Isby Blue

For my daughter's birthday we are taking all of my nieces and nephews with us to visit our crazy and caged long lost relatives at the zoo. As favor bags, I found some cute and inexpensive Hello Kitty satchels and mini backpacks for the girls. For the boys, I was having a bit of trouble. I couldn't find any backpacks or something of the sort that didn't go over my birthday budget. So, Brenden and I (mostly Brenden) came up with a solution- canvas totes with my monsters painted onto them. This is what I've done so far. I still have some finishing touches to do- except for the octamonster- he's done. Not a bad idea, Brenden!

I finished Emily's birthday monster yesterday. Woo Hoo! Well, I tried something different with the eyes (using doll eyes instead of felt) and I'm not sure how much I like it- though I do like the eyelashes. Emily had a lot to do with the look of Apple as well. Since it was her monster, she helped me design the face. I think Apple could use some eyebrows but Em says "No". Apple didn't turn out quite how I would have liked but she's cute all the same. And whats more important is that Emily loves her.

Just a little something I decorated up for Emily. She is learning to write and is very into writing and receiving letters so I thought she should have a little mail box to hang outside her bedroom door. I bought the box at Michael's and it already had the pink paper with the postcard print on it. I just decorated it up with her name in sparkly alpha stickers, K & Co rub-ons, a flower and some fibers. I even decorated the nail head with a little rhinestone. She loves it. Now she and her baby brother play mail man all day! Next on my list for her is to make her a little stationary box full of pretty girlie stationary!

For Valentines Day, I made these monster cards for my family. Despite the fact that they were quite last minute, I think they turned out well! Time just snuck away from me! Before I knew it, Valentines Day was only a day away! The monsters are my own characters that I drew up to use as patterns for plushies.

All cards pictured above © 2008 Lisa Means

A few months back, my daughter wanted to make a clothes pin doll kit for her friend. I thought it was a great idea. We went and bought the needed supplies, got a cute little bag to store the kit in and even made up directions to go along with it. We had so much fun that we made a couple more kits up for her cousins!

We thought we would share these directions with you. This is a simple inexpensive craft that kids always have fun making!

Pick out the fabric you want to use for the dress. Based on a 4" clothes pin, you would want to use a piece of fabric sized at 2"w x 1"h for shirts, 2"w x 2"h for skirts and 2"w x 3"h for dresses. Of course these are just guidelines!

To attach clothes, either put glue on the fabric or glue on the doll and wrap the fabric around the doll. If you want, you can give your doll a ribbon belt.

For hair, cut several pieces of the yarn or floss to the lengths you want and glue to your doll’s head. Another option for hair is to draw it on with a marker.