ben to eat there more often.
Ben kept asking me what I wanted to do, but I didn’t really have any requests. I just enjoyed being together and being able to hold hands (we are both usually holding little hands). We thought about going to Griffith Observatory or the beach, but I didn’t really want to sit in traffic, so since we were in the area, we went to visit our first apartment.
We walked around the apartment grounds a little bit reminiscing about our first year of marriage, being pregnant with True, his last year in grad school, and how that first year consisted of a lot of sleeping (me) and studying (him). I only remember one date out; we were extremely frugal. We went up to our old floor and saw the door to our apartment. That first year of marriage everything was so new, we were getting used to living together and dealing with a whole lot of changes. It was fun strolling down memory lane.
Just as we were about to bid our apartment door farewell, Ben said, “A kiss begins with K,” and opened to his hand to reveal a little thing that looked like a ring. I just started laughing because we always chuckle at that silly phrase used by a jewelry store chain, and thought he was just playing a little joke and holding some trash that looked like a ring. As I chuckled, he kept his palm open, and I realized he was holding a real ring. Turns out in his hand was an art deco, ruby eternity ring I had been eyeing online.
It was such a beautiful surprise, and while I love the gift, I love the giver much more. There was no occasion, and just a random date on a Saturday, so this gift was really a surprise. After our little stroll down memory lane, we headed off to a nursery because Ben wanted to pick up another fruit tree. We joke that he collects fruit trees and I collect antique rings (he definitely has more trees than I have rings). While he walked around the nursery, I kept admiring my pretty ring, which I put next to my other art deco ring on my right hand.
We still had time to kill before we had to meet some friends for a celebratory graduation dinner, so I yelped a nearby ice cream place. M Creamery sounded good and it definitely lived up to their glowing reviews on Yelp. Ben and I sampled almost every flavor there. My favorites were tres leches, honey lavender, Thai tea, and strawberry balsamic (I know the girls would love this one!). Should we find ourselves back in this area, I will definitely stop by here again.
The last time we went out on a date was probably almost a year ago, so this was long overdue. We think date nights are important, but we are both okay with not going out on dates regularly. We love this article, “You Don’t Need a Date Night” and I think it describes exactly how we feel about spending time together. We consider our Friday nights our “date night,” but we stay home. We have family movie night with the girls as soon as Ben gets home, then when they go off to bed at 7:30, Ben and I start our “date night.” I’ll make tilapia ceviche or hand rolls, and we will eat on the floor of our bedroom and watch a movie together. It’s our special time, so even though we don’t go out, we feel like we get plenty of alone time together.
I have a large growing pile of fabric scraps. I refuse to throw them away because I am sure they can be used for something. I have been seeing different types of interesting necklaces made of buttons, beads, and fabric. Then, I figured why not make one out of my scraps...
I think it made my white shirt a little less boring. This was so quick and easy to make.
How to make a recycled scraps necklace (which is very similar to the straps on my braided tablecloth bag):
1. Take your scrap fabric, I cut a .5''-1'' snip and tear the rest of the fabric down for a nice frayed edge. Used 3 different fabrics for each strand.
2. Take 3 of the torn pieces and tie the ends together with a rubber band.
3. Braid the 3 pieces together and tie ends together with rubber band when done.
4. Repeat steps 2 & 3 for more strands. Remember you can make the strands any length you want, if run out of fabric, just weave more into the braid.
5. Once all the strands you want are braided, gather one end of each strand together and straight stitch together with sewing machine. Repeat for the other ends of the strands. Snip off any excess.
6. Gather ends of the necklace and sew together (snip excess) or a ribbon can be sewn at the ends to be able to tie the necklace closed, but I just sewed both ends together.
7. Voila! A nice way to make use of all your lovely scraps.
Sorry if the directions get you a little lost, but it really is easy. I promise. Maybe I should put some in the shop. Please share any other good ideas you may have of things that can be made with scraps. I would love to hear (read) them!
Tulle Crown and Feather Wand
The wand is inspired by this one from Anthropologie. Most times, we rather make our own than buy, and of course, we needed to make a crown to match the wand. The girls say this crown and wand are perfect for fairies, so fairy wand and crown it is! We would love to make our version of this ruffle cape next.
