{Girly} Super Hero Decor

Some of you may know that my BFF and I co-founded an organization called BirthMom Buds that provides support to birthmothers and each year, the weekend before Mother's Day we host a retreat and celebration in Charlotte, North Carolina. I really enjoy the task of decorating for the retreat. Each year, we choose a theme each year for the retreat and try to carry it out through out the whole weekend. This being our 9th event, we are starting to get a little more creative and out of the box with our themes and chose this year's theme to be (girly) Super Heroes. Our colors were pink, yellow, lavender, green, and light teal and we created one table in each color.

My Silhouette machine makes creating decor SO easy. I seriously wonder how I ever did this before I had a Silhouette! ha! 

My BFF created some amazing buildings out of cardboard boxes by painting them black and adding and cutting out little windows. Those were the main part of the centerpiece and then I created other things to go around the buildings.

The clock tower is my favorite part of the building. So cute!

To go around the buildings, I created several thing. First up, is the candle holders below. I spray painted them black. The masks are fabric and were made using a simple mask shape from the Silhouette store.

I also took glass vases and spray painted them black. I filled them with beans for weight and then silver shred. I created super hero bubbles (using this shape from the Silhouette store) with different words like "pow," "wow," and "bam." I created a colored bubble and then a slightly larger black bubbled and sandwiched two of the bubbles in between a small dowel rod that I painted black. I applied the letters with pop dots to give it a small bit of dimension.

I think my favorite part of the tables was the girls popping out of the building. This same girl is in the retreat logo. I traced the logo in the Silhouette software and cut just the girl out. She is on a small black dowel and is secured inside the building using floral foam. The initials BMB were cut from black vinyl.

I also printed some super hero themed quotes on colored card stock, framed those in frames we used in a previous year's decor, and placed them around the buildings as well.

The last thing I created for the tables was some table scatter/confetti to sprinkle around the centerpieces. The bubbles are the same shape from the Silhouette store. I used the print and cut feature to create a lot of these easily. Sometimes, creating mass quantities of something using the print and cut feature can be a little tedious so my tip is to print everything all at once and then use two mats. While the Silhouette is cutting, you can be peeling off and getting the next page ready to go in.

Lastly I created a banner using the tag line for the retreat, "Super Birthmoms Unite." I found some printable comic book pages online, then turned them into black and white prints in my photo editing software. Then I cut out triangles and letters in solid block using the Silhouette.

And now, here are some more pictures:

The BFF and I were super pleased at how it turned out!

There we are rocking our super hero attire at our Friday Night Mixer.

(I'm "C Kent" and she's wonder woman!)

This post is part of a monthly Silhouette challenge created by Lauren at The Thinking Closet. Check out the links below for more projects by some talented crafty ladies using their Silhouette machines.

Spring Hoop Home Decor - Daily Dwelling

I Heart Labels: Flour & Sugar Jar Edition - The Thinking Closet

Bleeding Heart Card with Free Flower Download - Creative Turn

A Numbers Game - Learning Numbers with Your Preschooler - Lil Mrs. Tori

My First Silhouette Challenge Group Project - Tanya's Creative Space

Personalized Garden Post & Grandma Book (Silhouette Mother's Day Presents) - Whole New Leaf

Girly Superhero Decor - Coley's Corner

"A Cup of Tea" Customizable Art Printable - Tried & True

The Lady in Hat "Thinking of You" Card - An Elegant Touch

Interested in joining us for our group posting event next month?  We'd love to have you.  Simply contact Lauren from The Thinking Closet by email.

Linking to the link parties listed in my sidebar

The Path Less Traveled

It’s Friday – the day where I join other bloggers and take five short minutes to just write from the heart. Five Minute Friday is hosted by Gypsy Mama and this week’s prompt is PATH.

In 2001, I was faced with a dilemma. For me, there were two paths I could take and I took the one less traveled......

When I chose to place my second son, Charlie, in an open adoption directly following his birth, I knew there would be lots of loss but I didn’t realize there would be gains as well. Because I chose that path, I became part of a community of people, the adoption community more importantly the birthmother community that I never would have been a part of if it weren’t for that choice.

I met Lani, (often referred to as my BFF on this blog) my very best, dearest friend because of adoption. She is, as she so eloquently puts it, “the sister God let me choose.” Had I not chosen the path of adoption, I wouldn’t have her in my life and that makes her very sad.

Honestly, many of my closest, dearest friends are other birthmothers and had I not chosen adoption my paths probably never would have crossed theirs.

The heart ache I initially felt after placing Charlie into the arms of his adoptive parents is what led me to find my writing voice again and what led Lani and I to start BirthMom Buds. Writing and BirthMom Buds have helped me feel useful and given me another purpose in life.

Does all of that make the hole in my heart from relinquishing Charlie smaller? No absolutely not! But it has made the path more bearable. 

Five Minute Friday: Community

It’s Friday – the day where I join other bloggers and take five short minutes to just write from the heart. Five Minute Friday is hosted by Gypsy Mama and this week’s prompt is COMMUNITY. 


How perfect is this week’s prompt of community! Along with my BFF and some other wonderful women, I have helped build a community of birthmothers from all over the place called BirthMom Buds. Though I don’t write about it very often on this blog, ten years ago I gave birth to and placed a baby boy in an open adoption and while it’s a bittersweet journey, I find myself proud to be a birthmother and more importantly proud to be a member of a community of such amazing women. 

On Thursday of next week, I will head to Charlotte, North Carolina where I will join other women from the birthmother community for our annual retreat full of sharing, listening, learning, laughter and probably a few healing tears.


This also explains my absence from blogging lately as I've been finishing up some last minute type things. I honestly probably won’t blog much until I am back! This year’s theme is a fiesta, so appropriate since it falls on the weekend of Cinco de Mayo. It’s been fun planning the décor though I haven’t been able to share it here but I will be able to once it’s all over!


So, I am ready – ready for a weekend of community and to hug the necks of some of these amazing women that I only have the pleasure of seeing once a year and some I have yet to meet face to face!

The Little Touches and the Silhouette

This was the 7th year we have done our Birthmother's Day Celebration but the first year I have ever had a Silhouette to help me create things for it. Let me just tell you, it was awesome for this! It allowed me to kick things up a notch without having to spend a lot of extra time on some of the extra "attention to detail" (as Sandra Lee would say) touches that I think make an event/party so much more personal. 

Let me just share some of the things the Silhouette helped me do..... 

Using the Silhouette, I was able to create these awesome stickers for the bags that were given to attendees staying at the hotel when they checked in. I created a scallop circle using a shape from the Silhouette store out of black and white damask paper. Then I layered a circle with the retreat logo (also cut with the Silhouette) on top of that. 

Remember when I posted awhile back about the drink mix packet holders I made to go on a bottle of water? Well, those were really created for this event. But I knew people who would be attending read this blog so I couldn't show these to you yet but they turned out great! I cut and scored the actual holder using a cut file I created out of black and white damask paper then I print and cut a smaller circle using our retreat logo and layered that on top of a slightly larger circle cut out of black cardstock. 

 

I also made something I call "mint books." They look like a little book of matches but when you open them up there is a mint or Lifesaver inside. I created the cut file for this myself so the Silhouette did all the work for me by scoring and cutting it so all I had to do was add a mint to the inside of each one and secure it with a staple. These would be great for wedding favors too! I'm willing to share the cut file if anyone wants it.)

   

The Silhouette also helped me create an applique for the goodie bags. I ironed on heat and bond to the backs of different black and white fabrics and then cut out a dress I purchased from the Silhouette store. Then I just ironed the dresses on the black bags. Easy peasy!

And I used it to create the name tags. This year we decided to use the plastic sleeve kind that you can get from office stores. I created an insert with each attendee's name for the inside and then cut them out with the Silhouette. We added thin ribbon to tie them on with. They turned out great too. ( Nope, I didn't change my name, just forgot to take a picture of it but my BFF had taken a pic of hers.)

Sometimes I seriously wonder, is there anything this machine can NOT do? ;)

And just so you know, I'm not getting paid by Silhouette to rave about their machine. All opinions are my own. I just big puffy heart love that machine!

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and

Breakfast at Tiffany's Decor

I am so excited to finally be able to share the decor that we used for this year's retreat theme: Breakfast at Tiffany's. While we used this for a women's retreat, it could easily be adapted to fit a bridal shower, baby shower, or Birthday party. 

First, I knew we needed to bring a modern twist to the theme so I chose to do that with black and white damask print. That was used in the invitations as well as in the decor a little bit. 

Of course you need Tiffany blue boxes with this theme! I bought those thick cardboard boxes at Hobby Lobby and bought one large one per a table and one small one per an attendee. Originally my idea was to paint the boxes Tiffany blue but the boxes were buckling under the paint so I opted to wrap them instead. I got my Tiffany blue wrapping paper at Party City. 

We started off with a black tablecloth and then used black and white damask fabric as an overlay. We put a giant box wrapped in Tiffany blue paper with a white bow in the middle of the fabric overlay. Then we scattered big and small diamonds around, laid some strung pearls around the overlay, and put a couple of candles, and a couple of frames with quotes in them on the overlay as well. 

The frames that were on each table were just silver frames that you can buy in the wedding section of most craft stores to use as place cards. My amazing assistant, Monika, found different quotes by Audrey Hepburn and I typed those up in a pretty font and put them in the frames. (We had more quotes than this but these are just the ones I got shots of.)

Originally, the candle holders were going to be silver. I bought a thing of plain candle holders in the wedding section and sprayed them silver. But I accidentally left the silver candle holders at home. My BFF was coming down a day later than me so I called her and she saved the day by picking up some more candleholders. She knew she wouldn't have time to spray them silver but also knew they needed dolling up a little so she bought some black and white ribbon and just glued that around each one. I love how they turned out and like them better than the silver ones!

At each attendee's spot we had a little box wrapped in Tiffany blue with a white bow. I actually watched a you tube video to learn how to tie the actual Tiffany bow for these boxes! We struggled with what to put in them but finally Lani or I (I don't remember which of us remembered first!) remembered a little poem that goes with an empty box about the box is filled with love so you should never open it. We googled and found several poems. I combined a few of the poems and came up with one I liked. I then used my Silhouette machine to cut out the little tags and tied them to each box. 

And that pretty much sums up the decor. It was simple but elegant and I was really pleased with the way turned out!


* Check out some of the "little touches" for the event that I created using the Silhouette machine in this post.
** Check out this post all about our group craft. 

Linking up to the craft linky parties listed in my sidebar

I'm Back!

I'm back. Did you miss me? The past week was insanely busy but mostly in a good way. Our retreat that I mentioned I had been so busy preparing for was awesome and amazing as always. All the hard work is definitely worth it when I see all the smiling ladies and see how much they are getting from it. 


When I got there on Thursday, I rested a little bit after checking into the hotel and then had a nice relaxing evening with Melanie and another friend C. We went and listened to an 80's band in Uptown Charlotte and had drinks and appetizers outside on the patio of one of the restaurants. 


The rest of the weekend was a mix of leisurely site seeing, amazing dinners, meeting many amazing women, getting ready for the Birthmother's Day Celebration on Saturday, attending the Celebration, dancing, taking random photos, etc.... Like last year, I got to meet some awesome women who I have been friends with online for awhile but never met in person. And I of course got to spend some much my BFF and we stayed up way too late talking as always! 


At the end of the weekend, J and Noah came to Charlotte to pick me and Lani up and some of the ladies got to meet Noah for a few minutes. That was nice. 


I will be sharing some of the decor from the retreat here on the blog in the next few days as well as the group craft so I link those up to some of the linky parties I usually link up to. 


And just a couple of pictures: 

Me and My Weight Loss Buddy Monika

She is down 33 lbs and I'm down 23. 

Me and my BFF

We take a photo in these "hand chairs" every year. 

Me taking a random photo - what I love to do!

Two Things to Share

I have been swamped lately with semi-last minute stuff for the upcoming BirthMom Buds retreat, dealing with Noah, and just life in general but I have two different things I want to share really quick. (If we are Facebook friends, you might want to just skip this post because you've already seen these things.) 


First up is a radio interview. On Monday, I spoke on an internet radio show called Adoption Journey to Motherhood about BirthMom Buds. If you care to listen to my interview, just head on over to this website. Look for the 4/18 show on the right. I am the second interview at about 30 minutes in. You can pull the slider to that mark if you don't want to listen to the first interview.


Second, is a video. I shot this video of Noah and my Dad at last night's Miracle League game. They LOVE to steal bases and last night they were the first batters so they were able to steal all the bases. Check out the video below.

Have a great Easter weekend!

My 15 Minutes

Recently I was interviewed by an Associated Press reporter from New York for an article about Birthmother’s Day. Apparently she had been given my name and contact information from several others in the adoption community as a good resource for her article.  Originally I thought he article was just going to contain a quote or two from me about Birthmother’s Day but during our interview she began asking questions about my personal adoption situation. Although the main focus of the article is still Birthmother’s Day and does include two other birthmothers. They also decided that they’d like a photograph of me, Charlie, and Angee (Charlie’s adoptive Mom) to run with the article so they sent an Associated Press photographer here for a mini “photo shoot.” He got some great shots and I got some really good ones afterwards.  The article “hit news stands” last week and it’s in a lot of different newspapers and publications all over the United States including some big ones like The LA Times, The Boston Globe, and The Atlanta Journal Constitution. I’ve actually lost track of how many different publications it has been in at this point and I know it will still be running through the weekend. It’s been overwhelming!  One funny thing – they misspelled Lani’s (my BFF and co-founder of BirthMom Buds) last name. They spelled it Dowling when it’s actually Downing so that part has been funny as I keep referring to Lani Dowling as her new alias. 

I’ve done interviews in the past and have been misquoted so I was kind of nervous about this one, especially since it was going to be all over the US. But I’ve been pleased with this article for the most part! 

Here’s the portion of the article about me, Lani, and BirthMom Buds…. The journey of "coming out" as a birthmother is a painful one, she said, but the Internet has done wonders to ease the way for both adoptees and bbirthmothers looking to access documents or just meet others for support. Nicole "Coley" Strickland of Boiling Springs, S.C., found fellow birthmother Lani Dowling in Atlanta, Ga., that way after blindly searching for support soon after giving birth to a boy in 2001 and placing him with a couple she met at the restaurant where she was a waitress. Two years later, Strickland and Dowling founded Birthmombuds.com, which has 900 registered users around the country. The two send out care packages to new birthmothers, pair up buddies living close to each other and host regular chats for birthmoms online. They also coordinate Birth Mother's Day events every year. While details for this year's events are still firming up, gatherings are planned in New York City, Los Angeles, Seattle, Nashville and areas of Oregon, North Carolina, New Hampshire and Ohio, among other states. For birthmoms who don't live near one of the gatherings or don't feel comfortable in a group setting, Strickland, 32, suggests they make Mother's Day a little easier by writing something about _ or for _ their relinquished children, lighting a candle, planting a tree or donating a book to a library in their honor. "It really does give us a time to bond with other birthmoms," said Strickland, who has regular visits with her now 7-year-old as part of an open adoption. "We feel a lot of the same things at the same time. We need to be there for each other." And last but not least, here's a few of the photos I took after the AP photo shoot.....

Noah and Charlie

Me, Noah, and Charlie

Charlie, Noah, and Natalie (Charlie's sister via adoption)

Group Shot - Charlie, Noah, Natalie, Jason, and Me (I took this one with my camera on the tripod using the timer and the kids thought me running to jump in the picture was hilarious!)

I'm back! (And Bmom's Event Recap)

I'm back! The BirthMom Buds event that I was so busily planning for is over! It went great and we had a lot of fun, but I'm also glad it is over. I'm ready to NOT be crazy busy. Although, I do enjoy craziness and enjoy planning the events each year, I'm ready for a little boring-ness in my life. So, let me recap the weekend for you. First of all, for those wondering and because a few have asked, Noah was fine without me all weekend. He stayed with J and they did "boy stuff" and he was very, very good. Not like times in the past, when he has been whiney and fussed all weekend. I talked to him several times over the weekend and he did miss me but he seemed just fine without me. 

Our theme this year was The Road Less Traveled. Each table had a box (that J built) filled with flowers. The boxes were painted to look like roads and sticking out of each box was a street sign. The "streets" were Adoption Avenue, Triad Trail, Birthmom Blvd., and Reunion Way. The boxes were sitting on top of a road map and had two decorated candles sitting on top of it. There was a little suitcase sitting at each place setting. 

Once we got to Charlotte Friday afternoon, we (myself, the Bestest Bud also known as LaLa or Lani Dowling and Holly the niece) checked into the hotel and headed down to the conference room Melanie (a great friend and event planner extraordinaire). We began setting up the conference room and were joined by another bmom and event attendee. We headed out to dinner where I had some yummy yummy quesadillas. After dinner, we headed back to the hotel finished up the goodie bags and headed off to dreamland.

Saturday morning we woke up bright and early and headed to the conference room to quickly finish setting up and grab a bite of breakfast before guests started arriving. It was great to see everyone again and of course meet new faces. 

We started the morning off with welcomes and introductions. Then we played a neat game called speed friendship that I learned from another blogger. We moved onto our breakout sessions in which the ladies could learn about challenges that come up in every day conversation as a birthmother, moving forward in life and making creative collages as visual way to help you move forward, and adoption scrapbooking. We also had a craft – we made jumbo clothespins which can stand up and hold a photo. Totally fun and neat to see how each person’s turned out differently. 

After that it was lunch time and time for the balloon release which launches us into the program type portion of the day. We had two speakers this year. One speaker was a 15 year old who is an adoptee. His name was Justin and hearing him speak and talk about what a great life he had was touching and personally validating to me in many different ways. I think each of the ladies got something from it as well. 

Our second speaker was an adoptive Mom of two named Tory. She really captured me with the way she began telling her story. She started it off with “Once Upon a Time…” and described a married couple who desperately wanted to be parents but couldn’t have children of their own.  Next came the slideshow which always a favorite part of the day and we ended with the candle light ceremony which is always my personal favorite part of the day. 

Our day was filled with door prizes, learning, sharing, and just being in a room full of other women who totally get it. It’s hard to actually put all of the feelings into words but once again, it was a successful celebration of our children. 

For those who were from out of town or those who just wanted to hang out more, we did dinner and dancing. We went to this really fun 80’s club that reminded me of my 30th birthday party all over again. 

And finally after Sunday brunch, I arrived home to my boys! 

Let me just thank everyone who helped somehow – even if it was a big way or a small way. Melanie, you make the planning part enjoyable for me and you do such an awesome job at it and make it seem effortless. Holly, I can’t do anything with out you girl. Lani, thank you for putting up with my bossiness (And I’m sure my Mom is laughing at that part!) and just being you! Alicia and Leigh – thank you for the help you provided with booklets, placemats, poems, etc. Thank you to my family and friends for putting up with my craziness for the past few weeks. (Ok, forever.) And thank you to anyone else I’m forgetting to mention!!! (Hmmm, is this what it feels like to give an acceptance speech at the Oscars or some other awards show?)