Beautiful Life Photography

Well it is almost time for our elf Scooter to make his way back to the North Pole. 

He has been such a fun & mischievous elf this year and I am going to help him go out with a bang.  Scooter is going to take the stockings on Xmas Eve, and hide them, and the kids are going to have to follow the clue’s that he left to find them.   That naughty elf!  I got some of the clues online and changed the words to fit my needs.   I have a printable version and left certain areas blank that will allow you to fill in the name of your elf etc…. 

The second clue will be hidden in the oven.  I left “pumpkin roll” out of the downloadable version.  If you haven’t made one before I have a delicious recipe

The third will be hidden under my sons bed.

I left the area blank for the quiz as well so you can add an age appropriate quiz.

Well, every room in our house has a ceiling fan so the stockings will be hidden somewhere…..

DOWNLOAD STOCKING HUNT LIST HERE & HERE

HAVE A HAPPY AND HEALTHY HOLIDAY AND BEST WISHES FOR THE NEW YEAR!!

I have been dying to do a silhouette project for a long time.  I kept putting it off because I thought it was going to be complicated or wouldn’t turn out quite right but I was wrong about both!  This project was SO simple and turned out great!!  The silhouettes look just like the kids and I love the fact that you can even tell Marco is laughing!  Let me just say, when you complete this project don’t admire your work with wet paint on your hands!  Yes, this is round 2!  I got black paint all over the front of BOTH of them!  The lighting in my house is horrible so this photo doesn’t really do them justice, they are soooo adorable!

The first step is to take a profile picture of your subject.  Preferably near a large window or slider and don’t use your flash so you get a nice silhouette.  Then I used the magic wand tool in my photo editing software to outline just their heads, it doesn’t have to be perfect, and I printed it on plain paper.   If you don’t have software that can do this you can just cut out around their head after printing.  Next I photocopied and sized it onto a plain sheet of paper until it was the size I wanted.

Next you are going to take your purchased wooden plaques and paint the edges and just around the sides on the top.  I purchased these at Michaels.  The “unwrapped” plaques are very inexpensive starting at .59 cents.  Measure the top of the  plaque and cut your decorative paper to the appropriate size.  Once the paint is dry I used Mod Podge for paper to glue it to the front.

While the paint is drying you can cut out your silhouettes.  I used double sided tape to adhere the photocopy onto a piece of black cardstock to help keep it in place while I cut.  Place the tape around the edges not under the silhouette.   Once the paint is dry you can glue the decorative paper on and give it some time to dry before gluing the silhouette on.  Let the silhouette dry for an hour or so and give it one more coat of Mod Podge on top and you are done!  I stapled some ribbon to the back and glued a piece of felt to cover it and finish it off .

I made a mini ornament silhouette for Kate’s tree…as if it doesn’t already have enough ornaments

xoxo,  Sonja

Put a smile on your guys face with a hanger like this,  featured at the Ace Hotel. 

Photo courtesy of Color Me Katie

It looks like they etched the wood but I am going to make them using a pack of wood hangers from Ikea, of course, and my friends cricut!  You can buy “Cricut Cuttables Adhesive-Backed Vinyl” at your local craft store in all different colors.  Apply transfer tape after cutting and apply onto hanger.  Seal it to give it extra hold and you’ve got a great gift!  How cute is that!!  He’ll love it and himself because HE LOOKS GOOD IN THAT!

xoxo, Sonja