Creating the Baby Album

Now that Thanksgiving and Christmas are finally over, I have some time to work on baby projects. One of the many projects are finding and putting together a photo album/scrapbook for our baby girl, scheduled to arrive sometime around Valentine's Day.
Now I've been looking for a baby album for a few months now..and never really found any that I liked. It seems all of the baby books out there are all the same and pretty generic; baby animals all over the cover, big 'baby boy' or 'baby girl' splattered across it.. Nothing that was really my taste.


Finally I found a leather journal at Barnes & Noble that I fell in love with. And it's great because it fastens shut, has a place for a pen/pencil on the inside, and is totally my taste. And one of the best parts was that it cost less than $20.

Now I'm not going for 'cutesy' so this might not fancy everyone's tastes as baby albums go, but this suits mine just fine.

It's not a secret that I'm a huge fan of Alphonse Mucha's artwork, so of course I had to incorporate his artwork in to the album, even if it's just on the inside cover. Our baby girl will love Alphonse Mucha too.. I just know it. The decals on the right are Jolee's brand scrapbook decals. I am in love with everything Jolee's.. I want it all!!!


Instead of going overboard on stickers and scrap booking decals, I bought a paper punch to punch out my own little decorations. I love punches because you can use them for all sorts of things other than scrapbooking, and are WAY cheaper than buying stickers and confetti over and over..

Here is a butterfly punch I bought for only $3.99 at Joann Crafts. Cute!

I cut some scrapbook paper a little smaller than the size of each page using Fiskars paper edgers..then glued some on a few pages. I didn't want to get too ahead of myself because the only photos I have of baby girl are ultrasounds, and I'm not sure which paper I will want for photos of her once she arrives.

Here are some of the pages:

I really loved the look of the black and white ultrasounds against the black and white star paper. It just 'popped', and I wish I would have had an assortment of other black and white paper to do the other pages of ultrasound pictures..but oh well.

Now I am in no way a professional scrap book person, nor are my supplies very organized at all.. so I'm sure this looks very amateurish but it was fun to do, so I don't care!

It'll be nice to have those other pages pre-cut once the baby arrives so I don't have to mess around with that part, because once she comes I know I'll really have little to no time to dedicate myself to this book.

My poor boys' baby albums are no way near half done..and my oldest is 7yrs old! Oh well it's the thought that counts!!!

Homemade Tea Soap

My good pal Katrina had a great idea to make homemade tea soap to give out as Christmas gifts to her daughters' teachers at school. Having never done this ourselves, we went ahead and dove right in. What could go wrong.. right?!

We used both Goats Milk Soap base and Shea Butter Soap base for our soaps.
They set up pretty much the same and had the same final result.

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Our teas included Celestial Seasonings Chai Tea, Lipton Cranberry Pomegranate Green Tea, and a Vanilla Caramel Truffle tea.. Mmm.. it was hard not to drink up all that tea.. especially the Chai!
I'm thinking any tea would work well, whatever your preference.

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We searched around for soap molds, but couldn't find any we really liked, so Katrina picked up a cheap 8x8 cake pan to use..our plan being once the pan was filled with soap, we'd let it cool and harden, then cut into soap bricks.

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For our soap, we used half of a 32 oz package of soap base for our first layer, then after that layer had hardened, we melted the remaining soap base, added different tea, and poured it on top. If you are not making layers of different scents/colors of soaps, I'd melt the entire 32 ounces of soap. This amount with the 8x8 pan will have you end up with a good size soap brick.

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What you will need:

Soap base- 32 oz package or however much you prefer.

Soap molds or 8x8 pan

Microwave safe bowl

Spatula

Butter knife

Tea

Step One:
Heat desired amount of soap base in the microwave for 40 seconds on high, then 10 second intervals until melted. Or if you prefer you may melt your soap in a double boiler.

Step Two:
Once completely melted, add desired amount of tea. We used one type of tea for each batch. We used quite a lot of bags.. I want to say maybe 10? It's your preference. If you prefer to add any oils, now would be the time. Stir.

Step Three:
Pour your soap into your pan or mold. Use a spatula to scrape along the edges of your bowl to get all of that tea goodness in your soap. Let it cool for about 30 minutes or longer.

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As I stated above, we made a 2nd batch, using different tea, and poured it on top of the hardened soap for a layered effect. This is the time to do that step if you want.. 
One note- the green tea will turn out a green color, so if you want a single colored soap, do one entire batch (using the 32 ounces) with just green tea.

Can you see the two-toned colors of the teas in this picture? The bottom layer is the green tea.

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Step Four:
If using a mold, tip upside down and apply gentle pressure to release.


For the pan, we scored the soap to the desired size using a butter knife. We then set the pan on an oven burner that was on low for a minute or so to get the bottom a little melty so we could pop it out.

Scoring the soap.. Enjoying some tea ☺

Wrapped it up in some tissue paper.. ready for delivery!

This soap smells SOO good! Let it rest over night before you wrap it up.

Happy Holidays everyone!

Wonderful Cinnamon Scented Ornaments

Who doesn't love a house filled with the aroma of cinnamon and gingerbread? Mmm..

Jake and I created some wonderful cinnamon scented ornaments that were super easy, and made the house smell amazing.

What you'll need:

1 cup of ground cinnamon

1 tbsp of ground cloves

1 tbsp of nutmeg

3/4 cup of applesauce

2 tbsp of white glue

Stir together the cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg. Then mix the applesauce and glue.

Work the mixture with your hands to form a ball. If the mixture is too wet, add more cinnamon. If the mixture is too dry, add more applesauce.

Use additional cinnamon like flour and dust your surface and roller with it to prevent sticking.

Roll out to a 1/4 inch thickness.

Use your super hero muscles to cut shapes with cookie cutters. Looks hard doesn't it?

Place a hole at the top of each shape so a ribbon can be added to hang the ornament later. We used a straw, but you could use a toothpick, etc. Bake in the oven at 200 degrees F for 2 hours.. or if you don't want to involve the oven, you can let these babies sit out for 4 to 5 days.. I am impatient however and chose the latter.

The shapes were still pretty fragile after I removed them from the oven, so I let them sit for about 20 minutes.

Then we decorated them with metallic markers and ribbon.

And voila! Our finished ornaments. Super easy and our house smells sooo good too!

Kid Fabulous Snow Globes

So I saw this idea on Pinterest- which I am completely addicted to, and decided to make some.
They are water-free snow globe ornaments made from Solo cups, card stock, pom-poms, glitter, ribbon, you name it.
You will also need ribbon/yarn/string (or I used hemp) to string through the bottom of the cup (the top of the globe) to hang it from the tree.
More items needed: scissors, Elmers glue and I highly recommend a glue gun.

First we gathered our supplies. I really need to invest in another craft type box for all of my pom-poms and misc. items, but have yet to do so, so they are organized in super flattering baggies. I also found some super cool metallic reflective type card stock scrapbooking paper for the bottom of the globes at Hobby Lobby. Ooooh shiny!

Before you begin, punch two holes opposite each other on the bottom of your cup for the ribbon/yarn/string to thread through (the hanging element) for your ornament.

Take your cup, turn it upside down onto the card stock (or any other material you prefer) and trace around the base with a pen. This outline will help you and your kiddo(s) stay within the circumference of the cup when decorating.

Cut out the circle. Leave a little space around the circle to allow room for the glue when finishing your craft.

Decorate away!

Made a cute present using card stock and ribbon. I left a little more space around the diameter of the traced cups when cutting, so if we wanted to later, we could add embellishments (as Jake did to his ornament on the left).

Here are a few of the ones we finished..

Jake with his snow man globe.

I would love to see finished globes from others, and to see the different techniques and craftiness used! Thanks and stay warm out there!☺

Wrap It Up!

Okay, so being a recycling fanatic I never understood the idea of buying wrapping paper- I mean, does the landfill need more junk? I admit this year I bought some at the store (I had to! It was only $1.99 buy one get one free!!)..but this stuff I will use to wrap bigger gifts and/or if I run out of what I'm about to show you.

So a super economic way of wrapping gifts is using stuff you already have! I save paper bags from the grocery store- I have a stockpile under the sink (please tell me I am not the only one). I used to throw them directly in the recycling bin but then I read that a doing so isn't really saving the earth all that much. The proper way to recycle those paper bags is to first use them at least 6-7 times, THEN recycle them. Okay, so that made my 'getting rid of these bags' all that more unproductive.

So why not cut these suckers, turn them inside out and wrap gifts with them? I mean c'mon, most of these gifts are going to children anyways.. my kids, my friends' kids, nieces, nephews..my sister..lol. They will more than likely not remember what wrapping paper wrapped their gift. I searched my brain and I couldn't remember a single time I was doing headstands over a wrapped gift because of the bodacious paper.

These are the gifts wrapped in paper bags. Not so bad, eh? I have to tell you this as well- the Dollar Tree sells this 'craft paper' looking wrapping paper as well with regular wrapping paper (and it's only $1) that you can use if you still want the rustic recycled look but don't have any paper bags.

This is Jake stamping a tree pattern cut out of a potato onto the paper. My idea was to stamp all of the gifts, then add a little embellishment using glue and sequins. For stamping we used a potato stamp as stated before, cookie cutters, lids off of various items around the house, paper towel rolls, etc.

Pretty cute, eh? Remember, we are not Picasso's! We are just having fun!

Here we added the sequins and paper punched dots.

Then finally tied a bow with hemp. :)

Another great thing about this (other than recycling/reusing which is awesome) is that it's fun! It's fun for you and fun for any kid! And how kids are so proud of their art!
Have fun!

Katrina's Super Sweet Steamburgers

Okay, so I have to give much deserved credit to my friend Katrina who gave me this recipe. She had brought over a crockpot full of steamburger mixture some time ago and my entire family fell in love with them. So now we make them almost once a week! Thanks Katrina!

What is a steamburger you ask? Well basically this recipe would probably be compared to sloppy joes, but in my opinion, and Katrina's as well, these taste much better.

I have been wanting to try this recipe with Boca or MorningStar Farms meatless ground crumbles, but have yet to try that variation.. when I do I will let you know how they turn out!

This recipe makes a large amount, lets say for a group of people or a large family.. so let's say you're making it for a small family, just split up the ingredients. Okay, so let's begin:

4-5 lbs of hamburger
chopped onion (I use dried onion flakes)
2 cups ketchup
4 tbsp vinegar
4 tbsp sugar
4 tsp mustard
4 tsp worchestershire sauce
1 cup water
salt & pepper

Brown your hamburger with the onion. Now I can't stand chunky hamburger. I need my hamburger super fine..as I related my problem to my friend, she went out and bought me this meat masher thingy. Now I have no idea what it's REALLY called, and honestly I use it to mash all sorts of stuff including potatoes, so it's wonderful. I recommend this tool to everyone!

After your hamburger and onion are nice and cooked, drain (and rinse if preferred). Add the rest of the ingredients and stir. Simmer 5-10 minutes before serving (or however long you want the meat to soak up the yummo flavor).

I serve my steamburgers in hot dog buns so the meat has less places to fall out..
So there you have it! I recommend this recipe to anyone who loves sloppy joes.
Thanks Katrina!

Paint With Your Hands!

So this weekend we did a lot of painting with our hands.. our first was an attempt at making Christmas cards, the other was to make hand print Christmas trees. The cards would have turned out better if I would have purchased cream-colored blank cards instead of white ones, but I had initially bought the white cards for another project that failed, so we were stuck with the cards we had. Oh well...live and learn! ;)

So our first project was the Christmas card fail: cute but you couldn't really see the white paint on the white cards. Nevertheless, I will show you what we did, because I think these would turn out great on any other color of paper.

So we began by painting Jake's hand.. Here we are using Tempura paint, which I LOVE. It's super easy to clean off of hands, feet, etc!

After the paint dried, I stenciled out a hat and he added glitter to this part..

This was our finished project. Kinda cute, but you can barely see the white paint against the white background of the card :(

This is where the inspiration came from. :) Oh well.. we still had fun painting and glittering!

The other project was to make Christmas tree pictures from our hand prints.

Caleb wasn't too sure what we were making him do.. haha.

And here is our final result. Pretty cute, I think ;)

Uber Yummo Spinach Dip

I've recently become a fan of spinach dip and so I thought I would try making it myself (as I did with the hummus). This is my friend Heidi's recipe which she gratefully gave to me (thanks Heidi!) after I tried it at her book party. She had pulled this recipe from her memory and in the recipe it says to add 2 pkgs of lite cream cheese- now I thought this was too cheesy in the end result so from now on I think I'll try 1 1/2 pkgs, but that's completely my preference. If you're a cheesy-lovin spinach dip person, stick with the 2 pkgs! :)

What You'll Need:

2 packages of lite cream cheese
1/2 cup mayo
1/4 cup grated parmesan
2 tsp pepper
1 can spinach, drained & squeezed as dry as possible
1/2 cup artichokes
2 cloves garlic, finely minced
1 can water chesnuts, sliced then minced
salt to taste

Now, I had no idea how to ' drain and squeeze the spinach as dry as possible', and tried squeezing the spinach with my hands, while wasting and getting spinach all over my sink. Thank goodness chef extraordinaire Irene came over to help me with this part. She put the spinach in a paper towel and squeezed over the sink. Thanks Reenee! She also showed me how to get the cloves of garlic out of the bulb and mince them. Reminder- I am a newby when it comes to this stuff ;)

So, basically throw all of your ingredients in a saucepan over low heat on the stove. Gradually increase the heat until it gets 'melty'. Stir continually to avoid sticking.

Yummo! We enjoyed our spinach dip with some awesome pita bread. Mmmm.... :)

Christmas Stars

Okay so this is an easy peasy craft..but there's something about foil stars that I love.. oooh shiny.. ;)
After I decorated my hearth for the holidays, I thought it was missing something.. stars! I'm in love with stars. It's ridiculous. So here we go..

First, grab a buttload of boxes, and some star stencils.. and a cat. Just kidding about the cat part..the cat is not actually necessary, although a great helper at being in the way during cutting, taping, the stringing up of said craft, etc.
I am so glad my recycling hadn't gone out yet, so I had plenty of boxes on hand, YES!

Trace the star shapes on your cardboard. I guess you could do it straight onto the foil, but I thought using the cardboard would end up being more sturdy (hell-o, we still have another MONTH until Christmas, and who knows what these poor little stars will go through in that amount of time).

We used a glue stick to glue our stars to the foil. Here Jake is pretending to attack his star with the glue. School glue might work better, but I was afraid it would leave 'glue lines' showing through the foil on the other side..

We then cut out the stars, leaving a little foil around the edges to secure it, and taped some twine to the back and hung them up.

Ta Da! Easy peasy and kinda cute.. We had extras.. I think we will either hang them on the tree or use for gift tags.. :)

Heidi's Hummus

I have to begin by saying.. this hummus is delicious! I've never made hummus before and had never eaten any hummus I really liked, so when my friend Heidi threw a book party and served hummus, I grabbed only a minimal amount so I could try her variation. I had always heard how good hummus was for you and a lot of my friends ate it, so I really wanted to get in to it, but the store versions I thought were gross.

So, that being said, I must name this post 'Heidi's Hummus' after her fabulous recipe. Enjoy :)

For this recipe, you will need:
1 can chickpeas, drained (my can says garbanzo beans chick peas)
Juice of one lemon
2 cloves garlic
1 tsp cumin
1/4 cup tahini (if you don't know what this is, it's found in the middle eastern section of the supermarket)
1/4 cup olive oil
salt to taste

Okay, so just throw your ingredients in your blender and puree until smooth! Mine was really thick and my blender was having a tough time with this process..my friend Irene suggested a food processor.. we had to stop the blender a couple of times to mix by hand and then return to pureeing.

Doesn't it look delish? It is! And WAY too easy to make! Yummo snack!

Creating a Blog

Okay, so this is my attempt at creating a blog.. I chose the name one two three jump! because many things I aspire to do, I have never done, and have really little knowledge in. I find something I like, and jump in to do it. One great example is this blog ;)

I am really big on being crafty, hence the idea behind this blog. I am always wanting to create new works of art with the kids and try new ideas I find on the internet, and thought how wonderful it would be to post pictures and tutorials of these to share with others, as I have seen.

So I hope I do this right.. we will see!
Thank you for reading..