Secret messages

I posted last year about this educational game I loved playing with my daughter. We still play it, even though she has her colors and shapes down pat now. It's just fun.

I came up with something new to do indoors last week, when it was too windy to go outside. (Anybody else from Utah wonder what is up with this wind?) Mim will color for a long time. Sometimes over an hour. She LOVES it. And asks me the whole time if I can color with her, which is sweet, but if I can't, it just makes me feel bad. So I was coloring with her the other day and came up with something that still meant we were interacting, but didn't necessitate me sitting with her the entire time.
SECRET MESSAGES!

I write letters or simple pictures in white crayon on white paper, then draw a box around it with a marker. She fills in the box with the matching marker and the letter is revealed! It's a pretty impressive trick to a 3 year old.

{The number 3, Mim's current favorite.}

{The sun.}

{A flower}

{Ha! She's started pulling faces in pictures.}

It was a nice way to keep her busy but still be involved. It was perfect for while I was doing dishes- I did a page of secret messages, then she colored them while I took care of things without the constant, guilt-inducing "Mama, will you color with me?"

I could just dye

Oh, puns. Remember THESE? You might, since I just mentioned them in my last post. Anyway, I sent a link to Rit Dye about them and they ended up posting a picture and a link on their blog, which I thought was pretty awesome. About a week or two after that, I got an email from one of the blog's editors asking if I wanted some free dye. Ummmmmmmm... YES!

So a few weeks ago, I got a pretty heavy box. I opened it up...

 It's possible that me and my big girl spent around 40 minutes arranging and rearranging them. That's 15 bottles.

Anyway, I'm so excited to get going with some of the things I have planned for these. I have something dyed, I just need to finish sewing it before I put it up here.

So, the moral of this post- if you do something cool with a specific product, it can never hurt to let the makers of the product know. They might send you $50 worth of awesome FREE stuff. 

By the way, Rit didn't ask me to post about them. The editor, in the note, said she'd love to see what I did with it, but that's it. I thought it was totally awesome of them.

Pinspired on wheels (a double whammy)

I realized that without context, my title sounds pretty much like gibberish. So here's your context, then.

Double whammy:
This pinspiring was brought to you by THIS PIN and THIS PIN.


I thought those clutter crates were totally a good idea and was totally (maybe?) going to get around to making some. And then, more recently, I saw the BHG drawers on wheels. And that's when the pinspriation hit. I totally had an old drawer in the basement that I had saved when we were demolishing stuff down there. I could get my clutter crate and not even have to build it!

So here's the drawer:

It's pretty big. There was some wallpaper in the bottom that just pulled up. I decided I wanted to put it back after everything got a good scrubbing, so I kind of washed the off the sticky side (which had a bunch of gritty dirt and cat hair on it) and then reattached it with a thin layer of mod podge on the bottom of the drawer.

 I also added blocks to the corners because the kind of casters I used had a post on them. I used liquid nails and it got a little bit messy, but I didn't really care.

After the blocks were secure, I drilled holes and attached the casters as per the instructions on the package. And....DONE! Super easy.

Here it is, all filled up and on wheels. Now my big girl can drag her blocks wherever she wants to.

{It's hard to see the wheels because they're sunk into the carpet a bit, but they're there.}

I'm so glad her blocks have a permanent place to go. I had them in an under-the-bed tupperware, but there were too many and it could be tricky to get them all in and still have it fit under her bed (especially for a 3 year old). No under the bed problem with this, because I don't want it under the bed. It's too cute/handy to be hidden away.

See how I made the blocks HERE.
My last Pinspired post HERE.

Best aunt ever

Well, probably not, since my niece's birthday was in December. These are her combination late birthday/kindergarten graduation gift. I was going to make some fabric strap flip flops, like THESE, but then I found all these little jewel beads (that actually used to be my daughter's dress up bracelets, but she broke them) and inspiration hit.

 Little bejeweled flip flops. So cute, right? Here's how I did it:

First up was gathering supplies. My daughter helped me sort out the pink, purple, and white ones.

{Upholstery thread, scissors, needles, the beads, hot glue. }

 The beads had two sets of holes in them, so I threaded them like this.

There they are. I had measured the flip flop straps before, so I knew how many beads to thread.

I used hot glue to keep the beads down at first, but knew a little extra something would be a good idea if I really wanted these to wearable. 

So I wrapped more threads around the threads that held the beads together. That sounds confusing. Here's the picture:

And then I was done. I sent them off one at a time and I can't wait for my niece (who is 6) to get them.

Thrift finds

So, there's a flea market in Utah County. It's called Fleaology and they have a blog HERE. I went with some friends a few weeks ago (they only have it quarterly or so, I believe) and scored some pretty awesome stuff.

I think this mirror is awesome. I think I'll probably give it to Mim some day for her dress ups, but I think I'll wait until she's a little older and I won't have to worry so much about her breaking it. For now it goes on my dresser, which is fine with me, since it totally reminds me of Beauty and the Beast, which is my favorite fairy tale/Disney movie.

 The brown scarf was a DI (Utah's Goodwill) find, but the red with white polka dots was from the flea market- 2 bucks!

 

These are my new awesome flour and sugar canisters. They're awesome. I only wish I had more counter space (since it's so limited in my tiny kitchen, they're usually in the cupboard).

 

 I did not happen to find any zippered pouches at the flea market, but I did get about 2 yards of this awesome strawberry/floral/polka dot for $9. I didn't get any pictures of it before I started cutting it up.

 

 This was not a thrift find. It's from the old swamp cooler that used to go in our living room window. That monster is out behind the shed, waiting to go to the dump, but I noticed this wheel on it a few days ago. I thought it might be kind of a neat little keepsake, plus it kind of reminded me of these from Pottery Barn:

They're no longer available, but I remember seeing them in a catalog and thinking they were pretty cool.

Anyway, I've been pretty pleased with my thrifty finds lately. Anybody want to go garage sale-ing with me?