Family Growth Chart

I've had a growth chart in my mind for a while and yesterday I finally made one. I had intended to do one just for DD but decided instead to make one for the entire family. Mickey will always be a family favorite, even if DD doesn't maintain her obsession so I figured it was pretty safe.

It was easy enough to do, just a little time consuming. After completing it a light bulb went off and I realized an easier way. Next time I guess.

DH asks me almost weekly, "did she get taller overnight?" Now we can check. At 30 months and 8 days old she is just short of 3 feet tall. Don't ask me where she got the height.

Deardenland Sign

MIL gave this sign to FIL a couple years ago for Christmas. You've got to remember that my in-law's are obsessed with Disneyland. And now that I've been, I've become a little obsessed too:) So I wanted to give DH a similar sign for Christmas. MIL and I went to the boutique that made the sign for her. They told us they no longer had the Walt Disney font (we later found out they did) and that they wouldn't do a multi-colored sign. This frustrating event lead MIL to buy a Cricut so we could do it ourselves! YAY!!!!And with Sure Cuts A Lot, I was able get the perfect font.

Like I said, I wanted our sign to be similar, but not the same. DH decided he wanted the sign to look like this:

so I ended up with this:

Hallelujah!

My parent's got me a camera for Christmas! YAY!!! I really wasn't expecting it but I'm having so much fun! DH got me Sure Cuts A Lot for Christmas so I've been having a blast labeling EVERYTHING!

Now I'll have to play catch-up and post all the things I've made over the last few months.

Mickey Counters

I'm so proud of myself when I come up with something on my own, rather than copying ideas I see on blogs. These original ideas are few and far between, but I'm happy that they come at all.

This idea came from the frustration that all DD ever wants to do is watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. We've started having "art time," "dance time," "reading time," "cooking time," "clean-up time," and anything else I can come up with just to get her excited about something other than Mickey Mouse.

I wanted to limit how much she watches so I came up with this:


We keep this at her level on the side of the fridge and now every time she wants to watch Mickey, she has to take a "Mickey" off the board. Don't think I let my child watch 8 episodes a day! She gets 4 on the weekdays and 8 for the entire weekend. 4 a day even sounds like a lot!
It probably makes more sense to just have 4 Mickey's on the board, but DH and I liked the look of this.

Making it was simple. I just cut out 8 black Mickey ears and 4 red & 4 yellow Mickey ears that were 1/4" smaller, all on the Cricut. I have some Mickey paper that I used as a background then glued the black Mickey ears to it. I left the red & yellow Mickey's loose and took it all to Utah Idaho Supply to have it laminated. It was less than a dollar for all of this. When I got home I cut up adhesive magnets (97 cents a pack at Wal-Mart) and stuck them to the back of the colored Mickeys and to the front of the black Mickey's so they'd stick together and it was all done.

Super easy, and so far it's been really effective.
And again, sorry for the camera phone pictures.

Cricut Love

MIL let me bring home the Cricut while I'm working on DD's new Mickey room. It was a real pain to drive 30 miles to cut all the things I needed to.

I decided to stray from the Mickey cartridge tonight and make some Christmas cards for an upcoming achievement days activity.

I've been so focused on the Mickey cartridge that I never really took the time to browse through the others. I found some awesome cards for Thanksgiving which is was perfect to send the great-grandparents these turkey hands that DD recently made for art-time. I love this this autumn script and this cute little turkey.
While I was at it I made a "give thanks" banner for the mantle. I wasn't in the mood to string it so I just taped it right to the mantle.
As always, I realize I should have done things slightly different when it's too late. When I was attaching the leaves to the mantle, I wished I had them going in random directions, not so uniform. But by then the letters were glued on and it was too late. Oh well, I'll know for next time.

I still haven't found my camera. I hope that someday soon I'll stumble upon DD's hiding place. So these pics are all from my phone. They're awful, I know. Sorry.

Halloween Potions

For the first time since I was a little kid, I am excited for Halloween. I never understood the desire to be scared or act silly. But that has changed. Maybe it's because DD is almost 2 and I can dress her up or maybe my in-law's love for the holiday has rubbed off on me, but I'm totally into it this year.

I went downstairs to find my Halloween decorations and was shocked at my lack of decor. I have a scary tree that glows and 2 pumpkins which are of Mickey & Winnie the Pooh. And all 3 of those items were bought by MIL. So I started blog surfing for ideas and found one that I LOVED! Substantially Chic Designs had the cutest potions display! So I decided to copy her ;)

I raided my fridge and transferred a bunch of stuff to Tupperware so I could use the glass and I spray painted the lids matte black.
I printed out a bunch of labels that she linked to. The only problem was that I was printing them at my in-law's house and didn't have my bottles with me to size them correctly.
I set made a list of things to buy at the dollar store but only found about 1/2 the things on my list so I came home and improvised.
I saw another blog that did Harry Potter potions and made labels out of brown paper bags so I decided to add a few of those.





I love the Vampire blood. I had this awesome bottle in the fridge which had some acai berry drink in it. I was happy to have an excuse to dump it. The label is from Love Manor and the liquid is water with a few drops of red food coloring.

The corrosive sublimate label from Spook Show and I just filled it with maple syrup.

The polyjuice potion is simply dirt and water. DH made the label.
The skeleton was supposed to have a label but I didn't print it. DH and I decided to leave it alone.





Living Death is another Potter reference and contains water with red & blue food coloring. The Danger: Unknown Specimen was a toy snake from the dollar store that I cut up. That one grosses me out.





I had this cool bottle that DH's grandpa gave us containing his homemade plum syrup. The syrup was almost gone and I thought it would be perfect for the Life Renewal Potion, which is water & green food coloring.

The Human Flesh label comes from Love manor and inside is a toy liver from the dollar store and water.




I was excited for the eye of newt. Like Substantially Chic, I got hydrating balls from the dollar store and added green food coloring. I didn't have a label so DH made one.
The petrified butterflies bottle is empty (shameful, I know). I've been trying to find butterflies at the dollar store but haven't had any luck. But I love the label, so I kept it.
The eyeball label comes from Spook show and just has chocolate balls with eyeball wrappers from the dollar store in it.


Now, this potions collection is on a floating shelf above the TV and I thought it needed a little more. MIL just bought a Cricut for us girls to share!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and we got an awesome Halloween cartridge, but it'll be a few days before I'm at her house to cut something cute so I came up with something else.




Running off the Harry Potter theme, I made a warning sign on "parchment." I haven't decided it I love it yet, but it'll work for now.





I had made a potions sign with the cricut, but after adding the Harry potter stuff, it just didn't look right so I took it down.






I also made a trick or treat banner, but I wish I had made it bigger. I was really just playing with our new toy and that's what I came up with.


It's amazing the crafting possibilities a Cricut provides. DD is obsessed with Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. She's turning 2 in a week and we got a Mickey cartridge (of course) so I'm going to spend my lonely weekend while DH works making decorations for her birthday! So excited!


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