Christmas Challenge: Advent Calendars

This week is the start of December and that means the start of Advent calendars!

  Here is one that I made... I made it using things I already had on hand so it was FREE!

I used a cupboard door (check Ikea's as-is section), clothespins, primer/paint, hot glue, scrapbook papers & embellishments, and adhesive vinyl.

First I primed the cupboard door.

Then I painted it Lamb's Wool White from Dutch Boy. It is a warm white color... I love that it is white but not shape and too bright.  Since my house is filled with warm colors it works perfectly.

I sanded the edges to give it distressed look.

I also brushed on a stain I made from paint and water (50% of each) and wiped it off with a paper towel.  This gives it a nice aged look.

While the paint was drying I made these envelopes with my Silhouette... I love my silhouette! This library envelope came with the silhouette.

I embellished each envelope to make each one a little different.

I hot glued the clothespins to the cupboard door.  I tried to space them out as evenly as possible.

I cut out the vinyl with my Silhouette for the middle.

I am going to add a bible verse and a little treat to each envelope for each day.

Now I am excited to see your advent calendars!  Feel free to link up older post as long as they are an advent calendar.  

This Linky party is for advent calendars ONLY!

Craft Camp Day 3 Crafts: Dragon Handprint Art and PopCorn Box Lanterns

Craft 1 is Hand Print Dragon

Our Dragon Hand Print Art was inspired by Activity Village But we did change it up a little.

First I prepped the body parts.  I downloaded the Hand Print Dragon template from Activity Village and used my Silhouette to cut out the shapes.  You can use scissors but the Silhouette makes it go MUCH faster!  I also pre-glued the eyes onto the face.  I put all the body parts and a glue stick together in a baggie for each kid.

We painted the first hand red and placed it at the front of the dragon body.

2. Paint the other hand yellow and place at the back of the dragon body.

3. Rub the hands together to make orange.   

{We found it was good to add more red and yellow paint to each hand.}

Place each hand in-between the red and yellow hand prints you already placed to make the middle parts of the body.

4. Use Elmer's Glue sticks to attach the body parts to the dragon.

We let the kids use their creativity to place the parts on their dragons. 

Show me your dragon face!

Snack: MYO Dragon:

We cut up some cheese, meat sticks, cukes, and peppers and had the kids use the pieces to make a dragon.

Here are some of their creations:

Craft 2 Pop Corn Box Lantern:

{I created this craft!}

Here is what you will need:

Pop-Corn Box template*** cut out.  

Elmer's Spray Adhesive

Tissue paper cut in to little pieces

Double sided tape

***For the pop-corn box I used my shape from my Silhouette and added the circles on each side. But here is a template you can download and use a hole puncher to create the holes if you do not have a silhouette.

I prepped the boxed but sticking the 4 sides together  and got the double side tape in place.  I sprayed the whole inside of the shape with spray adhesive.

We let the kids place this tissues over the holes, covering the whole side of  the box.

We then assembled  the boxes for each kid (this was quick since I had them prepped)

We used the flame-less LED candles to put inside the box to light up the lantern.  You DO NOT want to use a REAL candle... can we say fire hazard?!!

We left it as a lantern to sit on a table but you could easily add some string to hang it up too.

I hope you enjoyed our Craft Camp Crafts!

Day One Crafts HERE
Day Two Crafts HERE

 

Heat Transfer Vinyl T-shirts

In the Spirit of Iron Crafter Round 8 I made an easy project with my Silhouette and their Heat transfer vinyl!

Have I mentioned how much I LOVE my Silhouette? Because I do- I really do!

Anyways- on to the very cool t-shirts I was able to create!

Here is a quick how-to (I didn't take pics because it is pretty straight forward)

1. Create your design in Silhouette. I made two different ones for each shirt.

2. Cut out your design in white and Iron on using the directions on the heat transfer vinyl box. Let cool.

3. Cut out your design for the yellow and Iron on using the direction on the heat transfer vinyl box. Let cool.

All done!

Here are some other projects that I made with vinyl:

Reuseable lunch bag with iron on vinyl

Reuseable Snack bags with iron on vinyl 

Airplane Pillow with heat transfer vinyl 

Forever Family plaque with vinyl decal 

Be sure to enter your vinyl projects into the Iron Crafter Round 8: Vinyl

WINNER and another fun project with the Silhouette!

The winner of the Silhouette SD is:

Comment #1 Brittney!  Congrats you lucky lucky girl!! : )

Brittney e-mail me to claim your prize!  (firefliesandjellybeans (at)gmail (dot) com)

Here is another fun and EASY project that I made with my Silhouette:

The Silhouette makes Freezer paper stencils so easy and they look so professional! 

Just pick your text and send your freezer paper through your Silhouette with the wax side down.  Iron your freezer paper stencil to your t-shirt with the wax side down. 

Using fabric pant (or craft paint... just remember to heat set it when it is dry!) dab the paint over your stencil.  Since my t-shirt is white I only needed to do one coat of paint... with a darker color shirt it will take more coats.  Be sure to have a piece of freezer paper on the inside of the shirt so that the paint does not seep through to the back side. 

You can peel the freezer paper off while the paint is still wet!  Set your shirt in a safe place to dry. 

Now you can add the rhinestone crown (tutorial on how to add rhinestones here) and the tutu (tutorial on how to add the tutu here) to the shirt and you have a wonderful gift for your niece (or at least I did!)

I used:

Hiccups font

crown_C20091125011834_2050911/30/2009 image from Silhouette online store.

You know you NEED one of these machines! 

Silhouette is also offering this SWEET deal for F&J Readers!

A Silhouette SD

The Rhinestone starter kit

3 additional packs of rhinestones

And 1 Pick Me Up tool

ALL FOR $229!

This Rhinestone Bundle includes:

The Silhouette SD

2 sheets of rhinestone template material

2 sheets of rhinestone transfer tape

2 rhinestone backing boards

1 rhinestone placement brush

1 CD of rhinestone images

1 pack of clear 10ss rhinestones

1 pack of clear 16ss rhinestones

1 pack of clear 20ss rhinestones

1 pack of pink 10ss rhinestones

1 Pick-Me-Up tool

This is an incredible deal worth $125 in savings!

Click HERE and enter the code:Jellybeans

If you already have a Silhouette- You can get the Rhinestone bundle (everything listed above minus the Silhouetter SD) for 34.99 (reg. 54.99) Use the code: Jellybeans 

AND

 All rhinestone products will be 30% off.

This promotion will run from April 21st-April 26th.
  TODAY is the last day!! 

Don't miss out!

Last chance to get in on the Silhouette giveaway! It closes at midnight tonight! A winner will be announced tomorrow!!

Click here to enter our Silhouette giveaway!

Silhouette is also offering this SWEET deal for F&J Readers!

A Silhouette SD

The Rhinestone starter kit

3 additional packs of rhinestones

And 1 Pick Me Up tool

ALL FOR $229!

This Rhinestone Bundle includes:

The Silhouette SD

2 sheets of rhinestone template material

2 sheets of rhinestone transfer tape

2 rhinestone backing boards

1 rhinestone placement brush

1 CD of rhinestone images

1 pack of clear 10ss rhinestones

1 pack of clear 16ss rhinestones

1 pack of clear 20ss rhinestones

1 pack of pink 10ss rhinestones

1 Pick-Me-Up tool

This is an incredible deal worth $125 in savings!

Click HERE and enter the code:Jellybeans

If you already have a Silhouette- You can get the Rhinestone bundle (everything listed above minus the Silhouetter SD) for 34.99 (reg. 54.99) Use the code: Jellybeans 

AND

 All rhinestone products will be 30% off.

This promotion will run from April 21st-April 26th.

Good luck and Happy Silhouette-ing!

&

Rhinestone #1 Shirt and Silhouette SD Giveaway!!

***This Giveaway is CLOSED!!***

Yep! Your read that right! We are giving away a Silhouette SD today! I am so excited for one of you! You are going to LOVE this machine!

I LOVE LOVE LOVE my machine... I have not decided on a name for it yet... but it will have one... I am leaning toward Skyla or Lainey

Here is one of the things that I made with mine this week {Along with the Rhinestone starter kit}

It is my daughter's 1st birthday today!!!  So I made her this special shirt to wear at her 1st birthday party.  Cute and girly!

You will need:

Silhouette SD machine

Rhinestone starter kit

T-shirt

Tulle (optional... but totally worth it!)

First I am going to show you how I worked with the rhinestone picture to add MORE bling to it

here is what the #1 looked like to begin with (you can find it in the Silhouette store for .99) 

Cute -but I wanted there to be more bling so I added more dots for more rhinestones!

First I selected the #1 shape and right clicked on it.  Then I selected ungroup.

Now all your little dots should be separated. 

Now select one of your little dots (do NOT resize!!!) and right click and select duplicate.  This will give you another dot... repeat for at least 12 more dots

Move your dots inside the #1 to fill it in

Now we are going to group them back together so that it is easier to move around. 

Select all the dots (I just make a rectangle around them with the mouse) and right click, now select Group.  Now all the dots should be stuck together in one big group! 

Now send it to your silhouette... no need for the carrier sheet!  Make sure the RED tip is in!

Peel off your blue backing and make sure all the holes are out... Silhouette suggests you do this in a quick swipe... but I had to pick out some holes... not a big deal!  Put it on the cardboard sheet.  Dump some rhinestones on it and use the brush to move them around to fill in most of the holes.  Use your Pick-Me-Up tool to fill in the rest of the holes and remove extra rhinestones   

Put your clear adhesive transfer sheet over all the rhinestones and make sure the all stick. 

Move it to your shirt. Place a piece of fabric over it and iron for 30-45 seconds.  

Remove the clear adhesive transfer sheet  and turn your shirt inside out and iron on the back to pull the glue through. 

Ta-da!  Totally cute 1st birthday shirt! 

Of course, you could put any number on it and it would be SUPER cute!

HERE is the tutu tutorial

And Now the giveaway! 

Silhouette is giving away ONE machine to a lucky F&J reader!

Here is how you can win:

{leave a separate entry for each!}

1. You MUST be a Fireflies and Jellybeans and Silhouette blog follower and post a comment on the Silhouette blog. (only one entry)

2. Like Silhouette on Facebook (one entry)

3. Blog, Tweet, Facebook about this giveaway! (one entry each)

This giveaway is open to US Residents only and ends on Monday April 25th at Midnight!

Silhouette is also offering this SWEET deal for F&J Readers!

A Silhouette SD

The Rhinestone starter kit

3 additional packs of rhinestones

And 1 Pick Me Up tool

ALL FOR $229!

This Rhinestone Bundle includes:

The Silhouette SD

2 sheets of rhinestone template material

2 sheets of rhinestone transfer tape

2 rhinestone backing boards

1 rhinestone placement brush

1 CD of rhinestone images

1 pack of clear 10ss rhinestones

1 pack of clear 16ss rhinestones

1 pack of clear 20ss rhinestones

1 pack of pink 10ss rhinestones

1 Pick-Me-Up tool

This is an incredible deal worth $125 in savings!

Click HERE and enter the code:Jellybeans

If you already have a Silhouette- all rhinestone products will be 30% off.

This promotion will run from April 21st-April 26th.

Good luck and Happy Silhouette-ing!

***Disclaimer: I was provided with the Silhouette SD machine and also the rhinestone starter kit for the project in this post... however my opinion is ALWAYS honest!***

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