Dress Up Disney Days Polynesian Resort

We have a large family. Summer finds our family spread out in all directions. We still want to spend fun quality time together. We thought it would be nice to begin our Disney Dress Up Days project.

With Dad working and three children away, four of us set out to explore Walt Disney World's Polynesian Resort!

We planned our trip including a special dress up day. We thought it would be fun to wear summer dresses for the ladies and a Disney Hawaiian shirt for the young master.

We found the resort to be nicely themed, fun and it smells incredible. The aromatic lobby is filled with the wonderful scent of the Polynesian restaurants. Oh it smells so incredible.

We walked around and took a few snapshots of our visits. We were sure to swing by the front desk to request a lei for each of us. We may even wear hula skirts next time! We had a great time! We especially love the lit torches in the evening and the food!

Frozen Birthday Banner

As you must be aware, Walt Disney's Frozen animated film has reached enormous popularity. In our home, Frozen is a hot ticket! Frozen the movie, soundtrack and even opera bellows are common. I wanted to add to the Frozen phenomena by creating a Frozen themed banner for Miss.J's Birthday! I am a strong believer in recycling, reusing, upcycling and so forth. Recycling matched with a zero balance in my craft budget has forced me to use only what was on hand. Usually, this wouldn't be an issue but when we moved cross-country I donated about 90% of my crafts supplies. When we moved recently for D's job, it made sense to reduce again. So, I'm operating on very little supplies. I searched through my beautiful Thirty One Gifts bag of partially used cardstock and supplies and found: Cardstock in a few shades of blue, white and ivory. I brought out two shades of blue paint, a small blue jingle bell left over from Christmas craft show crafting, a silver fabric bow, blue ribbon and frilly ribbon resembling sparkling icicles. I also pulled out a Frozen advertisement and blue cross-stitching floss with a large needle. I also decided to use my Cricut machine with two cartridges: Basic George and Tie the Knot! I also brought out two types of glue: Tacky glue and Elmer's blue glitter glue that I won from Elmer's on Twitter! ( Thank-you Elmer's Glue and Twitter!) So, I knew that I wanted to assemble the banner differently from Miss Z's graduation banner. I decided that I would use a hole punch to tie ribbon between the sides of each piece of the banner. Well, to my surprise, with our move the hole punch has not surfaced as well as my good scissors. Unfortunately, this meant that I'd need to use an old pair of shears and sew the banner. I definitely had a challenge ahead of me between lack of specific materials and tools. So, I decided to just eye the banner pieces. I cut my cardstock scraps as close as possible to a similar size. I glued the Happy Pieces to the frilly icicle ribbon and let dry. I decided on the pattern of colors and sewed the Birthday and then the name banner pieces together with floss. I cut the Frozen advertisement into various pieces and sizes based upon the pictures. I glued the scrap pictures onto the first and last banner pieces for each of the three banner segments. I painted a full sheet of white cardstock with a mixture of two shades of blue. I allowed the paint to dry. I cut out the banner letters by using scrap cardstock, the Frozen advertisement and eventually the painted sheet of paper. I glued the silver and blue ribbon scraps to the Happy banner pieces. I let the Happy banner dry. I used the Cricut machine to cut out the letters and snowflakes. I glued the letters to the banner pieces. Once dry and assembled, I added a few details including two old snowflake stickers that fell off of a holiday project, tied frilly icicle ribbon between some of the letters. On the name banner, I tied white tulle in bows to the beginning and end of the banner. I added a pastel turquoise ribbon to the beginning of the banner and finally sewed a blue jingle bell onto the end of the name banner. Earlier I added the silver bow to a banner piece as well. This recycled scrap banner took a lot of time to create due to the challenges that I faced. I think for having to use only leftovers plus one full sheet of cardstock that it turned out better than expected. However, it was not the image that I had planned on. Overall, I'm pleased with the Happy Birthday banner for my young lady! Happy Birthday!!!

Rainbow Graduation Banner Tutorial

We Love to do arts and crafts projects in our home. I often craft with my Cricut machine for parties,school projects, fun and I even sell cute confetti/ table scatter!

I wanted to create a colorful Graduation banner to celebrate Miss.Z's High School Graduation!

I consider her school colors as a theme. However, I wanted less drab of a banner. Something that she may wish to keep and decorate her room with. At very least,  something fun and colorful!

I decided to go with a rainbow theme. I just love rainbows. All of the colors together!

Well, I must say that I love the beautiful projects that can be found on Pinterest,the wonderful Etsy, Instagram and so forth.However, when it's your first time making something, sometimes it's not Pinterest material! I will share how the banner was made. However,  keep in mind that I would recommend assembling the pieces together on the side or sew them together. I used a tag style and strung them with fishing wire adding ribbon for color. I weaved the line through the tag notch on the top if each piece. It allows too much play for the pieces in my opinion. There's a first for everything and this was my first banner!

I cut out the pieces of my banner with the Cricut and two cartridges: Basic George and Tie the Knot!

I cut out Tags in a 2 1/2 inch size. I cut Circles to place each letter. I cut each letter to fit the circle base. Unfortunately,  it's been a few weeks and I don't recall the exact measurements of the circles and letters. I planned my strategy in advance. I knew that I wanted rainbow colors. I chose to plan on the circles being placed in a pattern opposite of the tag. I wanted each similar letter placed in the same color of circle.

Tag pattern: Red,Orange,Yellow,Green,Blue and purple.

Circle Pattern: Purple,Blue,Green,Yellow,Orange and Red.

I chose the letter pattern in my preference.

Once the pieces were cut, I placed the tags in order on the floor.
Next, I glued the circle onto the tags with Tacky Glue.
Then, I glued on the letters.

Once the paper was dry, I tied a knot in the beginning of the fishing line. I weaved the clear fishing line through each tag. Be sure to add each tag in order. I began from the first letter of each pattern. I tied off the end of the fishing line. Choose the length of fishing line that you desire based upon the size that you want the banner to be.

I then hung my banner in the wall. I tied colorful ribbon to each end if the banner. I then tied in rainbow order additional ribbon to place between each tag to keep the letters spaced apart. I then clipped the ribbon to lengths that I liked. Second lesson: If I were to create a tag style banner again,  I'd pre-cut the ribbon to be the same length. I'm not perfect by any means but I enjoyed making the banner for the graduate!

I was happy with the result. I would have liked the banner to have been closer inbetween the letters. It was my first banner and a learning experience. I kept the banner up for a week. Then, I took down the second half of the banner with Miss.Z's name leaving the Congratulations to celebrate the end of the school year for the children! We enjoyed three weeks of a colorful rainbow banner!