Mushrooms, turtles, and snails combine with leaves, berries and flowers to highlight some of the flora and fauna of the forest floor. This weeks Spoonflower Design Challenge is “Forest Biome” and I had fun bringing a touch of whimsy to my design.
It all started with the mushrooms. Once I had 4-5 drawn out and colored, I decided that a couple of them needed faces. I’m pleased to introduce you to Lady Mushroom (see my first animation of her over on Instagram).
The leaves were next. I wanted a variety. Those little heart branches were last and they are my favorite!
Then I needed berries… but I wanted a variety of berries for interest.
I added the turtles in honor of my 8 year old son. He loves turtles. I’m not big on realistic turtle drawing, though. My turtles often have those super unrealistically high shells. He has vaulted ceilings. 🙂
I thought I was done, and I was really happy with the design, when my husband decided I needed to add snails. He does that sort of thing all the time.
“But I don’t want to add snails! Snails sound hard!”
Nonetheless, I added snails. And I love them. He was right. It definitely needed snails. And one of them definitely needed a face, however unscientific it may be. 🙂
Spoonflower is showcasing these in their contest as wallpaper, but how would you use it? Fabric? Wallpaper? Would you turn it into a little girls dress? Or dress the walls of the kids playroom? Let me know in the comments!
I’m super excited about my latest addition to my Etsy shop. I’ve been toying with the idea of designing some clipart for a while now, but something else keeps taking it’s place in line. Finally, I pulled together some of my favorite designs from the chicken egg counting sheets and other designs I had on hand. To those I added this brand new chicken coop design and wala! Chicken clipart for you to use in your diy projects.
Do you want to create a sign? Perfect!
Do you want to make your own forms or recording sheets? These are for you!
School worksheets or your class or homeschool? Yes!
Bullet Journals, coloring books and more? Of course! Available in color and black and white!
These have a personal license, but you can use them for anything you want (distribution of papers created for your classroom or church is fine, but please don’t take credit for yourself and don’t share files with others.)
Best of all, if you already have my Egg Counting Sheets and you want to add other forms to use in your homestead binder, this clipart pack matches!
Discount alert! I’m giving you all a coupon code to use for the next week (just for my readers!) For 30% off through February 9th (2023), click here or go to my shop and enter coupon code CLUCK at checkout.
I know I have a wide range of people who are readers here. Raise your hand if you are a chicken person (okay… leave a comment?). If you aren’t sure, you probably aren’t. A chicken person doesn’t necessarily have chickens themselves, but they want to. And not all people who have chickens are chicken people. (Am I right?)
And of course, among chicken people there is a wide variety as well. Some just love the birds and others make fancy coops and decorate them seasonally. (Someday I want that to be me.)
We have chickens in a quarter of our garden with a somewhat ugly but functional coop. I made it myself with the help of 3-12 year olds (6 of them). I guess you could say that I’m a kid person at this phase of my life. 🙂 Anyway, I digress.
While I dream of what I would do if homeschooling and gardening, laundry and occasional house cleaning didn’t take up all my time, I made some really cute (sorry, I’m biased) chicken coop signs for you to decorate your chicken spaces with!
They are in my Etsy shop now. Head over to grab the bundle for yourself for 30% off this week. Coupon code COOPSIGNS30 or click here.
Frame them and and hang them under shelter if you have it. I think they would be cute mounted to wood and sealed from the elements and hung on the outside. Your call. What would you do with them? Let me know in the comments! 🙂
This is late being posted. I was sick for most of August, so now, with just over a day left in the month, I wanted to share what my kitchen shelves have looked like all month.
Thankfully, for most of this sickness, I was not down completely. On my good days I had time and energy for a few extras like changing the decor from patriotic to sunflowers. I don’t have many spaces in the house I can decorate (long term renovation and many unfinished spaces all over the house), so it doesn’t take long.
Unfortunately, blogging was the last thing on my mind. I haven’t done much on Pinterest or Etsy either. How thankful I am that these sorts of things wait in the wings when real life gets hard to do.
Bottom Shelf: Greens from Hobby Lobby, purchased a couple years ago. Love it and use it all the time all over the house. I’m thinking about getting another. It’s very versatile. The house is a 2×6 cut into shape, painted black and modge podge buffalo check scrapbook paper on it. The kids and I made them last year (also in my winter shelf post). The bird and pedestal are from Hobby Lobby (noticing a trend?). The truck wasn’t originally on the shelf, but a couple weeks ago my mom picked it up at the Dollar Tree for me and my 12 year old son put it up there. The negative space that was there before was nice, but I like the truck too, and he was just too delighted with his decorating for me to take it down.
On the counter: The sunflower bowl was a gift for my birthday last year. I love it! We painted the jar with grey chalk paint for a bridal shower a a year or so ago. We made several for the tables and gifted one of them to the bride (it was just like one on her registry). I got the other two! 🙂 The flowers in it were also from Hobby Lobby. The plates are too cute to put in the cabinet. They were part of a gift basket from my husband’s boss last Christmas (more for me than for him I’m sure!) and are from, you guessed it… Hobby Lobby. I took all the junk that usually sits here off the counter so that it could be cute for a change and am guarding the space for the most part. It makes me smile!
What space is making you smile these days? Leave a comment and let me know! Leave a link so we can see if you have a pic online somewhere! 🙂
This is one of three bridal showers I did last spring for ladies in our church. This bride is the one I designed wedding invitations for (I shared those here.)
The bride is one of the adopted daughters of our pastor and his wife and I was delighted to have the opportunity to do something special for her. She loves farmhouse decor (as do I, so it was perfect!), so it just seemed natural to use that as her theme.
The invitation was designed to be emailed to the church. (I’ve changed all names and numbers to protect privacy.)
Would anyone be interested if I were to list invitations in my Etsy store? Let me know and I’ll see what I can do!
I used my trusty chalkboard (love this thing!) and a pennant banner my oldest daughter and I made for her 11th birthday (several years ago now). I just love using it when I get the chance!
The center pieces were fun. I ordered a bunch of mini rolling pins (I’d wanted them forever and found a great place to buy them on Etsy!) for this event and my own use. For the party, I used fabric to cover them and taped it on. This was a great way to temporarily dress them up, but leave them for me to do something else with later. I also decoupaged and added vinyl we cut on my cricut to the wood wood pieces for fast and easy signs.
The jars were painted with chalk paint. We made three of them and I gifted one to the bride. I took the idea right off her registry. She had registered for one exactly like it, so I just DIY’d it for her. (Thanks mom for your help in that project! We all know you did all the work!)
No two tables were exactly the same. Many other elements used for the center pieces were taken directly from my house. That’s my cake plate, my cute blue truck from Hobby Lobby, my “abide” wood block (part of my home spring decor), and those beads were something I wanted to make for myself anyway… just used the party to get it done. 🙂
Oh, and that’s my cute little tiered plate piece. (More beads I made for myself… these were part of my Valentine’s decor.) I keep the church party budget down by using decor and making decor that I want for myself anyway. 🙂
These pallets really make this dessert table, if you ask me. They are painted grey and fit perfectly with the pink. Of course more of our pennant garland to finish it off.
The tiered tray is from home also, as well as all the decor on it. My son made the “LOVE” blocks for me years ago (it actually spells “SNOW” on the other side. The little houses, the cupcake stand, the Rae Dunn mug I styled re-styled myself in this fashion, the mason jar plate and all the hydrangeas were right out of my kitchen.
All the little details were so fun to pull together, right down to the gingham ribbon on the rice krispie treats and the “R” I placed on the drink table as a nod to her new last name.
Was the event perfect? No. No event ever comes together just as it is in my head, but we enjoyed a time of fellowship, ate some goodies, watched the bride and her fiance open gifts, and bowed in a time of prayer for the couple and their coming marriage. The couple and their families felt the love of God poured through the church family… that makes the event a success.
These dandelion prints make me smile. You’ve seen the artwork before here, but I wasn’t done. Before long I began working on these prints that would be fitting in any child’s space.
I love whimsy in my home decor, but especially in my children’s rooms. I don’t know how much of my home decor taste is because I have so many children in my home (six kids age 15 and under) and have for so many years, but I can’t help myself. I love making spaces that my family can enjoy. And they make me smile too.
And I love white space. This is something my husband and I don’t always agree on. I show him something I’ve created and he wants me to make a background. “NO!” I reply, calmly. (ahem) I just love how the focus is brought to all the right places with plenty of “negative” (that’s the fancy way to say white) space.
I included all the phrases, the dandelion fuzz blowing in the breeze, the little boy gifting a dandelion to his sister or friend because I think they carry the whimsy of the whole set. I really love the “D is for Dandelion” print. I was aiming for the simplicity of the outlined flower and the yellow “D” just sitting in the corner. I picture this set in a homeschool room, or even a preschool. On the bathroom walls or one or two of them sitting on the dresser in a nursery.
I finally got them added to my shop today. Your coupon code for 33% off is DANDELION33. Or you can click this link to have it taken automatically. Discount is only for a week, so head over quick! (I usually offer a discount for new products in the shop to my readers, so if you don’t want to miss a discount, sign up to follow and receive notifications in the sidebar!)
As Christians, most of us would agree that Bible reading is important…even if we don’t do it as often as we know we should. But for years, I didn’t understand the importance of Bible journaling.
This whole idea of Bible journaling has become popular in recent years and has come to mean different things. For some it’s art added to the margins of your Bibles, for others it’s a full page written about what you read each day. To be honest, I don’t have time for either of those and the weight of either leaves me doing nothing.
Years ago, my husband and I learned how to use “Reading Highlights” from Navigator’s 2:7 Bible discipleship course. With this system, we are encouraged to underline any verses in our daily reading (even just a chapter a day). Once the reading is done, we go back and look over anything we have marked, respond to them prayerfully, and pick one to write down.
But this post is supposed to be about the importance of Bible journaling, right? So why is it important?
I read a chapter in my Bible and talk to the Lord. I learn and I’m encouraged, but nothing sticks. It’s done until tomorrow when I do it all again. But when I take the time to choose a verse or two from my reading and to formulate my thoughts, even into a couple sentences, and put them on paper, I carry the lesson or encouragement further into my day. And when I want to remember during dinner to share with my family, it is easy to refer to my notes and pass that encouragement to others. Sometimes I end up choosing to memorize a verse or passage because of the time spent journaling, truly letting the “…Word of Christ dwell in [me] richly,” as Colossians 3:16 says!
Bible journaling is important because it is a tool to take the Word of God deeper into your heart and life. I had fallen out of this practice, but wanted to get back into it again. In doing so, I decided to make pretty journal pages for myself.
I’ve also listed them in my Etsy shop for any of you that are interested. Use them individually or print them front to back and bind them to make your own journal. I think I’ll put mine into a 3 ring binder, but you could take yours to a printer like Staples and have them bound. Perhaps I’ll do that someday, but I don’t get out much. 🙂
As always, I want you to have an opportunity to have them at a discount during their first week in my shop. Enter BIBLEJOURNAL33 as the coupon code for 33% off through the 22nd or use this link to have it taken automatically.
Pin the image below to save for later or share with your own followers! Thanks for your support!
Last year I had the joy and privilege to design the wedding invitation for a sweet couple in our church. I brought out my paints and paper and went to work. It was so fun! With some back and forth between us, I think the end result was beautiful! Shown here are the two options for the RSVP/Registry card. She picked the back one, but I wanted to share both with you.
In the last 5-6 months I’ve been working on a big project. One of my biggest so far, in fact. I’ve turned Anna’s wedding invitation into an entire design collection, complete with a second colorway. I’m working on the finishing touches to the collection for fabric, but while I’m waiting for that, I’ve followed this line of inspiration to some new places.
These stickers are designed for use on your tablet’s digital planner/calendar/bullet journal in your note taking app, but they can also be used on any computer where PNG files can be used (not suitable for printing). They aren’t just for weddings, but add a romantic and beautiful feel to your everyday digital world.
As always, I want to offer my readers an opportunity to get these stickers at 33% off for the first week I have them in my Etsy shop. Enter coupon code ANNASTICKERS33 or click this link to have the discount taken automatically through April 15, 2022.
Like it? Please pin the image below! Thanks for your support!
This week’s theme at Spoonflower was Weeds. I thought and thought about how I could uniquely represent that theme, but I kept coming back to dandelions. Well, I thought, maybe I can at least use a different angle on them.
Different or not, I ended up creating this sweet print of children with dandelions. She is blowing the fuzz off a spent bloom and he is offering her a fresh one.
I don’t usually dabble in people, so this was a challenge for me. I changed my design half a dozen times over a weeks time. Then, the night before, my husband made some suggestions that turned my design on its head once more. (My designs are always better for his input!)
Tuesday morning found me working on it still. I finished it with only a couple hours to spare. As it turns out, there was a flaw in the copy I submitted. The flower he is holding in this pic was on the wrong side of his hand (Stem showing). Oops! I guess I’ll never know whether it would have been more popular without that mistake. Oh well. I’ve fixed it up in time to share it with you. Dandelions at play! What do you think?
If you like my Dandelions at Play design, would you please pin the image below or share it on other social media!
The verse is decorated with grasses, flowers and ladybugs. She loves ladybugs and adored this piece. Sometime in the last couple years the painting went missing and she was so upset. Her face just lit up tonight when I printed out this new version for her to hang next to her bed. The artwork has been reworked digitally for distribution and is ready to be downloaded and printed by your favorite printer or at home for immediate display or gifting!
