Mother's Day Totes

My mom, the avid Pinterest and Facebook user, decided to "hint" at what she wanted for Mother's Day by posting the Pin on my Wall. Subtle, right? It worked. She got what she wanted, although it was a couple of weeks late because on the first try, my daughter was unhappy with the results. (Not too unhappy since she kept it for herself) So, handy (ha ha!) tote bags it was.

Dad

Mom

Part one of this process was that Adam and I had to stamp our hands on the totes. After that came the kiddo and a couple of details. Sadly I didn't get a finished picture of them, but I used yellow fabric paint to make a swirl in the center, and green to do the outline of a leaf in the corner of each.

Drying

When I mailed them I was a little nervous about the paint sticking to itself in the envelope (it's over 100 degrees here) so I made sure to fold them design out and they made it to their respective locations just fine.

Wreath gone wrong

I wanted to make my own wreath using ribbon I found. It was a nice wide wire rim ribbon. I see tons of them on Pinterest. I never actually read the directions.

Folding

I started by folding the ribbon back and forth in equal lengths. Then I decided I wanted a less uniform look so I started over making the lengths a little uneven. I then took floral wire and wove it through the sections.

wiring 

Since I wanted good support, I actually ran two pieces of wire through. In this photo you can see the bottom wire already woven as I am running the top wire through. My theory was that at the end I would form the two wires in to loop that met each other, thus making the wreath shape.

Flat

After I wove all the ribbon and pulled the wire tight, I realized I had grossly underestimated how much ribbon this project would take. I ended up with a flat wreath that looked nothing like a wreath at all. At this point I decided I needed a plan "B".

Hanging Loop

I decided to fluff up all the loops I had made and see what happened. I kept fluffing and reworking, again and again until I was reasonably happy with the result.

"wreath" bow

In the end I had made what my supportive family referred to as the "world's prettiest bow". I am not convinced. And I still don't have my wreath. On the bright side, I didn't use my favorite of the ribbons I bought. And I did go back and read the directions on Pinterest, so perhaps this next time I will get it right. Stay tuned.