This is a blog filled with wonderful surprises that I am giving to you ... FOR FREE, just to help you get your Visiting Teaching done each month. It's a present for you every single month! Make sure to check out my other blog too at http://visitingteachingtips.blogspot.com for other Great Visiting Teaching and Relief Society oriented ideas!







Saturday, February 26, 2011

Bookmark


Here is another bookmark that I created, actually for my daughter
but I  like to pass things on, so here you go to use as you like.  My
daughter wanted 10 per page, and that saves alot on ink if you are
doing the printing on your own home printer. 
Enjoy!  Katie G.


Monday, February 14, 2011

Printable Valentine Card

I needed to make some cute Valentine cards to go with the heart shaped bowls filled with candies for my husband's Home teaching families, so I thought I would share with your too.

Just print them of on 8.5 x 11 cardstock (in Color), cut and fold them in half.  You can buy the exact note card size envelop either at Walmart or Office Maxx or Depot, as that is where I buy mine. 

Happy Valentines Day and Enjoy!  Love, Katie G.

Monday, February 7, 2011

More Cute Valentine Ideas

I usually make up my own Valentines, because I can, so I try to come up with a Valentine that has a message that is specific for either the gift I am giving, or for the person.  Here is my little gift idea that i am giving to the ladies I Visit teach and I hope that none of them come look at this post before I get their Valentine to them.  Well.... if they do, then they will have something to look forward to..... do you think?
Click on the image and it will make it larger for you to see in better detail.  I love vintage so I took an old Vintage Valentine and added some other do dads, and turned it into a Valentine, that is color coded to match the little gift I am giving.

I went to Target and in their $1 section, I found some really cute black, red and white note pads that have a magnet on the back side.  They also had some really cute matching pens so I bought them and taped them to the front of the note pad.  I then found some matching pencils too, and did the same with them.  I bundled all of this up in a Valentine Cellophane bag and tied the top off with a red ribbon.  It turned out so very cute.  Now... Notice what the Valentine says right at the top..."PLEASE NOTE" ... get it?  Note pad and please note.  Pretty cleaver and very cute. 
These Valentines will print two per page and they are note card size.  Walmart sometimes carries the note card size envelop, but if they don't have any, then Office Max or Office Depot or any other office store should carry them, but unfortunately in bulk.  I do allot of card making so, I buy bulk most of the time. 

Sending a Package to someone in the mail for Valentines Day?  I made these up to send my Valentine Package to my son's family who lives in Wyoming.  These can also be used as gift tags too, for cookies or other goodies that you make up to give to someone for Valentines Day.  Enjoy!

I found a cute old Popcorn themed Valentine here:  http://vintageholidaycrafts.com/ that I used to create one of my own, to put on a box of microwave popcorn to give to my sons and sons-in-law as part of the Valentine packages I do for my children's families.  This Valentine (at the bottom) would be cute to use in many different ways.  Today at my local Target store, I found these darling large heart shaped bowls in pink or red, and I thought how cute it would be to pop some popcorn and fill up those bowls. (and to make it extra yummy, add a bag of Valentine M&M's) I would wrap the popcorn filled bowl in cellophane and tie the top with a beautiful bow, and of course I would attach this cute Valentine to tie in the Popcorn message.

On my blog, http://visitingteachingsurprise.blogspot.com/search/label/popcorn I even have a Mother gooses or Koolaid popcorn recipe that would be great to use for the popcorn if you wanted to get alittle more creative than just having buttered popcorn. Kettle Corn is really good too and that is easy to make as well.  I found a very simple recipe for Kettle Corn on the Rachael Ray site.  http://www.rachaelraymag.com/Recipes/rachael-ray-magazine-recipe-index/appetizer-starter-recipes/Sweet---Salty-Kettle-Corn

I also found another site that did about what I did with this popcorn idea and here is their link http://keepingmycents.blogspot.com/2011/01/homemade-popcorn-valentine.html

Have fun and enjoy your Valentine giving!  Love, Katie

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Very Cute Valentine Ideas

 
   Have been looking for some cute and original Valentine Ideas to do for my children.  I have found some really cute one that I wanted to provide links so that you too could see these fun things to do.  Here is the first one that I found.  It is soooo cute and would be cute even not hanging with a berry wreath behind it.  I have put this link below the image.  To see it closer, click on the image 
http://www.lilluna.com/2011/01/tutorial-tuesday-valentines-wreath.html  There is a complete tutorial of how this was made and it only cost $4! 

Now I found this next one in my search for really cute and creative things to do for Valentines at this site: http://tatertotsandjello.blogspot.com/2010/01/whimsical-valentine-wreath.html  I can't believe just by looking at the picture that it is made out of cupcake liners.  The tutorial on how to make it is on the blog, so be sure to go to it and have a look see!  My mind of course went wild with this one, because think about all the other holidays that you would like to have  a wreath up and you could buy the cupcake liners for St. Patricks Day ( which I have a hard time finding decorations that I actually like for that holiday) of for any other holiday or time of year!   SO CUTE!  Make sure to scroll down below the instructions, because displayed on that blog are a bunch of other cupcake wreaths!

When I find some ideas from blogs that I like, I usually find that their tastes are like mine, so I really enjoy looking at the other cute things they have created, and I make sure to save them to my favorites list so I can find them again when I need another project.  So.... I kept looking around on this same blog and found this other cute idea for Valentines Day....  They are playing cards made into Valentine Coupons.  Now how cute and cleaver is this?  She even has the printable coupon link on it so you can benefit from her work and ideas.  It is so very cute.  Here is the direct link to this project http://tatertotsandjello.blogspot.com/2010/02/valentine-project-playing-card-coupon.html  You will need to go look at other projects on this blog because she has so many other ones that are just darling!  So here is the link that will take you there http://tatertotsandjello.blogspot.com/search/label/crafts 

and as I scrolled down I came to these darling flowers made out of felt or leather, but I also thought you could buy some vinyl and make them too.  http://tatertotsandjello.blogspot.com/2010/11/1-leather-or-felt-flower-gift-idea-with.html is the direct link to the tutorial to make these but what a versatile project.  These could be given as a gift to someone or made for yourself to have a purse clip, a hair clip, a belt clip, a shoe clip or any other kind of clip that you came up with.   I absolutely love this site and the ideas that she has so cleverly come up with that are new and fresh.  You know, I have seen cute purses that have cute flowers and ruffles all over them, and you could make one using a plain purse or bag pattern and adorn your purse with these darling flowers.  We have a store in Utah that is called Home Fabrics, that have bolts and bolts of fabric that can be used for draperies, upholstering  furniture, and they also have large rolls of vinyl and leather for really cheap per yard.  I think this must be a seconds store, but looking at these darling flowers tutorial, my mind went wild about where I can go to get the materials to make something really cute like this. 

This image came from this blog http://ptskjohnson.blogspot.com/2010/09/jizdani-designer-bags-giveaway.html and gives sort of an idea of what you can do to decorate a purse with flowers.  The one on the image aren't the same ones as above, but you can find a pattern for those as well online.  Look how she has added a cute button to the center of the flower to make it even cuter!
Here is a link to a site that has all different kinds of free patterns for making purses that you can use.  There is even one that is made out of duct tape if you can imagine!!!!
http://pursepatterns.com/free_bag_patterns.html    Here is one that looks very simple to make, http://tinyhappy.typepad.com/tiny_happy/2006/06/shoulder_bag_tu.html and would be darling with flowers all over the front of it.  I would make the purse in a vinyl and then put darling fabric or vinyl flowers all over the front of it.  I found this purse at this site http://craftstew.com/sewing/free-purse-and-tote-bag-patterns and it has lots of other purse patterns too.  I think just alittle clutch purse with a zipper would be so cute decorated with these flowers.  Can you tell I like these flowers???
 
           One last thing... Don't forget to go to my own Valentine ideas on this site that I have created in the past years for ideas too.  (go to the Labels section on the right and at the bottom, click on "Valentines" ..They are still cute and current ideas and there are printable things that make it so much easier, that is if you own a printer.  Enjoy!  Katie G.

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Bookmark on rededicating our lives in Service to the Lord


If you want the spiritual thought that I wrote to go along with this bookmark, go to my other blog at http:visitingteachingtips.blogspot.com  This is the corrected scripture reference... that is the for the words in "Quotes".

You know what they say about old friends and antiques? They grow more valuable with time.

Glad that you dropped by my blog!

This blog and it's contents go hand in hand with my Visiting Teaching Tips and handouts blog found at http://visitingteachingtips.blogspot.com/ If you by accident get to this blog first, make sure to go back to the other one and see all that there is for you there. This is sort of my overflow or stroage blog because I can't keep everything there, so I add my creations to this storage unit and that is my Visiting Teaching Surprise for you. Sometimes however, I do put in things that I think you would enjoy even if they aren't specifically related to Visiting Teaching, but my vision in life is that if I take all the time to make things, I may as well share them and get more use out of them. Sorta like hand me downs but brand new "Down loads". I hope you enjoy these freebies. Drop me a note to say hello in the comments under the downloads posts.