Trunk or Treat: Pandemic-Style

I think we all agree that 2020 came with challenges.  Most activities for the year were cancelled due to the pandemic.  By the time October came, our church decided it was important to have an activity for the children so we decided to proceed with our annual Trunk or Treat.  We looked for creative ways to be safe and socially distance.  I think most actually enjoyed the challenge.  There were a lot of fun ideas.  I'm not sure what made me think of this, but I decided to hand out the candy using a "vending machine".  

When the children approached the vending machine, my husband instructed them to put their bag at the end of the chute and speak into the machine their choice of candy.  

This is a close-up I took after the event was over and it was partially disassembled.  You can see here that as we ran out of a particular candy I would put an out of stock sticker over that selection.  It wasn't easy to access the candy that was actually inside the "machine", so this was the best I could do.  

This photo is bad, but I wanted to show the set up behind the scenes.  We arranged the candy on a shelf behind the vending machine with each candy labeled with its corresponding vending number.  I was standing behind the machine listening to the selection each child chose, and I would quickly drop it down the chute (seen to the right of this picture).  Occasionally the machine would "malfunction" and send extra candy, especially toward the end when I still had a lot of candy left.  It was fun, and the children (and adults) really got a kick out of it!

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I had nothing to do with this one (other than letting them borrow a few items), but I wanted to post it because I loved it.  My niece and nephew set up this lumberjack theme and handed out the candy using a remote control Jeep (that matched their own Jeep).  I thought it was so clever and cute!

 

He Is Risen!

I was asked to do a bulletin board for Easter.  I knew it would only be up for a few weeks and I needed to hurry, so I did this one in record time.  I did some creative recycling (starting to get the hang of that) by using the mountain from the bulletin board I was replacing (posted HERE).  I'm sure it is not geographically correct, but it gets the main point across.

Thanksgiving Teepees

I host Thanksgiving each year and I like to have a fun activity available to anyone who would like to participate.  Last year I found a teepee printable on the Made With Happy blog.  I thought the kids and some of the adults would enjoy it.  I was pleasantly surprised at the participation, especially from one of the newest members of the family, my youngest sister's husband.  He is very creative and seems to be good at everything!  He took the teepee to new levels (literally).  Here are some of the creations:

 

My creative granddaughter's teepee

 

 

This one was done by one of my crazy nephews.

 

 

Not sure who did this one, but I like it.

 

 

My sister's family compound/reservation, including the royal palace complete with a hot tub and an outhouse.

 

 

Here's a close up.

 

 

Somebody burned the turkey!

 

 

My patriotic nephew's version

 

Not sure what we'll do this year.  I'm still trying to decide.  Hope we have as much fun as last year!

Falling Leaves

Just a quick post.  I ran across these pictures from several years ago.  I cut a bunch of leaves (and a few pumpkins) from black contact paper and applied them to my bathroom wall for a fun little addition to my skeleton shower curtain. 

Pumpkin Carriage

This pumpkin carriage was originally supposed to be a decoration for my daughter's fall wedding, but it didn't get finished in time so it just became a decoration for my home.  (It turns out there is a lot of stuff to do to prepare for a wedding -- who knew?? 😉)  I had planned to add a silhouette of a couple inside and also an appropriate license plate (I forgot what that was going to be), but I didn't see any reason to add those details after missing the deadline.

The file is from the Enchanted Autumn kit from SVG Cuts.  I really enjoyed making it.  I just wish I had completed it in time for the wedding.

 

I added a strand of tiny lights (from the Dollar Tree) to the inside and put one of the lights through a hole into each of the tiny lanterns.  I really loved how it turned out!

 

Here is another view of it lit.  If you look closely you will see in the background the fall tree I made featured in an earlier post HERE.

90th Birthday Party

My mother-in-law just celebrated her 90th year here on Earth.  We were thrilled to celebrate with her and throw her a party.  As usual, things didn't go exactly as planned and I didn't make half the decorations I had hoped to, but nobody knew that except me (and maybe anybody who saw my Pinterest board).  I made her a photo book with pictures from all throughout her lifetime.  I had it printed at Costco and used it as a guest book.  Compiling and organizing all the photos took many more hours than I care to count, so that set me way behind for the party decorations.  I've learned to just let it go and it will be fine.  The important thing is that we all had a wonderful time and she can't stop talking about it.

 

 

 This was the bulletin board I did with lots of pictures of her and her family and friends.  I'm (unofficially) in charge of bulletin boards at my church (where we had the party) and this one was due for a change, which worked out great for me.  I did this for the party and then changed it out for our Homecoming celebration the next day.  I cut out the Happy Birthday balloons and the big 90 on my Silhouette machine.  You can't tell from the picture, but the letters and numbers were cut from white glitter cardstock and the balloons were cut from three different teal cardstocks (one was embossed).  I really like how they turned out.  I wish I had gotten better photos, but we were really pushed for time just to get things set up before the guest of honor arrived.

 

 

 

Here is a close up of the Happy Birthday balloon banner.

 

 

 

It took me forever to decide on what I wanted to use for centerpieces.  (I needed ten.)  I knew I wanted to use something with photos, but I had trouble choosing exactly what.  Lack of time finally made the decision for me so I made these lanterns since I thought they would be quick.  They would have been but I had to battle with both my printer and my Silhouette machine.  Also, I wanted to be able to possibly use these again in the future, so I assembled them using repositionable glue so I could store them flat.  It worked pretty well, but it slowed things down some.  The cut file was from SVG Cuts Tiki Party set (found HERE).  I wanted it larger than I could fit on the page, so I had to make some adjustments to the file before cutting.  Inspired by a few different ideas on Pinterest, I printed on vellum two different photos and alternated with text panels for each lantern.  I also cut lots of 90 confetti and spread around everywhere.

 

 

 

 Of course I had to make a crown for the party princess.  She wore it proudly during the entire party.  The cut file was a freebie by Bird's Cards.  I adjusted the file to fit an adult and cut it from silver glitter cardstock.

 

 

 

 This was also inspired by Pinterest (both the punch and the Fountain of Youth sign).  I love Pinterest!

 

 

 

 Costco made the cake, but I added the 90.  I had to guess at what size to cut it since we didn't pick up the cake until right before the party, and I almost made it too big.  I cut it from glitter cardstock and mounted it on clear plastic.

 

 

 

Here is the gift table.  (She requested no gifts, but she is just too loved.)  I had one of my helpers scatter more photos and 90 confetti.

 

 

 

 I take no credit for this.  My helpers did a beautiful job with the food table. 

 

 

 

 Dessert Table

 

 

 

I picked out some of the most interesting-looking/funny photos and placed one at each table for a game.  I asked the guests at each table to work together to make up a story about their photo.  Some tables had one or two sentence stories and others had two or three pages!  LOL 

 

Spring Explosion Box

Here are some close-ups of the explosion box mentioned in this post.  It has been so long ago I don't remember many details, but if anyone really cares you are welcome to ask and I'll try to answer any questions.  You can't see it very well in the picture, but the line of green beads is supposed to be a caterpillar. 

Then when you open the box, a butterfly emerges.

This picture shows a little of the detail.  You can barely tell that the corners are punched/embossed.  Each of the boxes I made had different butterfly stickers added.  This one probably was the one I liked least, so I kept it for myself.

 

Ladies Tea 2011

This was from the 2011 annual Ladies Tea at church.  It was my first attempt at anything like this.  I was really outside my comfort zone and very intimidated.  Each table is decorated by a different lady (or team).  The other ladies are so creative and talented.  I won't show their tables so mine won't look so bad.  :-)

We were supposed to give each lady at our table an inexpensive favor.  I made these explosion boxes.  I had planned to give them photos from the tea to add to the inside.  Yeah, that didn't happen.  Oh well.  The ladies at my table were my friends and family and they still love me.  I didn't get a picture of the inside of the boxes because I had stayed up all night finishing the boxes and was running late.  But I do still have one so maybe I'll post more about it later.  (Update:  I posted about the explosion box here.)

I made these as place cards.  My sweet daughter wrote the names for me because she is so much better at that than I am.  The bottom one was for my niece who was 8 months pregnant at the time.  :-)

The centerpiece I made.

This shows what I did for chair covers.  I used white pillowcases over the chairs and then just added the bows and butterflies.

It was near Easter so I made the theme for mine Spring/Rebirth.  I wasn't thrilled with how it turned out, but it was ok and we all had a good time.

Landscape Timber Leprechaun

 

My mother was so talented.  I definitely got my love of crafting from her, but unfortunately I did not inherit much of her talent and creativity.  She always amazed me at what she could make out of ordinary trash.  We didn't have much money so we weren't able to buy much, but my mother made us such cool things I treasure to this day.  I thought this post was fitting since her birthday was on St. Patrick's Day and she painted this landscape timber leprechaun (using no pattern) over 20 years ago.  She has been gone now for 10 years and I miss her dearly.  She was an amazing woman!

New Year Bulletin Board

Obviously this is another old bulletin board.  It was meant for the beginning of the new year, but it could be used for anytime (minus the year).  It's just a simple bulletin board encouraging church members to find what service best fits them.  The ones in the middle were highlighted and changed out weekly.

It's been so long ago I can't remember much of the details.  I do know the snowflakes were cut from sparkly prism-type paper (Crayola Stardust) which reflects the light and makes them look different colors.  I believe the puzzle pieces were cut using print and cut on the Silhouette Cameo.

Jesus Is Our Greatest Gift

This is the quickest and simplest bulletin board I have ever done, but I like it and especially the message.  I combined ideas from the following three pins:  Victorian Christian Woman, Home and Heartstrings, and The Classroom Creative.  Thank you all for the ideas!

I used wrapping paper with the names of Jesus (from Hobby Lobby) as the background paper and just used some ribbon I already had.  I made the tag on my computer and attached it with some more ribbon. 

Pin the Nose on Rudolph

This is a Pin the Nose on Rudolph game I made last year for our children's Christmas party at church.  I started with a blue poster board and then hand cut the "snow" on the ground.  The snowflakes are punches.  I already had the Christmas tree from another project (to possibly be posted at a later date).  The tree is from the Cricut cartridge Paper Doll Dress Up, and it is decorated with different punches.  The cute little Rudolph is cut on my Silhouette using a cut file by Stinkin Cute,  and the little silhouette of Santa's sleigh is from Paper Piecings by Nikki.

No Greater Love

This was the bulletin board I did for February.  It is very simple but has a powerful message.

I used the print and cut feature on my Silhouette to cut the heart with the Scripture verse (John 3:16).  The cross is cut from faux woodgrain contact paper using the New Testament Cricut cartridge.  The text for the title was cut from vinyl using my Silhouette.

Crowns

I made these crowns (ten in all) for the 2012 Christmas cantata.  Using Cricut Craft Room I welded a long rectangle and multiples of the "crown-s" shape from the Wall Decor and More cartridge.  I cut them out of gold poster board then glittered them and added sequins.  Here is a screenshot of my CCR file.