Fall Festival Centerpieces

So, my cute Beehive Presidency decided that it would be fun to help with the Fall Festival. Usually our ward has a carnival so the girls thought it would be fun to plan a game for the night and be in charge of it. Well, they decided NOT to do a carnival this year so we asked if we could help with decorations and the activities chairman asked if we could make centerpieces.

Now comes the tricky part...we had to make 21 centerpieces with $20.

Hahahahahahahaha!! Pretty funny, huh??

Well, I set to work searching the internet for something inexpensive - but also something that the girls could help make. It had to be something that could be made at one night's activity.

So, after much searching, I decided that the paper strip pumpkins would be easy easy easy and cheap cheap cheap. We ended up making 63 of them. WOW!!

But I wasn't sure how to display them on the table - luckily my mom was in town. So, we ventured in and out of several stores and finally decide don these. Paper plate resting on a paper bowl...but they actually looked really good. I wish I had taken a picture at the festival because they look so cute on all the tables!!

Here are ALL 21 centerpieces!!!

Square Pumpkins

Chance's class has a Mystery Reader come in every week and read to them. I wanted to go in October so I could dress up. I decided to read the book "Spookley, the square pumpkin". It is a cute story about appreciating the differences in everybody.

Well - as you can imagine, I couldn't go empty handed!! I thought it would be cute to give the kids a little square pumpkin. Literally, I made 25 of these in less than one hour!! That includes cutting the wood, painting, and assembling!! They are super easy and the kids LOVED them!!

I used a 2x2 piece of wood and cut them into squares. I drilled a hole into the top and painted them orange. I used dowel pins for the stems. I like them because they are a little bit textured but you could use regular dowels as well. I painted them green. Then I stuck the dowel pin into the drilled hole and hammered it in.

I debated adding the raffia or drawing a face on them - but I ended up liking them just plain.

Father's Day gift idea....

You may be thinking..why is she posting a Father's day craft in the middle of October. Well, I can't believe that I forgot to post this craft - but then I realized that it was a crazy time of year. The kids had just got out of school and I was getting ready to go to girl's camp so this one kinda slipped by and then I was dusting off my hubby's and thought to myself, "Did I add this to my craft blog?"

I gave a YW lesson on the Priesthood and found out that you can request a copy of a priesthood holder's line of authority from the general church office. I immediately started thinking about what a great Father's day gift this would be for my husband, my dad, and my father-in-law. Just be aware that the line of authority will be mailed to the address on file - so I had to have my mother-in-law and my mother watch the mail and then send them to me.

Originally, I had big plans to make it all cutesy with digital scrapbooking and such - but then I saw this simple idea on someone's blog...and I'm sorry but I don't remember where and I can't find it. If you happen to come across it, let me know and I'll be sure to link over to it.

So, here is what I ended up with. (sorry it is not the greatest photo)


The frame can be purchased at Walmart for about $10. It is an 8x8 square shadowbox frame. I printed the line of authority onto vellum paper and cut a tie template out of scrapbook paper. So easy and so meaningful. I also printed a wallet sized line of authority for them to carry with them.

It has an awesome quote on the bottom that says: We in the restored Church of Jesus Christ can trace the priesthood line of authority exercised by the newest deacon in the ward, the bishop who presides over him, and the prophet who presides over all of us. That line goes back in an unbroken chain to angelic ministers who came from the Son of God Himself, bearing this incomparable gift from heaven.

FINALLY!!!

Sometimes it LITERALLY takes me YEARS to get a project done!! Hahaha..I'm not kidding!!

Years ago (I know this because we still lived in West Jordan) - I came across this blog that used rain gutters for bookshelves. I know ya'll have probably seen them. You can google "rain gutter bookshelves" and TONS of pages will show up.

Well, I finally got around to doing mine!!! I was getting overrun by books and needed to do something. (Getting rid of them is NOT an option! )

So, I put on my big girl pants and FINALLY got around to making some. They are SUPER easy and now I wish I had done it sooner. I actually used a metal one by my front door because I wanted it to be magnetic. I used vinyl ones in the playroom. I have one more piece of rain gutter and I just need to cut it up and I'll put some in my kid's rooms by their beds. They LOVE to read books at night before bed - but they usually end up just stacking them on the floor.

Without further ado....here they are!!!

Pumpkins

There are all sorts of pumpkins out there in the world wide web right now...and I have my eye on a few of them.

I started with these ones because I already had a spare 2x4 sitting around in the garage.

The original idea can be found HERE:

I'm not sure how she attached her stems but I drilled a hole in the top of the pumpkin and the bottom of the stem and then used a dowel to connect the two pieces. Does that make sense? So they are attached, but you can turn the stem to the side if you want to just for a different look.

Also, we painted ours different colors - except for Chance - he wanted ALL of his to be the same color.

Chance decided that he wanted to make faces on his - so his looks like this on one side and then he cut pumpkin faces out of black paper and glued them onto the other side...depending on what he wants..he can turn them either way. Smart little kid..

Here's the finished project!!!