american girl doll – Sweet Southern Grace

Today, I am teaming up with six of my blogging friends to share our ”Surprise Box Challenge”.

CDD9489D-3C53-4647-BA41-6F03AC62144B

Our rules were simple: draw names, purchase $10 worth of items from The Dollar Tree and ship to the person we were assigned to then wait to receive our items!

82C83F87-C619-4A3F-91FE-A0DB246D5890

CHALLENGE ACCEPTED

Challenge accepted?! I was a little unsure of the items I received until.. The first idea that came to mind was making a tree for my youngest daughter’s, American Girl dolls!

F97C40B7-A63A-44E3-9953-ABF5711EB5F9

I decided to get to work on the tree first! I used the ribbon to make a box topper first. Super simple!

EAADBD01-D089-4A30-96F8-CBB6B99D2620

I just gathered the ribbon in a few loops, like so..

97B187E2-D34B-45F6-BE1F-D28E0CC12475

Then I used the twine that was attached to the wood hanging piece to tie a knot and secure my bow!

3DDAC625-69AC-4567-AC79-46ACF23FC595

I used the remaining ribbon to cascade down the tree in three different sections.

70C591B0-6CB5-44C4-B65F-F2E5DB57C610

I decided to use the berry garland as my garland and sort of loop it on the tree. I also used the wood tree ornaments and just strung them on the tree. They even game with string to tie them on the tree!

DEC96AAA-AE54-49A5-AA8A-E07892FB5A63

I decided to use the red scarf as my tree skirt but cut off the white pom pom balls.

799CE6FD-B024-4DD4-82DD-01CA5F6E6CF1

I did not use the lights because they needed batteries and that was not included in my box. Bummer!

97F71EF3-D9E5-4CBE-8955-A5DC0C2CEB2D

My little sure did love Mommy’s new craft for her doll thet she got for her birthday!

696E590F-D144-48B0-986B-B957F275FDCA

I hope you enjoyed this challenge and will visit the other ladies blogs as well!

4D857094-CBC6-4919-9B81-93A7014452D6

Decorate and More with Tip

Stilettos and Shiplap

Today, I’ve been invited to team up with my friend Terrie from Decorate & More with Tip and several of our blogging buddies to bring our readers inspiration with “hearts”. I knew exactly what I wanted to do when Terrie invited me to this challenge!

Guess what I took out of my craft closet? My painters canvas drop cloth, of course! I always have one on hand from previous projects from curtains to pillows! I decided to make a canvas drop cloth “ribbon” garland with hearts!

First things first..I made a heart template by hand drawing a heart on a piece of copy paper. Then I placed my heart template onto the canvas drop cloth canvas and traced the heart template with a pencil onto my canvas drop cloth.

I decided to make 7 hearts, so I needed 14 in total, with each heart being 4 inches in size. I planned to stuff my hearts with tissue paper to give them more of a fuller look and to help them stand out more on the garland.

Next, I sewed around the edges of two of the hearts, leaving a 1/4 inch from the edge. I also left enough of a section unsewed (open) so that I could stuff with tissue paper. After stuffing with just the right amount of tissue paper, I placed the heart back onto my sewing machine and sewed up the remaining edge.

After finishing all of my hearts, I moved on to the “ribbon”. I used some twine that I already had on hand. You can find it at Wal-Mart, Hobby Lobby or any craft store.

For the ribbon, I decided to do 21 inches in length and 2.5 inches in width. To make the ribbon, measure the size you want to use and cut a small slit at the top of your canvas for the starting length and rip down to the desired length. Measure and do the same for the width. The amount of ribbons that you will need will depend on the size of your ribbon and the length of your garland. My garland is 58 inches and I have around 40 ribbons.

To tie your ribbon onto your jute twine- I am going to show you in a series of photos, how I tie my ribbon onto the twine. Hold your ribbon and loop it around a couple of your fingers. Now, flip your ribbon upside down, as you bring it up to your twine.

Take the loop section of your ribbon and hold with one hand then pull the ends into the loop.

This is the ends pulled through the loop.

Then pull tightly to secure your ribbon’s knot.

Now, go and do this several more times until you’ve completed your garland! I did this 40 times!

For the hearts, I just did one small tack of hot glue and sort-of evenly spaced them. By evenly spacing them, what I actually mean is what looked best via my eye!

You could style your garland on your mantel, on a wall in you living room, the possibilities are endless when it comes to using this garland! You could even add colored ribbons in to go with the changing seasons!

I chose to style my garland on our little girls kitchen set! The girls and I had a fun afternoon of making handmade Valentine’s cards! We even had tea with their dolls too! I hope ya’ll enjoy our blog hop and hop on over to visit the other ladies to see what they’ve come up with for our “heart” challenge!

Love, Shae