Outdoor Fairy Garden

I don't know what it is about fairy gardens, but I find them so cute and fun! You can find a variety of them along with their accessories at different craft stores and garden centers. In fact, one of the first places we spotted our very first one was at a local garden center in our area several years ago...this particular garden area also offers workshops on how to create one. Although we've never done this before, it did plant some ideas of how we could create one of these at home.

After searching thru some pictures online and remembering what the ones from the garden center looked like, I starterd with the basics and looked around our home to see if there were any items we already had that we could use for the garden...because, let's face it, accessories can add up in cost!
My best advice to how you can stay under-budget is to shop your house and yard.

Please don't mind the shoes on the wrong feet. At this point I'm pretty convinced she does it on purpose. ;) Personality, this one!

Here is the breakdown of items we had combined with items we purchased:

We had the following items:
1. wooden bird house ($1) painted. Bought at a craft store.
2. rocks/pebbles (free)
3. blue gems (several years old) Used in our wedding which is a fun little fact!
4. dirt (probably an obvious one and free)
5. seashells (free)
6. popsicle sticks

Purchased these following items:
1. drain pan ($1) from Dollar Tree!
2. small figurines (from a previous project and about $4)
3. pumpkins (2 for $1) from Dollar Tree
4. Bridge ($1) Dollar Tree

We also added some seeds to the dirt in hopes that we would be able to grow some grass/greenery...along with some acorns my daughter found at a park one day. :)

Overall, this project cost about $10!!! I'd say that is pretty darn good. The girls and I would also like to buy a little fairy figurine for the garden, so we hope to do that soon. :)

In the meantime, the girls are having fun adding a few more pebbles here and there that they find on the road and they also enjoy playing with the little bunny (who is sadly missing his ears because my son broke them off) and a mushroom figurine in the garden. :) We are still waiting for some grass to grow as well. It's been a fun little lesson in plant growth for the girls and myself since I do not have a green-thumb!

The Beginnings of a Fairy Garden

Now that a lot of our indoor spaces are decorated, I'm trying to move on to the outdoors.

There is a little spot on our porch where I wanted to put a fairy garden. After seeing some pictures of them online and reading just a little bit about them, I knew it was possible to make one on a budget.

I plan on getting to all of that later in the week, but for now, we are having fun decorating ours and figuring out what goes where. :)

Do Your Kids Like Crafts?

 Now that my girls are at the age where they can actually complete a simple craft from start to finish, they do like doing them. Recently, I have begun to look for ways for them to help me around the house with projects...and not just with chores. I am usually always thinking of fun things for them to participate in-like decorating the house for the holidays or helping me paint the letters of their name to use as decor in their room. It's fun being able to come along side them and watch them as they learn new things like that- especially because it's something I enjoy doing with them!

So how do you get your kids involved in such things?

Well, for me, I look for things my girls can help me with around the house- things like decorating their room or picking out a color scheme for the playroom, etc. (And I always try to make sure they want to participate in these ideas because I know that if I just made them do something "crafty" that they didn't want to do in the first place, it would feel like a chore to them and I certainly don't want that).

For example, a couple of things I have been wanting to do lately are paint some letters for my sons room and decorate some Styrofoam cones for Christmas that we just bought at the craft store. I know some of you might be thinking that Christmas decor is a little early, and it is, but I wanted to get a head start on some of it now because, well, it's just plain fun to do!

Here are a couple of examples of how my girls helped me out this week:

1. I took all 3 kids to JoAnn's to help me pick out some things and used our gift card from my MIL. And just to clarify, two out of 3 of my children are able to have an opinion...I wouldn't expect that from my youngest just yet ;) so going out with 3 wasn't all that bad but it was an experience to say the least. 


 

2. When we got home, we busted out the paint (Tempura) and the paint brushes and put some paint on some pieces of paper (that way we could keep the paint contained somewhat).

**We chose the color blue so it would fit in with the nursery colors.

3. And the girls just painted away. They really loved this craft because they knew it would be something special their brother would keep in his room for a long time...and it's something they enjoyed doing for him.

The other project we worked on this week was decorating some Styrofoam cones with pink and purple yarn (colors they picked out on their own) and added some pom poms to them with toothpicks.

I also want to mention that my oldest came up with the idea to secure the pom poms to the cones with toothpicks. It was genius! I didn't have to worry about glue getting everywhere...and the toothpicks were so easy for them to use.

So what we did was wrap the yarn around the cones, secured the yarn with some toothpicks, and used pom poms to decorate them. Super fun!!

Didn't they turn out pretty cute?!

I was even surprised that my 2 year old wanted to do so much of this craft by herself. She was actually able to get the pom poms threaded with the toothpick and managed to put them into the Styrofoam cones herself! Hooray for independence like that!

She was quite pleased with herself, and so was I! They both did a great job and it was a lot of fun to do together!

It is always so neat to watch my girls get excited about projects that we can do together...they especially LOVE painting and are always asking if they can help me paint some of my furniture projects. I haven't been able to let them take the reigns on those kinds of projects just yet, but they do love to help out and for that I am grateful.

I would love to hear if any of you get your kids involved in decorating or the decorating process? And if you do, what are some ways in which you allow your kids to help?

New Flowers and a Sneak Peek

Over the weekend, we were able to buy some fresh hydrangeas for the house. I am so happy they are starting to go back in season. We bought them at Trader Joe's so if you have one near you, chances are they are carrying them. Since the Farmer's Market hasn't started up here yet, buying these flowers at Trader Joe's seems to be the best way to get them. I couldn't find them anywhere else and really, really wanted some for our home...can't you tell? ;)



Also, I wanted to share a sneak peek of an awesome kid's project I completed over the weekend when we were snowed in. I will share more details later in the week, but here is a glimpse at the fun project your kids will enjoy.

And here are my little helpers helping me paint some of the wood pieces for this project.
They really enjoyed that part too!

I will share more details and pictures later in the week of this.

Thanks for stopping by!