Monday Made It

It's time to link up with Tara again for another Monday Made It, and I'm happy to say that I had this one well underway and wrapped up before the weekend. I'm getting better at this time management thing...

So here is my classroom Made It...
 A few weeks ago was the last day of summer school, and as I was returning my materials to my classroom I happened to pass a recycling bin full of these really nice PALS boxes. I think that Virginia is the only state that uses the PALS testing program but I can't be sure. Let me know if you use it too.... Anyway, our reading teacher was apparently cleaning out the literacy room and decided to trash these boxes that normally hold all the hard copies of the testing materials. I'm not sure what she did with the materials but I knew that I could not pass up these great boxes. I really had to restrain myself, because the bin was overflowing with these puppies. There were probably 20+ boxes headed to the dumpster. I stole 4. But as I was leaving, I noticed a few other teachers had sniffed out the treasure too.

So I got out my trusty spray paint and attacked them with Pepto Pink.

It was on my summer To-Do list to make these cute circle labels. I made a set of labels for all of my read aloud book bins. These are books I keep on my personal shelf to save them from the wear and tear of the classroom library. Normally I keep these books in magazine files out on a shelf, but I decided that they took up to much space. I'm going to use these pink boxes to store books that I'm not using year-round. I'll probably find a home for them in my closet.

At the last minute I decided to attach the labels with velcro so I can easily change the purpose of the box if needed.

Here's an inside view.

Now onto my Home Made It...

My best friend's daughter is having a birthday soon and I have sworn off giving her toys since she already has a gazillion and will not be lacking in that area for a long time. So I decided to get my craft on! This project was inspired by something I saw on Etsy and decided that I could make myself for cheaper. Plus it was fun to make. You will need a white foam wreath form and these items:

Tulle and matching ribbon in your preferred colors. The tulle came in 5 yard rolls and I only used about half of each color. The coordinating ribbon came in 3 yard rolls and I used almost all of each roll. So what did I make with all this fun stuff???

Isn't it so stinkin' cute!?! It was time intensive, but really easy. I just cut the tulle and ribbon into about 12 inch strips and tied, and tied, and tied, and tied some more. I used a lighter to seal the ends of the ribbon so it wouldn't start fraying/unraveling. The pattern I used was one of each color of toole, then one color ribbon, three tulle, then the second color ribbon, three tulle, and then the third ribbon, and so on. I don't recommend using ribbon larger than 1 inch wide though. It's not impossible but it was difficult to tie the fatter pieces of ribbon and I used more of it because you need longer pieces than with the thinner ribbon.

I also made it so that the number hanging in the middle can be changed out and used for future birthdays. I can't wait to hang it on the little birthday girl's door! If you want to see my inspiration click here.

Finally, here is my Pinterest Made It...

If you haven't seen the pictures of using nail polish to paint your keys then you must have been living under a rock for the past year. It's too widespread now to bother tracing it back to the original source but here are my new keys. As you can tell, they look pretty similar so hopefully the nail polish will help me tell them apart. I have doubts about the durability of the polish on the keys but it doesn't hurt to try, right?

Thanks for visiting and don't forget to enter my Back to School Super Shoe Giveaway! The winner will be chosen via Rafflecopter tomorrow! Click the button below to enter. Good Luck!