Boxwood Clippings

We had so much fun last week making these star and stripe napkins. A patriotic summer is about to begin next week with Memorial Day and we thought this would be a perfect craft to embrace the months ahead. It’s so easy it could be a perfect activity to do once the kiddos are out of school.

You Will Need:

A Potato

Fabric Paint

Foam Craft Brush

Plain Napkins

Painter’s Tape

Scrap Paper

Directions:

We used this clip art and printed it to use as a template for our potato stamp.

We then cut the potato in half and cut around the template to create a potato stamp.

Next, we painted the stamp with our fabric paint using a foam brush.

After applying paint to the potato we tested it onto a piece of paper. We found we liked to do an initial stamp on paper and then stamp the remaining ink onto the fabric napkin until we needed to apply more paint for an overall uneven look.

(By the time we were done stamping our star napkins we had lots of stamped scrap paper. Stay tuned for another project using this scrap!)

Next up was the striped napkins. We applied painters tape to make our stripes and then painted in between the tape. Again, we didn’t want a totally uniformed look so we roughly painted our stripes.

We felt like little girls again stamping with our potato stamps and now we’re ready for summer barbecues with these summery napkins. Fun and easy are always our favorite crafts!

Good morning everyone, we hope you all had a wonderful weekend.

Today we’re sharing this project over at Lil Luna, diy wooden flags…

See you over there!

We’ve had some major gifting around here lately, so we got together to make some basic craft bags a little more interesting…

First, we used a pencil to draw our message and then used India Ink and a flat paint brush to paint over our pencil guide. The India ink makes the writing extra shiny and smooth, but you could just use regular craft paint for a similar look.

We’re all about really simple ways to make gift-giving a little more personal. What are your favorite tips?

Good morning friends!

Today we’ll be over at 6th Street Design School, sharing this little project with you from Em’s new living room.

Come join us HERE!

A few weeks ago, I had a baby shower for my good friend Brea. I wanted a quick and different way to decorate the party cupcakes, so went through my ‘scrap box’ and ended up using remnant ribbon and washi tape:

I simply tied knots of ribbon and folded washi tape in half around toothpicks, the result being easy and festive.

The cupcakes looked so great grouped together, and the toppers worked out to be considerably less expensive than store-bought versions! Do you have any thrifty tips for party planning? We’d love to hear!

Watercolor is all the range around the bloggy world these days, and why not? It’s flippin’ amazing!

This watercolor card is a so simple and can be used for any occasion, and the best part is you can make it while you’re having art time with the kids. Just pull out those Crayola paints and save yourself a pretty penny on your upcoming  events.

 What You’ll Need:

Water color paper (I use this one)

Watercolors

Cup of Water

Paintbrush

Thin Black Pen (in love with this!)

Stack of Magazines or a heavy item.

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Instructions:

1. Fold your paper in half

2. Lightly wet your paintbrush and get a good amount of paint on it

 3. Glide your paint in a line across the top of the card

 4. Next, lightly dip the brush in water and make another line touching your first.

5. Repeat again!

 6. Do the same but starting at the bottom of card. I like to use another color too.

7. Wait a few moments until it’s dried off then set it under a heavy stack of books or magazines. Place some white paper on top of it to protect it.

8. I like to leave mine a couple of hours or overnight, then when it is completely dried and pressed write a saying in your own penmanship.

I hope you find this little tutorial helpful, and your inspired to create your won little works of art. :)

Although it’s not April Fools day until next week, these paper and fabric flowers have me second guessing their true identities.

This time of year in Utah seems to be a constant battle between Winter and Summer, and although it won’t be long till real blossoms are in bloom, I’m dying to try my had at these beautiful creations.

This up cycled beauty is by Alternative Blooms and can be found HERE.

This giant wall flower is perfection, found on You Are My Fave (instructions HERE). 

And finally, these beauties by Craftberry Bush are to die for (instructions HERE).

My mother had a mini freak out when I mentioned I wanted to make flowers for my wedding centerpieces 8 years ago. I don’t think this is what she had in mind! I’m sold, are you?

Good morning everyone!

Today we’re excited to announce we’ll also be contributing to one of our favorite blogs 6th Street Design School. Be sure to go and check out our post today where we’ll be sharing this fun DIY!

 See you over there!

Here at Boxwood we are always trying to explore new ways to wrap gifts. Today I am happy to share one of our new favorites: Disposable tablecloths! You can find them at any grocery or party supply store costing about $3 per large tablecloth.

Believe me when I say this stuff is amazing to wrap with! Here are three different ways I used an aqua tablecloth:

As a Filler: I cut squares of tablecloth and put into the gift bag, just like I would tissue paper. Sometimes by the time I get a gift to a party my tissue paper is all smushed and wrinkled…but the plastic holds its shape beautifully. Love!

As Gift Wrap: I used the plastic exactly as I would wrapping paper. The only difference is the plastic is quite translucent, so you have to use a few layers. It is actually easier to wrap up the ends of your present as it doesn’t hold its creases like paper does if you need a re-do. Also, tape sticks to the plastic better than paper.

As Trimming: When cut into strips, the plastic was a cross between rafia/ribbon. it is so fun to work with.

The presents look very polished with their shiny plastic finish, and I can’t wait to give them to their recipients!

With the great price (I only used a fraction of the tablecloth), ease of  wrapping and pretty finish I will be buying many more plastic tablecloths in the future. What do you think?

This week my friend Brooke’s twin girls turned one. Naturally she wanted a girly celebration, so one afternoon we threw together this garland (with lots of help from Katie).

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HOW TO:

First, we printed off the letters we needed and cut them in circles. Next we glued the edges and dipped them in glitter. While they were drying we cut out bigger circles out of card stock and folded them in half, again and again until we had this accordion look. Then we simply hot glued the letters onto the folded card stock, and then them onto ribbon.

Pretty darn cute, don’t you think!

My organization project was really just for the house, but I’ve really caught the bug and nowhere is off limits. :)

Being part of a big family, we have LOTS of birthdays and they are so hard to keep track of. I use THIS system Em blogged about a few years back. But also found having a list somewhere I see daily helps me pop them in the post on time.

Over at The Project Girl, she has a great free printable (see HERE).

I also emailed my family a copy…now there’s no excuse!

Last weekend we escaped the inversion and headed up to the mountain village of Midway, Utah to attend Winnie’s Workshop Valentine’s class and boy, did we have fun…

Winnie’s Workshop is a picturesque country barn owned by mother and daughter duo, Nancy and Meredith who’ve put their heart and soul into making this space a crafter’s heaven.

Nancy, a life-long seamstress, has a larger than life personality and is currently teaching classes on quilting and felting what she calls “wacky woollies”.

Meredith has a bachelors in print-making, a masters in visual art, and is currently teaching classes on letter-pressing and bookbinding.

We were warmly greeted into a Valentine retreat with Nancy at the sewing machine, stitching bright wool hearts to pillow covers, Meredith warming up the vintage letterpress with red ink, and the workshop adorned in heart garlands and fabric, cards, and ribbons galore all ready for us to start crafting!

For the next three hours we made our own letter-pressed Valentine’s cards and crafts, munched on delicious snacks, chatted and laughed, and enjoyed the beautiful and quaint surroundings of the Midway valley and mountains. It was a day to remember, that’s for sure!

Thank you Nancy and Meredith! We had a such a great time!

Click HERE for upcoming classes, make sure to look at the kid classes too.

Please inquire about any special requests, private parties and group discounts. Nancy and Meredith are so great to work with and will work with almost any budget. We are already thinking of future birthday parties and girlie retreats!

We had a crazy good time and know you will too!

Nancy and Meredith will be at the Utah Art Market this weekend (Fri Feb 1st+ Sat Feb 2nd) selling their gorgeous letter-pressed stationary and ‘wacky woollies’…we can’t wait to see what these two talented ladies bring!

Last year I loved my Valentines decorations in my downstairs bath. In fact they ended up being in there wayyy longer than valentines. So this year I decided to stick with the soft pink and just add some white a silver to cool things up a bit.

A couple of easy DIY’s were involved in this:

First the spray painted cinnamon sticks in arranged around the candle.

Second the pink artwork, I simply splashed some craft paint on canvas and played around a bit.

Finally the feathered wreath on mirror, I just hot glued a bunch of feathers on a styrofoam wreath layering as I went.

Other than that, all the decorations are 100% Christmas clearance items. Boy do I love making deals look pretty! What are you’re decorations looking like? Email us a pic we’d love to see!

In my last catalog from Crate & Barrel I noticed a little ad mentioning Paperless Post. So I went to check out the link HERE, and found out the two companies have joined together to offer a FREE collection to their readers.

Aren’t their invites so cute and stylish? Perfect for that last minute get-together. This design is tempting me to host an Oscar party…

Go see if there’s a free invite for your next event or announcement, and don’t forget to invite us!

PS. Over Christmas we were playing a game when the word “catalog” came up, my 9 year old nephew asked what it was….scary how things are changing!

While looking for ideas for ideas for Valentine’s presents this year I stumbled upon this idea from Nicole at Visual Heart. I love the idea of a Valentine being a thoughtful token of love rather than huge, commercial presents, so thought this idea was perfect.

I picked up a deck of cards from the dollar store, a few binder rings at Target, and got to work.

I love this idea, not just for a significant other but for anyone you love. Can’t wait to celebrate the month of love :)

I always get so sad taking down my Christmas decorations, so this year I went straight to decorating for Valentines.

The fairy lights in our dinning area really cozy up the place, so they’re officially staying till spring. I made these little hearts to dress them up for the season. They’re not only cute, but free to make and very easy!

If you’d like to make your own, all you’ll need is: 

Fairy lights (I use icicle, currently on mega sale everywhere!)

A pair of scissors

An old newspaper or magazine

Marker or pencil

Simply draw your heart shape on newspaper, and cut. I like to do a few pages at a time to make it super fast. Then punch over lights, the paper rips easily since it’s so thin.

This is all I had the energy for on my sick day, hope you guys aren’t feeling yucks! Look after yourselves x.

Good morning Everyone! I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and a very happy New Year!

Yesterday I shared this project over at Lil Luna, but thought I’d post it here too, in case you missed it!

It’s a cute little project to share to kick-start the new year: this free printable New Year’s stationery:

Simply download the design HERE, and print on regular cardstock.

I always love a fresh start, and New Year’s is a perfect time to set goals and visualize my future. By having my goals written down in a place I can see them, it’s easier to keep them fresh on my mind, and therefore easier to complete. Personally, I like to set only three or four goals, so completing them is actually doable!

What are your tips on goal making? We’d love to hear!

We can’t tell you how thrilled we were when our friends over at Lonny called and asked us to share some gift wrap ideas with them.

Our brains instantly exploded with ideas that we can’t wait to share with you. But first up, we knew another ‘cozy look’ was in order since we had such a great response from last year’s version. Tell me, have you ever seen an old sweater look so cute?!

For a how-to on this gift, and a peek at our other faves, be sure to check us out HERE.

Thanks again Lonny, we sure had fun :)

Paper bows are always one of those things we can’t resist once they go on clearance, but we rarely end up using them on gifts.

Since most things look better grouped together we thought we’d try adding a whole cluster of bows to a foam wreath. We were surprised how lovely, modern and clean it looked.

To make the wreath you’ll need:

A foam wreath.

Some pins.

A thimble.

About 70-100 bows (depending on size of wreath and bows).

This really is the easiest project, because all you do is pin the bows into place. The hardest part is punching the pin through the paper on the bow, that’s why the thimble comes in handy. :)

What do you guys think? Will you be making one?

Good morning everyone. We hope you had a lovely weekend. Today we are excited to share a fun way to decorate for Christmas.

When Sarah created her glam centerpiece it reminded us of childhood Christmasses, when our Mum used to decorate our mantles with sprayed fruit and nuts. The living room mantle was gold, and the dining room mantle silver, and once these decorations were up the mood was set for the Christmas festivities to begin.

We thought it was due time to bring it back. So this year we asked Mum if we could decorate her American mantle and take it back old school with spray paint and adding a slightly modern twist:

We think it did the trick of setting the Christmas mood in the house, as our Dad immediately went into the back yard to clip ivy to spray. It is quite possible that next time we go home, wall hangings and end tables will all be adorned with spray-painted sprigs and garland.

By gathering items around the house and spraying them to match, you can create your own masterpiece in very little time.

We are also available if you would like help decorating for Christmas. Please leave a comment if you would like to learn about our holiday decorating rates.