A few projects...

Whew!  It's been a busy start to our summer!  Here I thought I would have a lot of extra time to get things done around the house, catch up on projects, and blog... yeah right!  Luckily, this week is somewhat free so I've had some extra time to get caught up.  We started our summer with friends coming to see us and picking up our extra dryer (yay for more garage space now!).  It was quite an adventure for them to get here -imagine trucks breaking down, problems renting a truck to take the garage back, etc.- but they made it and we had a great couple of days seeing them!  Then, Colby and I celebrated our 3 year anniversary.  Three years blew my mind!  Time has flown by but it has been an amazing three years.  And now we are quickly approaching our biggest adventure yet... the arrival of our baby boy! Yes, it's a boy and we are thrilled!  We've been working on the nursery (A LOT more to come on that later!) and I am super excited!

Here are some projects that I have been working on the past few weeks:

The first was a welcome sign that I had seen on pinterest.  Our front door gets a lot of love from about September-January.  It even gets decorated in July.  However, from about February-June, it's blank and quite frankly, just plain boring.  So when I saw this idea, I knew I had to make it.

You can find the tutorial here.

Here is my version.  I started with a pack of papers by the company "My Mind's Eye" that I bought at Archivers (along with the blue and white string) and I combined it with some other odd scraps and tags that I have collected while scrapbooking.  I cut out the letters using yellow cardstock with my Cricut machine.  I bought the frame at Goodwill for $3 and got rid of the glass and ugly flower picture within it.  Then I touched up the paint on the sides and I was ready to go!

I cut out various shapes and sizes of the tags and began stapling them to the string using mini staples, one strand at a time (3 total).  I kind of tried to follow the tutorial is shapes and placement but I changed my mind a couple of times as well.  When I was done, I wound the string around the frame and secured it in the back.  I couldn't wait to put it on our front door.  Our door looks much cheerier now!!

Pack of papers: $6 (with a 30% off)

String: $2

Frame: $3

Tags and staples: Free, already had extra

Total cost: $9  

My second project was for our anniversary.  I was working on a congratulations card for our friend who was graduating and I noticed that one of my Cricut cartridges had some really cute silhouettes of couples doing different things (it was the "Sweethearts" cartridge incase you want to know).  I thought to myself, "That would make a really cute anniversary card somehow."  I started cutting and creating and suddenly, 2 hours had passed and I had a really cute anniversary card for Colby.  Here is what I did...

I started with having the Cricut cut the silhouettes onto tag shapes.  There were 5 silhouettes in all.  One of a couple dancing, a couple sharing dinner, a man proposing, a couple dancing at a wedding, and a woman pushing a baby carriage.  I thought this was a sweet representation of big moments in our lives together... dancing in the park on our first date... a million dinner dates out... Colby proposing... our wedding... and now our new little one on the way!

After all the tags were cut out, I glued black paper to the black and then adhered them to vintage style papers I had saved.  The last tag I made as a place where I could write my message to him.

When it was all done, I added the final touches of writing a little description of each moment we had shared, and then tied it with a ribbon at the top.  I was pretty pleased overall.

We had a great night celebrating our anniversary by eating, believe it or not, pancakes! (Hey, a pregnant girl does have her cravings!)  We watched our wedding video and enjoyed a glass of sparkling grape juice since wine and champagne are out of the question for now.  We gave each other our gifts and then had to get ready for our vacation we were leaving for the next day.  My gift for Colby was very appropriate for the next day's activities- a new set of luggage!  Here were my surprises...

 An absolutely beautiful crystal heart necklace and a "I Spy" photo album with a list of things to find/do and take pictures of while we were in Savannah during vacation together.  (I will update on this later when I have the pictures printed and the album finished).  It was so sweet and I am one lucky girl :)

Sorry for the long post!  I'll be making a new entry soon that's all to do with baby boy!!!  I have a lot of ideas for the nursery.  Now it's just getting them in one place and deciding!  Hope you all are staying cool in this summer heat!  This momma is for sure!