Taylor, Author at TaylorMade

DIY Roach Costume

November 3, 2015 By Taylor 5 Comments

Yes, you read that right! My son wanted to be a roach for Halloween and I said yes :)

A few months ago I was throwing around group costume ideas for the three kids. Nothing was sticking then my oldest said, “what about bugs”? I immediately liked the idea because my daughters name is Bee so naturally she could dress as a Bee. Then my four year old got super excited cause he wanted to be a lizard. Who am I to crush his dreams and tell him that a lizard isn’t actually a bug? A Bee and a Lizard, done. But then my oldest son said he wanted to dress up as a roach?! I tried to talk him out of it because how does one even go about sewing a roach suit?? But he was determined and I like a good sewing challenge so I said let’s go for it!

There is very little roach costume inspiration out there, which is good and bad haha. I didn’t have anything to live up to in the era of Pinterest expectations but I also didn’t have a clue how to make it! After a good ol’ google search, I did find one awesome “cape” that a legit costume designer made and I pinned it HERE. After I saw that I knew a cape was the way to go. I found some brown jeans and a brown tee from the mens section so I just cut it down and sewed up the sides) for the body and got to work on the roach cape.

I bought brown suiting for the legs and ironed a very stiff fusible interfacing to the wrong side so they would be extra stiff. I used hot glue to attach a thin strip of brown faux fur to each leg… creepy right? For the antenna I used the suiting with some jewelry wire inside and a little brown pom-pom glued at the end.

Then I freehanded roach-shape-wings on to some brown satin. I used quilt batting inside them and sandwiched it between. I also sandwiched the legs between the wing layers before sewing right sides together. Then I flipped them right side out and top-stitched. The wings are two separate pieces but sewn together at the top where they connect. Then I added a neck hood/cape part with double batting and a layer of felt in between so it would stand up a little more. It was so thick that I really would have liked to hand-sew it so there wasn’t a huge line down the middle but, it was the day before Halloween and mama only has so much time.

I added a neck piece made from the suiting and used velcro to attach it.

Overall I’m really happy with the way it turned out, and he was super excited about it! I also learned that some people have quite the aversion to roaches… even when the model is a cute six year old haha! Stay tuned for the lizard and bee later this week :)

Cinnamon Sugar Popcorn

October 20, 2015 By Taylor 1 Comment

It’s finally fall! My favorite season full of pumpkins and parties and costumes and crafting! Today I have the pleasure of sharing a tutorial from Imperial Sugar, Cinnamon Sugar Popcorn in Stuffed Paper Pumpkins! It’s fun, kid friendly and delicious. Imperial Sugar has a ton of fun edible Halloween crafts to make with your kids so check them out HERE. As usual, my boys did most of this project alone, I just was the supervisor ;)

We made the homemade Cinnamon Sugar Popcorn together in the kitchen then we decorated pumpkin faces and stitched them up. These would make a fun gift but we just kept them for ourselves!

Cinnamon Sugar Popcorn Ingredients:

1/4 cup coconut oil (or canola)
2/3 cup popcorn kernels
3 Tablespoons butter, melted
2 Tablespoons Imperial Sugar Cinnamon Sugar Shaker (this wasn’t available at my grocery store yet so I mixed my own but I’m excited to find the shaker!)
1 1/2 teaspoons sea salt

Directions for the Cinnamon Sugar Popcorn:

1. Add the coconut oil and three popcorn kernels to a large pot with a tight fitting lid. Cover and cook over medium-high heat until all kernels pop. Take the three kernels out of the pot.

2. Add the rest of the popcorn kernels. Cover and take the pot off of the heat. Wait 30 seconds. Put the pot back on the heat.

3. Cook, shaking the pot occasionally until the popping slows down. After about 2 minutes, take the lid off of the pot. This lets the steam out and keeps the popcorn crisp.

4. While the popcorn is popping, melt the butter.

5. Pour over the popcorn and sprinkle with salt and cinnamon sugar. Toss until completely coated. You could also do this in a large paper bag. Let cinnamon popcorn cool completely.

Supplies for Treat Bags:

Colored yarn or string
Hole punch
Heavier weight brown craft paper, colored paper or white paper (we used orange cardstock)
Scissors
Colors, markers or colored pencils (optional)

Directions for Treat Bags:

Print out the Pumpkin and Apple Stuffed Paper Bag Patterns. You can print directly onto brown craft paper or you could use colored paper, or white paper that you hand color. Choose a heavier weight paper if your printer will allow it, as super thin paper will tear when stitching up the sides. We used orange cardstock then decorated them like jack-o-lanterns.
Cut out the pattern. Use a hole punch to punch holes where indicated.

Remaining Directions:
While popcorn is cooling, begin stitching up your paper patterns. Using colored yarn, stitch the front and back pieces together. Tie a knot in both ends of the yarn to keep it from coming loose. We started from one side (at the bottom) then went around to the other side across the top then stopped.

Leave the bottom part of the pattern open. Before sewing it entirely closed, fill with Cinnamon Sugar Popcorn.

Once it is full, stitch up the bottom of the stuffed paper bag and tie off ends of yarn. Cut off any excess yarn. Now you have a fun treat to take to your party, give to a friend or eat!

When ready to eat, just tear the stuffed paper bag open and enjoy.

This post was sponsored by Imperial Sugar but all thoughts and opinions are my own.

Tissue Paper Pom Pom Flower Kit

October 6, 2015 By Taylor 1 Comment

UPDATE: You can find the whole/cream flower kits HEREand the pink kit HERE!

If you know me you know that I can’t leave a blank wall alone for long :) Well… here is our “nook wall” as we call it the day we moved in to our house two years ago, such a sad little nook. About a year later my talented husband built some nook shelves (that I still need to post about). But I felt like it needed a little something more. When I saw this Tissue Paper Pom-Pom Flower kit from Martha Stewart Crafts in these colors I knew they were perfect for our nook wall!

We just had our kitchen remodeled this past summer and because we have a pretty open floor plan, that turned into remodeling the breakfast room and all redoing all of the flooring. The living room to the left has a lot of color and the breakfast room to the right has some amazing new wallpaper. I didn’t want to go too wild so the mix of pinks and whites were perfect for this space!

I have made a few versions of these flowers before for showers but these turned out way better! I obviously never added enough layers of tissue. These actually took me longer than I expected because there are so many layers haha!

They really look pretty anywhere, my husband even thought they were a dining room centerpiece when I was building them on the table :)

Here is our wall before…. better than when we moved in but lacking the TaylorMade pop of color.

After the perfect “floofing” of the flowers I just hung them up with thumbtacks. Ahhh the colors!! LOVE!

I just used two packs (5 each). Martha Stewart Crafts Halloween products are available in store at Michaels :)

Marble Counter Alternatives

September 25, 2015 By Taylor 8 Comments

This is a story all about my countertop woes and how I overcame them haha! Kidding… countertops aren’t that serious but they are a huge part of your kitchen and they are important! This isn’t the usual cute decor or craft post but I figured it might help someone else choose a marble counter alternative, so why not share my experience right?

We started our kitchen remodel in July this year (before pics HERE) and I just knew that I had to have white cabinets and marble countertops! I am very decisive and I usually have a clear vision in my head. Between my “vision”, magazine clippings and a Pinterest board I was armed and ready. I started asking around looking for contractors and in the process I also asked people about their selections and how everything was holding up. I was more than bummed to hear that a lot of people already had stains on their marble (sad face.) In the meantime we found a great contractor and he agreed that marble countertops might not be a great choice for us (double sad face- look how pretty they are).

Apparently marble isn’t a good option for people who want to cook in their kitchens haha! I’m only half way kidding. I started researching and learned that marble is super porous so foods that stain like wine, berries and juice could leave permanent marks even on marble that is sealed. Oil and citrus also cause etching and marring. There are two schools of thought though, some people like these marks and consider it worn-in and cozy looking like a pair of broken-in jeans. I know myself and I am not one of these people! We are messy and I like things clean and neat, so after a lot of thought and research we decided marble isn’t for us. Waaahhhh. My problem at that point was that I had the look of marble in my head and it wouldn’t leave, it’s just so pretty! My contractor told me that granite was his favorite as far as durability and cost so we started there.

Granite: durable and won’t break the bank but hard to find in grey tones

Guys, it’s really hard to find any granite that looks like marble. I don’t mind the texture as much as the colors. I don’t have any brown tones in my house at all. No beige, cream, tan, taupe… none. Those colors look great in so many peoples homes but our house is very “cool”. We have blues and greys and aquas with bright whites. The main problem I had with granite was I couldn’t really find any without brown/tan/cream undertones. There were still plenty that I liked but didn’t think they would work. I liked the “marble look” of these.

I also liked this one which is called “fantasy brown”. Of all the granite that this yard had I liked this one best. We decided to keep looking though…

Quartzite (not to be confused with Quartz): durable, looks a lot like marble, so pretty but expensive $

During my research I learned that my favorite kind of countertops are quartzite! They are natural, earthy and so gorgeous. They almost look like a salt block to me. I asked the employees for details and they said that it isn’t nearly as porous as marble so the staining wouldn’t be as bad! Perfect right?? Perfect until I learned about the price :( We have a lot of countertops and this was just out of our budget. But I can’t get over how pretty they are.

Quartz: only slightly more expensive than granite, very durable and messy family friendly, comes in grey tones

After searching for the perfect thing and being sad that nothing was marble (I was getting annoying about it) I spotted this… Definitely the right color and still natural looking without being too busy. I think I liked it. I asked a million questions and found out that it was quartz. A manmade countertop that was super durable and not nearly as expensive as quartzite.

They showed me the other colors; all the ones I liked had grey or white backgrounds with what looked like glass rocks inside and some even had mirrored looking rocks. Some of these are not name brand but some are Silestone. They are anti-microbial and had a warranty! Yay!

My husband went to the Silestone warehouse to get a closer look so he sent me this picture and the background caught my attention. It had a marble-esque pattern!

They gave him a book with every single color that they carry. I immediately loved the look of two of their colors, Lyra and Helix. Here they are next to real Carrara Marble… pretty close for a durable option!

Left is Silestone in Helix, Middle is Silestone in Lyra and right is marble. I had found our winner!

Our kitchen is very white so we ended up going with Helix (on the left) to give it more contrast. I was super nervous because of my marble expectation but the day it showed up I was really happy! We have lived with it for over a month now and we LOOOOVE them!! So easy to take care of and doesn’t show anything at all! Here are the guys installing it :)

There you have our countertop “journey” haha… and hopefully this post helped someone with their marble countertop debacle! Let me know if you have any questions, and stay tuned for the big kitchen reveal coming soon!