November 2016 A Harvest of Memories Scraps

November is a very difficult month to endure due to painful memories. We honor my Mother in-law's birthday on November 11th and will never forget the loss of her on that dreadful day of November 19th, 2013. We watched my husband's mother slowly deteriorate from cancer, she died from a tragic fall, and a month later we nearly lost little brother from horrible health issues. November was when little brother became very sick and had to hospitalized weeks later. I am truly grateful for my testimony that families are forever. We will be reunited again with our loved ones who passed on someday. I am also truly thankful to God for answering our pleas in healing my son from his many difficult medical issues he encountered the first few years of his life. He is absolutely amazing and brings us so much joy in our lives! I'm counting my blessings! We have so much to be grateful for! 

In Loving Memory, 2013

Our Family: Life is Beautiful, 2013 

Credits: I used a huge collaboration kit (papers and elements) called"That's Life" from many popular scrapbook artists. "That's Life" was a Digi Scrap Parade freebie.  The templates are by Cindy Schneider from Sweet Shoppe Designs. I used the following fonts: FO-giggles, Lucida Handwriting, and print clearly. 

All Family Thanksgiving, 2015

 
Credits: The layout is by Penny Miscellany, Autumn Day papers, journal card, pie, flowers, and buttons are by Elif Sahin from Sahin Designs, yellow leaf, pine cone, mushroom, pine needles are by Kristin Cronin Barrow from Sweet Shoppe Designs, and acorns are by L Grier.  I used the grumble font. 

Beach Quiet Book: Ice Cream Truck and Ice Cream Pages

Change the Button Tires on Ice Cream Truck and Build and Ice Cream

Snap Open to See Ice Cream Buttons
Supplies: Ice cream truck template, wool blend felt, embroidery floss, interfacing for window, large buttons for tires, ice cream buttons, ribbon, and snap.  I used the blanket stitch and back stitch.  Little brother loves to change the tires (learning how to button) and snap open to see the ice cream buttons.

Buttons to Change the Tires

Off Road Tires

Build an Ice Cream
Supplies: Ice cream bowl, ice cream cone, ice cream toppings, sprinkles, ice cream pocket, patterns/instructions are from Imagine Our Life. You need wool blend felt, embroidery floss tiny beads, ice cream ribbon, red sequins, and clear vinyl. I sewed the vinyl sprinkles with my sewing machine and hand stitched the rest of the pieces doing a blanket stitch. Little brother can pretend to build an ice cream sundae or cone. 

Sprinkles Topping

Beach Quiet Book: Octopus and Turtle Pages

Count the Fish Beads and Pull Turtle's Tail with Bead Maze

Count the Fish Beads and Open the Octopus Zipper
Supplies: zipper, blue, parachute chord, fish beads, white tulle, many different colorful ribbons, eyes, lilac purple felt, and embroidery floss. I made my own simple template for the body. Obviously, I sewed the zipper and ribbons with my sewing machine. I hand stitched the octopus body doing a blanket stitch. I hot glued the eyes on the felt. On this page, little brother can count the beads, become familiar with colors, and understand different sizes.

Pull The Turtle Tail
Supplies: Turtle template, maze template, black, white, and two types of green wool blend felt, black embroidery floss, green floss, green ribbon (for tail), vinyl, bead. I hand stitched the turtle with blanket stitches and French knots (eyes).  Little brother can pull the tail down and push a bead through a spiral maze. 

Turtle Bead Maze

Beach Quiet Book: Football and Build A Sandcastle Pages

Tie The Football Laces and Build a Sandcastle

Supplies: Wool blend felt, embroidery floss, shoe lace, shell buttons, pearl button, other surf board button, button for sand pail, sequins, tulle, eyes for the crab, and ribbon.  The lace foot ball template I got from Pinterest. As for Build and Sandcastle, I got the sandcastle pattern and tutorial from Imagine Our Life and  Shell is from Bugs and Fishes. Little brother learns how to tie shoe laces and building a sandcastle.

Peek a Boo Crab

Peek A Boo Pearl

Beach Quiet Book: Life Jacket and Fish Pages

 Life Jacket and Fish 

Life Jacket

For the Life Jacket, I used the tutorial and pattern from Sewing Skills Quiet Book Page 18-19.  Supplies: I bought some orange nylon material, webbing, clip, and extra batting. I sewed a sail boat button in the corner and did a blanket stitch to secure the webbing and life jacket down in the page. Little brother learns how to clip and and take off the clip on the jacket. 

Match the Fish Snaps Off and Dolphin on String Can Hide in Rock

As for the Ocean Floor, I was inspired by a shark page on Pinterest by Wonders of Felt. The fish patterns are by Purlbee, treasure chest, ocean floor are from Imagine Our Life. Supplies: blue fleece 8x8 square, wool felt, sequins, snaps, parachute cord, dolphin bead, shell buttons, gold ribbon, fake jewels, pearls, tiny beads for octopus, eyes for shark and fish, and clear vinyl for shark tummy.  Little brother learns colors, how to fasten snaps, play hide and seek with the fish on the cord, feel the different textures, and match the fish.

Shark Eating the Fish

Beach Quiet Book: Monkey and Beach Bag Pages

Monkeys Teasing Alligator and Mom's Beach Bag

Supplies: sun button, shell button, wool blend felt, embroidery floss, eyes, white ribbon, white tulle, and 8x8 water like fleece material. I got the monkey pattern from Imagine Our Life,  alligator tutorial (I drew my own template for the alligator) but got inspiration from 365 Days of Crafts, snake, tree, and sun is from Bugs and Fishes. I came up with the patterns for the beach, water, rock, bananas, birds, and clouds.  Little brother learns how to snap on and off the monkeys and play peek a boo to find animals under objects. I have taught him the song"Two Little Monkeys Swinging in the Tree" when he plays with this page.

Peek a Boo Bird

Peek a Boo Snake

I sing the song "Two Little Monkeys Swinging in the Tree".

Mom's Beach Bag- Keys, iPhone, and Wallet 

Supplies: wool felt blend, the brown flower felt I found at a local craft store (it's thick), embroidery floss, ribbons, button, rubber band, vinyl plastic for license and card. For the beach bag, I used Imagine our Life's purse and iPhone and found keys patterns off Pinterest. Then I used the tutorial and pattern for the wallet from Lola Nova. The driver license and Chase card came from Smile Like You Mean It. Little brother learns how to fasten and unfasten a button on the wallet. He can pretend to use a phone and keys. He may become familiar with numbers 0-9 and learn my phone number.  

Inside of Wallet Mom's Fake Driver's License and Chase Card

Beach Quiet Book:Treasure Map Shapes and Sun Pages

Treasure Map Velcro Shapes and Weave the Sun

These are the first and last pages from the Beach Theme Quiet Book 

Blue Pocket and Velcro Shapes Treasure Map

As you can see, I sewed a blue pocket for the first page to put the shapes in. Little brother loves to match the shapes and place them in the pocket.  He also learns colors and shapes.

Velcro Off the Shapes
Supplies: Wool blend felt, Velcro squares, shapes pattern, embroidery floss, needle, and Fusible Interfacing (iron) between the felt shape pieces to help secure the Velcro in place. I hand stitched the shapes and map by doing the blanket stitch or basic stitch. The treasure map  and shapes pattern came from Imagine Our Life.

Weave the Sun

Supplies: Wool blend felt, embroidery floss, and ribbons. Again, I used the blanket stitch on the sun border and weaves pieces. I used the following patterns circle from Busy Bug Life and weave from Sunshine, Lollipops, and Rainbows. Little brother learns how to weave.

Little Brother's Beach Theme Quiet Book

Little Brother's Beach Theme Quiet Book
When Little Brother turned two years old in May of 2015, he finally unwrapped his homemade Beach Theme Quiet Book for a birthday present. The quiet book has been great to take with us to doctor appointments and during church! He also likes playing with it during the daytime occasionally too. 

Front of Quiet Book
First, I made a Quite Book Board on Pinterest and collected many pins for inspiration and ideas. I read the pro and cons of the different types of Quite Books. I choose a simple book style instead of the rings. Next, I researched how to hand sew by watching the following You Tube Videos: the blanket stitch, back stitch, and French knots. Beware I am a beginner sewer with my Brother sewing machine. The stitches are not straight as you will see in the handle and on some of the pages! I spent hundreds of hours making his quiet book stitching by hand many tiny pieces.  It is a beautiful keepsake for years to come and I plan to make more quiet books for my grandchildren in the future.

Supplies: 
The book was made from many colorful wool blend felt sheets, which I bought from an Etsy Shop called Benzie Design. I also bought Velcro, interfacing, cream muslin material, navy fleece material, and a fleece under water ocean scene material for the book cover from Walmart. I followed the instructions on how to sew my book by using the following tutorials: Sewing Skills Quiet Book and Sewing with Nancy to assemble the Quiet book together. Each square was 9X9 (I made a template from card stock). I added a blue pocket inside the front page of the book and sewed on the Velcro as a closure. I also liked the idea of little brother carrying his Beach Quiet Book with handles.
Blue Pocket and Velcro Shapes Treasure Map

Monkeys Teasing Alligator and Mom's Beach Bag

Life Jacket and Fish 
Football Laces and Build a Sandcastle

 Octopus and Turtle
 Ice Cream Truck and Ice Cream

Weave The Sun

Stay tuned! I will post more photographs of each page. I will break down what supplies I used for each page, what skills little brother learns from each page, and where I found the patterns, inspiration, templates, etc in other blog posts.  

Masquerade Daddy Daughter Harvest Ball

Masquerade Daddy Daughter Harvest Ball

Last year I helped accomplish a magical Daddy Daughter Date. It was a formal dinner, which we all dressed up in our Sunday best. I loved wearing my jeweled black dress and green mask! Each girl made a mask during Activity Days week prior to the evening. They also helped us make invitations, name cards, and napkin rings. Our goal was for it to sparkle that night by using lots of glitter, white lights, shimmery ribbons, and gems! We decorated the place in restaurant style each girl got their own table with their Father. We had servers (Young Women and Men from our ward) take their orders and serve them their food. We had a photographer take photos at a backdrop and provided some fun props. We asked a couple Young Women and Young men who were on the Ballroom team perform a couple routines for some entertainment. We then did three rotations of activities such as writing a letter to our missionaries, minute to win it games, and learn a waltz from the ballroom dancers. At the end, we did a group waltz dance all together. It was a fun night, which I hope the girls will never forget! 
The Invitations
We used 12X12 glitter scrapbook papers and embellished the invite with feathers, gems, ribbons, and black mask dye cuts (from silhouette machine). 

Close Up on the Invites
Credits: The Frames and graphics are from The Graphic's Fairy, the dancing couple from here and black paper is by Zoe Pearn and grey paper is by Shabby Princess. I used the following fonts: Francine Hmk, Old English Text MT, and Bergamot Ornaments.

The Table Setting
We cut some burlap fabric in squares, made name cards, napkin rings, masks (template here), menu, pumpkin party favor (filled with candy), spray painted pine cones, black lacy paper over glass container for tea light, and candelabras (silhouette machine which we spray painted them).

Another Table Setting

The Menu
We asked six Young Women and Men in our ward to be servers. They were dressed in black and white. Credits: Graphics and frames are from The Graphics Fairy, papers are by Zoe Pearn and I used Imperator, Goudy Old Style, Bergamot Ornaments, Old English Text MT, and Francine Hmk for the fonts.

The Place Mat (Activities to do while eating) 
Credits: I found misc games from doing a Google search Tick Tac Toe, Pumpkin Maze, and Dot Game. I typed out some ice breakers questions for them to talk about during dinner. The silhouette dance couple is from here. The oval frames and silhouette of girl are by Allison Kimbell Designs. The other Graphics are by The Graphic's Fairy. I got the silhouette dancing couple from here and the man silhouette here.

Photo Booth and Props
We used white lights over a white curtain and layered it with gold and cream material, bought a few pumpkins (put gold and cream ribbons on the stem) and balloons. I found the Photo Booth Props templates from here -----> Keepsakes Photo Props 

Banners and Pumpkins
As you can see we went with the color theme of black, orange, purple, gold, cream, and silver. When I planted my garden last year, I made sure we did pumpkins! I painted the pumpkins black, purple, white, etc. I used some glitter, ribbons, and masks to embellish them.  I was happy to decorate my front door with the colorful pumpkins after the event! I used gold and silver spray paint to make the pine cones (great for Christmas decorations, ha). As for the banner, I used the Goose Bumps kit from Shabby Princess, orange paper and alphas was from Zoe Pearn's Something Wicked Kit, and then I tied colorful ribbons on the banner.

More Pumpkins

Entertainment and Games 
We divided the guests into three groups and did three rotations. I made a map to show them where to go. We did Minute to Win it games, Learn a Waltz, and Missionary Letters to our current missionaries serving from our ward. Credits: Papers are by Zoe Pearn and Shabby Princess, graphics and frames are by The Graphics Fairy, compass is by Kate Hatfield from The Lily Pad, and the waltz dance couple silhouette is from here.

The Overview of Lights, Table, Chair Setting, and Disco Ball 
What a wonderful privilege to be apart of this magical night! I have the best church calling ever!