Charm & Whimsy

Non Candy Easter Basket Ideas for a Toddler.

This is really the first year I’ve put together something for The Boy from the Easter Bunny. He is only 2.5 years old after all. I think he will have fun looking for eggs in the yard and getting a treat basket so here goes.

I wanted to put something together for him that would have fun things besides candy. This is what I came up with. Everything came from Target and cost around $15 including the basket:

- A glittery, light-up pinwheel

- 2 books from the dollar bin

- 2 pairs of socks – SpongeBob (he doesn’t know who Spongebob is but they’re cute, they look like sneakers), and bunnies with sparkly noses from the dollar bin

- A sparkly, light-up egg wand thingie

- Miniature Bert & Ernie figurines

- Annie’s Organic fruit snack pouch

- Glow sticks/bracelets (I added these later)

- 4 chocolates (Lindt mini bunny, mini chick, carrot and ladybug). Yes ok this breaks my no candy rule however they’re small and this is a special occasion and they’re super cute

- Plastic eggs filled with the following:

- Fruit snacks

- Goldfish crackers

- Punch balloons – these are a favorite item in our house. You will regularly find 2-6 balloons blown up all over the place. They’re sold in the party section of Target and I think there are 6 giant balloons per $2 bag. Super! Cheap entertainment – gotta love it.

 

Here are some other ideas I threw around:

- Matchbox cars

- Boxes of raisins

- Bubbles

- Packet of seeds (an older kid might like this – not quite instant satisfaction enough for a 2 year old)

- A flashlight (The Boy is fascinated by flashlights)

- Plastic dinosaur

- Character toothbrush (Toy Story is a current favorite)

- a tangerine (except he doesn’t like those – but still a good idea)

Let’s hear some of your ideas – what is the Easter Bunny bringing for your little one?

I finally put privacy film on the sidelight windows of our front door.

Hooray for walking around in my underwear in the kitchen!!! TMI, I know - but come on – admit you do it too.

The sidelight windows of our front door look right into the kitchen and main hallway so I always felt a little weird that people could look in if they were at our front door.

That’s a rainbow maker at the top of the window there – it’s fantastic! It fills the foyer and stairwell with rainbows in the afternoon. The boy and I love it so I didn’t want to cover that pane with film because no direct light = no lovely rainbows.

I used this window cling film from the Improvements Catalog, specifically the linen print. It was really easy to use so we’re not going to go into much detail about that (cut to size, spray water on the inside of the window, remove backing, apply film and squeegee out the bubbles). What I am going to show you is the little message I added to the sidelight windows after I put up the film.

I had to move our alarm sticker to the other side of the front door before getting started because I needed the cutouts on the left side. If someone were to bend down and peek through my greeting – they would see the living room and foyer wall but not me in the kitchen which is what I wanted.

I opened a Word document, typed “hi”, changed the font and size until I liked it and then printed. Unfortunately, after I took it to the window it was not big enough so I used our printer’s copier function and enlarged it by 400% and then it was perfect!

I trimmed the excess paper and taped it to the outside of the window. My sweet boys were providing moral support - aren't they cute?

Next I took my handy dandy ceramic precision cutter and cut out the letters (I don’t know why it’s gotten bad reviews on Amazon – it worked great for this project and I’ve used it many times for paper).

Remove the cut outs, the paper from the outside and voila! Looks neat, huh?

Time to go upstairs - the master bedroom has a big window (knee level and up) facing the street on the way to the bathroom and another window in our bathroom in front of the toilet and shower – this has also been on my list since we moved in. With the shades/curtains always drawn it’s too dark but one needs privacy in the bathroom, no?

I only put it up on the bottom because I love seeing the trees outside, however that blocks the boy’s view so – hello cutter – time to make a peep hole! Win-win all the way around.

In the end, it was a fairly quick project (the two windows, four sidelights and “hi” cutout took less than an hour) and I’m lovin’ the freedom it affords. Hooray for that!!

Quick, beautiful crochet cowl and pattern.

I found this gorgeous cowl on Pinterest which led me to Anneliese’s beautiful blog www.aestheticnest.com. With all my web wanderings I can’t believe I’ve never come across her blog! Go check her out – she’s very talented.

Here is a link to her pattern. The light blue one took about 2.5 hours to make, the turquoise one about 1.5 hours. I just used yarn from my stash and that’s the great thing about this cowl – you can make it big or small depending on how much yarn you have. The pattern calls for a size N hook - I had a P on hand – no big deal! The stitch is very forgiving.

I used 2 1/2 50g balls of the Jaeger Baby Merino and 2 50g balls of the Zarella.

I love working with this twisted yarn. Aren’t the little bobbles charming?

I’ve made several so far – they’re quick, easy gifts to make. Also the stitch is simple enough that once you get the hang of it you don’t need the written pattern and can easily just carry the yarn and hook around with you to work on whenever you’ve got a free minute.

Hope this is something you’ll make too – go visit Anneliese’s blog to see all of her beautiful projects. I want to make that rainbow skirt for myself!

Have a lovely day!

Susie

DIY Picture Valentines with Hershey Kisses

I realize I’m posting this the evening of Valentine’s Day and it would have been more helpful last week; however this is something you could probably whip up anytime no matter the occasion or use it for next year’s valentines. Sorry for the untimely post!

All in these valentine’s cost about $2 for 20 prints at Costco and then another $3 for the Hershey Kisses – with plenty left to keep mommy happy while making them. I didn’t price regular store bought valentines but I’m guessing this is pretty comparable and cute to boot.

Isn’t he adorable?! I just want to nibble on this kid every day!

 

How To:

Start with a cute, close up picture. I tried to get a picture of The Boy giving a smoochie however they didn’t come out as cute as this one of him trying to grab the camera from me so I went with this one. Unfortunately I didn’t save a copy of it without the editing so imagine it’s a clean slate please.

Open up your photo editing software, I used MS Paint which I believe comes standard on most PCs. You can find it under Start Programs (bottom left button on your screen), All Programs, Accessories folder, Paint. Most photo software programs have some sort of editing feature so play around with what you’ve got. We’re just adding writing with brush strokes or you can also use text boxes.

I’ve selected “brushes” and chose the top right option which is called airbrush because I liked how it looked like a crayon (below). Then select the color of the brush stroke or letters. If you choose the brush stroke feature you’re going to be using the mouse to write the letters. It’s harder than it looks! The shaky letters below were not due to me trying to write like a child – it was really that hard. I did it a million times to get to what you see. Next time I’ll probably just add a text box although this still turned out nicely.

So once you’re happy with whatever edits you make, save the file and either order prints online or go somewhere to get them printed. I went to Costco and ordered 3” x 5” prints with a white border. I didn’t see the options online but I knew if I went in they could do modify the size and border. I think black borders are options too.

Once I got the prints home, I got a glue stick and a big bowl of Hershey Kisses. One for the card, one for me. One for the card, one for me. You get the idea

Add a touch of glue to the bottom of the kiss, then press on the photo.

Let dry thoroughly before piling on top of one another for transport – you don’t want the kisses to pop off.

Voila!! A Kissy For You Valentines. Mwaahhhh!

In hindsight this would have been fun to do with The Boy – he could have put the glue on the kisses. Next time.

Have a great day!

Susie