I love me some tie dye, that’s an established fact. There’s something freeing about rolling and squirting and making a big mess and I love breaking out the dye every now and then. But the fact is, there are only so many spiral dyed shirts a family of four can reasonably support. Sure, I could send my kids to school in hippie shirts every day, but every one is going to get tired of that really fast. That why I rushed to accept when Tulip Tie-Dye issued the challenge to create a trendy project using one of their dye kits.

We swapped out the beige slip cover on our sofa for a bright blue one last year and I’ve been deeply unsatisfied by our brown throw pillows every since. I decided I wanted to replace at least one of the covers with something bright and fun so I formulated a plan to make a cover featuring a rocket ship flying across the sky.

Wanna see how I did it? Of course you do!

Here are the materials I started with for the tie-dying stage of this project:

• Tulip “Carousel Tie-Dye Kit
• Natural color cotton canvas
• Natural color zipper
• Tulip Surface cover (not pictured above)

I’ve used Tulip kits before and they are absolutely the way to go when you want to dye a project. Aside from the item you are dying, they include everything you need to get started immediately: squirt bottles with dye, rubber bands, gloves and an instruction booklet with lots of ideas.

Before we get into the project, let’s start with a reminder that tie-dye is messy. Put your gloves on first thing!! Some of the dye powder must have gotten loose in my box because I managed to dye my hands before I even started. Also, be sure to cover your surface well. I put the surface cover over our patio table and it helped a lot to keep the mess in check. It’s also helpful to wear an apron and keep a roll of paper towels nearby in case anything dramatic happens with the dye.

OK, so like I said, I chose the ombre technique. I wanted my background to progress from light at the bottom to dark at the top so it would look like the rocket was headed up toward space.

To begin, wet the fabric, then gently gather it and mark it off into three sections with rubber bands.

Next, fill the blue bottle with water up to the line and shake it to mix. Be sure the cap is on tight or that your finger is securely plugging the hole so dye doesn’t squirt out everywhere.

Now squirt one of the outer sections to cover with the dye.

Once you’ve used about 1/3 of the dye, fill it back up to the line again. This will dilute the dye so the next section will be lighter than the first.

Take off the rubber band separating the middle section from the section you just dyed, then squirt the middle section to cover.

Fill the empty space in the dye bottle to dilute as you did a moment ago.

Remove the final rubber band, and squirt the dye on the remaining un-dyed section. While you’re at it, dye your zipper. I forgot to do this and it worked out OK, but I wish I’d remembered.

Roll the fabric up, place in a zip top bag and let sit about 6 hours (or overnight).

After the six hours are up, rinse the fabric under running water until the water runs clear. Dry the fabric. The  ombre effect on my pillow is subtle, but I love how it turned out with all the streaks and variegated colors. So pretty!

Next, make the cover for your pillow. I’m not going to show all the steps to do this because there are many tutorials online that demonstrate the process better than I could. I used this excellent guide from Prudent Baby to make mine.

Now it’s time to add the rocket to your pillow! For this part of the project you will need:

• Your finished pillow cover (you can do this part before you sew the cover if you prefer)
• Wool felt in red, two shades of orange, and yellow (my felt is from the Purl Soho Dahlia kit)
• A small piece of black felt (not pictured above)
• Orange and red thread
• Scissors
• Pins
• A couple of pieces of paper for sketching templates (not pictured)

Begin by sketching out a retro rocket ship shape on one of the pieces of paper. I searched for “rocket ship” on Google images and came up with lots of good images to use as a guide.

Fold your paper down the middle of the rocket ship and cut it out. This will ensure your rocket is symmetrical.

Fold the red felt in half and pin your rocket template to the fabric with the folded edge of each together. Cut the rocket out, then trim any jagged edges so they’re smooth.

Next, draw some flames onto a piece of paper and use the template to cut the flames from the darkest orange felt. Sketch another, smaller set of flames inside the edges of your flame template (see above), pin it onto the lighter orange felt and cut it out. Repeat this step, making a final small set of flames cut from the yellow felt.

Line everything up to make sure it looks OK and make any necessary adjustments.

Sew the yellow flame onto the lighter orange flame. Then sew the light orange flame onto the dark orange flame.

Line everything up on the pillow to determine the desired position of the rocket and the flame. Pin the flame down and sew it onto the pillow cover. This can be a little tricky to do if you opted to sew the pillow cover first, but it’s not too bad. Once the flames are secure (pictured above), pin the rocket down and attach it.

Ta da! Now your rocket is ready to fly off into space!

If you are interested in trying your own tie-dye projects, Tulip has put together easy to follow instructions for the basic techniques:

Tulip Tie Dye Kits are available at Walmart, Walmart Canada, Michaels, JoAnn, A.C. Moore, Hobby Lobby, Hancock Fabrics, Meijer. Tie dye kit contents and colors may vary by store.

Learn more about tie dye techniques, Tulip Tie Dye kits, and I Love to Create:

• Twitter: http://twitter.com/ilovetocreate (@ilovetocreate)
• Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/ilovetocreate and http://www.facebook.com/ILoveTulipFashionArt
• Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/ilovetocreate

Disclosure: I wrote this post as part of a paid campaign with iLoveToCreate.com and Blueprint Social. The opinions in this post are my own.

Happy Mother’s Day! I know I’m a day late, but I wanted to take a moment to celebrate all of the moms out there — and all of you who have a mom or know a mom  or love a mom.

I had a lovely day celebrating with my family yesterday. I got to sleep in a bit and then the kids gave me their beautiful home made cards. Zach also surprised me with a crazy unicorn t-shirt and a couple boxes of my favorite, hard-to-find English candy and then we spent the afternoon picking cherries at a nearby U-Pick farm. It was fantastic and I felt very grateful for my kids, my husband and the comfortable life we enjoy.

Even while I was enjoying my day, I kept thinking about moms who are not as fortunate as I am. Last weekend I was thrilled to host a table at the 2nd Annual Help a Mother Out Benefit Tea. As part of my responsibilities as a table host I invited people to the tea, decorated a table (more on that tomorrow) and helped the event run just a bit more smoothly. In return, I got to learn more about the valuable work Help a Mother Out performs every day. I’m already quite familiar with a lot of what they do distributing disposable and cloth diapers to parents who need a hand up, but I was really touched to hear so many first hand accounts from mothers who have benefited by receiving diapers from HAMO. Diapers can make a real difference in someone’s life, allowing them to enroll their children in day care so they can attend school or work to pull themselves out of a less than ideal situation.

This video telling three of those stories was played at the tea and I encourage you to take a few minutes to watch it:

If you are interested in supporting this organization, please consider making a donation. Even $10 can make a big difference in the life of a baby and his mama. You can learn more about HAMO’s Mother’s Day fundraising drive here: http://www.razoo.com/story/Moms2012

This was a busy week in Wendolonia land. My husband and I had an unusually high work load so we had lots of early mornings and late nights trying to take care of business. Still, lunch must go on so here is what I packed for the boys:

Monday

Monday was pizza day at school, so Wyatt had hot lunch.

Tuesday

No, this is not Wyatt’s lunch — it’s Augie’s!! When I asked him which cookie cutter he wanted me to use on his sandwich, he chose the “W” cutter. I asked him if he was sure he didn’t want his own initial and he insisted on the W, so he ended up with a peanut butter and jelly W sandwich. Hee!

The rest of his lunch had grape tomatoes, carrots, strawberries and goldfish crackers. It was packed in a lunch box with the same shape as this cute pig bento box.

Wyatt’s lunch was packed into the Easy Lunchbox. He had strips of garlic naan, a leftover hoisin chicken leg, carrots, bacon cheddar ranch dip from Trader Joes for dipping, and strawberries. I wrapped the chicken leg in a little foil to keep the mess from the sauce at a minimum and I also included a wet paper towel in his lunch bag so he could clean up more easily if his fingers got too messy.

Wednesday

On Wednesday, Augie had strawberries, meatballs from the freezer, garlic naan circles, cheese sandwich crackers and raisins.

Wyatt’s lunch was very similar: garlic naan, strawberries, grape tomatoes, wheat thins and turkey meatballs.

Speaking of strawberries, I want to show you my new gadget! If you’ve been reading these lunch posts for awhile, you may have noticed that we eat a lot of strawberries. I am a big fan of strawberries because they are delicious, super nutritious and my kids always eat them. I splurge and buy them when they’re not in season (though not in the dead of winter because they’re never good then)  and I buy them in half flats from the farmer’s market all summer long. Until now I’ve hulled every berry with a knife which is a pain in the butt. When I started thinking about making the first batch of strawberry jam for the year, I decided it was time to buy myself a strawberry huller.

I. LOVE. IT.

The one I got is from Chef’n and it works so well that even Augie can use it. A++! Highly recommended!

Thursday

Yesterday, Augie had leftover cubes of steak from dinner, pineapple, crackers and apple chunks. I dipped the apples in some of the pineapple juice to keep them from browning which is one of my favorite tricks.

Wyatt had the same lunch as Augie, but I swapped garlic naan strips in for the crackers.

Friday

Today, Augie had cheesy sandwich crackers, teeny little carrots, a nitrate and nitrite free turkey hot dog that I sliced and put on plastic picks and perfectly hulled berries.

Again, Wyatt had the same thing with naan swapped in for the crackers. This was packed in our Laptop Lunch box.

The carrots are a new product I’m trying and the kids seem to like them a lot. I saw these petite carrots at the grocery store the other day and picked them up to put into a stir fry. They are about half the diameter of regular “baby” carrots. Wyatt has been eating carrots lately (they used to be on the most-hated list), but they are still on the edge of his comfort zone so I thought these might be fun for him. I don’t personally love to eat giant raw carrots because I think they’re unpleasant to chew and these little guys remove all of those issues. They might be worth trying on your kids (or yourself) if you see them in the store.

Disclosure: I bought my strawberry huller and carrots. I didn’t get any kind of money or swag or anything to promote them — I just like them and wanted to share.

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This week’s lunch themes: strawberries and Star Wars day! Read on to hear more.

Monday

Wyatt chose to eat school lunch Monday, which was just fine with me and my tired morning self.

Tuesday

On Tuesday, I had stars in my eyes when I packed the kids lunches. Augie had baked tofu decorated with small star-shaped cutter, carrots, strawberries and pretzels.

Wyatt had the same thing (packed in the Laptop Lunch box), with the addition of a jelly sandwich on whole grain oat bread.

Wednesday

I went to the farmers’ market on Tuesday and bought a half flat of humongus organic strawberries. They started showing up in the boys’ lunched Tuesday and lasted all week long. Look at those suckers! They’re the size of apples! Well, small apples — but still!

Wyatt had three of those bad boys along with turkey meatballs, carrots, wheat thins and a wedge of Laughing Cow cheese. This lunch was packed in an Easy Lunchbox.

Augie also had some of the big guys, but I couldn’t fit them into his lunch box whole so I had to chop them a bit. I also gave him red bell pepper strips, Triscuits and meatballs. These were packed in our kitty lunch box which is similar to this panda bento box.

Thursday

On Thursday, Augie had a home made Jello jiggler (or Knox blox) that I put together using strawberry lemonade and this recipe (the same one on the Knox gelatin box), strawberries, garlic naan, ham and some Sahale Snacks almond and cherry clusters. I received the nuts as a sample from the people at Sahale Snacks (along with their honey almonds) and they are super tasty.  I have to get my hands on more as soon as possible.

Wyatt had strawberries, Knox blox, an apple cereal bar, ham and garlic naan.

Friday

Happy Star Wars Day! May the 4th be with you! Of course I couldn’t let this day go by without doing something special in the boys’ lunches. Wyatt chose Boba Fett and X-wing fighter cookie cutters for me to use on his turkey sandwiches. I also filled a Darth Vader “Easter egg” with some space-themed goldfish crackers. It didn’t actually fit in his Easy Lunchbox — I just put it on top for the photo. The rest of this lunch had strawberries, Knox blox and some tortilla chips.

Augie chose to go with Darth Vader all the way: Darth Vader soy cheese sandwich and Darth Vader filled with goldfish crackers. He also had red peppers, sugar snap peas, strawberries and grapes.

And speaking of Star Wars, I just wanted to share a link to this adorable and funny book I saw at a store yesterday: Darth Vader and Son. It’s filled with cute drawings of Darth Vader and a little Luke Skywalker and has lots of clever little jokes about parenting. I don’t know…it made me laugh.

Have a great weekend!

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Grilling season has officially started at the Copley house! The weekend before last I spent a few hours scrubbing the heck out of our grill to get it ready for cooking and then this weekend we hosted friends for our first barbecue of the year.

I didn’t used to like grilling very much (honestly, I hated it) but that’s changed completely in the last few years. The big attitude adjustment came when I bought my husband a gas grill for his birthday. Where charcoal is slow, unpredictable and messy, our gas grill is fast, fun and saves a ton of clean-up. I know it’s blasphemy in some circles, but to me a gas grill is the difference between dreading a barbecue and loving one.

The food is part of the fun of grilling, of course, but we keep it pretty basic around here. Burgers, sausages, steaks, veggies and the occasional batch of chicken drumsticks are about as crazy as we get. It’s fun to try a new marinade or something now and then, but what I like best are the social aspects of grilling. When I’m making dinner in the kitchen I’m usually by myself, but when I head outside to the grill I almost always have company.

If it’s just us, the kids will usually come out and bounce a ball or draw on the patio with chalk while I keep an eye on the grill. After awhile, their giggles will lure my husband out of our home office to chase them around the yard or kick a soccer ball back and forth.

It’s even better when we have friends over to grill, though. I set up our patio table right next to the grill so while I’m flipping burgers the the other grown-ups sit at the table drinking beers and chatting me up. Meanwhile the kids chase each other around the yard screaming and playing. When we’re inside our tiny house, the confusion and noise of a bunch of people can stress me out, but outside I find the chaos kind of fun.

My favorite part is after dinner. Everyone has calmed down and we’ve all grabbed our sweatshirts from inside to keep us warm as the sun sets and the fog rolls in from the bay. (San Francisco Bay area barbecues are cold!) I light a few candles and turn on the lights inside the house to give us a little extra light. Then one of the kids climbs up on my lap to snuggle while we talk to our friends about old times and new times and sip gin and tonics.

These are just some of the reasons why Grilling is my Happiness. Besides all of the tasty food, tell me what you love about grilling. One of my lucky readers who answers below will win a $25 Sears Gift Card!

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Sears. The opinions and text are all mine. Official Sweepstakes Rules.

I’ve always loved Eric Carle’s books. I loved them as a child and now I love them as an adult. The Very Hungry Caterpillar is a favorite with pretty much everyone in the world, of course, but I like some of his lesser known books as much or more. A few months ago I was reading Pancakes, Pancakes! to Augie at bed time and I started really studying the illustrations. I knew that Carle works primarily with collage but I’d never really taken the time to try to figure out how he put them together. After Augie dozed off, I slowly flipped through the pages of the book to see if I could determine what the artist’s process was. As I looked at the illustrations, I knew I had to try his technique!

I thought a little bit about what sort of project I could do and I decided to make some art for the wall of Wyatt and Augie’s room. I wanted something bright and effervescent so I came up with a plan to decorate a canvas with polka dots and a big monogram for each of the kids.

Here’s how I did it.

Begin by gathering your supplies. You will need:

• 18 by 24 inch canvas — or any other size canvas you would like.
• 4-5 sheets of white tissue paper — you can also use other colors as you like
• Mod Podge in gloss finish
• Assorted colors of acrylic paint — I used satin and glitter paints
• Paint brushes in assorted sizes
• Other paint brushes designed to achieve decorative finishes — I used sea sponges and a dragging brush
• Large circle paper punch
• Scissors

This is a pretty messy project, so the first thing you should do is fully cover the surface you’ll be working on. I used cut-up paper grocery bags which have replaced newspapers as my favorite surface covering. They are super sturdy and can be used many times before they need to be recycled.

The first step of this project is also the most fun because you get to play and experiment with paint. Spread a sheet of tissue paper out flat on your work surface. Choose a paint color and dilute it slightly with water. I chose bright colors — red, orange, yellow, green, turquoise — and some glitter paints in orange and green. The paint will need to be a bit of a thinner consistency than what comes out of the bottle or it will cover the tissue too well and be boring. Much of the beauty of this project comes from imperfection, so you want the paint to be streaky and leave brush marks on the tissue paper.

You might need to experiment a little with the consistency of the paint before you get it right, but because mess makes it interesting it’s virtually impossible to screw it up. I used  some of the colors just as they came out of the bottle, I mixed some together to make new colors and I also put two colors on my brush at once to get a sort of striped effect.

I divided most of my tissue sheets into blocks of three colors, but I painted a few sheets all one color to use for the big letters. I assumed the boys would pick red and green — their favorite colors — for their letters but they both ended up choosing green, so I was happy to have plenty of tissue to work with. It’s very difficult to see it in the photos, but there is a lot of variety in the paint on the tissue paper. I streaked and swirled the paint with my brushes. I doubled up colors (orange and lighter orange up on the top, blue with green on the bottom). I used the sponges to remove paint in some places and dab it on in others. The dragging brush was a lot of fun too. I used that to create circles and swirls — especially on the green sheet.

Here I used a sheet of yellow tissue for richer color. The top of the sheet uses satin paint, but the bottom portion is painted over with orange glitter paint.

When you have finished painting your tissue, allow your sheets to dry thoroughly. I stopped at four sheets of painted tissue which was plenty for this project, but I would have been quite happy creating more.

After your tissue is completely dry, it’s time to cut circles. Cut your tissue into long strips about 8 inches wide, then fold them lengthwise a few times so that you have a piece four layers thick. Use the paper punch to cut the circles. This was a little worky because the tissue paper got caught in the punch pretty frequently. When that happened, I just used the scissors to cut out the stuck part (or I just tore it out). I also used the scissors to cut some of the circles free-hand.

Next, cut your letter from the tissue. I used a half sheet of tissue for each letter. Sketch your letter on the back of the tissue paper. My kids’ names start with “A” and “W” so I could just write them on the back of the paper normally but if you are cutting a letter that isn’t symmetrical (like “R” or “S”), you will need to sketch the letter reversed. You can also sketch it on the front if that’s easier, but you’ll have to be careful to keep the lines hidden when you cut it.

Cut the letter from the paper.

Now you can begin gluing!

Pour some of the Mod Podge into a cup and dilute it a little with water. You want it thin enough that you can easily spread a very thin layer of glue on the tissue paper. I use a cruddy old paintbrush for this purpose

Randomly place your circles on the bottom half of the canvas. Rub each circle with your finger to be sure there are no air bubbles and the edges are fully adhered. I tried to keep a pretty good balance of color and I overlapped the circles frequently. I think it would have looked cool to do alternating rows of single colors too.

Place some of the circles over-hanging the edge of the canvas as well. When I did this, I just wrapped them around the canvas.

Keep gluing and layering circles until you are satisfied with the background.

Lay your letter on the canvas to decide where you want it to go. When I put my “A” down, it was directly over a few green circles and I was unhappy with how it looked. I layered a few orange and blue circles on top of the green to provide a bit of extra contrast between the monogram and the letters.

Spread glue on the back of your letter and then, working quickly, place the letter on the canvas. Be careful not to let it double over when you are lifting it up. You can get it apart pretty easily, but it’s kind of a pain. Ask me how I know. You’ll have a few minutes to lift up your letter and rearrange it before the glue dries if you don’t get the letter in just the right place the first time but you increase the chances of ripping it if you do that so do your best to get it where you want it the first time. Again, rub the letter with your finger to remove air bubbles.

I had trouble getting some of my letters to stick down, so I just ran the brush under those edges to add a bit more glue. I also found my tissue wrinkled up a bit , but I liked how it looked so I didn’t sweat it too much.

Allow the canvas to dry thoroughly.

When the tissue and glue have dried completely, seal the canvas. Again, pour some Mod Podge into a cup and dilute it with a little water. Using a large brush, cover the entire canvas with a thin layer of glue. Be sure to cover the side of the canvas if you wrapped any circles around the edges too. Repeat this step two or three times, allowing the glue to dry completely between coats.

Hang your canvas and enjoy it! I made one of these for each of my kids and I’m planning to put them over their headboards.

If you’d like to learn more about Eric Carle and his art, his web site has a wealth of information. I especially liked the slide shows showing how he paints his tissue paper and then how he uses his tissues to create his illustrations.

Disclosure: I was not compensated to write this post, but I did receive all the Martha Stewart painting supplies I used as part of a previous campaign I worked on. I liked them enough that they have inspired me to create this project of my own free will.

Man, I was uninspired lunch-wise this week. I found myself making the same lunches over and over and over — or at least it felt that way. I’ve been doing a lot of other creative projects lately. I wonder if that’s part of it? Hmmmm…I dunno for sure. In any case, here are this week’s lunches:

Monday

On Monday, Wyatt’s lunch was packed in an Easy Lunchbox. He had a roast beef sandwich on a whole wheat hamburger bun, pretzels, carrots, bean dip for dipping the carrots (in the red tub), wheat thins, sliced cheddar cheese and some strawberries.

Tuesday

The kids had some jello at a restaurant last week and totally flipped out over it. They begged me for days to buy some jello, so Monday afternoon Augie and I made a big batch. I let most of it set up in a big bowl, but I also poured a little right in some containers for lunches. Brace yourselves for a slew of jello lunch photos!

OK, so Tuesday: Wyatt had another roast beef sandwich, pretzels, strawberries and green-flavored jello.

Augie had Triscuits, soy cheese, carrot chips (purchased at our local gourmet grocery), watermelon and green jello.

Wednesday

Wednesday was another Jello day — I poured it right into a silicone baking cup when I initially made it. I also sent Augie with grapes, deli ham roll-ups and stars that I cut from garlic naan.

Wyatt had exactly the same thing, but I added some carrots to his lunch too.

Thursday

On Thursday, Augie had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich that I cut into a gingerbread man shape, strawberries, pretzels and mango chunks (his current favorite fruit).

Wyatt had strawberries, goldfish grahams, pretzels and a roast beef sandwich. I bought a ton of roast beef this week.

Friday

Augie’s lunch had mango, grapes, pretzels and turkey meatballs from the freezer.

I really phoned it in on Wyatt’s lunch today. He had a jelly sandwich (cut into “fancy” triangles), pretzels and strawberries.

And in case you were wondering: Yes! I painted my table blue last weekend!

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When I was a little girl there were very few things that frustrated me more than the racks of little license plates with names on them that are found in the gift shops of touristy destinations. I wanted an awesome license plate fastened to the back of my bike that told the world my name was Wendy more than just about anything. Were there any to be had?

No. No there were not.

Wendy was not a terribly weird name for a little girl in the 70′s, but apparently it was just  strange enough that it usually didn’t make the cut for personalized items. The harder it was to come by customized mugs, pencils and magnets, the more I wanted them. It became something of a family quest to find them but they were rare as hen’s teeth. My anguish was real.

So what did I do when I became a mother? I gave my children even rarer names than my own. While I sometimes came across a Wendy item at a truck stop in Georgia or Nebraska, my poor children — Wyatt and Augie — will likely never be able to buy something with their own name on it off the rack.

To assuage my guilt, I decided to make them their very own name stamps. They’re not terribly fancy, but they’re fun and the kids love them. Here’s how I did it:

I started by gathering my materials:

• a piece of paper
• a pencil — mine was sparkly!
• a small block o Speedy-Carve carving block– mine was about 1 x 1.5 inches
• Speedball linoleum cutter assortment — this comes with a knife and carving blades in five different sizes. The blades store in the handle.

Begin by cutting a piece of paper just slightly smaller than the width of your carving block.

Write the word you want to you on your piece of paper, centering it as well as you can. Go over the text with your pencil a couple times so that there’s a relatively thick layer of graphite on the paper.

Turn the paper over and put the word you’ve drawn face down on the carving block. You will probably be able to see your word through the back of the paper so you can put the image where you want it on the block. Rub your fingernail across the back of the paper a few times to transfer the image to the block.

When you pull up the paper you’ll be able to see your word written in reverse. This will be your carving guide.

Insert the smallest carving blade (pictured at the top) into the handle.

Use the blade to carve out the word you’ve drawn on the block. If you’ve never used a carving tool before, it’s crazy simple. Don’t be intimidated to try it at all. Basically, you put the pointed tip down parallel to the carving block and then gently push it away from you. The blades are sharp so you can use a light hand. They’ll easily glide through the block. Carve out the entire area covered by the pencil. I found it was sized perfectly so I only needed to do one pass with the small blade.

After you’ve carved your work, draw an oval around it. This will be the edge of the stamp.

Fit the deep V-shaped blade into the handle.

Carve a groove around your word following the line you just drew. As you go around the curves go slowly and turn the block so the tool follows the curve rather than rotating the carving tool itself. You’ll have a lot more control that way and your tool will move more smoothly.

Next, fit the wide square blade into the handle.

Use this tool to remove some of the extra block around the outside of the oval. This will give you a little breathing room when you cut the edges off the block in the next step.

Now cut all of the block that isn’t part of your image off. Be careful to cut straight down. Don’t cut any of the block under the image away or your stamp will be unstable.

Finally, ink up your stamp and test it out on a piece of paper. Often you’ll be able to see little imperfections that weren’t apparent just by looking at the block. Clean up your stamp by carving away any extra bits with the small blade. Be careful not to get too carried away though. I’ve ruined a few stamps by getting a little overzealous “cleaning” them.

If you look at the image above, you can see a few subtle corrections. The bottom stamp was my first test. I wasn’t happy with the “M” so I decided to clean it up a little. You can see in the middle stamp that I introduced a little line on the bottom left side of the letter. The top was my final version after I fixed that.

Have you ever carved your own stamps? Do you think you’d like to give it a try?

I’m still feeling a little behind on my Project 365 album, but I managed to knock out week 14 over the weekend, so I’m not doing too badly.  Here’s what I have:

I started off with a photo I took of myself looking super fashionable with a couple of tissue paper puffs in my hair. Monday’s photo was one I took of the boys snuggled up in bed together. Augie gets into bed with Wyatt just about every night at the moment. Things like this are so fleeting that I find they’re really easy to forget, but it’s a big part of life for my kids right now and it will be a nice memory some day. Tuesday’s photo is from a mom/son outing Augie and I took to Starbucks and Home Depot. That doesn’t sound like much to you and me, but it’s pretty much heaven for my three-year-old.

I had a bunch of extra slots to fill in the middle, so I slid in a decorative card, one of my Facebook status updates from the week and a card with produce labels stuck to it. I put this up on the fridge a few months ago and I’ve been adding the stickers from our fruits and veggies to it a little bit at a time. Idea was from here.

Wednesday’s photo was a perfect seven-year-old boy shot I got of Wyatt — all popsicle smears, lost teeth and half-grown permanent teeth. Thursday was a photo I took while working on an art project for the kids’ room (tutorial coming soon!). Friday night we had a glow-in-the-dark Easter egg hunt and Saturday you get to see a photo of my messy, messy desk.

Mother’s Day is only three weeks away. You are aware of that, right? That means it’s time to get your bum in gear and come up with a gift for that nice lady who birthed you (or possibly the nice lady who birthed your children).

Last month I received a huge box of craft paint and painting supplies from Martha Stewart for Plaid and I was asked to use them to create a Mother’s Day project. Check out what they sent:

There were satin and glitter paints in twenty different colors, four packages of reusable stencils, a heat tool, stencil plastic and brushes of all sizes, shapes and purposes and a bunch of other stuff too. I completely freaked out when I opened it.

Hello, my darlings! Come to Mama!

The paints are beautiful and they come in all the wonderful colors you would expect from Martha’s crew, but what makes them really special is that they work on nearly any surface: wood, glass, metal, plastic and fabric. They’re indoor/outdoor too. All in one bottle!

Because I had barely any limitations, my mind started spinning with all the fun projects I could make. Finally, I focused on my mom and her interests. One of her passions in life is growing plants and flowers so I decided to head in that direction and make a painted flower pot.

Here’s what you’ll need for this project:

• Large plastic flower pots — I made two for a matched set
• Martha Stewart Crafts multi-surface satin paint in a variety of colors — The colors I used were green olive, carrot, raspberry ice, pool and habanero.
• Martha Stewart Crafts Four Seasons stencils
• Martha Stewart Crafts stencil tape
• Assorted Martha Stewart Crafts paint brushes — Mine were from the basic and large assorted brushes sets.

You’ll also need:

• Martha Stewart Crafts stencil adhesive spray
• Martha Stewart Crafts stencil brush

(I forgot these when I took my original supplies photo.)

Begin by painting stripes of different widths on the top and bottom sections of your pot. I had originally planned to use the stencil tape to get a crisp line, but the pots I bought had ridges on them so I decided to use them as a guide and paint my stripes free-hand. The edges of my lines came out a little wonky, but I kind of like them that way. If you’re a precision crafter, use the tape.

I found that I needed a minimum of two coats of paint to prevent the color of the pot from coming through. Some colors — especially the blue — needed a third or fourth layer of paint. Be sure to let the paint dry completely between layers.

Once your stripes are dry, it’s time to add the flowers. I used the hydrangea stencil. Or maybe it’s a dandelion? I have to admit that I’m not entirely sure what flower I put on my pots, but I like it so whatevs.

Lightly spray the back of your stencil with stencil adhesive then let it sit for a while until the stencil feels sticky but is no longer wet (more on that in a minute). Press the stencil onto your pot, taking care that the edges of your image are adhered tightly with no bubbles or gaps. This will give you a nice clean edge and will keep the paint from seeping underneath the stencil and feathering. (I learned this the hard way.) I also covered the nearby portions of the adjacent stencil images with stencil tape to keep the pot clean in case I got a little overzealous when it was time to start painting.

Lightly dab paint over the stencil with an up and down motion, rather than brushing it on. You’re better off doing multiple light coats than one thick one because the paint tends to collect on the edges of the template.

As you finish painting each flower, remove the stencil and reposition it. The adhesive will stay sticky for for three or four repositions after the initial one, so there’s no need to re-spray each time you move it. I alternated the paint colors on each flower, painting the three orange ones first and then circling back around and painting a red flower in the three empty spaces.

One problem I had was that the first time I pulled my stencils off after initially spraying them with the adhesive, it left a ton of sticky residue behind. I asked around a bit and the consensus was that I probably sprayed too much adhesive on the stencil and I didn’t let it dry long enough. (I am an impatient crafter.) So, be sure to use a light hand and let the stencil sit around 10-20 minutes before you use it. I easily removed the sticky residue by rubbing it gently with a paper towel with mineral spirits on it. I was nervous that this might smudge the paint, but it came right off and it didn’t affect the paint at all. Nice.

When you’ve finished all your painting, let the pot dry thoroughly and then plant some pretty flowers in it. I chose some bright orange marigolds to match the bright colors on the pot.

Finally, give it to your mom, along with a big smooch! (You might want to apologize for your teenage years while you’re at it.)

If you’re interested in seeing some of the other Mother’s Day projects created by the talented bloggers participating in this campaign, be sure to follow Plaid on social media: Twitter | Facebook | Pinterest. You will not be disappointed.

Disclosure: I wrote this post as part of a paid campaign with Plaid and Blueprint Social. The opinions in this post are my own. You will see how much I like the products I got in this goodie box as I show you the other things I’ve been making with them in the coming weeks.