In the Nest, Ready to Learn Classroom Behavior Chart

Since school in getting ready to start for most of the world (we have already been back two weeks now!), I figured I should share our little behavior chart for our classroom so some of you all could take advantage!!  We are doing a little birdie theme, which I may get myself together enough to take pictures and show, but for now, here is the behavior chart!!  The students each have a clothes pin with their name and they all start out on green (woo hoo!) and can move up for good choices and down for poor choices!  Ours hangs on one of our cabinet doors and works wonderfully!

You can download the prints HERE.  I sent them to Costco and ordered 8X10 prints (there are four in all and costs about $6 to print).  You will have to cut the red from the purple.  I glued down the pieces on some butcher paper in the correct order and laminated to help make it more durable. 

Hope you enjoy!

Little Pumpkin Baby Shower Invites- Free and Customizable!

So my sister in law is pregnant with a beautiful little girl... which means I get to help throw the baby shower {fun, fun, and more fun!}.  Since the shower will be in October, we are going to have a 'Little Pumpkin' shower.  Since I am in charge of the invites, I kind of went crazy making all sorts of invitations and letting her choose a style that she liked best.  And since I have all these already made, why not share them??? 

To use these backgrounds, just download them HERE and open them in a picture editing software that allows you to add text.  My favorite and easy to use program is Google's free Picasa program.  Once you add your text and save as a jpeg file, you can send to your favorite print shop (mine is Costco, lustre finish).  I personally use a wholesale postcard printing service (like Overnight Prints) which not only gives you a nice sturdy card stock, but also allows you to add details for the invitation on the back and can usually be ordered with envelopes!  Oh- and is super cheap... but will take longer to get through the snail mail!

Let me know if you are able to use these for your baby shower- I would love to see!!  Also, any questions, just let me know!  Enjoy and happy showering :)

 PS: Many of these design elements and fonts are free to use for those of us amateurs who are not making things like these for money!!  I would like to thank just a few of these awesome places for having free goodies!!

Persnickety Prints
Kimberly Geswein Fonts
Pugly Pixel
The Coffee Shop Blog

A Shabby Chic First Birthday

Little sis turned one this month.  I had a blast throwing all the details of her party together... a shabby chic sorta affair with a little country garden feel to it.

The Invites
I design the invites myself using Photoshop Elements and use a business postcard printer online to print- for about $25 I can get 50 of these on heavy duty card-stock, rounded corners, and envelopes!  They also print the back- so all the details (and more adorable pictures) go on the reverse side!  Love this little trick to help save money!!

 Making the Banners
I went to our librarian at school to see if she had any discard books (older books usually missing pages) and I was in luck!  I used old book pages, packaging paper (which is kind of a paper bag feel and you can get at any hardware store), and I printed out the letters on 4X6 lustre finish paper at Costco.  To make things go quicker, I used a spray glue I had left over to throw them together- and I loved how they turned out!!

The Outfit
I made this shabby chic little outfit {the tutorial is HERE} for under twenty dollars and only about an hour of time.  It turned out super cute when paired with boots and some ruffly socks!

The Decor
I went with a country garden feel... think burlap, red checkers, and mason jars!!  I found favors in Target's dollar section: hand shovels and rakes, bubble wands, and pin wheels.

The Grub
The hubby got up early to smoke us a pork shoulder... YUM!  So the menu included chips and salsa to snack on, BBQ Pork sandwiches with a homemade Carolina style BBQ sauce, sweet baked beans, salad, watermelon, and a fresh strawberry-cucumber water, lemonade and sweet tea to drink.  The cake was a delicious dark chocolate with strawberry filling with a smoosh cake in white cake for the munchkin... so fun!  A perfect welcome to summer :)

I had a blast putting it all together and most importantly, little sis had a great time with family and friends!!

PS- I am all about sharing... you can download all of the following tags and birthday banner letters HERE (They are JPEG files designed to print on 4X6... I use Costco and choose lustre finish which is similar to matte)!  Just share the love by following my blog :)

A Tribute to Moms; Chalkboard Printable

A little tribute to all of us moms out there tirelessly working for our little munchkins!  Meant to be printed by your local printshop as an 8X10, simply add to your favorite frame for a sweet recognition of all the hard work our moms do!!  Happy early Mother's Day!

Click HERE to download your free print!

An April Chalkboard {FREE!} Printable

I have been playing each month to create a new chalkboard printable, the idea being that by the end of the year I will have one 8X10 picture frame that contains a new cute monthly chalkboard written phrase which can easily be switched out.  On to April... and what phrase suits April better than this one!?!

Either print from your home computer or send to your local print shop to have printed as an 8X10 (I prefer this choice since you can often choose a matte or lustre finish!)

To download, just follow this LINK and enjoy :)

Looking for previous month's printables???
January
February
March

A {Girl Kinda} Superhero Birthday Party

Big sis just turned four... and big sis just happens to be a tough little cookie!  SO it wasn't that much of a surprise when she requested a superhero party... an orange superhero party, lol!  But her wish was my command, of course :)  Here are some shots from the fun little fiesta!

The Invites!

I found these fun (and free!) Superhero-ish fonts that made creating all our Superhero prints a breeze:

Badaboom BB
Digital Script

and you can find many more at this very cool Superhero Font site called Blambot Comic Fonts!  Check them out- they are amazing!!!

The Grub!

We decided on a simple menu: Superdogs and Veggies with Ranch... 

because Superheros Eat their Veggies!!!  The superdogs were easy to prepare too- we had two crockpots- one with the dogs and one with chili (because the adults need to eat too!) and a topping tray that I prepared the night before: onions, pickles, sauerkraut, cheese, tomatoes, and jalapeno and yellow peppers.

You can find the printables above by clicking the links below!
Superheros Eat Their Veggies and Superdogs Are Served- 8 1/2 X 11 Printable
Sound Effect Bubbles- 4 X 6 Index Card Printable
The Banner was made from Scrapbooking paper of the colors above, then I glued on the following letters to create the: Happy Fantastic Four and simply hung on string- super easy banner!!
Fantastic Four Banner Pt. 1- 8 1/2 X 11 Printable
Fantastic Four Banner Pt. 2- 8 1/2 X 11 Printable

The Capes!

Of course superheros need capes, right?!  You can find the tutorial with free templates HERE!

The Activities!

We did a "Superhero Training Course" with a "Villain" pinata at the end.  We had tied up baby dolls (poor things!) that our little superheros had to rescue by completing the different obstacles... but it just so happened to be FREEZING that day (of course!) so we cut the training course short and skipped to beating up on the poor villain... which my husband picked out-on his own-and happened to really be a Mexican Wrestler- close enough I suppose?!

Fun stuff, right??  They seemed to all have a blast despite the frigid conditions :)  Anyone else out there have little girls requesting superhero parties??

DIY Superhero Capes {Printable Templates Included!!}

Well big sis wanted a superhero birthday party for her 4th... so what else was there to do but to make superhero capes!!! {You can see her party here}

I searched on-line and found a few tid-bits here and there, but nothing that really seemed to help all that much, soooo, we basically started from scratch!  Lucky for you, if you ever need to make a superhero cape for your little angel, I saved everything I did right here!

The first main decision came down to time and money (doesn't it always!?).  I decided to go with a felt cape versus a shinny material because 1. it is super cheap and 2. it won't fray so you don't have to break out the sewing machine!  Once I decided that, I gathered the following materials...

Materials:
Felt by the yard (2ft. cut length per every two capes needed)
A pack of assorted color felt sheets for the emblems
Spray Adhesive
Velcro squares or 1" Velcro to cut
Christy's Customs Superhero Cape Template
Christy's Customs Superhero Cape Shapes and Letters Templates

{The template above is designed to print out on normal 8 1/2 X 11 printer paper.  Download the template by clicking on the above link and saving each of the seven pieces.  When printing, treat the JPEG file as a picture.  Choose 8 1/2 X 11 paper size and choose BORDERLESS printing.  The borderless printing will preserve the correct proportions of the template and is usually only an option when printing pictures.  I personally would choose to print in draft to save ink.  Once the template is printed, you simply lay the pieces out and use tape to hold them together.  Cut along the dark line to get your cape template.  This cape size works well for 3-6 year old children}

Lay out your felt (most is sold doubled over- I left mine so each template cut out resulted in two capes) placing the template on top.  Use a washable marker to lightly trace the template.  Cut out.

Using the Shapes and Letters template above, print out the shape for a background and letter for the child's first name.  Cut out and use for templates on the assorted color felt choices.  Using spray adhesive, coat the back of the felt shape, place on cape, and felt letter, also placing on cape.

Now the Velcro to hold the cape on... oh how I wish I could tell you to spray the back of the Velcro and stick it on too... but you will need something a bit stronger than spay adhesive to hold on the Velcro... ours pulled off after the first hour or so.  A few stitches would be best to add on your little cape neck closers!

And wha-la!  Happy little superheros!

For age reference... big sis had just turned 4 in this picture, while cousin is 6 1/2.  The capes seemed to work well for both sizes!

And- KAPOW!  There you have it!  Super simple.  I did 8 of them in just a couple hours one evening and gave them as party favors.  I wish I had taken a picture of all of them, but in the rush of the party, I forgot- oh well! 

I'd love to hear if you use the templates... I'd love to know that someone else got use out of them too :-)  So please share if you do!

A March Chalkboard Printable

In my quest to do a printable for each month of the year that can easily be switched out, here is March!  I found this super cute Irish blessing and thought it would be perfect for a March printable!

This is meant to be printed as an 8X10- just send it to your local print shop.  I keep mine all in the frame together so they can just be switched out as the year goes by.  Click HERE or on the picture itself to get the downloadable file!

{Pssss- Looking for Subway or Chevron St. Patty's Day Printables- we've got em!!}

Looking for January or February??  Just click on these little guys :)

Enjoy, and as always, thanks for stopping in!

A Valentine's Chalkboard Printable

I have a little chalkboard printable side project going... the goal being to have one printable for each month so you can just quickly switch them out, leaving the frame there year round.  Well I just so happened to be working on February's today and since February is just around the corner, I just had to share!  You can print it out yourself on regular or cardstock paper or send it to your favorite photo printing shop and have it printed as an 8X10, preferably matte paper!  I hope you enjoy my little creation!

Just click for your free downloadable February Chalkboard Printable!

Thanks for stopping in!

Chalkboard Christmas Tree Printable

I just love all of these chalkboard printables that are floating around Pinterest... and to confess, I am a bit addicted to making them!  Here is my latest creation... cropped as an 8X10 to place in any frame that is just lying around the house to add a little extra Christmas charm to that mantle!?

Just click on the picture to download for free.  When printing it may warn you that the quality is poor, but because it is not a photograph, it will print fine!

Looking for some other Christmas printables... visit my Custom Printables page.

Thanks for stopping in!

Santa Gift Tags... for those Special Gifts from the North Pole

I am just having too much fun creating Christmas printables... the latest???  Special tags from Santa himself!  Just take a look... they come directly from the North Pole!  And of course, they are only for good boys and girls!

These are 4X6 prints designed to be printed directly onto 4X6 postcards.  Click on the "boy" or "girl" tag above to download for free!  Enjoy :)