Free Make & Take and Product Samples!

Be sure to leave a bit of time in your schedule tomorrow - Saturday Sept. 1st - to join us for a FREE project Make & Take and samples of four flavors of our Wind & Willow cheeseballs from 1-3pm!!

The cheeseball samples will be available in our Kitchen/Wine display room at the front of the store - we will be sampling four different flavors including: Pumpkin Pie, Caramel Apple, Smokehouse Bacon and Chedder and Old Santa Fe - YUM!



You can join us for the project Make and Take at the Paper Crafts Demo Counter, where you can create this adorable decorated notebook!

We hope to see you there!

Canvas Samples.

Today I wanted to share a few project samples that Sarah created recently using our blank canvases.

This 'blessed canvas' was created by simply painting and distressing the canvas with paint and then embellishing with twine, letter stickers and a flower embellishment.

This next canvas does take a bit more work, but the end result is amazing! To help you complete this canvas we do have a step by step project sheet for you, which includes a template for cutting those flower petals. You can find the project sheet on our website HERE.

 

 

For this LOVE canvas Sarah created something a bit surprising by mixing a few things together unexpectedly. She actually covered a canvas with these wood plaques (which are sold individually) that she had painted. Then she spelled out the word love with lace ribbon and a flower embellishment. So cute!

 

 

Finally, she created this next canvas by reversing out letters. She did this by painting over letter stickers and then removing them so you see the paper that is under the paint on the rest of the canvas. For this project we also have a project sheet with more detailed instructions to help you create your own! You can find the project sheet HERE.

Back to School.

We are down to only one week before the start of school! Are you ready?

I have the school clothes pretty much taken care of and the supplies all set to bring to open house - but I still have a few more projects I need to get done this week. Specifically, I need to put together a bulletin or magnetic board to keep us all on track as we get back into the swing of a new schedule. And I also plan on making a little something for each of my kids teachers for them to bring on the first day. If you are looking for ideas for either of these types of projects, today I have some fun project ideas to share with you!

First up, a few organizer board ideas. We created this bulletin board by painting one of our 12x12 frames and swapping out the glass with a 12x12 piece of cork board. Then we embellished with pattern paper from the We R Memory Keepers Hall Pass line and even made our own pins by gluing thumb tacks to the back of metal tag embellishments that coordinated with the paper line.

If you would prefer a magnetic board, Kristine created this adorable magnet board by placing a 12x12 metal sheet into a frame. She covered the metal with pattern paper and then embellished using paper from the My Mind's Eye 6x6 School themed paper pad. She created matching magnets by using glossy accents to adhere pattern paper (from the same line) to the backside of glass tiles and then adhering magnets to the back of the paper.

Here is another take on an organizer board. This board was created on a canvas and was altered by using vinyl, chalkboard paint and pattern paper. I love the addition of the decorated clips at the bottom of the canvas!

As I mentioned it is really easy to create your own magnets by adhering pattern paper to the backside of a glass tile using glossy accents and then gluing a magnet to the back of the pattern paper. Here are a few more magnet ideas that you could use for your own magnet board, or could be given as a teacher gift as well.

For these apple magnets, we punched circles of red cardstock and glued them to the back of the glass tile. Then we hand cut the stems from brown cardstock and leaves from green pattern paper and glued them to the front.

For these magnets, it is even more simple - we just found images that fit the tiles on pattern paper and punched them out and glued them on. These would be great to use just on a refrigerator to hold school papers or special pieces that are brought home!

Next, I wanted to share a few project ideas that would be perfect to create for those special teachers on the first day of school!

We created this apple treat box, by painting one of our paper mache boxes red, and then simply gluing this wood apple onto the front (which is already cut and painted). To add a bit more decoration we cut this "Back to School" tag from a piece of pattern paper and then attached it with a piece of red and white bakers twine. This would be great to fill with some treats or a few small school supplies - or even with a batch of apple magnets I shared above!  

 

Another idea is to embellish and fill one of our clear tubes with something fun for the teacher. We created a few sample ideas below:

 Or you could always fill up a Mason Jar with something fun too:

And one final idea, a teacher supply box. For this project we painted this divided wood box that you can find in our Beads & Basics department and then embellished with pieces from the We R Memory Keepers Hall Pass line and some ruler ribbon. We filled it with some fun office/school supplies, but of course you could also fill it with some treats for the teacher too.

 *To see some of our school themed projects from the past and other fun ideas we found online be sure to check out our Back to School Board on Pinterest too!

Have you created any organizer boards or teacher gifts to get ready for school? I would love to share them if you have!

Fall Baking.

Even though the weather is far from feeling like fall today, this time of year always has me thinking of cool, crisp, fall days. And with those days always comes my desire to do some fall baking!

From cupcakes to pies and cookies to candy, our baking endcap at the back of aisle 2 has everything you need to prepare for any holiday baking/treat making you wish. Right now we primarily have Halloween decorating and baking items with some general Fall and Thanksgiving items as well.  (Although of course you can always find plenty of general baking items in aisle 2 all year round too!)

There are so many fun products and baking ideas for you to pick from! Here is a peek at what you can find:

22nd Anniversary Sale!!

Today is the start of one of our biggest sales of the year - Our Anniversary Sale!!

This year we are celebrating our 22nd Anniversary - and do we have some great sale items to share with you as we celebrate this milestone!

You can view the entire 20 page ad online HERE!

A few additional things to note:
-The ad includes a 40% off (the white tag price) coupon

-You can find products from every department featured in the ad

-There are many project ideas featured in the ad - you can find project instruction sheets for these  projects online and in-store.

-We are also giving away over $5,000 in Gift Cards (Each day there will be one $100 and ten $10 gift card winners!)

-If you are a passport member you can also earn double points through August 31st.

-Hurry In - the sale does run through September 28th, but the best selection is NOW.

Getting ready for Fall.

Our Seasonal Department has been busy getting for FALL!

If you haven't been in lately, you will definitely want to stop by and check out all the gorgeous products and project ideas that they now have out is aisles 5-8.

Love this idea on how to alter one of our "People Feeder's" with a vinyl for Thanksgiving! Wouldn't this be great to have out at your Thanksgiving dinner?!

In addition to the fall items we also have plenty of Halloween decor and project ideas on the floor now too!

Last week I shared some of our recent alcohol ink projects on the blog post here, check out these Halloween bottles samples we created following the same technique!

 

 

Bakers Twine.

If you love Bakers Twine as much as I do you will want to check out the changes we made to aisle 11 in our Paper Crafts Department!!

You can now find all of the styles, colors, brands, and lengths in one place! We have bakers twine available from Queen & Co., Doodlebug, We R Memory Keepers and Darice. I'm sure you can find bakers twine to match any project you have or you can always find the bakers twine you love and then figure out how to use it!

New in Home Decor.

Yesterday I snapped a few photos of some new products and display rooms in our Home Decor area and wanted to share them with you today.

First, we have a new line that includes frames and home decor items with a rustic, yet playful feel to them. I really love these pieces!

We also recently reset a few of our display spaces, including this room at the front of the store that has some movie/TV decor pieces as well as sports themed pieces:

This corner display has lots of different pieces that follow the owl theme (plenty of different styles and colors and a wide variety of types of pieces too!):

We also have new pieces in this corner display: a great selection of girly, trendy decor pieces to chose from here:

Although summer is winding down, we still have some time to enjoy heading to the cabin or the lake and we have some new pieces to decorate them as well:

These pieces are definitely one of my favorites!! The rustic feel, the quote on glass, and sayings themselves are perfect:

And finally I also wanted to share this wall at the front of the store that has some of the products that coordinate with the decorative rod pieces I had shared on this Hanging Frames post.

And of course there is always much more to see!! Come check out all that is new in our Home Decor Department soon.

Do you know we carry...Springfield Doll Clothes?

And better yet - that they fit American Girl and New Generation Dolls too?

We carry a variety of outfits, coats, shoes, and clothes sets for the dolls and do stock the individual Springfield Dolls as well.

You can find them all in aisle 19 of the store.

A Few More Letters....

Today, a few more project examples of how you could decorate/alter our large Paper Mache letters.

For this E, we painted the letter with black acrylic paint and then actually covered the outside edges of the letter with pattern paper (a fun twist instead of covering the front), and then added a large flower to the corner.

For the letter I, we painted the letter and then covered it using 6x6" rhinestone sheets, cut down to fit the letter.

The letter P was painted, covered in pattern paper, distressed and then embellished with the Princess title and tulle.

For the letter S, the letter was first covered in tissue paper (that had been crumbled to give it texture) and then painted with a metallic acrylic paint. A simple floral embellishment adds the perfect touch to the letter. 

 

The letter M was painted, wrapped in a brown yarn and then embellished with fall flowers. A perfect rustic, fall piece!

And finally, the burlap B - for this letter we painted the letter a cream color, and then hot glued a strip of burlap on the front of the letter. (The burlap was ruffled by finding a middle strand and pulling to create the ruffle.)

In addition to these larger letters, we also created a few new projects using our smaller 10" wood letters. These letters are great for smaller spaces, or shelves and mantels that aren't as deep. Another great thing about the size of these letters is that it is easy to find space for them to spell out an entire word (a family's last name, a child's first name, the name of a season or holiday, or even just a word that is inspiring to you - are a few examples that come to mind).

For this letter R, we simply covered the letter in burlap and then embellished it by using burlap flowers down the side.

The letter K was covered in pattern paper and then embellished with a yellow flower. I love that ribbon was also added to the back of this letter to allow for hanging - plus the extra pop of yellow is perfect.

The letter F was covered in fall themed pattern paper and then embellished with leave die-cuts and brown twine and ribbon. It would be fun to also cover an "A" and two "L's" with the same pattern paper and display during the Fall season.

The letter K was also covered in pattern paper and then embellished with on of our pre-painted wood footballs and a photo. (We have a wide variety of wood pieces like this football that you could use to match the theme you wish.)

And finally, this letter N was painted and then embellished with jewels from an assorted pack, which were adhered using Glossy Accents adhesive.