I love you to the moon and back.

For today I wanted to show you a behind the scenes peek at how I made this sweet canvas for my baby boy. You'll get a look at my creative process. My idea was to have a painted background and a moon that was lots of paper layers. So I started with my paper. I went through my stash and pulled out whatever I had that might work in a boyish color scheme. I had lots of blue, green and brown paper so that was my color scheme. 

My baby boy is picking his favorite papers. He approves! 

Isn't he so handsome? Once I had my color scheme I grabbed my paint and threw a whole bunch of it on my canvas, literally. Then I grabbed a brush and started mixing it all together. I had way too much paint on here, so I put some in my art journal and on another canvas. I'll work on those later. 

I wanted to keep my background simple. I added some blue to the corners, but then got stuck. I didn't want it to be busy because I wanted the focus to be on the moon. So I decided to pick out all the other elements for my canvas and then finish the background at the end. I loved layering the papers for the moon. I needed some more pattern in other places on the canvas so I decided to add some stars. 

I am really in love with script writing. I've seen it on Etsy, on Studio Calico, and in scrapbook papers.  I was so excited to play with doing my own script for this canvas. I've already practicing my handwriting a lot. My normal handwriting is not very pretty so when I want to do something fancy I  would practice writing it different ways. Now I have my own style that I like and comes naturally. I did each word a few times using a Heidi Swapp color shine mist and a paint brush. Then I picked my favorite one and cut it out. 

it's coming together...

I love the layered papers... 

My messy desk; it's always good and messy when I'm in the zone. 

This was my finished canvas, but it just didn't seem right. I didn't want to do too much with it, so I left it for a couple days. Then when I came back to it I realized I need to add some doodling and black pen to the letters. 

Now it's just right. 

I love you to the moon and back my sweet baby boy! 

4th of July Decorations

Horray, summer is finally here. Here in Colorado we had snow in May! So I am so excited that the weather is finally warming up. Here's my darling daughter eating some watermelon. It just doesn't get much better then that. 

On Memorial Weekend I got out my 4th of July decorations so we could enjoy them early.  The 4th of July is my second favorite holiday. I love it! I love the summer. I love the patriotic spirit. I love spending the whole day celebrating and BBQing with my family. It is the best.  You can see my 4th of July Pinterest Board here. 

So these are a bunch of decorations I made last year. I love this flag inspired wreath. I searched Pinterest for the best 4th of July wreath and I just love this one! I followed this tutorial here. You basically but squares of felt and use pins to stick them into a styrofoam wreath. 

I did make a few changes. The first thing I did was wrap my styrofoam wreath with duck tape. I had a styrofoam wreath on my door before and the wind blew it off and it smashed to pieces. I am hoping the duck tape helps this one last longer. I also feel like it hugs the pins so they stay in better too. I wanted my stripes to be even, so I measured it out and marked lines on my wreath with a sharpie. I wanted to have a lot of stripes and each section is roughly 2 1/2 to 3 inches across. 

The last change I made was I painted wood stars and tied them on with wire. 

Since my wreath hangs outside, I knew paper starts would never make it. 

We also planted red, white and blue petunias! I love it. 

Now I am totally in love with Mason jars. When I saw these flag mason jars here. I knew I had to make some!! I used spray paint because I made a bunch of them and gave some away as gifts. I took an old sponge and cute my own star stamp. It worked great. 

After painting take some sand paper to the jars to roughen them up. I like the rustic look. 

I also had some small mason jars and thought, why not paint a 4th of July flag right on it? I think these darling little jars are super cute. I spray painted the jar white and then used acrylic paint to add the stripes and blue. Then I got my tinniest paint brush and hand painted on the stars. 

Let me reassure you, my stripes are not straight AT ALL!! I sanded these jars a little extra so it was really distressed and then the stripes didn't bother me. It has a great rustic look. 

I filled the cup with rice and stuck in these baby pin wheels from Micheals. 

Next I knew I had to make some great 4th of July Pinwheels. You can follow any tutorial. Here is one here.  I had some fun double sided paper which made these easy and super cute. You can find some 4th of July paper here. However, not all my paper was double sided so I simply Mod Podged some paper together. I then add some great ribbon around the stick for an extra touch. 

On my mantel. 

I am so excited for even more 4th of July projects this year. Stay tuned! And enjoy your summer!!