I’ll share up front that if I can ever locate the original set again, I’ll be happy to send visitors back their way. But for now, here’s the new alphabet!

Since we have had printable bubble letters for over four years now, our readers have used them for so many projects – lots of students use them in their school projects for presentations and banners. Others use them as embroidery patterns, or even as sewing patterns for alphabet initial pillows. You could also use them for any crafts you want to personalize with someone’s name, or use a projector to trace the letters onto a wall or piece of furniture to paint words in a mural. Got any more ideas? Leave them in the comments below!!

Chicken Alternate Variety: you can swap out the steak for chicken and prepare it the exact same way for chicken tacos, which are also phenomenal.

Our family original steak tacos recipe!

Taco Filling Ingredients:

• A 1 pound flat-iron steak with taco seasoning (recipe below)
• 10-12 oz grated cheddar cheese
• Diced tomatoes
• Shredded lettuce
• Optional: taco sauce and sour cream (technically NOT optional at all in our family, but maybe in yours!)

We’ve tried nearly every cut of meat on the planet for this recipe, and a flat iron steak is by far the best, tastiest option. It is slightly tougher than a regular cut of steak, but the flavor is hard to beat, and since you cut it up into tiny pieces anyway, the toughness is a non-issue. It’s also known as the butlers’ steak in the UK and oyster blade steak down under.

Taco Seasoning Ingredients:

I make this in big batches and keep in handy in a mason jar – it’s like a beautifully better version of the taco seasoning packets you can buy in the store. Bonus points: it’s economical, too! So these amounts will make far more than necessary for this particular recipe, but you can also use it in soups, chili, or other Mexican-inspired dishes:

• 4 Tbsp chili powder
• 3.5 Tbsp paprika
• 3 Tbsp cumin
• 2 Tbsp oregano
• 1.5 Tbsp garlic powder
• 1.5 Tbsp onion salt
• 1 Tbsp onion powder
• 1 tsp ground celery
• 1 Tbsp flour or corn starch
• Pinch of cayenne pepper (or more to taste)

Taco Prep Instructions:

I start prepping the meal with the tortillas because they take the longest.

Now roll out the dough into tortilla rounds. My system:

1. Preheat my nonstick frying pan (no oil necessary) on medium heat
2. Roll out my first tortilla with a rolling pin
3. Place it into the frying pan
4. Roll out my second tortilla – which is just about the perfect time to…
5. Go back and flip the first tortilla in the pan
   (so you know, flip it to the other side when the dough starts to bubble)
6.  The second side cooks faster than the first, so cook the second side for about 60 seconds
7. Place it into a tortilla warmer or a serving bowl and wrap it with a clean, dry towel
8. Put the second tortilla into the frying pan
9. Roll out the third tortilla…
10. Repeat as necessary until they are all done!

I usually try to get my husband to start cooking the steak on the grill right as I start cooking the tortillas, because the timing of having it all done at the same time works out pretty well. But if you’re doing it all yourself, go ahead and throw the meat onto the grill or broiler about now. You’ll have to pay close attention to flip the meat and flip the tortillas so that nothing burns – which is why it’s good to have someone else cook the meat.  Here’s how you do it:

Cook the steak for 3-4 minutes a side until you’ve reached the desired doneness.  Just check it frequently with a meat thermometer or by cutting slightly into the thickest part of the meat to make sure it’s cooked to your liking. What I like about the flat iron steak is that they tend to have varying thickness, so that I can get my nice medium cooked ends while my husband can get his super-rare part from the middle.

Allow the meat to rest for at least 5 minutes before slicing it across the grain, then chopping up the slices into small cubes. You might want to add a little more of the taco seasoning at this point for additional flavor.

To serve: give everyone a tortilla, and let them fill it up however they want. Fold in half, take a bite, let your eyes roll back into your head, and enjoy!

If you were a fairy, wouldn't you want to hang out in this garden?

My mom recently came to visit, and I really wanted her and my four-year-old to get a chance to make a fairy garden.  It was something I’d been wanting to make myself for a long time but just kept not quite getting to.  I figured that having the two of them make their fairy garden together would not only be fun, but it would give my little girl something to remember her grandma by between visits.  They had a great time, and my little one likes to climb up into the window to look at it and play with it.

Here’s another Craft Jr. project for your fairy garden – make tiny fairy houses, too!

What You Need to Make a Fairy Garden

• Large container
• Potting soil
• Small plants (we picked some that looked like minature trees and shrubs)
• Doll house accessories
• Aquarium gravel

Fairy Garden Craft Supplies

Once you've put your soil into your fairy garden container, choose some of your larger plants and furniture as "anchor points" for your design. We wanted ours to be a park.

Next, add in our secondary plants and pieces and make sure everything that needs to be is planted in the soil.

Add potting soil to cover the plants' roots and raise the level of your fairy garden to near the top of your container.

Use colored aquarium gravel to cover the soil and give your fairy garden a finished look. This reddish gravel looked just like a miniature version of the lava rock you would find in a park. We also used black and white to make a path through the park.

If your container is large enough, you can make different scenes in your fairy garden. Here is our park bench scene.

Here's a little gardening scene within our fairy garden.

Snowflake Art Project for Kids

All the credit for this cool snowflake craft idea goes to the author of Ten Kids and a Dog.  I saw it and just knew we had to try it with some canvases we had that didn’t get used for their original purpose.  We made four of them altogether.  Three of them (one by each of the big girls, and one by me) will be a Christmas present for my mom.  On the fourth, we added quotes from my daughter about why she loves her teacher.

What You Need to Make a Snowflake on Canvas

• Stretched canvas
• Tape
• Paint
• Paintbrush
• Marker (optional)

Lay the canvas down and use the tape to make a snowflake pattern like the one in the picture. It's basically an X with an extra horizontal stripe through the middle. Then add small pieces of tape at the corners.

We ran out of clear tape part way through the project and decided to try to make a snowflake with painter's tape. As you'll see below, it had a different look when it was finished.

Pick some nice winter colors. We went with three shades of blue and one light gray. The kids can then just paint however they want all over the canvas and tape.

It's so easy that it even makes a good toddler craft!

Once the canvas is dry, remove the tape, and you will have an awesome snowflake pattern left behind. (The one on the left is the one that had the painter's tape.)

As a teacher gift, we added "Why I Love Ms. Anne" along with several quotes from my daughter!

When writers talk about "autumn's splendor," this is what they are describing.

The autumn leaves here in our neighborhood have been nothing short of spectacular.  Really.  This one tree alone had green, yellow, gold, magenta, burgandy, red, and probably some colors I don’t even know names for.  It was the inspiration for this craft.

I’ve made a version of this in the past, and I put WAY too much work into it.  This version probably took 30 minutes, and that includes gathering the leaves at the local park.

DIY Fall Leaf Wreath Craft

What you need to make a fresh autumn leaf wreath:

• Leaves
• Wire*
• Wire cutters
• Embroidery hoop

This craft cost approximately $2.00 because the supplies were so simple.

Pick out your leaves.  I took my wire right to the park and just put together bundles of five leaves at a time.

Stack five leaves on top of each other and wrap with a short piece of wire.

Lay the leaf bundles around the embroidery hoop, overlapping each bundle and coiling the wire around each bunch to affix it to the embroidery hoop.

The back of your autumn leaf wreath will look like this as you work your way around it.

This is what the leaf wreath looks for fresh. As it dries, the leaves curl up. It's a totally different look but also beautiful.

*Frugal tip:  Instead of floral wire, I used “trip wire.”  It was way easier to work with, and hubby picked it up for $0.99 at the army surplus store. Alternatively, the Dollar Store also has floral wire that will work for this project.

What I Learned the Hard Way:  Sometimes I overcomplicate things.  The last time I did this project, it required an entire room and three days as I pressed and dried the leaves and wired them to a huge wreath frame.  You know what, this one is just as beautiful.  Also, if you hang it outside in the autumn/winter, it will likely not dry out as quickly.

Aren't you just freaking out right about now?!

I’m sort of in love with Nutella, so you can bet that when I came across this recipe, I was all over it!  My four-year-old and I made these during her little sister’s nap the other afternoon.  Yummy stuff.

What You Need to Make Nutella Cookies

• 1 cup Nutella
• 1 cup flour
• 1 egg
• 1/2 cup sugar

Seriously, you don't need the sugar!

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and put your Nutella, egg, and flour in a mixing bowl.

The Nutella cookie ingredients never really got to the point of being like dough. Instead, after running them through the mixer for about a minute, it was more like a shortbread dough.

Roll the Nutella dough into 1" balls, place on a cookie sheet, and flatten. Each of our batches made about 30 cookies.

 

Bake your Nutella cookies for about 8 minutes. They come out looking a lot like ginger snaps but are softer.

What I Learned the Hard Way: The selflessness of motherhood apparently extends to letting someone else lick the Nutella off the spatula…

Mmm, Nutella.

Oh, heavenly summer…when fruit is fresh and much of it is local! Here’s an easy-peasy idea, perfect for summer parties and/or a fun activity with the wee ones in your life! BONUS: they’ll be so excited to eat the rainbow!

How to make a rainbow fruit platter

For my rainbow, I used strawberries, peaches, pineapple, kiwi, grapes, blueberries & blackberries. For the clouds, I used some small marshmallows we had on hand that were pastel… mini white marshmallows would be ideal :)

In the spirit of full disclosure, I’ll admit that we didn’t just eat the fruit, NOPE… FIRST WE DIPPED IT IN CHOCOLATE! It was the dessert for a 3-year-olds rainbow birthday party… lest you think I’m a rotten mom for not serving cake, check-out the rainbow cake I made for her pre-birthday party (don’t ask…sometimes birthdays get out of hand…can I get a “heck yeah”).

Sunflower Headband Craft

My four-year-old is really into dresses and long hair.  She loves the floral headbands that are so in style right now, so we decided to make on one our own.  They’re pretty expensive in the mall, so we hit up the dollar store for some simple craft supplies.  It’s been a couple of weeks of almost daily wear, and she still loves it!  Not only that, but it was really quick and probably cost about a dollar to make.

Related Pages: Another Flower Headband Tutorial, Silk Flower Barrette Craft

What you need to make a flower headband:

• Headband
• Silk flowers
• Ribbon
• Hot glue
• Scissors

Craft and dollar store supplies to create a flower headband.

Glue the end of the ribbon to the inside of one end of the headband and wrap the ribbon around, adding a dab of hot glue about every inch to hold it in place.

Hot glue one or more silk flowers to the wrapped headband.

It works with smaller headbands, too. These were 7 for $1.00 at the dollar store, and we wrapped them with a pretty thin ribbon.

We put several flowers on this headband craft.

So fancy!

The right way to paint on the walls with your kids!

I may have mentioned that I’m kind of a Pinterest junkie.  A friend of mine introduced me to it several months ago, and one of the first things I ever re-pinned was an awesome decal she had found online.  I’ve long been wanting to put it on my own wall, but I thought it would be really cool to turn it into more of an arts and crafts project.  It was certainly a lot less expensive than buying the awesome original, but it did require some work on my part.  My painting ability is not compatible with my perfectionist tendencies, so this took longer than I would have expected.

Of course, another friend of mine saw what I had done and turned around and just drew one on her wall with a Sharpie in about 20 minutes, and it looked great.  Go figure.

What you need to paint a mouse hole on the wall:

• Black paint (we used acrylic)
• Two craft paintbrushes (I used one that was fairly wide and one that was very fine)
• Piece of paper to create a template

Draw the picture onto a piece of paper. You can hold it up to the wall to get just the right size for your molding or other space. (I'm loving the fact that everyone's favorite mouse apparently prefers bikini briefs.)

 

Cut out the template and tape it to the wall, tracing around the basic shape with a pencil. This will give you some guidelines to follow as you do the different pieces.

Cut the various shapes out of your paper and apply them one by one by taping them to the wall and tracing around them.

 

I'm pretty sure my kiddo thought we'd moved to Opposite World when she found out I was going to let her paint on the wall!

 

Once the hole was painted, we taped on the shading effect and traced around it with a thin black line.

I used clear tape around the shorts and along the edges of the clothesline pole to make my lines a little straighter. After painting, I removed the tape for a much crisper line than my shaky hand would allow me to make.

Totally stinking cute, right? Mine's not as perfect as the decal, but it also cost $0.59 to make!