Create IT GO - A kaleidoscope of ideas

Creative Way to give Money as a Gift {DIY Money French Fries}

June 15, 2015 by createitgo Leave a Comment

Are you still looking for a fun and quick gift? Want something different? Well, I have the perfect little idea for you! And it’s so fun and simple to put together!

Just run to your local McDonald’s,or any other place you want where you can pick up a fry box. (I bought a thing of fries and also asked for an extra box.) You can also pick up a gift card to go along with it if you want. I also asked for an extra bag to use as I gave the gift away in.
Then, go grab some cash. You want lots of bills, so if you are going to give $20, you may want to get 20 $1 bills. OR if you are giving $50 or $100, you may want to split it up into something like 10 $1 bills, a few fives and a couple of tens or twenties…or something like that.
Then all you need to do is to fold your dollar bills to look the same size and shape as french fries.
I figure out how tall I want my fries to be according to the fry box.
1. I fold the top of the dollar bill over first to that height. (And I vary the height I fold them all too, so it looks more realistic…well, it’s not going to ever look realistic. haha)

4. I open that last fold back up, and then fold one side into that center line.

5. Then I fold the other side into the center line as well.

And that’s it! Take the folded dollar bill and help shape it into a rectangular cube with the folds that you made.

Then I start placing them into the fry box.

It’s really so easy and doesn’t take much time at all. It’s creative and much more fun than just throwing some cash in an envelope.

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I love taking the whole thing and throwing it in a bag from the store where your fry box is from. That way when you give it to them, it just looks like you picked up a bag of fast food for them. It’s pretty funny when you go to give them their gift and their face is like, “Oh! You’re giving my McDonalds? Umm…ok…thanks.” lol
OR you can just grab a fun little bag to wrap it up in…like this one with the cellophane front that we threw one more dollar in behind the cello.

I love adding a thing of real fries in the bag too OR a gift card for birthdays, or almost any occasion! The gift card is great for graduates, to have something on hand for them when they go off to college.

What’s the most fun way that you have ever received or given money gifts? There are so many ideas out there. I’d love to hear from you!

Thankss Createitgo

Some People Are Worth Melting For (Frozen Inspired) Ornament

December 15, 2014 by createitgo Leave a Comment

I don’t know about your house, but mine is STILL humming with Frozen songs. And Olaf seems to be even bigger (if that is possible!) in our house ever since we made that adorable Olaf costume for my daughter for Halloween (seen here). Then the Olaf Inspired mug came along and, so of course, we needed to add an ornament to our Olaf filled house for this winter season!

I love my Silhouette! Have I said that before? I love my SIL!!!

And I have enjoyed being part of the Silhouette FB challenge group so much this year as well. Today I’m sharing my holiday post as part of that group and it’s soooo much fun! Plus, I’ve got a surprise for you at the end of the post!

For this Frozen Olaf Inspired Floating ornament, I actually used the same image that I created for the Olaf Inspired mug shown below and posted here,

but I made it smaller and placed it on a transparency shaped ornament (like shown in this tutorial on ornament inserts I did here), and placed into a plastic ornament bulb. (Had to do plastic on this one, bc little hands will not be able to stay away from this ornament! Luckily, Hobby Lobby has these year round, and I love that you can’t even tell that they are plastic!)

Then I added a little strip of paper and printed “Some people are worth melting for…” and hung it along side the ornament with some baker’s twine.

So easy and so fun!

If you’re interested in learning HOW I created this cut file by myself, read on!

I started with the eyes and just created a solid circle and then another circle around the eyes. The outer circle, I created one circle a bit smaller than the first, then right clicked on it, and hit Make Compund path. That’s your eyes. Next for the nose, I just drew a triangular like circle using the tool to make a curved shape. (Looks like an hourglass symbol on your drawing tools.) The mouth, I just drew with lots of points as I made it, to make it more manipulative and the same for the eyebrows. It really was pretty simple. Just play around with your drawing tools some, and you’ll get the hang of it!

Want to Check Out More Silhouette Projects?

My Silhouette Challenge buddies and I are all sharing projects on our blogs today, so peruse the projects below for a wealth of Silhouette inspiration!

Meet This Mormon

October 15, 2014 by createitgo Leave a Comment

I’m excited to be part of this huge group of bloggers today!

We belong to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints otherwise known as “The Mormons”. We are proud of this part of who we are! We are excited to team up with over 65+ of us strong… to extend an invitation to see a film. A film entitled “Meet The Mormons”. This film is not meant to be an “in your face” – you must join our church film. It is simply designed and produced to uplift and inspire you through six stories of those of our faith who have followed promptings to follow Christ more fully in their lives. We hope you take the opportunity to enjoy this film. We hope your hearts are made light as you feel the goodness that comes from following our Christ and Savior. All proceeds from the film will be donated to The American Red Cross. So not only will you be uplifted and inspired, your money will be going to an amazing charity!! We also would like to take a moment and share our personal testimonies, stories of our own personal conversions, and our own stories of how following our Savior, Jesus Christ has changed our lives. The light of the gospel of Jesus Christ offers a joy and hope that only following him can provide. We hope as you click through and read our stories and testimonies of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, you will feel uplifted and encouraged. We are by you! We love connecting with our readers, that is why many of us do what we do! Please be kind and considerate in your comments. It takes great bravery for us to open our hearts and our mouths to share with you such a tender and personal part of who we are. We share because we feel strongly the need to share the peace and the hope that is the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

What an amazing group of talented, funny, witty, courageous, and uplifting bloggers! And what do we all have in common. Our faith.
I want to share a little bit about myself and my family and our beliefs in our Savior, Jesus Christ with you today. Again, this isn’t always easy and is something that means the world to me. I truly believe that there is beauty in agency and in differences. I respect other’s choice of their beliefs, even when they differ from mine. We can all learn from each other. I ask that you be respectful of mine as well.
#MeetthisMormonI grew up in Idaho mainly, until high school when my family moved to Texas. I grew up in an active LDS family (LDS means Latter Day Saint or belonging to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints). My parents were always very busy helping in church, and with 7 children, you can imagine how our home was. Busy? Yes. Full? Yes. But also full of love and full of the Spirit of Christ and teachings of him. My home/family and my faith/church, I learned, were the two things that were constant in my life. And I came to truly appreciate those even more when we moved (when I was in high school).
About that time. I learned more about my true personal relationship with my Savior, Jesus Christ. I learned and gained a testimony of my own, through my own study and prayer, and as I did, my faith increased. I know that Joseph Smith truly did see God the Father and his Son, Jesus Christ. I studied and learned from the Bible AND the Book of Mormon each year. I know that there is life after death; that we CAN see and live with our loved ones again. I gained a testimony of the way our church is set up…the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) has set up the church today to follow how Jesus Christ set it up when he was live on the Earth. We have a modern day prophet and 12 apostles. I know that they are called of God and that they speak to us, the word of God. I learned that I could rely on the Lord, and that through His sacrifice FOR ME, and his atoning of MY sins, that I could be forgiven of my own shortcomings and weaknesses. I learned that I could talk to Him anytime I needed and that He would be there listening. I felt of His love and His spirit. Sometimes very strongly, other times, softly.
I now have my own family. I have a wonderful husband that serves in the youth program at church with the Young Men as well as being the Boy Scout Scoutmaster in the troop that is associated with our congregation. He is a wonderful example of trying to lead our home, the best he can, to being worthy to go back and live with our Father in Heaven someday. I have 5 children that have good hearts and righteous desires. They study and learn for themselves. They help and serve others around them. They deal with disappointments and trials as do we all, but they learn and become stronger from them. They want to be good and want to be happy. That is what the Lord wants for all of us as well.I was just thinking yesterday as I was driving home from how truly and deeply I love my children and feel sincerely blessed to be their mother and to have them in my life each day. I learn from them every day.

Do they make mistakes? Yep, you betcha! Do I? Yep! Certainly! Is our life perfect? No way. But I have come to realize…and treasure, that my relationship with each of my family members is what fills me up each day. We love the Lord, and we are thankful for all that we are given, and that is enough.
We would invite all of you to go to this movie coming out today in theaters “Meet the Mormons”. (You can find out which theaters it is playing in and watch the trailer here.) See what we are like, what we believe, destroy the stereotypical myths that there are about us. We are Christians, who love the Lord and want to do His will. I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me. Phillipians 4:13.
If you have any questions or want to know more about the “Mormons”, you can find more here as well. If you would like to receive a Book of Mormon, you can also request one there OR you can request one from me and my family will send you one with our personal testimonies in it. Hope you get out and get to enjoy the movie “Meet the Mormons”.#meetthismormon #meetthesemormons

DIY Sock Minion

February 15, 2014 by createitgo Leave a Comment

The FB Silhouette Challenge Group I recently joined challenged us to use fabric in our projects for February on our Silhouette machines, so this is what I came up with!

It’s Minion Madness in a Sock! I don’t know about your house, but in mine, minions are a huge hit…STILL! It doesn’t go away! Everyone loves them! I was thinking about a sock bunny I made as a child (like a sock monkey) and thought I could make it in a similar way and it would make a great minion too! And it did! It turned out adorable and so fun to play with for my kiddos!

Interested in making one yourself? I’m posting a tutorial with step by step instructions below on how to make your very own DIY Sock Minion, so keep reading!

PLUS…I’ve got even more for you today after the tutorial! 44 other projects that you can do with fabric and your Silhouette from the SIL Challenge Group!

Now for that tutorial…here are my step by step instructions as to how I made it. 🙂
First thing you’ll need to find is some yellow socks. I picked mine up at Academy. (Soccer or baseball ones would work great! The soccer ones are more thick, ribbed looking and the baseball a bit smoother…)

1-First thing is you want to decide the size of your minion and cut your sock. I used the long straight part for my minion. You can use the area from the toe to the heel, but I was afraid the toe would be shaped weird when stuffed, so I opted for the straight-away. (below)

The next part I used my Silhouette machine for, BUT if you don’t have one, you can just draw this out and cut it yourself without a machine.
I purchased some of the denim iron on patches to use for the overalls. (Since it is already stiff, there is no need to add interfacing when cutting on your SIL.) I placed it directly onto my mat.

I drew up the overalls and straps in my Silhouette program. At first I started with a design like this. I used simple rounded rectangles and welded them all together to look like overalls. (It’s long on the sides to go around the backside of the minion.)

You could do the above or…I then ended up changing it to this so that I had more options as to where the straps went on the minion. (The long rectangles were the straps now, so I could wrap them around better.)

I used my Silhouette machine to cut the fabric. This was my first attempt at cutting fabric on it. I was nervous! Don’t ask my why! lol I put the settings on canvas/heavy fabric. I ended up double cutting it and checked the ends to make sure they actually cut before I took it out of the machine…just in case I had to cut it again, but I didn’t. A double cut worked perfect!

So, this is what you should have at this point:

Then I cut a little square cardboard to go inside my sock that stretched it a bit to allow for the stuffing that would stretch it later. I ironed on the main part of the overalls.

Then added the straps. (I circled one part of the straps at the bottom of the pic below to show you I also ended up cutting a little niche in the straps to get it to lay flat as it came around the side of the minion.) Then I started adding my stuffing.

Okay, you are ready to grab a needle and thread now. You want to go in and out all the way around each end of the minion like shown in the pics below.

After you go all the way around with your needle and thread, you pull it and cinch it all together tightly.

And lastly to finish the main part of the minion and to close him up, you hold it cinched together tight as you stitch back and forth straight across from different directions to keep that cinch shut tight and tie a knot.

Congratulations! You have finished the body of your minion!
Next, you are ready for all the accessories that make him so fun!I grabbed three blue buttons, two smaller for the tabs on the overalls and another for his belt buckle. I used vinyl and just cut a tiny diamond by hand and punched a tiny hole in the middle and then cut a tad out to look like a “G” for “Gru. I then cut out a tiny pocket shaped out of the scraps of denim left over from the patch and applied the vinyl to the belt buckle button and hot glued it on together.

The smaller buttons at the end of his straps on his overalls, I sewed thread through first and then hot glued them on.

I used two washer and two googly eyes for his eyes and some black ribbon to go around him for his goggle straps. Hot glued those all on too.
His mouth I probably struggled with the most. I debated on felt, but couldn’t get it to look right, so I ended up using a muted reddish orange color (so it didn’t stand out too much, but could still be seen) and stitched a funny little crooked smile on. I stitched across him one way and then came back the other way to fill in the gaps.

I didn’t have any black yarn (although that would work even better I think), but used black embroidery thread to make his hair. I just sewed random little black pieces of hair all over the top of his head. You can also do it long and combed like some had or crazy sticking up! 🙂

Looks like he’s got his arms tucked in too! haha

And there you have your sock minion! I love him! And my kids fight over who gets to sleep with him. As an afterthought, you could put rice or beans in the bottom of him to help him stand better or to be able to use as a bean bag. Just don’t let him get wet! haha

I love how his eyes seem to follow me everywhere! Too fun!

And now…