First Time Mom and Losing It

I can not say enough how much we love to celebrate the holidays. Things are so much more fun when you have a child that truly enjoys getting treated extra special. Our holidays always starts with a special breakfast, something fun to wear in our hair and something fun on our t-shirts. Later on we will have a festive snack and then for Easter, the opening of the baskets starts.

I love starting every holiday with a festive breakfast. It almost always includes a decorated pancake. I thought it would be fun to bake the pancakes in the oven using these silicone egg shaped trays. We added fresh strawberry puree to make the pancake eggs pink and then drizzled on some melted white chocolate. My daughter had fun decorating the pancake eggs with Easter sprinkles and candy.


We always dress for the holiday and the easiest way is to decorate a t-shirt. I love using wax paper as stencils to quickly paint on a cute design. You can do a search for whatever you want and the word "stencil" and the possibilities are endless. Since my daughter loves glitter I decided to use glitter glue and glitter in place of the fabric paint. A cute little pompom completed the design.


To go along with the shirt I made a super simple bunny ear headband. I made the headband black so that it would blend in with my daughter's hair. She loved how fluffy they were. It was so comfortable that she left it on all day.


Every toddler & preschooler I know is obsessed with those Kinder surprise eggs. Since they are banned in the US I decided to make my own with some safe toys inside. It was amazingly easy to do and my preschooler thought they were the real thing.


Since my daughter is old enough to craft with me she helped me decorate some pudding cups. We made them look like little girls dressed in Easter dresses.

I love every holiday and I try to make it special for my daughter by making it fun. We usually do holiday themed crafts and food. Another tradition I like to keep is to make her a shirt she can wear. One of my favorite and easiest ways to decorate a shirt is to use a stencil, waxed paper and paint or glitter.

Supplies:

• Plain White Shirt
• Candy Cane Stencil
• Wax Paper
• Fabric Glitter Glue
• Fabric Glitter
• Aleene's Fabric Fusion Adhesive (optional)

Step 1: Click on the link to download, save and print out the stencil. If you don't like this one you can do a google search for "candy cane stencil." There will be hundreds to choose from.

Step 2: Place the printed stencil under a piece of wax paper with the paper side up. Trace the stencil design onto it.

Step 3: With an exacto knife, carefully cut out the parts of the candy cane that you want to be red. I made sure that the first piece was red and alternated it with white.


Step 4: Trim the excess paper around the stencil and then carefully place the design on the shirt, paper side up. Use an iron to stick the wax paper onto the shirt. Make sure you iron it enough so that the edges are fully adhered onto the shirt.


Step 5: Use a foam stencil brush to pounce on the glue onto the cut parts of the stencil. You want to make sure you are fully coating the stencil. Sprinkle on the red glitter being careful to cover all of the cut parts of the stencil. Let dry for at least 6 hours with overnight being best.


Step 6: Remove the excess glitter by carefully grabbing two ends of the stencil and funneling it back into the container. Carefully peel off wax paper.

Step 7: (Optional) Place some of the Aleene's fabric fusion adhesive onto a paper plate and dab on some glue over all of the red glitter. Allow to dry completely. Preferably overnight or 8 hours. This prevents the glitter from falling out over time.

Step 8: Make a bow with the ribbon and then use a strong fabric glue to glue it place.

My precious, sweet little girl will turn 3 this week. Where does the time go? I can remember when I first set eyes on her. She was such a long waited for gift so my husband and I treasure her immensely. She has grown up to be such a funny, smart and beautiful little girl. In honor of her birthday week I came up with a fun number 3 shirt the she can wear on her special day. Here is how I did it:


1. Print out the printable. Click on the link, download and print out with the "fit" setting.
2. Tape the printable onto a table and then tape a piece of freezer paper, paper side up, on top. Make sure the piece of freezer paper is bigger that the printable.
3. Trace the number three and remove the freezer paper. Place another piece of freezer paper on top and then trace the crown.
4. With an exacto knife or small scissors cut out the inside of the number three. Do the same for the inside of the crown.
5. Place the three stencil on the shirt in the middle. Then place the crown stencil. on top at the same position that it is on the printable. Carefully slide the number 3 stencil without moving the crown stencil.


6. Iron on the crown stencil carefully. Making sure all of the edges are stuck onto the shirt.
7. Place some fabric paint onto a paper plate and with a sponge brush and paint in the crown. Wait for it to completely dry and then peel off the stencil.
8. Place the three stencil on top of the shirt matching where the crown should be on top of the three. Use the printable as a guide. Iron on carefully making sure all of the edges of the three are stuck on.
9. Paint in the number three with a layer of fabric glitter glue. Sprinkle on some fabric glitter making sure to coat the number completely. Place a piece of freezer, paper side up onto the glitter and take the bottle of glitter and roll over the glitter to make sure that it is sticking to the glue. Wait about 5 hours for it to dry completely and then carefully pour off the excess glitter onto a piece of folded paper. Pour the excess glitter back into the glitter bottle. Peel off the stencil.
10. You can outline the crown with some fabric puffy paint and add some rhinestones to the top of the crown if you like.




**I am not sure how well the glitter will hold up to washing so I recommend turning the shirt inside out and hand washing, being careful not to agitate the part with the glitter. I would also allow it to air dry.

My favorite way to dress up daughter during the holidays is to make different t-shirts for her using iron-ons or stencils. It's so easy to buy a plain shirt for a couple of bucks and just print out a stencil to paint with. I have done tons of shirts for my daughter by printing out a stencil and tracing it onto some freezer paper. Then I take the freezer paper and iron it on and then use some fabric paint to color it in.

I wanted to try something different so I decided to experiment with some glitter glue and fashion glitter in place of the standard fabric paint.

First I printed out the printable. Then I placed it on a table and taped down some freezer paper, paper side up. I used a pencil to trace the outline of the rabbit. I took an exacto knife and I cut out the rabbit and trimmed around the stencil. Next I ironed on the stencil to the middle of the shirt and brushed on a nice coat of the glitter glue.



I quickly sprinkled on the glitter until it was fully coated. I placed some wax paper on top of the glitter and used the glitter tube to roll it on top to make sure the glitter was stuck onto the glue well. Then I and let it sit for about 5 hours.


After that I poured off the excess glitter into a piece of folded paper and put it back into the glitter tube. I carefully peeled off the stencil.


I took a white pom pom and used fabric glue to glue it into place where the tail would go. Allow the fabric glue to try completely before putting on the shirt.


I am not sure how well the glitter will hold up to washing so I recommend turning the shirt inside out and hand washing, being careful not to agitate the part with the glitter. I would also allow it to air dry.

Will you be DIY'ing anything this Easter?