[aRRRR you ready for some...]

It's finally here! A day I've long been awaiting. A day when little A will be sent off to school with a bag full of Valentine booty for all his little preschool mates to enjoy.

Oh how I love Valentines. Hands down some of my favorite memories as a child were cutting doilies and red and pink construction paper hearts and applying them to a self-made mail/shoe boxes of sorts in preparation of the wonderful flood of cards and candy to be received by peers. When it was all over I'd sit in my room sorting through my loot, picking out which cards I liked best. I remember Garfield and Peanuts cards were usually on the top of the list. Oh what magical school memories (second only to the Halloween costume parades and cotton ball Santa beards).



In honor of this momentous occasion little A and I have decided to share our Pirate Valentines with all of you. Simply download the boy and girl pirate sheets and get started.



You can then print these onto white or colored card stock. From there you simply cut out felt heart eye patches and then stitch across the paper, write a cute piratey saying such as "you're gRRReat!" and the front of the card is complete.



You can get creative with the candy. Here little A and I did variations of gummy hearts sealed in sewn wax paper and lollies stitched right onto the back of the cards.

Little A can hardly contain himself. He can't wait to dress up as a pirate and deliver his treasure to all his friends. He also can't wait to have a lolly, so I slipped a little card in his bag just for him, from mommy.

Now all I need is a box (or two) of chocolates, conversation heart cookies and a night out with Jon and my V-day celebrations will be complete.



** All downloads are for personal use only. Please do not use for resale, or commercial production.

[a Freebie and an attempt to...]

A couple of weeks ago I attended an organizing event where I was fortunate enough to meet and glean from LA's Apartment Therapy organizer extraordinaire, Beth Zeigler. Beth, who in addition to blogging is a professional organizer and founder of her own company Bneato, gave a fabulous mini boot camp that I found very inspiring. I was already a big fan of organizing, but after hearing some of Beth's tips I decided I could take it up a notch.

My craft/studio space needed some love...as did my laundry area (I say "area" because there is no laundry "room" in my house. The washer and dryer are outside on the back porch...one of the odd by charming quirks of old school Southern Cal) so I decided to start there. In an effort to make things more fun and visually appealing, and of course easier to organize, I created several assorted downloadable labels that I also wanted to share with you.

Click here and you can download all 22 labels. You can use these on jars, boxes, file folders, envelopes, gifts, journals, scrapbooks and really anything else you can think of!

My arts and craft supplies are now getting a good sorting and look so inviting. This makes me want to paint and create so much more! (Both a good a bad thing...you know, with all that "extra" time on my hands.)

In the laundry area I decided to do something different with my detergent. The lid to this jar broke while putting it away after the Neverland party - sadness - so I decided to repurpose it. Now I love scooping out detergent which makes doing the laundry that much more enjoyable (every little bit helps right?).

And of course, my favorite part of the organizing adventure...While I was busy sorting and photographing, my little 3 yr old decided he would do some un-sorting of his own in the button department...(It's a good thing he rather enjoyed re-sorting them by color while putting them back.)

[last minute]

Hello friends. Sorry this is so last minute and so late in the day but we are all rather sick over here (I managed to get the flu bug...ugh).


Just click on the above pic and then right click to download the labels. Enjoy and Happy Valentines!