Hi Everyone,
It's Krisy back today. It's holiday/party season with Christmas being only a few days away but for our family party season is birthday season. My eldest daughter is a Christmas Eve baby. Since the day she was born we made a pact that we would make sure that she gets to celebrate a birthday without Christmas taking over. There are no combined presents, cards or celebrations. Everyone in the family was warned of these rules right from the minute they came to visit her in hospital.
Here is the birthday girl...POPPY
Each each year I do a theme for her party. The first year I kept is simple as we had 2 parties (one for friends and one for family)... it was pink, white and purple. The second year the theme was woodlands and the third Monsters Inc.
This year she is four. And she had a little bit of a say in what she wanted. FROZEN. I always buy bits and pieces and team them up with handmade bits and bobs whether it be pom pom garlands or bunting. This year, I got to work making decorations and a costume for my husband. I'll get to the costume after the decorations so keep reading.
First, the Snowflake Decorations.
This is the perfect activity to get the kids involved in and they are perfect Christmas decorations too.
All you need is:
Toilet rolls or cardboard tubes
white paint
Helmar Craft glue
Scissors
Glitter
You then need to squash the rolls flat and cut them into strips across the tube. I forgot to take a process shot of this part but in the next photo you will see what I mean. Then I took my Helmar Craft glue and glued them all together in snowflake shapes. I started by gluing six together in a flower shape and then adding folded ones between the edges for a more snowflakey feel.
Once they had dried, I painted them with 2 coats of white acrylic paint.
Then I added more glue and dipped them in glitter. I only did the sides, one because that is all you really need to do and two I had glitter everywhere.
I tried adding glue directly onto the edges and it worked by the best way I found was to spread some glue out on your desk, dip the snowflake and then dip it in the glitter. Much like when you batter something. Think of the glue as the egg white and the glitter as the flour.
I used a few different colours of glitter in silver, white and blue.
This is my tried and tested best dipping process in photos.
What I did with all the finished snowflakes we created was I hung them in strand using bakers twine. They would look great hung from fishing wire too but bakers twine is what I had on hand. One they were tied in strands, I hung them from the rafters of my back deck. I made long stands by tying them one under the other. (My Mother in Law even commented that they would be great Christmas decorations....I know!! Hence the reason they will remain hanging for another week until Christmas. Thanks for that :P) They were a bit hard to photograph as strands as the background was too busy so here is an individual one.
If you look really hard amongst the silly string and the crazy family in the next photo, you can kind of see the snowflakes hanging in the background.
I made these over a few months. You need roughly 3 or 4 toilet rolls per snowflake to make a decent sized one. So this is a project best planned ahead!
Now for part 2 of my blog post....Kristoff!
I cheated a bit and bought my own Anna costume and all the kids something special to wear but do you know how hard and expensive it is to purchase a Kristoff outfit?! It's ridiculous and here in Queensland, Australia it is a million degrees around Christmas time so I had to think of something that was kind of cooler and my husband wouldn't complain about wearing. I spent a long time thinking about this and was almost ready to make something from scratch when I had a crazy idea...I could turn a t-shirt into something pretty close to the real thing. It was so simple to make. Seriously, anyone could do it.
This is what I came up with:
This is what I started with.
A dark blue t-shirt
some fur
a roll of trim
Helmar Fabric glue
Scissors
Clips are not necessary but I thought I would need them at the beginning.
The picture of Kristoff is off one of the table cloths and was my guide. I picked up the shirt from K-mart for $10 and the trim was on sale for $5 and the fur only cost me something like $3. So far I am less than $20 and the cheapest "Winter" costume I could find with postage was up over $100 so I am winning.
To start I just laid the shirt out flat and roughly marked out where I needed to alter the sleeves, collar and waste.
This is what the marks looked like before I cut them out.
Then this is after.
Once it was all cut out I just used my Helmar Fabric glue to stick on all my fur and trim. To make the edges a little more stable, I folded them over about 5mm and glued them and then glued the fur trim to the inside. In this picture you can see the thicker edge that I am gluing the trim too.
And this is what it looks like close up and finished. I did have clips out to hold things in place but I didn't need to use them. I was worried about the glue seeping through the thin cotton of the shirt so I applied a bit but not too much. I think the hot day helped the glue to dry very quickly. So, if you are going to try this, I would suggest you put a sheet of cardboard between the front and back so that they do not stick.
Then I went on to glue on the trim. I used most of the 5 meters. I think there was less than 20cm left on the roll that my daughter claimed for her scrapbooking.
And ta-da!
The perfect Australian alternative to heavy Northern winter wear.
And here is a photo of it in action.
I'll be honest, I did not expect the fabric glue to hold up the whole day in 35 + degree celcius Queensland weather nor did I think my husband would wear it all day without complaining. But surprisingly it did and he did. The top knot of the hanging bit of the sash at the front did peel a bit by the end of the day from picking up the kids but overall everything held together. I was really impressed. So if you can't sew; don't dispair you can still create awesome outfits! Everyone was well impressed my my summer design and the fact the whole thing was just glued together. So, go get your self some Helmar's Fabric Glue and get making!
Thanks for looking. Have a wonderful Christmas and fantastic New Year.
Krisy xx
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