Simply w/ love ~DIY ribbon bookmarks

I made these 'sweet simple ribbon bookmarks' for some of my most cherished people. ~ They did not cost very much time or money and they fit perfectly in an envelope but I made each of them with a specific person in mind. ~  

Ribbon is so accessible at the Bazars here, and fairly inexpensive to buy, so my 'use what you have' theme came in handy for me on these little gifts. :) 

Gifts the joy and the dilema.
This year I committed to being more faithful at sending birthday greetings and gifts to family back in the States. Sometimes the joy of giving a gift can be stripped by feeling the pressure to get something just perfect (which for some reason tranfers into dollar signs $) or something unique (which transferss into lots of time), or for me trying to figure if my package will make it back to the States. So I have committed this year to giving 'simply with love'. I remember my sweet sister-n-law sent me a can of 'Rebublic Tea'(ginger peach!!) with a note of things she liked about me taped to the front for my b-day... as you can see I left the note attached to the can of tea just like it came almost a year ago. (this tea is some of my favorite so I use it sparingly since I cannot get it here) anyway my point..simply sent with love a gift means so much and it DOES NOT always have to cost lots or money or time. Not that investing time and money in a gift is a bad thing but for me it cannot be every person I give a gift too. I don't want to give out of obligation and pressure, I want to give freely out of love and a smile. ~

         Here is a quick picture tutorial for Ribbon Markmarks:

I hope you enjoy the simplicity with me

My little note on this tutorial is: remember to singe the bottoms of the ribbon so they do not frey.
All you need to do is take a lighter and allow the flame to singe the very bottom. Maybe just try one for practice before the orignal so you get the hang of it.

Some days I make things so complicated, however today I am enjoying simplicity ;)
from my west corner~ Becky

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Giveaway winner

Hi there to each of you who entered the fabric giveaway.

We have a winner... and the winner is...Ruth. (mattandruth)
(I have no other contact info~ so Ruth  please contact me.

My e-mail address is creativecontentment@gmail.com and I will send you your gift on Monday the 13th)

Thank you for all who signed up for this giveaway, hopefully you will be the next winner.

This giveaway was a learning expeirence for me and soo much fun.  I really enjoyed this.  However I think I didn't quite hit the 'fun' factor for all of you living in Turkey with the fabric giveaway. What would be fun to receive?  Were there some of you who read the Giveaway post and didn't sign up becasue fabric isn't your thing? I would really like your feedback, so here are a few options. 

Would you like:
*Fabric
*Craft Supplies
*Homemade items (becasue I am going to become one amazing sewing crazy lady, just you wait. ):)
* or any other ideas

I really would love to hear, so please leave a comment with what you think would be a fun giveaway. I would like for this blog to cultivate a following here in Turkey and encourage others to 'use what they have' and help inspire creativity and hope. 

Please if you live in Turkey and read this blog I would LOVE your feedback. Really, give me an ear full, I'm listening. My brain is full of ideas and is always runny with colors so I would love to hear what others here in Turkey would like to see more of.  Also if you enjoy this blog spread the word and share my link with others, I would like that very much.

Ok off to put my girlies to bed.  ~ in the west corner. Becky

TP roll Robots invaded our home

We had our DEAR DEAR friends from Isntabbul visit us a few weeks back and like always when they come and stay with us it is like a breath of sweet air.  We love having them.  Each time they come we seem to need to find something to do with our kiddos ~ they have 2 and we have 3 in one apartment for 3 days.  So this time around my friend and I started grabbing stuff and a robot emerged and tada an army of tp roll robots invaded our home and the fun lasted for hours. (literally) (We did one of our silly snack Saturdays based on our robot day.)

The supplies :

Tp roll

Tin foil

Water bottle tops

Water bottle cut up

googly eyes

buttons

pieces of cut up paper (from previous project)

Small pieces of fabric

pipe cleaners

tooth picks

Colored pencils..

obviously all this is NOT necessary for a tp robot but

like I siad we were just pulling things out and having fun with it all.

Really this post emphasis my theme right now 'use what you have' . I think sometimes you would be surprised what you have in your house to make fun creations with your kids.   

 

I was in the process of making the kids some kind of robot station but just couldn't finsh and it soo didn't matter.  They siad this was the robots headquaters and off they went imagining away, putting this here and that there. This piece of cardboard has been used two other time in our sweet shop and in our makeshift movie theater, I think it has finally seen it's last days. :)

The fun thing about kids is you give them an idea and they run with it.  I absolutley love the fun creations they made. 

I literally save ALL my tp rolls.  I know it sounds crazy but really they are the easiest things to collect and you can create so much with them. I had enought tp rolls to supply a whole class room of kids for this project.

So if you have kids start hording your tp rolls, they will come in handy.  :) 

~ from my west corner

Becky

My life in color

Please all you living in Turkey click on this link and sign up for the fabric giveaway!!!

At the Bazar. (Pazar)

My outdoor Craft store. :)

This is where I find my pieces of ribbon and buttons and an occasional piece of fabric.

 

My outdoors.

This is where I find moments of hope and some

moments of laughter.

This is where you can get a cup of tea. lol :)

Beauty, charm and enjoyment are found everywhere. 

or if you rather you can come over to

my west corner in Turkey and share a cup with me. :)

I am finding contentment today in the little splashes of color God has put around me. 

I do miss my family lots today so I thought you all could drop over for a virtual tea:) and enjoy a bit of life and color in my little west corner of Turkey. ~

Thanks for dropping by.  ~ Contentment is often a choice.

Becky

Again if you live in Turkey I have a giveaway planned for June 10th. You comment that you want to win, there will be a drawing on the 10th of June and I send the winner the 'package of care' June 13th. All you have to do is comment or send me an e-mail..easy peasey!! O kadar.

  Hadi ya~ bak  Giveaway LINK

DIY Tiered Skirt

For everyone living in Turkey ~Click HERE for details on the fun Giveaway.

Well I promised to share with you how I made this skirt for my newly 5 year old. 

Here's the skirt in action.

There are MANY SO MANY tutorials out there on how to make a homemade skirt.  I am not going to attempt to re-invent the wheel, however there are a few things that I wish I would have known earlier and had pics for ~ like how to gather a skirt for a ruffle, so I will share those things with you plus a wonderful resource for making tiered skirts.

Well here is where I picked out my fabric and then got the measurments for what each tier needed to be.  Okay STOP there, how did I figure out the measuremnts?

This great 'skirt measurent calculation tool' does ALL the work for you.
 (i love it i love it) All you need to do is measure the child's waist and then know the length of the skirt you want.  I just measured another skirt my daughter had that I liked the length for.
Then the 'calculation tool' gives you measurements for each tier up to 6 tiers.

Here is my fabric cut from top to bottom tier. 
Each piece is folded in half~ they fold out the long way.

If you are interested in making a tiered skirt

please follow THIS link.

It is one of the best I have found for newbies like me.
 The pictures are clear and there are several for each step.

The following pictures and instructions are the ones I would have liked for reference and clarification.  Many times tutorials 'assume' you know something that you may or may not.

I hope these are helpful.

 How to gather a skirt for a ruffle

*I draw a line with one of my girls washable markers all the way across the length of the fabric.

*Then I take a needle with an extended amount of thread that will go the length and more of the fabric piece.

*I sew like you see in the picture below. It is a quick stitch so that I can pull on the thread and it will gather easily and then pull out after done sewing. The thread is not doubled.

*This is the ruffle after sewing my way thru the length of the piece of fabric, pulling slightly and arranging it.

*I then pin this piece to the next tier and sew on. After it has been sewn on I pull out the yellow thread I used to make the ruffle.  Again this LINK shows all the directions for pinning and sewing in detail. (I did sew the rest of the skirt with my sewing machine just the ruffle part I did by hand.)

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Ironing for the elastic waist band

*Ironing is necessary in sewing and makes everything so much simplier.

*For the first tier fold over a small bit and iron, then fold over again about 1/2 in. to 1 in. depending on the width of your elastic and iron down the fold. This picture is the 2nd fold.

*This is where you will sew to make an opening for the elastic you eventually pull through.

This LINK that I shared above shows you how to do that.

Oh and yes it was made with lots of love...so my very own tag of love to go with it.:)

Now every time the 'tag' bothers her she can think of me. :) lol Watch me have to cut it out eventually.

Enjoy and please let me know if this has been helpful to you. ~ Becky

~Don't forget if you live in Turkey to leave a comment or e-mail me for the
fabric GIVEAWAY.  Click here for details. Now you have the perfect thing to make with the cute fabric. :)

Giveaway and Tiered skirt (I DID IT!!!)

Ok this post is going to be fun!!

First I DID IT! I finally made my first (picture worthy) from scratch skirt.  Maybe to some of you sewers it's 'no big deal', but to me, a very sewing machine challenged (even though I love mine, we just seem to argue now and again), non reader of directions girl, this is big news. :)

So today, because I believe if I can learn to sew than ANYONE can, I am hosting:
a giveaway to anyone living in Turkey!!( I have a REALLY fun giveaway planned for ALL my followers in July.)

I am giving away 100% cotton fabric to the winner ~ Yep check below for the pics.
This is my way of encourging all of you out there in need of an outlet to... go ahead and give sewing a try... sew some bookmarks or an upcycle or why not try a pillow.  :) Learn along with me and do a jig when you actually complete something.

Here is the skirt I made for my daughter's 5 year old birthday. I upcycled a shirt to match. :) Which I still need to wash so that the cut edges frey but you get the idea.

I really want to show you all how I did it and a great tutorial that was full of pics that really helped me. I'll share that in my next post.


Ok, on to the Giveaway...

 the GIVEAWAY~

This little package of care has : 
2 meters of 100% cotton fabric (enough for a skirt for your daughter, niece etc)
A light blue ribbon ~1 meter
2 summer greeting cards
1 knitted bookmark made by my dear friend
1 fabric bookmark made by me (not pictured)

So here is the Scoop:
*The drawing will be help on June 10th ~ that gives one week for you all to sign up
*I will ship it to you anywhere in Turkey
*The ship out date to the winner will be the 13th


In order to Win:
* Leave a comment in the comment box below saying you would like to win. (Turkish or English is fine)
Yep that is it!! 
(You could also e-mail me: In the subjet line put ~Giveaway ~ then include your name in the e-mail.)

~I will need a way to contact you. (So please check back on June 10th to see if you've won... you can
e-mail me your address then if you would like.)

For this giveaway I am not asking you to follow or subscibe to me, just simply leave a comment, no extra hoops to jump through. If however you find yourself coming back to my blog once, twice, or maybe even three times, :) then please join Creative Contentment by e-mail or by following along.
I would LOVE to have you !!!!!

Ok Turkey dwellers you now know the rules~~

I am super excited and looking forward to sending you this simple "package of care".

In my far west corner ~Becky

(For all of you dear followers and subscribers that don't live in Turkey I haven't forgotten you :) I have a REALLY fun giveaway planned for all my followers in July.  However for my first giveaway I wanted to invest/give to those in Turkey because I know what we can and can not get here, like how hard good fabric is to come by. I recently was so delighted by those who gave me a pile of fabric (see this post) no strings attached and I wanted to invest in the same way.  Thanks for understanding.)

Investing with paperdolls and (a give away)

Investing in the Neighborhood School ~#3

(to check out 1 and 2 - click on the number)

Trying to find ideas for a 1st grade full of 25 children that I can explain in Turkish and is 10 liras or less was a little tougher for me this time.  However thankfully I was graced with an idea.

I wanted to remind the kids that we as individuals are truely unique, each of us with our own special fingprint and yet each of us as humans alike in so many other ways.

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We talked about our body, becasue it shows how much we are alike and yet how differnt we are.

We sang the song head and shoulders knees and toes in English with the actions and they LOVED it.

I shared fun facts like: we have about 206 bones in our bodies and approx. 5 liters of blood. Also this is when we talked about how each finger print (parmak izi) is differnt and unique, and how each of them are each unique and special.

I made little clothes and photo copied them on one sheet of paper. There was a set of boy clothes and a girls set. I passed out one sheet to each child according to their sex and then they cut the pieces out and traced them onto colored construction paper and then glued them on their paper doll.

The goal was for each child to make paper dolls of themselves.  We then went around the room and took their fingerprints that they then glued on back with their name and date.
 We did this as a reminder of their own uniqueness.

Here they are making and showing off their paper dolls. My daughter is in the bottom left corner. :)

Each child recieved:

A paper doll

Set of paper clothes

Half a sheet of colored construction paper

Small white piece of paper for finger print

Each child brought:

Glue

Wet wipes

Colored pencils/crayons

(some kids do not bring their items so I always have things on hand and encourge lots of sharing with seat partners)

For the finger prints:

I brought a small water bottle of water, paintbrush and some water paints for the finger prints. I used the brush in the water bottle to wet the black paint and then had the kids wipe their fingers with a wet wipe after we took their print. 

GIVEAWAY for Turkey dwellers :)

If you make it to the bottom of this post :) their is a fun treat for all those living in Turkey who follow my blog.  INVEST in others is part of my theme for this season so I want to invest by doing a give away for anyone who currently is living in Turkey.  

Come back Friday to see what I want to INVEST/GIVEAWAY to you and how you can win.

It is super super simple. (really super simple) ;)

~in my little west corner~ thank you for stopping by

becky

ps. those of you who don't live in Turkey and are feeling left out, no tears I have something fun up my sleeve for you really soon. :)