Howling at the Moon

 Normally there isn't much that I do for a Valentine's day mood in our house, but for some reason this year I feel like decorating a bit, even though we aren't at home on the day itself. We will stay in a little cabin in the wood from friday till monday, but I'm thinking of bringing some garlands, vases for flowers and little presents. Maybe it's because I'm really looking forward to that weekend and decorating the cabin adds just a bit more to the fun and coziness.  This weekend I bought these cherry blossom branches, cut out lots of hearts and sticked them to the branches. Very simple, but I really love the result. 

  While searching for DIY Easter decorations some beautiful paper woven eggs came along in my Pinterest feed and clicking from one woven paper egg to another I found a template but very short instructions. There was a link to a book about paper weaving though, so I bought the book.  The weaving didn't look as if it would be very hard to do, but honestly, it took me hours before I had an egg that looked just a little bit as the ones in the book. So what you definitely need is patience, but also you have to cut out all pieces very precisely to end up with a nice result. Also possible: maybe it's just me not very good at paper weaving while you find it isn't difficult at all).  I have had enough weaving for now, but maybe I will make some woven balls for my Christmas tree this year.      Book: The Art of Paper Weaving by Anna and Lene Schepper (book contains templates and instructions)   ~*~ My Bunny Bark was featured by Keeping It Real ,  Life on...

     Now that boxes are being delivered by the dozens these days, I thought I could make as well something fun out of them. After some drawing and painting and some cutting and gluing I was finished.    I used a small, flat box  for this project, that I turned on its side.  Cut loose all adhesive tape, so the box can be layed out flat. The drawing will be on what initially was the inside of the box (because the outside of  boxes has lettering on it most of the time and you want your houses to be brown).  Search Google for lots of canal house ideas and draw a couple of the most beautiful with a white board marker on what you want to be the front of your box(or draw with a pencil, so you can still correct, and then track with a white marker) Cut out the facades and windows with a little knife (I use blade 11 for all paper cutting projects).  Cut off the sides and back of the box lower than the front, so they're out of sight behind the cana...

When I was young my parents always rented a movie box when we were off from school for Christmas and we watched movies almost all vacation long. As a family we developed a collection of favorite movies in that vacations. Our all time favorite was Close Encounters of the Third Kind. It still is one of my favorite movies ever.When I was about twenty the boyfriend I had then was a dj and made some records for Outland Records (a record store in Amsterdam). On one of the records he used a sample from the movie Close Encounters, as an ode to my family. That was and is how much we love that movie.  For all time sake we thought it would be nice to do it all over this year. Christmas Eve will be the night we go to my brother and his wife to watch the movies of our youth with the whole family. We will all bring our favorite food to put on a grazing board, so none of us has a lot of work making food and such. We will eat while watching and in between the movies we will unpack Christmas p...

Now that Sint Maarten deliverd lots of candies and sweets and Sinterklaas has brought his presents and is off to Spain again until next year, it's time for the next holiday: Christmas. This weekend I will set up the Christmas Tree with my daughters. We also have a 'Carols from Scrap' saturday, when there are two choirs formed, one for children and one for adults, that will practice carols for the whole day. At the end of the day both choirs will peform at church. Very good way to get in the mood for Christmas.  I started to make some Christmas Decorations this week.  From gold colored straws I made this star: I got this idea from Etsy, where you also can buy complete kits to make these so called Himmeli's yourself

It's almost December 5th and that's the day the people of The Netherlands celebrate Sinterklaas. It really is a children's fest. Sinterklaas is an old Saint that brings presents, together with his helpers. He has a horse that can walk over rooftops and his helpers can slide down the chimney. In the weeks before December 5th children set their shoes before the chimney and at  night the helpers (all named Pete, but you have Rhyme Pete, Dance Pete, Wrap Pete and Chief Pete, to name a few examples) put little presents in it.  On the 5th of December Sinterklaas celebrates his birthday. That day all children are awaiting the evening, because that's the moment Pete can knock at the door any moment and leave a bag full of presents. For the children that are still at elementary school, but don't believe in Sinterklaas anymore there's a alternative Sinterklaas celebration (around the age of 7, 8 you can't make them believe any single thing anymore, unfortunat...

This week I started making Christmas Cards. It wasn't in my planning to make cards myself, but when I was in my nearby craft store yesterday, I saw beautiful pastel colored paper. That's how it usually goes: I decide to make it an easy Christmas with little home made things, until I see craft supplies that I really like, most of the time because it has nice colors. So there I was, spending another afternoon at the craft table, but I love the result! The idea and templates for the card I found here ~*~ My Flying Saucer Rider was featured by Creative Jewish Mom , Two Chicks and a Mom and Sew Can Do ! Thank you, Sara and Donna, Staci & Ali Rose and Cheryl!

As told last week my daughter will have her birthday in a couple of weeks and she asked me to make a piñata, like every year. She's really into cacti for some reason, so the piñata also had to be a cactus. It didn't matter which cactus, so I made my own favorite: the Saguaro. ~*~ My Blooming Cactus was featured by Queen Bee Baker ! Thank you very much, Michele!

Now that the days, and especially the evenings, are warm enough to serve dinner outside and eat al fresco, I thought it would be nice to give the outside diner table a summery look also. A couple of years ago I bought a butterfly table cloth and to have some light later in the evening, I decorated a paper solar lamp with butterflies, to match the table cloth.

For a fine colleague that will turn 50 soon I made a card myself. Just a bit more personal than a store bought one.  I made this card with two layers of balloon, that I cut out of white paper. One serves as a background, the other one has the middle cut out. Between both layers of 'balloon' I've put a piece of cellophane. Before I glued all three layers to each other, I've put some confetti behind the cellophane.  On the back of the balloon I've attached a piece of cotton yarn and then I glued the finished confetti balloon to a shining and sparkling golden piece of carton.

This week my youngest had her 8th birthday. It was on a school day, so besides unwrapping presents we didn't much yet, but this weekend we will celebrate for family. Next week her own friends from school will come over. Normally we go somewhere, a zoo, a swimming pool, a theme park or whatever, but this year my daughter wanted to stay at home and play Bingo. It's something they do sometimes at the after school childcare service and apparently she loves it so much she finds it party worthy. I bought little presents to win, most of them having something to do with unicorns, because unicorns are it in our house at the moment, enough for everyone to don't go home empty handed.  Besides the bingo to fill up the hours, I made a pi ñ ata. A unicorn pi ñ ata of course.  ~*~ The Unicorn that I crocheted for my daughter's birthday was featured by Strawberry Butterscotch , by Sew Can Do and by Creative Jewish Mom! Thank you very much, Anna, Cheryl and Sara...

In just couple of weeks my youngest girl will be turning 8! While she normally is quite original in choosing a theme for her birthday (the Angler Fish from last year for example), this year it has to be unicorns. The upside from this theme is that inspiration is everywhere. To not duplicate someone else's idea is impossible. Finding the original source is also undoable, so excuse me for not naming the one who came up with this idea in the first place.  ~*~ The Sinterklaas Hot Chocolate that I made last month was featured at the monthly party from Shanice at City of Creative Dreams ! Thank you very much, Shanice! The Fire Rocket that I made for New Years Eve was featured by Nifty Thrifty Things !    Thank you, Vanessa!

The last couple of years I didn't send Christmas Cards anymore, but my family and in laws are complaining more and more about the lack of Christmas wishes coming their way from our side, so this year I made cards for all members of the family 😏. ~*~ The Sinterklaas Cake that I made was featured by Sum of Their Stories ! Thank you, Julia! The Hot Cocoa Set was featured by Pattern Paradise ! Thank you, ladies! www.betweennapsontheporch.net

After seeing the Chamander Piñata that I made a couple of weeks ago on request, another person ordered a piñata . I had to be a unicorn. Good thing that I'm already in the unicorn modus because my youngest daughter is a fan, that made it so much easier to find inspiration. Examples everywhere in and around our house! And with this piñata I can practice for the one my daughter wants for her own birthday in two months.    www.betweennapsontheporch.net ~*~ The Unicorn Hooded Scarf that I made last week, is featured by Two Chicks and a Mom and by Creating My Way to Success !  Thank you so much, Donna and Jill! The Azel Pullover was featured by The Blue Willow House ! Thank you, Sharon!

My daughter had a birthday party of a class mate this week and asked me to make a card. The girl who was having her birthday is a horse girl (not entirely sure this is a word other languages recognize, but 'horse girl' is a Dutch word for girls with a life that's totally about horses), so the card, and the presents of course, had to do something with horses.  Years ago I made some paper cutting art (didn't blog back then, so I'm very sorry to say that the paper cut heart isn't recorded anywhere here on this blog) with a Martha Stewart pattern and just this weekend I found the little knife I used for for the cutting, so it seemed like a nice idea to pick up the paper cutting art to make a nice horse card.   www.betweennapsontheporch.net

The last time I made a pinata I posted a picture on my personal Facebook account and told people I accept orders. I didn't expect much of it, because most people prefer fabric made things because it's so much cheaper. And you wreck the pinata anyway.  But two weeks ago a friend of mine asked me to make a Pokemon related pinata, most desirable a figure named Chamander (don't know about you, but I had to google), because that's her son's favorite. Here he is: Chamander! www.betweennapsontheporch.net

My daughter wanted to go disco swimming at her birthday party. Before we took off to the swimming pool, we ate pizza and drank lemonade and while eating and drinking my daughter unwrapped her presents. For dessert I made a Pusheen Birthday Cake, which I will show you later and after everyone had finished the cake we had to hurry, so we almost forgot the pinata.  We tried to wreck it, which happened to be very easy, because after the first hit the pinata fell to the ground and then it was easy to tear the paper by hitting the pinata with the stick. Which was good, because we were already late for the swimming pool.   www.betweennapsontheporch.net