I am a fairly crafty person, and thanks to Pinterest, MarthaStewart.com, multiple Google searches, and many, many others, it's pretty easy. I do not pretend that all of these ideas are my own, but I usually do tweak them. I will post free printables and patterns of things that I make from time to time. I am not a super inventive person, and I am no graphic designer by any means, but I do try to make cute things that I can use for cards, dresses, etc. So, please check back on my Freebies page for cute things you can use too!
Speaking of crafting, back to school season inspires me to create and craft like crazy! The sales on the school supplies make for endless ideas! Usually I just sit there watching the adorably funny Target commercials and think about all the neat little things I could make. This year I have a kindergartener (my oldest, -sigh) and now I get to make crafty things for his teacher (and hopefully others who like what I make).
The first of the crafty ideas is back to school pictures. Since Riley is our first kindergartener, and we wanted to make the day as special and fun for him as possible, we chose to have a little fun with our back to school pictures.
My goal as a mom of a school aged child is to make breakfast every morning. That may not always work out, and sometimes it might just be cereal, but it's a fun time for us to talk and get the morning off to a good start. I chose to make him pancakes for his first day of school. I have friends who can make Mickey Mouse pancakes like a breeze, I've tried and they always end up looking a bit odd. But I tried making this K pancake to celebrate his first day, and he got a kick out of having a K for his breakfast. (Note to all who try this, a ketchup squirt bottle would probably be easiest. I tried just pouring it from the mixing bowl, and it took several burned pancakes and odd looking letters before I got this one right. Hind sight is 20/20!!)
Inspired by a couple of pictures on Pinterest we chose to take several pics, just to have a little fun with it. (My kids have not yet learned that their mom is the paparazzi and they still enjoy taking lots of pictures for me.)
We decided to take a pic of him holding a sign, that I made and put the date on it, for his first posing pic.
As you can see my little R-man was very happy to be posing, as he usually is.
The next pic we used a book that he got from Dolly Parton's Imagination Library. (This is a wonderful program for kids in Tennessee. You just go to www.imaginationlibrary.com and register your newborn child and they get a free book every month for the first five years of their life. If you live in Tennessee, you HAVE to do this! My kids look forward to it every month. Now that R-man is 5 he is a little sad that brothers and sister get books and he doesn't. I am going to attempt to keep this up for him using the book fairs, and Barnes and Noble cheap book stacks. We'll see how that goes. Ha ha!)
The rest of the pics are just fun poses we thought we'd do, and since R-man is a camera hog, it was pretty fun!
(I got my foot in the pic, but I cropped it out for my Facebook posts.)
I saw our shadows walking in to school that first day, and I just couldn't resist taking a pic!
A little pic of us together before he ran off to play with puzzles and wave good-bye. It kinda broke my heart that he wasn't a little sad when I left. But, he's a big boy now, and he is very brave.
Last but not least, little brother was a little sad that Riley was gone that first day, and he was very happy to have his big brother back home that afternoon. So, while taking Jude's two month pics my sister had the cute idea of putting him in Riley's backpack. Thankfully Riley was a good sport and held up his chunky little brother long enough to get this great pic!
That's all for now, I'll be back soon with more back to school and other crafty ideas!
