Today I wanted to share with you a project that I created for my guest post on one of my favorite blogs Hubby Made Me. 
I love decorating for 4th of July and had a lot of fun making this wall plaque. Not only is this project super easy, its cheap too!
Start with a blank piece of wood any size you would like. I actually got this from Wal-Mart but you can also get one from any craft store.
This part depends on the size of wood you purchased, but you measure horizontally and put down Frog Tape to make lines to get ready to paint.
Go ahead and paint the each individual lines from Navy blue to ivory. You can use whatever kind of paint you like. I did the blues first, let them dry then I did the ivory.
Next, I had this old metal star laying around, you can actually get one at any craft store. I painted it with the spray paint & primer mix. I am a huge fan of spray paint! I keep tons all different colors for any projects I have.
Here in this pic you can see why I painted it white first, so you can still kind of see it under the red paint. I like the finish of the paint when it dried. Here I used Acrylic burgundy color.
Next, you want to go ahead and staple some hemp rope on the back of the plaque so it can hold. The size of rope just depends on size of the plaque you use.
I purchased this small scrapbook wooden piece from Michaels. I loved it as soon as I had seen it. I figured it would add a little something for 4th of July. I always have Mod Podge laying around, but you want use it to layer of the scrapbook piece. You want to put 2 or 3 layers over it. It also leaves a glossy finish on the plaque. If you want your plaque outside, you want to use the Mod Podge Outdoor.
Next, you want to trace over the star because you are going to cover the star with a 4th of July pattern of scrapbook paper of your choice. You can even do all different patters on the star too. 
After you trace the triangles, cut them out and then layer the star. You want to first cover the star with Mod Podge, then fit the triangles on the star then cover with another layer of Mod Podge. When it dries, its then clean and glossy.
This part is probably the trickiest part of the whole project. I had a roll of Burlap and wanted to make a rosette for the top so that the nail doesn’t show when you hang the plaque. To make the rosette, you want to cute a long piece off of the burlap roll. Then fold it in half and twist and roll it up at the same time. Once it is all rolled up, you want to hot glue gun the bottom to hold it together. The rosette will depend on the size of the plaque. 
Last, you want to Hot glue gun the star onto the plaque. I also wanted to add just a little bit more color, so I found some Red, White & Blue scrap material and ripped a piece off and tied it up top with the rosette.
You can also just use it as a plaque without the hemp rope too.There you have it! I hope you have as much fun creating this as I did!
Yesterday we had Weston’s Circus themed first birthday Party! It was such a great time! I think I had the most fun planning it and making most of the decorations. Weston seemed to have fun too. He was so excited for his party, that we tried multiple times to put him down for a nap but it wasnt happening. He seemed to do fine for the first couple of hours but we had to speed up the process of cake and presents because of course he was getting fussy. For the party we decided to have grilled hamburgers, hot dogs, and a few sides. Eric usually hates it when I throw parties because thats what I like to do and sometimes (usually) I go a little overboard. This time he was very content that I actually stayed within my budget. We invited a few of our good close friends that we have met here in WA, and I was happy my mom flew in for the party too. My mom purchased balloons and made a couple of balloon animals and all the kiddos were making their own balloon designs. It rained of and on all day so when it wasnt raining the kids ran around or sat and watched Megamind. Once Weston opened all his gifts the kiddos all enjoyed them while he watched.
These are the invitions for the party. I ordered them from Dimple Prints on Etsy. Dimple Prints also designed the theme form the decoration. They do the design, then you print them out on your own. I decided to up it a notch on the invites and cut out cardstock in the colors of Weston’s theme, then I glued the cardstock to the invite to make the wording and colors pop.
I dont do alot of baking. So after searching for the perfect smoosh cake, I found this cake at Safeway. Its a large sun cake. It kinda resembled a clown and it was the colors of the party so I just purchased it. When we were looking at cakes Weston had his eyes feasted on this one!
These were one of my favorites at the party. I love cotton candy! As another item for people to take in their goody bags I made mini bags of cotton candy. I found mini plastic bags, and cotton candy at Wal-Mart. I then stuffed the bags with just a little tasting of cotton candy so everyone can get their sugar fix!
These were alot of fun to make too! I just took pretzel rods and dipped them in white chocolate and then decorated them with sugar sprinkles in the colors of the party theme. Then I tied the top with favor tags that said “Thank you for a roaring good time -Weston” I then cut them out
These are the goody bags I made for the kiddos. I purchased the colored bags at Michaels and glued cut outs of pictures from the party theme on different colors of carstock. I filled them with crazy straws, bubbles, candy and punch ball balloons.
You cant really see it that well but this is the banner I had made with cut out of the designs from the party theme. I also made the banner too. I made it with ribbon and cardstock
This is just a better view of the pretzel rod bouquet of all the different colors of the party
Then label it with whatever you want to put on it. I would usually put the personalize it with “to” & “from” but if you dont know everyone’s names you can just put “from ____.” Sometimes I will go the extra mile and use a special font to make labels, then punch them out and stick together. I am a huge huge fan of rafia, but you can use any color ribbon you like to tie the label around the bag.
