Crafty Endeavors

Making a Simple Ice Cream Sundae Gift Basket

August 19, 2016 by Eileen 31 Comments

I love making cute gift baskets – so much that I have a board on Pinterest entirely devoted to homemade gift baskets and boxes.

Whenever I’m stuck for a gift, whether Christmas gifts or shower gifts, I always think about what I can put in a gift basket as a themed gift.

My sister-in-law and her family were staying with us for their family vacation this year, and I wanted to do something special for them. I made this cute DIY ice cream sundae gift basket, and it was a hit!

Collecting Materials for the Gift Box

First, I collected the materials that I needed for DIY ice cream sundae gift box. I went to Michael’s and they were having an awesome summer blowout sale on gift boxes.

I got this gift box for just three dollars! Of course, I bought a few of them for later projects.

Next, on my weekly trip to the grocery store, I purchased a few of the ice cream box necessities – chocolate syrup, strawberry syrup, cherries, and cones.

I also bought a few boxes of candy that could be used as toppings. The boxes were on sale for .99 cents.

As for other toppings, I already had tons of sprinkles and a box of walnuts at home.

My final trip was to Walmart for a cheap but cute ice cream scoop. I found one for .88 cents! (Side note – if you are looking to get a better scoop, there’s an awesome scoop on Amazon that uses the heat from your body to heat up the ice cream!)

Also at Walmart, I found polka dot napkins and turquoise spoons for a dollar per pack. I also found ice cream cups there for $3 per pack.

If you are looking to buy a kit, there’s a great ice cream sundae kit on Amazon, which has the cups, spoons, straws, and little umbrellas in bright and cheery colors.

Last, I purchased the condiment cups on Amazon. Love Amazon! I also needed the condiment cups for my son’s Sesame Street themed birthday party, so I bought a big bag.

I already had scrapbook paper and ribbon in my craft collection, so I didn’t need to buy those things 🙂

Putting the Ice Cream Sundae Box Together

The next step was the fun part – putting everything together into a cute ice cream sundae gift basket.

I poured the boxes of candy into the condiment cups. The boxes were a perfect fit because I had little to none leftover.

I also filled condiment cups with rainbow sprinkles, chocolate sprinkles, and crushed walnuts.

I unwrapped two different kinds of cones (I bought a variety pack) and wrapped a stack of them in cellophane for freshness.

Then I took a piece of ribbon and tied a few spoons to the ice cream scoop with a sign that read, “Just add ice cream.”

I took scrapbook paper and cut pieces to cover the store labels – to make them prettier 🙂

Then I printed my own labels that read “chocolate syrup, cherries, etc” (see download below) on regular white printer paper.

I glued the labels to the scrapbook paper and then taped them to the jars, for a cute, uniform look.

I didn’t love the design on the ice cream cups, so I wrapped a polka-dotted napkins around the cup, to match the napkins and make for a brighter box.

Last, I added a sign to the top of the box, covering up the bicycle design.

I love the way the box turned out! My sister-in-law and her family loved it too. We had a great time creating ice cream sundaes at home 🙂

As far as cost, I saved a lot of money with the discounted box, grocery store sales, and good finds at Walmart.

Altogether, I spent just less than $35 dollars (with the condiment cups being $10.50 and tons of these leftover for other projects) on the this DIY ice cream sundae gift basket.

Considering we had ice cream sundaes for seven people and tons of leftovers, I still think that’s a great deal!

It’s a great summer gift basket, housewarming gift, a sunshine gift for someone who needs some positivity – the list is endless, and everyone always loves it!

Making Adorable Cards from Toddler Art

August 7, 2016 by Eileen 7 Comments

I’m always looking for cute greeting card ideas for my kids to make. There are so many fun cards out there that creatively use kids’ hand and footprints. Although cute, I always had trouble getting one decent hand or footprint for a greeting card. Not to mention the mess it makes.

As soon as my son was old enough to paint, I had him “paint” with cotton swabs, instead of paint brushes, so he could easily dab the paint onto the paper. This kept the paint really confined but still allowed him to create artwork. (Sponge brushes and foam stampers are great for making cards with toddlers too.)

As any toddler’s paintings would be, my little guy’s artwork was very abstract.

I was having him make birthday cards for all of the August birthdays in my family. Yet, rather than give messy toddler paint prints, I thought of a great way to showcase his art but to also turn it into a nice-looking greeting card.

So after my son did a little painting, I did a little cutting and gluing – and voila! Don’t the birthday cards look nice?!

Materials for Making Greeting Cards from Toddlers

Making these greeting cards is so simple. The materials are so easy too. Most likely, you will even already have all of these things.

Card stock – I like having toddlers make artwork on card stock because it is so thick. When they layer paint on paint on paint, the card stock works really well. I mostly used this bright color pack. The brighter the colors, the better the cards turned out. (Looking at the purple card (below), I wished I used a brighter color for the actual card.)
Kids paint – I love this washable Crayola paint. Lots of color choices keep my son very interested in painting!
Paintbrushes – sponge brushes, cotton swabs or stampers work too! My son loves making greeting cards with these foam painting stampers. He has this farm set, but they have transportation ones, animal ones, sea-life ones, and even holiday sets too! He only uses the paintbrush for so long, but the foam stampers keep him interested for longer
Scissors – just the regular ole pair you have laying around the house 🙂
Glue – or even tape 🙂
Sharpie/Marker (if needed) – I used a sharpie to add the balloon strings. You could use ribbon too!
Stickers or embellishments (if desired)

Making Cards with Toddlers

After my toddler painted on the card stock papers, I let them dry for a few hours or so. Then, I cut his paintings into shapes – cupcakes, presents, balloons, and layered cake for the birthday cards.

I then took a new piece of card stock (a contrasting color), folded it in half, and trimmed off the top (unless I was going for a tall card – like the balloons and train). After, I took the birthday items that I cut and glued them down to the card.

I even did a train cut-out for my train-loving dad. I used a nearby water bottle cap to trace those perfect circles 🙂

Using Patterned Scrapbook Paper for Toddler Cards

After making cards for all the August birthdays, I was running low on paintings, so I substituted printed scrapbook paper (here is a similar one) that looked like a cupcake wrapper.

The greeting card turned out so cute that I wished I thought of it sooner 🙂

Birthday Shapes

As far as the shapes, I free-handed them as I cut. You could certainly draw on the paper and then cut.

Adding Embellishments

While making cards with toddlers, you can dress up the cards by adding some embellishments to the front of the card. I added the word happy with letter stickers because the present birthday card looked a little plain.

A Personal Touch

Last, to give the greeting cards just a little more of a personal touch, I had my son decorate the inside. He colored with his crayons and picked out stickers. This gave him another opportunity to be creative making birthday cards.

I just love how the birthday cards turned out! My son got to be as creative as he wanted with no restrictions (like finger prints or footprints), and I got to help my toddler create something to give to others that was refrigerator-worthy.

Even though I used birthday shapes for this batch of greeting cards, you could easily alter the shapes for holidays too.

Making cards with toddlers is a win-win for everyone involved. Your child gets to do a fun activity, you get to save some money with homemade cards, and your family members/friends get a creative, cute card, showcasing your child’s work.

And, the best part is that there is no need for hand or footprints. Now that’s a win right there 😉

Easy and Fun Bridal Shower Game with Free Printables

July 8, 2016 by Eileen 39 Comments

In addition to our home projects, I always have a crafty project (or two) up my sleeve. A few months ago, I was asked to be a bridesmaid in my friend Meg’s wedding, and her sister reached out to me asking for help with fun bridal shower games.

Thinking back to fun bridal shower games, my sister PK planned an awesome game at my shower. She collected a dozen photos of me at different times in my life and projected them onto the wall. The bridal shower guests guessed what year the photo was taken.

Even though I loved the game, putting a version together for Meg would have involved collecting and scanning a lot of photos, not to mention getting their dates correct.

Although it was a fun bridal shower game to play, I probably wasn’t the best person to head up that game.

I thought a little more and remembered my friend Tiff’s bridal shower. Tiff and her closest friends always go all out and plan the most awesome parties.

And, you know that I love a good theme party (Check out our Beatles party, Sesame Street party, and Seinfeld party)!

Tiff’s bridal shower theme was Breakfast at Tiffany’s, and everything was so amazing – from the invitation to the party props. (See her awesome invitations)

At Tiff’s bridal shower, we played the best bridal shower games. One of them was called Mustaches and Tiaras and it had bridal shower game questions about the couple. And, there were props! Everyone got tiara and mustache props (card stock cutouts glued to popsicle sticks).

How to Play this Fun Bridal Shower Game

To play this fun bridal shower game, each player received one tiara, one mustache, and a list of questions that were asked to the bride and groom ahead of time. It’s basically a game of “Who said it?” with silly props.

The Hilarious Details

The bridal shower questions that the bride and groom answered can include anything from favorite ice cream topping to biggest fear to random questions, such as, “Why doesn’t the glue stick to the bottom of the bottle?”

The bride and groom answer these questions about themselves and then submit them to you, ahead of time. They aren’t allowed to share answers.

From the bride and groom’s responses, prior to the party, you chose one answer to be read aloud.

Then at the party, you read the question and then the one answer you chose. The guests needed to decide if that answer was the bride’s answer or the groom’s answer.

If it was the bride’s answer, they put their tiara up, and if it was the groom’s answer, they put their mustache up.

Once in awhile, there’s an answer that both the bride and the groom gave, and then the party guests hold both the tiara and the mustache up.

When you see a sea of faces staring back at you with tiaras and mustaches held up, it’s pretty funny! (Check out some great pictures of this game being played at Tiff’s shower on her blog).

I had to recreate this unique bridal shower game for Meg. I emailed her and her fiance the couple questions ahead of time, and sorted through their answers for the bridal shower game.

Here are the mustaches and tiaras, along with the question cards that I made for her bridal shower.

The great thing about this fun bridal shower game is that it’s so low pressure. Everyone can participate and have a good time. There aren’t any fill-in-the-blank parts about how well guests know the bride or questions about milestones in the bride’s life. The bridal shower game is easy on the attendees, always gets a good laugh, and fun to create!

Ready to start making Mustaches and Tiaras?

Download the free templates below – and you’ll have all of the templates you need for this hilarious bridal shower game!

Materials

Pink scrapbook paper
Brown or black scrapbook paper
Thick popsicle sticks
Gem stickers (I found mine at Dollar Tree)
And, the files listed above

I used this pink paper (lots of shades to choose from and use for later projects too), and I used the brown paper in this collection. I didn’t need too many sheets of brown and liked the other paper colors this pack had.

Making the Tiaras and Mustaches

Print one copy of the tiara sheet on pink scrapbook paper and one copy of the mustache file on brown or black paper.

After I cut out the tiaras and mustaches from the pages I printed, I took one tiara and traced as many as could fit on a piece of pink paper, and then cut these out. I continued to do so until I had the number I needed.

You could also print as many sheets as you need directly to the printer, rather than tracing. I preferred to save some scrapbook paper and not burden myself too much with our testy printer.

Then, I simply hot glued the tiaras and the mustaches to the popsicle sticks. I made sure the traced version was face down, in case any pencil marks came through.

I also made sure I hot glued the popsicle stick to the back of the right-side of the tiara and to the back of the left-side of the mustache (vice versa would also work), so guests could hold both up to their faces simultaneously, without having one backward.

Last, I placed a few adhesive gems on each tiara, which made for a great final touch.

Getting the Couple’s Game Questions Ready

Email your bride and groom with the list of bridal shower game questions well in advance, so you have time to read through them and decide which responses you will announce for each question. That’s part of the fun!

When choosing the responses for this fun bridal shower game, I tended to go for the funny ones because everyone loves a good laugh at a bridal shower.

I also tried to have an equal number of responses from the bride and groom. Additionally, I had at least 3 “boths” thrown in there too for good measure (and more laughs).

Be sure to make yourself a good answer key for the bridal shower game. It will help with easily referring to that when reading the correct responses at the end.

For the question cards, I simply printed these on regular blue paper (blue because that’s what I had). For efficiency, I formatted the questions so fit two on each sheet.

Mustaches and Tiaras - Easy, Fun Bridal Shower Game

I was so busy running the bridal shower game that I simply forgot to take pictures of the guests with their tiaras and mustaches. However, here’s one of our favorite pooch, sporting the props with just a little bit of help. 🙂

If you are looking for fun bridal shower games, definitely look no further! This laid-back, hilarious game is one of the most fun bridal shower games – and it’s easy for all to participate and play.

How to Easily Make a Wedding Wine Basket

June 19, 2016 by Eileen 61 Comments

Recently, I took a little break from the home project list to work on some crafty things for my dear friend Meg’s bridal shower.

My fellow bridesmaids and I wanted to make a first year of marriage milestone wine basket that would include 12 bottles of wine for our her first year of marriage.

After scouring the Internet, I couldn’t find what I needed – so I created my own. I’m including the printables for you too!

First, I choose 12 occasions that Meg and Steve would celebrate during their first year of marriage.

I wanted to pick milestones that they would definitely enjoy their initial 12 months of being married, such as first Christmas, first Valentine’s Day, first snowfall.

I didn’t want to use occasions such as first baby and first home – because those milestones might not be in the couple’s immediate plans.

Therefore, the occasions I went with were wedding night, first New Year’s, first Valentine’s Day, first snowfall, first spring bloom, first beach trip, first big purchase, first dinner party, first fight, first Christmas, first Thanksgiving, and first anniversary.

Next, I needed tags to go with each milestone.

I used cute poems that fit the occasion and I fitted them all to one sheet of paper with the titles running vertically.

This made it easy to print just one sheet of paper for all of the tags.

Download the Wedding Wine Basket Tags

The wedding wine basket tag is a PDF, and it is not personalized, meaning none of these poems include the bride or groom’s name. Therefore, it’s easy for you to simply print, cut, and attach. No formatting necessary 🙂

Making the Wine Basket Tags

First, I printed the wine tag sheet out on thick manila paper. Afterward, I used squiggly scissors to cut out each blurb. Squiggly scissors are my favorite because they hide my lack of ability to cut in a straight line.

Then, I took out my scrapbook paper collection and cut out tags. I coordinated the scrapbook paper colors and designs with the occasion. After that, I glued the poems to the tags, punched a hole in each, and voila!

The tags were done. Don’t they look cute?!

Choosing the Wines for the Wedding Basket

Ash and I then took a trip to Joe Canal’s, a discount liquor store, for the bottles of wine.

We had a ton of fun, as we ended up matching the occasions to the names of the wines. Although, this wasn’t the initial plan, Joe Canal’s had such a great selection that it was easy and fun to pair each milestone with wine.

We found a Christmas Chardonnay to go with the first Christmas tag, Jersey Blush to go with first beach trip, a wine called 30 degrees to go with first snowfall, and the list goes on.

Putting the Basket Together

To attach the tags to the wine, I simply cut a piece of ribbon and tied it in a bow around the neck of the bottle.

I then bought a basket from Michael’s and covered the bottom of the basket in tissue paper. Then, I added the title “Quenching Your Thirst Through a Year of Firsts” and a sign that said “Carry from the bottom.”

Twelve bottles of wine get heavy!

Wedding Wine Basket Bliss

Overall, the first year of marital bliss wine basket turned out great! My mom, who isn’t normally a fusser, fussed over it every time she came over (I had it sitting on a bench in the mudroom for a few weeks). At the shower, the bridesmaids and guests loved it, raving over it.

Additionally, a few sweet older women at the shower asked me if they could find the idea on the Internet. 🙂

Moreover, recently a friend of mine was looking for a special gift for her nephew’s engagement party. She asked me if I had any ideas for the couple that had everything.

She LOVED this idea and put together her own, also adding a beer of the month club gift too to keep with the theme. I thought that was another cute idea!

Overall, the milestone wedding wine basket is a creative, fun, and unique project, with plenty of opportunities to add a personal touch. And of course, Meg and Steve loved it too.

Making Sliding Storage Shelves in One Weekend

March 20, 2016 by Ash 72 Comments

My garage was getting a little out of control. Bulky tools from home improvements projects, boxes upon boxes of holiday decorations, gardening tools, piles of landscaping bags – nothing seemed to have a place.

It was hard to get work done efficiently – not to mention, find something when I was looking for it.

It was time to get smart about garage organization and storage.

Determining a Space for the Sliding Storage Shelves

I already had several prefabricated metal garage shelves doing a decent job of garage storage, but they had their shortcomings.

I had been eyeing this corner space next to our garage fridge. The space was 3 feet deep and about 6 feet wide, and it was currently underutilized.

There were just piles of boxes, gardening tools, and other things that had accumulated.

Corner spaces in the garage often become dumping grounds, as ours had become. I decided to capitalize on the vertical square footage, transforming this messy corner into garage storage shelving.

So, after a few days of pondering over garage storage shelving ideas and messing around in TinkerCad (an awesome 3D designing website), I came up with the idea below for garage storage shelves:

Garage Storage Shelf Requirements

I had 3 requirements for the sliding storage shelves project for my garage. My first requirement was deep storage shelves. The area had a lot of depth, and I wanted to make the most of the space.

I went with 3 ft deep shelves; this was twice as deep as the prefab shelves, so twice the garage storage space.

The second requirement (which is not evident in the TinkerCad drawing above) was sliding garage shelves.

Although 3 ft deep garage shelves would hold a lot, trying to reach something at the back seemed very burdensome. You would have to move things out of the way to get back there, which wasn’t very efficient, especially for vertical space.

Therefore, I wanted some of the deep garage shelves to be on drawer slides.

My last requirement was enough clearance at the bottom of the garage shelves to fit some of my taller tools (like my shopvac), and for them to just roll out (without having to drop off a shelf).

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Preparing Space for the Garage Storage Shelves

To start the sliding storage shelves, I first cleared out and cleaned the designated area for the garage shelves.

Then I located the studs in the wall (using my trusty stud finder), and used green painters tape preserve their locations.

The garage shelving unit was going to be bolted to the studs to make it stable.

Here’s the wall with the studs marked:

Building the Shelf Supports

The actual construction of the garage shelves was fairly straight forward. I just followed the design I created to construct the sliding storage shelves.

The whole garage shelf was made of 2 x 4 wood that was cut to different lengths.

Unfortunately, I was so caught up in the construction (it was a pretty fun project to work on), I forgot to take many pictures. Therefore, I’m just going to provide some visuals.

First, I made 3 vertical support structures for the garage shelves. I would install these on the ends and middle.

These supports looked like a 3 ft wide ladder – see pic below:

Next, I used 6 ft cuts of 2 x 4s to connect the 3 vertical supports, and to form a basis for each garage shelf.

I also added 2 extra 6 ft pieces at the back of the structure to bolt into the wall studs.

Adjusting for Sliding Garage Shelves

Before considering sliding storage shelves, I thought about making all of the shelves look like the very top one. However, that was going to be too simple, and I like to make things a little challenging.

Hence, the modifications for the garage sliding shelves.

The shelf slides were going to bear the load of the garage shelves, so it was not necessary to run as many 6 ft planks as the top shelf (which was just a static shelf with no slides). Three connecting pieces per row was sufficient.

Next, I needed structures to attach the slides to. I came up with the design below:

Building Sliding Garage Storage Shelves Notice the 4 slide supports on each row (one on each end and two in the middle). In between each pair of slide supports was going to be the actual sliding shelves.

At this point in the project, it was time to secure the structure to the garage wall. If I proceeded any further with construction, the DIY shelving unit would be too heavy for me to carry (not that it wasn’t already really heavy).

Also, there was just enough room for me to squeeze in between the 2 x 4s to get to back to bolt the structure to the wall studs.

Next, I wedged myself in the middle of garage shelving unit, picked it up like superman, and inched my way over to the wall. I used some lag bolts to secure the shelves to the studs.

Constructing the Storage Shelves

After that, I had to build the actual sliding storage shelves. Here is my design for each sliding shelf:

Building Garage Storage Shelves that Slide

During construction of the garage shelves, I did add an elevated piece to the back of each shelf. I didn’t want items falling off the back as I pulled the shelf forward.

First, I installed the slides on each slide support. Then, using ¼” scrap wood as shims, I elevated each shelf and secured them to the slides.

With the sliding shelves installed, the garage shelf project was pretty much complete. Last, I just had to install some gate handles for each shelf to be able to pull them out easily.

How to Build Storage Shelves for the Garage in One Weekend

Although, I did make a last-minute design decision though – I omitted the bottom row of sliding shelves and replaced it with a static shelf (like the very top one).

I realized that some of my tools (like my miter saw) didn’t have enough clearance to fit on the DIY sliding shelf.

Consequently, I settled for just 2 rows of sliding shelves, which was still plenty of awesomeness.

I took the pictures below of the completed DIY garage storage shelves:

Here you will notice the shelves’ height in comparison to the fridge.

There is also enough space to pull a car into the garage too – with about a foot to spare.

However, I was a little worried about bumping into the garage shelf with the car, so I got a cheap parking sensor to help (it turns from green to yellow to red as you get within a foot of the sensor).

Bonus Storage Shelving

After I finished the garage shelves, I had an extra 2 x 4 leftover. Still in a shelf-frenzy mood, I turned those into some normal shelves on the wall.

To the left of the sliding shelf structure was a hideous area begging for some DIY garage organization, and a prime target for a storage solution:

Creating More Garage Storage - Sliding and Floating Shelves Using some shelf brackets, I bought a while ago, I threw together a simple shelf for the garage with the leftovers from the main project.

Below is what I turned the above disaster into – see shelf at the top of the picture.

Using the Sliding Storage Shelves

The sliding storage shelves truly transformed a disorganized corner. We gained a ton of lost space through building the shelf tower.

Storage-wise, the garage shelves hold more than we could have imagined – most of the boxes of holiday decorations (Eileen loves that she can easily access these), tool boxes, and large tools such as the miter saw.

Underneath the storage shelves, I store the shop vac, jaw horse, and snow blower. It’s the perfect height.

Pleased with the outcome of my DIY garage organization, I found building the shelving unit one of the most fun and creative projects I’ve worked on recently.

I also completely impressed Eileen with doing the whole project in one weekend – that was the best part. She was also thrilled that the cost was less than $200.

If your garage is getting out of control and you have underutilized space, you should definitely think about building these sliding garage storage shelves.

The design worked beautifully, and you can’t beat the turnaround time and low-cost..

With phase 1 of “Project DIY Garage Organization” was now complete. Phase 2 of the garage construction is coming this summer – a dream workbench with fancy storage solutions.

How to Throw an Amazing Beatles Theme Party

March 18, 2016 by Eileen 38 Comments

I love planning a good theme party. I’m not quite sure whether it’s the cute things you get to create, the endless possibilities you have, or the way your vision all comes together for one special day.

A really great theme party is like having a living Pinterest board.

We decided to throw a 64th Beatles party for my dad based on the song “When I’m 64.” He loves the Beatles, and my sisters and I thought it would be a pretty cool theme to work with. We loved coming up with all of these DIY Beatles party ideas.

“When I’m 64” Photo Collage

Below is a collage my sister PK made with pictures of my dad through the years, with the song title “Glad All Over” hanging above.

Also, for more Beatles party decorations, we used old records hanging from the ceiling.

Beatles Song Signs

As far as my tasks, I began with the most time-consuming one, which was making the song banners – it was one of the best DIY Beatles party ideas, as it turned out awesome!

We picked out 20 Beatles songs – mostly Dad’s favorites, and cut out the individual letters so we could make these signs.

I used a pack of pre-cut letters from the dollar store, and I traced the letters I needed on yellow and blue paper. I used regular blue construction paper and a thicker yellow paper. Both worked fine.

Then I cut each letter out. I used an exacto knife for the holes in the Os, Ds, As, etc.

Once completed, I flipped the letters over and hot glued fishing wire to the back so that you couldn’t see the string in the trees.

We hung them in the house and outside. They looked especially cool hanging from the trees.

The songs we used were When I’m 64, You Say It’s Your Birthday, All My Loving, All Together Now, Come Together, Eight Days a Week, From Us to You, Glad All Over, Good Day Sunshine, Here Comes the Sun, I Want to Hold Your Hand, Johnny B. Goode, Love Me Do, Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da, Twist and Shout, With a Little Help from My Friends, and You’ve Really Got a Hold On Me.

For another DIY Beatles part idea, I also cut out food banners based on song titles. Above the appetizer table, we hung “Come and Get it” and above the lunch table, we hung “Can’t Buy Me Lunch.”

The dessert table was coined “The Magical Pastry Tour,” and the drinks station was labeled “Fuel on the Hill.”

Food Labels using Beatles Songs

Hands down, my favorite of the DIY Beatles party ideas was creating themed labels for all of the food.

We altered song titles to make a creative label for each food item.

My dad helped us come up with the wording – and both of my parents were getting a kick out of how funny we found some of the names.

I still laugh when I read “I Want to Hold Your Ham.”

Pictured above are most of the food labels.

To make them, I dragged the Beatles picture into Photoshop and then added the name of the dish in a cool font. I love finding awesome fonts.

You could also use a basic program like Paint to create them too.

Listed below is the full menu we served at the Beatles party, along with the song title food labels. I hope it gives you some great Beatles inspiration 🙂

Lunch – Can’t Buy Me Lunch

Meatballs/Rolls – While My Meatball Gently Weeps

Mac and Cheese – Get Back Mac

Grilled Ham – I Want To Hold Your Ham

Pineapple and Hawaiian Rolls – Here Comes the Bun

Fruit Salad – Strawberry Fields Forever

Baked Beans – Let It Bean

Potato Salad – The Salad of John and Yoko

Slice and peel potatoes – All You Need Is Spuds

Green Salad – Lettuce Be

Irish Soda Bread – Hello, Good-bread

Hot Dogs (for kids) – Hot Dogs and Mean Mr. Mustard

Condiments

Hot Sauce – Do You Want To Know a Secret Sauce?

Butter – Help, I Need Some Butter

Appetizers- Come and Get it

Veggies & Onion Dip – Golden Cucumbers & Glass Onion Dip

Mini hot dogs – Piggies (in a Blanket)

Cheese, crackers, pepperoni – I Should Have Known Cheddar

Cream Cheese Pinwheels – Cheese Cheese Me

Dessert – The Magical Pastry Tour

Cake – P.S. I Love Cake

Butterscotch/Cut-Out Cookies – Cook-ie in the House

Blueberry Bundt Cake – Til There Was Blue-berry

Snickerdoodles – Yellow Submar-doodles

Dixie Cups/Chocolate Syrup (for kids) – Here Comes the Sun-Dae

Apple Tarts – Apple Record Tarts

Drinks- The Fuel on the Hill

Beer – Can’t Buy Me Bud

Wine – I Feel Wine

Sodas (Pepsi, Dr. Pepper) – Pepsi Lane & Sergeant Doctor Pepper

Juice – Hey Juice

DIY Beatles Party Hats

In addition to the other Beatles party decor, I also made these Beatles party hats. I figured they were cheaper to make, and I could personalize them.

We used the names of the four Beatles – John, Ringo, George, and Paul. My dad’s name is John, which added to the creativity.

We also had a cousin George coming – and he loved his hat shout-out too.

To make the DIY party hats, I used a free template I found online and purchased scrapbook paper. I did a bunch of test prints (on regular paper) until I got the words lined up right.

Then, I printed on the scrapbook paper. After printing, I hot glued elastic (you can get rolls of this at craft stores) to the insides.

Next, I used our own heads to get a good feel for how long of an elastic to use. Apparently, the hats worked for dogs too.

The Best of our DIY Beatles Party Ideas

The highlight of the Beatles party was this amazing, almost life-size, face cut-out board of the Beatles, created by my sister Bridget.

She collected the different paint colors from around the house and garage, and then drew, painted, and outlined.

As far as the face cut-out board, we bought a 4×8 from Home Depot and had it cut in half at the store – for the convenience of it fitting in the car and also for the convenience of storage later on.

Then, we connected the two pieces with hinges.

It turned out amazing! So amazing that we had to do a dog pic!

Abbey Road Photos

And last but not least, a Beatles party would not be complete without an Abbey Road replication.

We used the patio (and had to use inverse colors –but nonetheless, the point was made) for this fun little scene.

Overall, it was a fantastic party filled with tons of DIY Beatles party ideas!

My dad had a very happy 64th birthday, our guests loved all the little details of our DIY Beatles party decor, and we had a great time putting everything together for the Beatles party.

How to Make Storage Bins from Cardboard Boxes

February 4, 2016 by Eileen 108 Comments

Before our baby was born, we spent a lot of time putting together the nursery. We painted cute gray stripes, decorated with a cute theme, and ordered the best furniture for our budget.

We found a great changing table with open shelving, so I was planning to buy storage bins to fit all the little things you need under the changing table.

However, I ran into a snag. I realized that I could only fit two store-bought fabric storage bins on each shelf. It awkwardly left a lot of open space, but three storage bins just didn’t fit across.

On top of that, there weren’t many colors to choose from on the store-bought fabric storage bins.

Since I was 7 months pregnant with my first and was pretty bored, I decided to make my own DIY storage bins. I tried using fabric from the curtains, but that was a fabric/hot glue mess.

So, I found a much simpler way – making DIY storage bins using contact paper and cardboard boxes! I can’t emphasize how easy it was! It’s definitely fool-proof.

Here is the end result – these customized storage boxes are made out of just contact paper, cardboard boxes, and packing tape! Not bad, huh?

The contact paper on the DIY storage bins easily allowed me to customize the bins in colors of my choice, rather than being tied to store-bought colored storage bins.

How to Make Storage Bins from Cardboard Boxes

I cannot tell you just how much I love these homemade storage bins. The customized storage boxes are so easy to make and you would never know that the base is made from a cardboard box!

You just need a little time and patience and a few easy supplies to make these DIY storage bins.

You can pick out different colored, patterned, or textured contact paper, which brings character to your space.

When making your own DIY storage bins, for just a few dollars per box, you get lots of storage and a pattern of your choice.

DIY Storage Bin Materials

Cardboard boxes
Packing tape
Knobs
Contact paper(s) of your choice

To make these cardboard storage boxes, I ordered a bundle of boxes from Amazon, since we didn’t have any laying around. (Have I mentioned how much I love Amazon prime?!) We were planning to move soon, so we would use the rest of the cardboard boxes then. However, if you have little ones already, diaper boxes and wipes boxes work really well for these cardboard storage boxes.

I also ordered three types of contact paper for the storage bins. The baby’s room was going to be gray and turquoise (gray walls, one striped with a lighter gray, turquoise carpet, and white furniture – check out our nursery makeover).

So, I found a cute, high-quality turquoise patterned paper and a gray one on Amazon. I figured I would alternate colors on the customized storage boxes.

For the inside, I used a less expensive, thinner paper in a neural color from Target. You don’t have to cover the inside, but it is nice to have a storage bin where you can easily wipe the inside.

Instructions for Making Customized Storage Bins

To make DIY storage bins, first measure the area where you want to put your customized boxes. Make sure they will fit length, width, and height-wise. I had to cut a little bit off the top of my cardboard boxes to make them fit.

Next, cut the flaps off of the cardboard boxes. You could use these as dividers, if you’d like 🙂 Use a good pair of scissors or a box cutter if you are cutting your cardboard box.

Now you are ready to cover your DIY storage bin with contact paper. Cover the outer four sides of the cardboard box with contact paper. Pay attention to patterns, if you want everything lined up nicely. Some patterns are easier to work with than others.

I didn’t cover the bottom of the cardboard box with contact paper, so this is what the bottom of the homemade storage bin looks like.

Also, you might need to tape the bottom or inside edges of the contact paper down, depending on the quality of your paper. If you want your customized storage boxes to last, I would get good quality paper, like this one.

Next, if you plan to cover the inside of your DIY storage box with contact paper, you can do that now. Since I was making this batch of customized storage bins for my son’s nursery, I wanted the inside of the box to be nicely covered, so I could easily clean it.

Later on, I made more cardboard storage boxes for various things, like paper storage, and I didn’t cover the insides – so it’s up to you!

Adding Knobs to the DIY Storage Bins

Now, ready for the best part?

This really makes your DIY storage bins look store-bought and makes them super functional.

After I was finished covering the inside and outside of the customized boxes, I was ready to add the knob to the cardboard storage box. The knobs made the storage bins look professionally made and made the bins easy to quickly grab.

I picked the knobs up from Home Depot – they were inexpensive white knobs. Yet, the screw was too long – so I simply swapped the large screws out for the short ones. (Below is the knob, washer, and short screw).

I drilled one hole in the front of each DIY storage box. Then, I added simple, white knobs, so I could easily pull customized bins in and out.

Here’s a picture of what the inside of the DIY storage box looked like, after adding the knob.

I definitely recommend using these knobs for the cardboard storage boxes because they made it so easy to pull out each homemade storage bin.

Later, I made more customized storage bins – for closet storage (winter hats, gloves, etc) and for Ash’s office. I used knobs on all of them and it was so much easier to grab a knob from the top shelf of a closet, then a whole bin.

For less than $5 per box, I had functional customized storage bins that I LOVED.

Time and Cost of Making DIY Storage Bins

The total cost of making customized storage boxes is really just the amount you spend on contact paper and knobs. I made my storage boxes for less than $5 per box.

I was so pleased with cardboard storage boxes that I used the leftover materials for winter storage bins and pantry floor bins. I also used chalkboard contact paper to make paper storage boxes for Ash’s messy office closet. They were fun because you can write on the contact paper with chalk, which makes for easy labeling.

These DIY storage bins are so pretty that you can put them anywhere in your house, leaving your guests wondering just how you made storage bins from cardboard boxes.

Overall, this was one of my favorite thrifty DIY projects – it’s hard to believe that underneath the customized storage bins is a simple cardboard box.

Updated: How did the storage bins hold up?

The customized storage bins have held up great. Three years later, these nursery storage bins still are in tact. In fact, I just tightened the knobs yesterday for the first time. The contact paper has remained on perfectly too.

And, I should mention, these bins get a lot of use!

Three years of pulling the diaper bins out multiple times per day!

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Crafty Endeavors

Collecting Materials for the Gift Box

Putting the Ice Cream Sundae Box Together

Materials for Making Greeting Cards from Toddlers

Making Cards with Toddlers

Using Patterned Scrapbook Paper for Toddler Cards

Birthday Shapes

Adding Embellishments

A Personal Touch

How to Play this Fun Bridal Shower Game

The Hilarious Details

Ready to start making Mustaches and Tiaras?

Materials

Making the Tiaras and Mustaches

Getting the Couple’s Game Questions Ready

Download the Wedding Wine Basket Tags

Making the Wine Basket Tags

Choosing the Wines for the Wedding Basket

Putting the Basket Together

Wedding Wine Basket Bliss

Determining a Space for the Sliding Storage Shelves

Garage Storage Shelf Requirements

FREE STORAGE SHELVES PRINTABLE!

Preparing Space for the Garage Storage Shelves

Building the Shelf Supports

Adjusting for Sliding Garage Shelves

Constructing the Storage Shelves

Bonus Storage Shelving

Using the Sliding Storage Shelves

“When I’m 64” Photo Collage

Beatles Song Signs

Food Labels using Beatles Songs

DIY Beatles Party Hats

The Best of our DIY Beatles Party Ideas

Abbey Road Photos

How to Make Storage Bins from Cardboard Boxes

DIY Storage Bin Materials

Instructions for Making Customized Storage Bins

Adding Knobs to the DIY Storage Bins

Time and Cost of Making DIY Storage Bins

Updated: How did the storage bins hold up?