day 119: spider web plates

halloween serving plate number one :)

day 119 and it's time to play with some plates and porcelain pens.  today's inspiration comes from char at crap i've made who made a really cute spider web plate as a decorative piece.  i thought this was a great idea especially for us new zealanders who can't readily access any halloween decor let alone serving plates!  i pinned the idea to my holiday goodness board :)

you need some porcelain pens and some plain plates, i went with white dinner plates as i plan to serve the party food on them.  then draw away!

the plates and porcelain pens

halloween serving plate two!

halloween serving plate three ... needs a picture, just
wondering what!

outcome: happyish ;)  it's times like these when i wish i could draw like the best of them!  however, they are at least more festive than the plain white plates they were.  i think this is such an awesome idea and i plan to do more plate designs and hopefully improve the drawing along the way :)

my thanks to char at crap i've made for the fantastic idea to stylise your own plates ... perfect way to put your own stamp on your parties and dinning ware :)

day 118: skeleton ice blocks

SPOOKY!

day 118 and i thought i had better make a start on making ice blocks for the party :)  i loved the idea of putting something in the ice cubes as fahrenheit 350 did with their cubes for halloween with spiders ... the drinks looked awesome with the frozen spiders swimming around in them!  i pinned this neat idea of their's to my holiday goodness board on pinterest.

i couldn't find any spiders i liked in mass quantity but i did find some really cute skeletons!  luckily when i was in singapore's ikea store i grabbed their ice cube tray that makes long bars, only problem is i only have one ... hence the reason for starting to make ice cubes for the party today!

it was another day when i wished nz had ikea!

i washed the skeletons and then put my first six in the tray to freeze, at this rate i will be finished making ice cubes the day before the party!

the first lot ready to freeze

they do look funny, bobbing around in their!

outcome: well we HAD to see what they looked like in the drinks so we have already enjoyed the first six!  they look hilarious swimming around in the glass!  i think i will make some for the party with cranberry juice ice cubes as well and give the kids them in lemonade should look awesome, if not totally scary!

my thanks to fahrenheit 350 for a really cool, halloweeny idea ... its the little bit extra that always goes down so well and this is one of those things that will hopefully make people feel in the mood for halloween :)

day 117: halloween silhouette pillows

a pillow for polly's bed made without a
cutting machine and with a free
printable silhouette :)

day 117 and today i thought i would make some halloween pillows for around the house.  i was totally inspired for today's pillows by the FREE halloween silhouettes from kami at no biggie.  they are wonderful and she has three free designs and each design comes in different sizes ... how cool is that, yip it's awesome :)  they are also pinned to my holiday goodness board on pinterest.

i decided i would use some sticky back felt letters to go with the silhouettes. i use a mixture of felt and cotton silhouettes with heat'n'bond to attach to the pillow bases.  the process i used to make these cushions is below in picture form:

iron the heat'n'bond onto the fabric you are using for the
silhouette.  for the one above i used a felt and used a scrap
of material so the iron wasn't directly on the felt.  keep
ironing until the bond has worked. using this method
means you only have to cut the witch out once but does
mean you do waste some felt :)

now the witch is cut out make up a pillow cover

while the pillow is empty, play around with the design :)

then attach the witch with the iron (again i used the scrap
of material to protect the felt from the full force of the iron
heat) and the sticky back letters.

fill the pillow and sew the gap closed, throw on a bed
and then realise it looks so cool you need to make more!

and here are the more ...
these are the ones i made for pollyanna's bed :)

outcome: these are totally addictive ... i don't have a silhouette or cricut but have always loved everyone's creations made with these machines!  to be able to do something like what they give you was really exciting and i loved how well and easily they turned out.  sure there was lots of cutting to do but for the effective it was totally worthwhile and not as time consuming as i thought it would be.  to be honest with you, if i hadn't run out of heat'n'bond i would have made more!

i owe the success of today's creations completely to kami at no biggie for the FREE halloween silhouettes. they are totally awesome and i can't thank her enough for sharing such wonderful silhouettes freely ... check her website out, she has done some amazing things with these silhouettes :)

day 116: halloween printables put to good use :)

some of the halloween printables put to use :)

day 116 and it's time to start making the house a little more halloweeny! i am starting with the cabinet in our entryway :)

i used the free halloween printables i pinned to my holiday goodness board to fill the frames that adorned the top of the sideboard. the photo frame art comes from craftily ever after, mrs adventure, vintage holiday images & cards, the vintage sage, and the graphics fairy. they are all freely available from these awesome sites.  my favourite printables were definitely the vintage halloween postcards :)

before the halloween printables ...

after the halloween printables!

the night time glow ... terrible picture but in real life it's
quite scary for the peeps!

i added some candles and a subway art piece from adelyn stone.  the actual subway art i printed on A4 parchment paper and matted it in some my minds eye paper so it would fit the 11" x 9" frame.

the cool subway art i matted and framed!

outcome:  needs some added extras which i will have to hunt and make over the coming weeks but a jolly good start for someone who hasn't done a lot of halloween decorating!  absolutely LOVE the subway art piece and the vintage postcards ... i'm thinking i may need a skull or two to finish this sideboard off though!

my sincere thanks to the websites listed above for their awesome FREE printables ... it is so nice to be able to use quality finds that don't cost anything :)

day 115: halloween invitations

invitation fit for a party :)

day 115 and every party needs some invitations.  there are SO many inspirational invitations on pinterest i was a tad overwhelmed!  so i have pinned many to my holiday goodness board but ended up choosing the design of the ones by parents.com.  the ribbon bats are what totally sold it to me :)

i typeset a very similar design on word and then printed it out on 160gsm card.  i loved the added matte so also went with that but used traditional halloween colours. i did attach the two cards together as i didn't use vellum and then punched the holes for the ribbon bat.  the eyes of the bat were hot glued on :)

printed invitation ready to dress!

matted in black

add ribbon bats with googly eyes and we are ready
to deliver!

outcome:  cool!  i feel really proud of myself. the bats are really cute if not totally bat like and the invitations have come out looking pretty halloweeny so hopefully the families and friends receiving these will feel festive and come dressed up .... here's hoping you lot!

my thanks to the VERY useful parents.com for this neat invite idea, its not the first time i have used them as inspiration for p365 and i am sure it won't be the last :)

day 114: dry erase weekly events notice board

complete with halloween papers for this festive season is
my family's new weekly events notice board :)

day 114 and today i start a month of halloween inspired creations found on pinterest.  halloween is a new holiday to new zealand, traditionally it is not very big or known.  each year for the past couple of years it has grown more, with more decorations available and people organising halloween events.  the trick or treating part of halloween is a VERY new concept and not one we can do in the country unless you want to run a marathon!

steve and i decided this year we would have a halloween party on the 30th (given it was a sunday) and we could then have everybody over for the afternoon, play games, and put on a festive afternoon tea!  so this month leading up to this event i plan to put my pinterest creating into preparing for our party, decorating the house, and making all sorts of exciting halloween inspired projects from pinterest!

today we are starting with a new family notice board.  we actually don't have one at any other time of the year and it's something we REALLY need as our lives continue to get busier!  remember the frames i used to put all those wonderful reading inspirations in for ben, well i am using the other 8 frame display i purchased for today's project!

today's project was inspired by the one created by kristy from next to heaven.  she has created her family a launch pad with all sorts of wonderful organising goodness including the weekly planner in the eight photo frame! i thought this was such a awesome idea to use photo frames as whiteboards, so much nicer!  i loved visiting her blog and seeing how much fun she puts into everyday life, something to live by :)  i pinner her weekly schedule idea to my home school projects board on pinterest.

i used halloween papers to insert where you would normally put the photos.  because i plan to change these papers with the different seasons and holidays throughout the year i attached my letter stickers to the glass so i didn't need to add them every time i change the papers.  i went with a fairly muted colour for the lettering so it will hopefully go with any papers i use in the future.  the lettering was also in foam so it gave the notice board some added texture :)

the supplies required

papers inserted ...

week days added :)

outcome: i am in love with this idea ... already i feel better organised and happier that the family ALL know what's on the agenda this week.  we are just repainting the wall where this will live and then it will be a permanent but changing fixture in our lives :)

my thanks to kristy from next to heaven for this fantastic idea that uses an everyday product in a whole new way ... love that, totally inspiring :)

liebster blog award

a while back (day 89) i made a card i found on pinterest made by jen from JENerally speaking.  since then i have visited her blog daily as she has the most amazing designs and i love her humour as she writes about them! she then gave me the liebster blog award for CASEing her card :) i of course accepted this award, how could you not from such a sweet, funny blogger!

 The conditions of this award are....
1) Create a post on your blog and post the award.
2) Link back to the person who gave you the award and say if you accept.

3) Choose 3-5 of your favorite blogs to tag, link these in your post too and tell the lucky people they have won the award.

As the aim of this award is to bring unknown good blogs to light, please don't tag somebody with 3000 followers!

So here are the three blogs that i have chosen to award with the liebster blog award:

• mal at the chic geek ... love her writing and her recipes are awesome too!
• homemade cards by erin ... another crafting card maker, her ideas are similar to why i like jen's so much, they both use space so well and their card layouts are awesome!
• tina from sunflowers & gingham, tina has just started out making creations from pinterest each day and i would really appreciate some of my followers going over to her blog and giving her some support to encourage her along!

so that's it for this post :) all three are worthy winners of the liebster blog award and hopefully it will earn them so well deserved extra traffic today :)

today being the first of october, i will be starting 31 days of halloween creations inspired from pinterest for this holiday season, see you back here later for the first one!