Recycled cans???

That's right.  Call me crazy (I'm sure my hubby did when I shared my idea ;) lol) but I took on the task of creating a hairclip for us "older" girls out of cans.  We all have our weaknesses, mine is coke -- vanilla coke.  What better way to shout I am a caffeine addict than to wear my addiction in my hair? lol  So here it is, my vanilla coke flower hair clip.

I was surprised that I managed to cut and assemble the thing without slicing a few fingers.  Getting the flat piece of aluminum and cutting out the flowers was the hardest part.  Once I got past that point it was just like working with a paper flower that would hold it's shape well if I bent it a little here and there.  The edges aren't sharp like I expected.  They felt much like a piece of paper but I also sanded the edges with steel wool to soften it a little more as was suggested in the hours of searching the internet.  I still wouldn't suggest this hair piece for a child since they are always playing with their hair and I am sure that if you ran your fingers at just the right angle you could get a paper cut.  But I think this is perfect for teens and women.  I am so glad we haven't taken our many bags of soda pop cans down to the recyler just yet.  I get to go digging through the trash bags all next week looking for the sprite cans and any others that will make fun clips.  I am especially excited for the Arizona Tea cans since they have the cutest colors and prints on them.  Because of the time it takes to cut each flower out and the risks of slicing my fingers to pieces to get each flower started these clips will be $6 each.  If you are interested in one email me at jaycee.beardall@gmail.com and let me know what you like.  :)

What's next?

So with Mother's day around the corner I am always looking for ways to add cute things to my Mom's "family" wall and this year I want to make a cermaic hand imprint on a 6 in ceramic heart of each of her grandhcildren to place beside each of their cute little picture frames.  I already have the supplies I need to get this project started I just have to find the time and motivation to do so.  If anyone is interested in helping to keep me motivated by wanting to do one with me please email before April 25th and I woulld love to schedule a time to do so.  Just in case you may not be able to picture in your head what it is I am talking about here is a pic similar to what I am talking about.

Oh Rapunzel...let down your ha-air!

So as a mother of 3 beautiful little girls hair is a pretty big deal at our house.  We have hundreds of elastics in probably every room in the house.  The hair clippies fill the drawers and hang from ribbons in the girls bathroom.  I even have 2 or 3 of almost every clip so that the girls can match whenever I have the motivation to do so.  My girls took their time to grow hair, it wasn't until Lexi my oldest was about 18 mos that I could get teeny tiny pigtails.  And all of my girls have had mullets lol.  Most babies seem to have more hair on the tops of their soft little heads and the bald spot in the back but not mine.  They were bald on top with long curls in the back.  The day I was able to put a clippie in their hair without a headband was a big deal to this mama.  My girls are very girly and love to have their hair done whenever possible.  The expense of hair clips and bows can get to be pretty pricey now that I have to buy for 3. 
Recently I seen some really cute Easter hairclips on another site and wanted to order some for my girls Easter baskets.  When realizing that with shipping and handling I was expecting to spend more than $30 for 3 small clips for a only a few wears I turned away.  I was sad and really wanted to do the clips so I looked at them again and decided to give them a try myself.  Lucky for me I have 24 hours all to myself every weekend of pure boredom while working my graveyard shift at the hospital.  I packed up my ribbon and glue gun and got down to work.  I had so much fun making the hairclips and wanting to try different styles it took over my nights.  I started with one little bunny clip and it has turned into a collection of animals, insects and my favorite are the Princess clips.  I now spend my shifts at work everyweekend (and sometimes during nap time at home) surrounded in piles of ribbon and strings of hot glue all over my lap as I try to find new and fun clips to make.  The girls are always excited on Monday mornings when I come home to see what I have created.  All of my hairclips are available to purchase if you email me.  I hope to have enough together soon to take them out to little boutiques near my home.  I have thought about doing etsy or something like that for a split second but think that it might take the fun out of it and so I am putting it off for now. 
So please check out my hairclips and let me know what you think and if I can make any fun ones for your little Princess. :)

 Princess Hair Clips are $6/each or order a set of any 3 for $14

 Princess Belle

 Princess Cinderella

 Princess Aurora

 Princess Jasmine

 Princess Snow White

 Princess Rapunzel

 Easter Bunny $3

 Easter Chick $3

 Feather Hair Clip $3

 Large Butterfly $3

 Set of Lady Bug and Bumble Bee $3

 Set of 6 hairclips $4

 Individual sets of 2 just ribbon clips $2

 Bowtie (great for little boy bowties too! available in other colors) $2

Zebra Hair clip $2, Large Ribbon Flower $2, Felt flower clips $1.50 for 1 large or set of 2 small,
Mini Bowtie set $3, Fabric Rose $2

A Dying Art

It always makes me sad to hear that an art skill is dying and future generations wont be able to enjoy it anymore.  One dying art that I have a great passion for is doll making.  In October of last year I got an amazing opprtunity to take a long weekend with my mother to Washington to learn the techniques of  lace draping.  Jeanette is a master at porcelain.  She makes and sells her own line of porcelain slip and has been in the doll business for years.  Her talent is absolutely amazing.  Twice a year she opens up her shop and her home (Jeanette and her husband Ralph are very welcoming and friendly people) to complete strangers who are wanting to learn this skill.  For several years my mom had wanted to go and learn more about lace draping after purchasing some doll molds from an older woman and there were lace drape molds in the set.  Fianlly we had the chance.  Jeaneatte and Ralph welcomed us like we were family and it was a blast.  It was all work with Ralph and Jeanette.  The amount of time and detail work that goes into each doll can be exhausting.  We only had 2 full days to take in everything we could and to get our dolls finished.  Our mornings started early and we literally didn't stop for 10 hours.  After the class mom and I would go out to dinner or to our hotel room and try to write down everything that Jeanette had told us.  She overloaded our brains with information and I know there is no way we got all the information down in mom's little notebook.  I was sad when class was over.  I want to go back so badly.  Maybe by next October mom and I can have enough money saved up again to go back.  I worry that if I don't get the chance soon I will miss out on the oppotunity for good.  Jeanette will be the last of all the great doll makers when she retires in the next few years.  All of her students that attended the classes were much older than mom and I.  She said we rare.  The younger generations just aren't as interested in dolls anymore and they don't understand the time and expense that goes into handcrafting each doll.  Who would want to purchase a doll for over $100 when you can buy a cheap mass poduced porcelain doll at the supermarket for $10?  It's sad. 
To explain to you just what lace draping is so you can understand the delicacy and patience required.  You take your porcelain greenware (porcelain slip that has set up in a mold and been dried for a few days) and after very carefully cleaning it you are ready to add your lace.  With 100% cotton lace you take your colored porcelain slip and you soak your lace in it.  Carefully remove excess slip from the lace and with a very small needle like tool begin to pleat or gather your lace onto your mold.  The wet slip should "melt" with the dried porcelain to bond together.  Each layer has to be done slowly and carefully.  If you bump your lace as it is drying you can still break the lace unknowingly until it fires and then you would have holes and missing pieces in your lace dress.Once you have your dress desing onto the doll and it is dried it will go in a kiln for several hours to fire.  During the firing process all the lace under the porcelain slip burns out leaving an extremely delicate and detailed fine layer of porcelain.  The look is AMAZING!  I can't wait to do my next lace drape doll. 
Here are some pictures from our class.  If anyone is interested in ordering a doll or trying the technique let me know, I would love to spark someone's interst in this art.  But be prepared to spend some good money.  A doll can easily cost $300-$400 made to order or $100+ and 2-3 days to make one yourself.

It all started with a childhood memory....

When I was little I always remembered my mom taking the time to make our birthday cakes.  We didn't get a store bought cake like kids do today.  One of my favorite cakes that my mom made for me was a pink barbie doll cake.  You know the one with the barbie in the midle of a cake that was her dress.  My mom always laughs and says it looked like a pregnant barbie doll but I just remember loving it.  I will have to find the picture from my scrapbook and post it for you later.
As I became a mother myself I longed to have the skills to make a fun cake that my girls would remember for years to come.  It wasn't until a neighbor snet out a message on facebook about wanting to do a small cake decorating class in her home one month a couple summers ago.  I jumped at the opportunity and couldn't wait to get started.  The class was 4 weeks and touched just a little on how to bake a cake properly, cutting and filling the cakes, making frostings and fondant and a few of the piping basics.  At the end of the 4 weeks we had to bring a cake baked filled and frosted to decorate.  Here is the pic of the cake I did.  It was a white cake with raspberry filling (mmmmm my favorite) buttercream frosting and fondant accents. 

From that point forward I was a baking fool.  I look for any and every chance to bake a cake.  Friends and family have began asking for help with birthday cakes to baby shower cupcakes and I am loving ever minute of it.  Here are several more of my cakes, ok maybe more than a few ;) you can see my obsession now

 Father's Day cake for my husband Dan just a week or so after my cake class.  Not too bad for freehanding it my first time.

For Lexi's 6th birthday she wanted a rock and roll princess theme I thought the cake was perfect for her.

 Our little Miss Bai Mae had a darling 3 tier pink and green ladybug cake for her first bday.  The top tier came off for her to smash and eat at the party.

 And for Miss Ally Bear nothing less than a perfectly purple Tinkerbell cake would do.  The cake fit her perfectly.

 Of coursewhen Lexi graduated Kindergarten we had to celebrate with a cake

 My shoe obsessed mother got a high heel cake for her bday.  I learned a lot of hard lessons while working on this cake.

 Again new babies is a perfect excuse to bake another cake right? lol These cakes were just small 6 in cakes.

 A pirate Princess cake for a friend's little girl

 Another fun pirate cake  just a couple of weeks later.

 A real cute cowboy cake.  I love how much creativity fondant can give you.

 A girly girl cake for a teenager

 A girly superhero themed cake.  I loved how it turned out.  Ignore the finger mark on the cake it happened after delivery.

 A cute floppy hat cake for another friend.

 If you know my sister you know that music is that girls life!  A black and white piano themed cake was the only option I had ;)  The bottom tier even plays out the tune Happy Birthday!

 A friend was very brave to allow me to do their weeding cake.  It was my first but I loved doing it!

 When my brother and his wife said they were expecting I wanted to add to my cakes with a fun idea to announce the sex of the baby in a cake.  The neutral outside look of the cake makes unwrapping this gift so exciting.  When they cut into the cake to serve it to family the pink inside was a great way to tell them the baby on the way was a baby girl.

 This is my second wedding cake for a girl who used to babysit my little girls.  I had fun making the flowers.  The calla lillies are by far my favorite flower to make and to see on a cake.

 My nephew is recently taken with outerspace so we made a cute space cake complete with an astronaut.  My sister in law requested this cake after seeing the one I did below for a friend.

And the cake fun does not end here.  Of course it can't.  I have tons more cakes to share with you.