Baubling On and On

i have all girls. my girls are very girlie. my girlie girls love girlie things, like hair bows, flowers, and rings. they put these things on and they spin and they sing. and they laugh as the sun catches on all of their bling! unfortunately for me, buying their bling makes the register ching, and suddenly no more shuffle of bills in my pocket, but that annoying jing-a-ling.

dr. seus ain't got nothin' on me! word.

so my oldest is worse than most of the teenage girls i knew in high school. she changes clothes at least twice a day (more if i leave her unattended for more than ten minutes), is constantly checking herself out and posing in front of the full length mirror. everything she sees in the store is "beautiful" and something she really needs. her favorite game is dress up and i'm pretty sure that's what she dreams about at night. she has very strong opinions about the clothes i buy her or put out for her in the morning. the first of which always being "no jeans, mom! they're not pretty!". *sigh* and, of course, her sister just copies everything she does, so i'm already seeing the dollar signs fleeing my wallet as the years pass in my head. there are proms, homecomings, weddings.... the more immediate problem is her jewelry.

she was always admiring of my wedding rings and the few other rings that i wore. then she started noticing the occasional necklace on other women. then the ear rings were a big deal. suddenly, i wake up in the morning and she's climbed up on something to get into my jewelry box and is pulling out whatever she can get her little hands on! obviously it was time to get her some of her own.

have you seen these?


i know, cute, right? but let's be honest. these are for little kids. how long are they really going to last? so should i really pay full price for those? nah!! i can totally make that! and you know what? i can! with a little help from my blogging peeps, you can, too! go here to see where i got the idea for this project (a girl and a glue gun). i LOVE this blog. seriously, what's not to love? it's a craft blog that uses a lot of glue gun action. i have a glue gun! and i know how to use it! well, you know. the basics. plug in, point, pull trigger. how hard could it be?

so i went to the store to find the bases like what kimbo had in her post, but couldn't find them in bulk. they wanted $5 for one! i began to have second thoughts. but then my genius eye fell on these:


look familiar? well, they should. you're keys are probably hanging from one right now. well...not the exact ones, obviously. unless they're very small keys. these are about the size of a 3 or 4 year old's finger. convenient, no? so i sunk them into some Styrofoam and pulled out my stash of "some day" materials (as in "i'm sure i'll find a way to use this stuff some day). i pulled out some fabric and beads that i thought would work well, and away we go!



have you ever seen these?


well, they make awesome rings for little girls!


while i was at it, i found a couple of fake flowers in my stash that i'd used for a baby shower decoration and decided that they girls could use some new hair clips, too. so i clipped then off of the stem, found some "some day) beads, and hot glued them all to a clip that i also found at the store (25 for under $2).



then i made a couple of flowers out of fabric using the method kimbo described in her "hair crap" posts:


and that's it! it cost a fraction of what i would have had to pay to buy one already made only to have them get lost or broken within a month! and who's the coolest mom ever? me, of course!! it just doesn't get any better than this.