Valentine Love Letters Decoration

The last week has been a lot of fun to find little love notes randomly throughout the day in our own envelope on this banner that I made. A few weeks ago I began sketching out this idea. Originally I was going to make it into an advent calendar, but my sister had a great idea to turn it into little pockets to keep love notes in. So I sketched it out and she did color tests and we decided on this! Man alive, I love that sister of mine and how fun it is to create stuff with her. Someday we'll live by each other again, but it's wonderful to be able to create together via the internet. :)

I have enough materials to custom make 3 more for anyone that would like to purchase it. I posted it on my etsy shop at: http://www.etsy.com/listing/91563034/owl-valentine-love-notes-banner

So here's the full view...

...and a close up on those two cute little love birds :)

This is the heart pocket that holds the papers to write on and the little red envelope holds our small pencils.

I LOVE the new embroidery machine I got for Christmas. It was really fun embroidering all our names and little designs on it and writing "Be Mine" with it. Those little Christmas tree advent calendars took about 3-4 hours just to embroider the numbers below the pockets. Now it's a cinch.

Another Needle Book (For My Little Sis)...

I decided to make another needle book especially for my sister. She loves owls and hedgehogs and the colors green, turqoise, browns, oranges, etc. I just sent it yesterday so she should be able to start using it in a few days. :)

More Needle Books and Another Advent Calendar

Okay so that was pretty fun making the little birdies hugging needle book and I decided I wanted to make a bunch more. I have no idea why I made so many. And I've sketched a few more ideas to make more. They are fun and fairly fast. It just feels good to finish something instead of it taking a month (or a few years... ahem... my cross-stitch). I really love working with felt. It's so fun and bright and easy. Anyway, here's a bunch more little needle books I made this last weekend.

And here's the side view. Look at all that fun color?!

Princess and the Pea Needle Book. I used some of my mom's old Victorian trim she gave me. :)

Closeup of the pea. :) So I may just keep this one and give the rest away. I have to keep this one because of a funny story between Seth and I. Here goes... a few years ago while living in LA Seth was teasing me about being such a princess about something. I decided to make a joke of it. Without him knowing just before bed I put a pea under our mattress on my side. When we got into bed I tossed and turned and pretended like I just couldn't get comfortable to the point of driving him crazy. Finally I stopped and said, "It feels like there's something jabbing into my back. I just can't fall asleep. Hold on... I'll check..." then I lifted up my mattress edge and pulled out the pea and said with relief, "OH! That's why! A princess can't sleep on a pea." He looked shocked and then laughed so hard at me. I felt very clever of course, well, because I was. :)

Cherry Blossoms Needle Book

Little Red Riding Hood Needle Book (This one is Seth's fav)

Froggy and Mushrooms Needle Book

Night Owl Needle Book

Leafy Branch Needle Book

... soooo which one is your favorite?

You never know- it may just end up in the mail on it's way to your house. :)

Now onto the not-so-quick project. I still can't figure out why I could make that other little advent calendar for the missionaries in our branch on a lazy Saturday and this calendar for Seth's sister and her family took me all month. It was slow and go for some reason. I think I must have put a lot more time and thought into each little pocket. I made it go to 31 instead of 25 because they have a daughter who's bday is on the 31st.

Close up of the top half.

Close up of the bottom half. It was fun to invent so many more little pockets since it went all the way to 31. I also decided not to make some of the pockets I had made for the missionaries.

This was the little bear on a stick that goes from pocket to pocket as the month wears on. I made a bear because I'm cheesy and their last name is Bair. Get it? I know, I'm a nerd. :)

The very good news is that my hubby bought me an embroidery machine for Christmas so I don't have to spend 4-6 hours hand embroidering all those numbers if I ever want to make another again! Now I could even start making my Halloween calendars again and selling them. At least that's the plan. Yipee!