The Thing About Daisies...

Doing this meant that we had to find the perfect picture to use. That's no simple task when you have 200+ engagement photos and 600+ wedding photos. Lets just say it took awhile to narrow down. Once we figured out our top choices it was beyond simple to upload the photo(s) onto Canvas4Life's site. On their front page they direct you to get started by choosing a photo off of your computer. While it's uploading they also check the quality of the photos. I was using our very large original files and it took less than a minute for it to upload.

Once you get to the next page, the fun starts! It's where you get to decide on the size of canvas that you want. We went with a 16" x 20" canvas, which is a great size. I really like that they have a "mock" living room with a sofa...so you can get a visual idea of how large the photo will actually be. Us visual people really like that! After you pick your size you then move onto choosing between color, black and white or sepia. Granted if you're doing a black and white photo then this step really doesn't matter. Then it's onto canvas finishes...canvas depth...edge bleeding...and then BAM you're done (minus the whole paying part).

Oh and bonus...shipping is FREE if you choose Supersaver!

So now that we all know that the process is super simple and wonderful let's move on to the photo itself. We ended up choosing a photo from our engagement session. I wanted to do a color photo as a test, because let's face it... sometimes color photos lose their brilliance when printed.


This has always been one of our favorite photos, but it never made it to print. Probably because all of our engagement photos are our favorite! It's adorable... plus I'd say it fits the criteria of bright colors.

My order was processed on October 5 and the next day (Oct 6) I got a shipping notice. Yep that's right...in a matter of one day I went from a placed order to a shipped order. Holy wow! And if that's not great...within a week I had my new canvas print in my hot little hands!

The canvas was shipped in a flat box and protected by bubble wrap, which was far more than I expected! Once we got rid of the packaging there was a beautiful canvas starring back at Nate and I. We are both very impressed with the quality. And the color... oh the color. No issues there at all. Our beautiful, bright photo was perfectly conveyed onto canvas!

My only complaint is that we got our photo uncoated, which is totally OUR fault. The uncoated canvas really does not do well with the oils on your hands...which I learned quickly after I tried to wipe a bit of dust off of it. But, again, it was our choice to get it uncoated and if we had to do it again, we'd get the coating. So by no means is that the fault of the company.

Okay...enough talking...here's some photos of our new canvas painting!

Beautiful huh!?

I can easily see us getting more canvases done from Canvas4Life. We have a handful of photos that we want on canvas and with their prices I wouldn't feel awful getting more than one!

And because Canvas4Life is so wonderful they are offering you... my totally awesome readers a 10% discount! Yep...you read that right! If you're anything like me you have a photo (or twelve) that you want to be made into a canvas. So go go make one and get 10% off. Just type in thingaboutdaisies into the promo code section.

Go...do it...you'll be happy you did!

The colors are amazing. I must say that living in the midwest is wonderful, especially for a fall lover like me. Nate and I have been enjoying the weather like crazy. We're making the most of it by going out and exploring, which we did a lot of when our friend was in town.

I'll just let some photos do the talking.

Hay ride through a local corn maze.

Pumpkins straight from the patch.

Our haul.

The beautiful old cobble stone sidewalks in the German district in Columbus, OH.

Piles of pumpkins, gords and squash!

Fall trees.

Fall skies...one of my many favorite things about the season!

I hope everyone is enjoying their fall so far. We're getting every last drop out of it here, as it will be our last one before we move. Granted the falls where we are going aren't bad either...just different.

Happy Fall y'all!

I had been working on the idea about the same time as the other baby shower I threw, if not longer. Everywhere I went I was on the look out for all things baby and nautical (Cassie is doing an adorable nautical/maps theme). As I slowly gathered stuff I tired to figure out a way to send the items. I wanted it to be cute and something that could be used if she had the desire to. That's when I came up with an old suitcase. One of my local thrift stores always had great vintage cases and I knew that I would be able to find one...or three. Yep I went through two other suitcases before I found the perfect one.

After I gathered clothing, toys and the suitcase I started making things as well as painting the suitcase. Once I was done I wrapped everything in map tissue paper and sent it off!

I am so happy with how it turned out and that I was able to do this for Cassie and her husband. It was so much fun putting it together, I love hunting for gifts for friends. There is something so wonderful about having such a genuinely great friend and getting to do something special for them even though many states separate us.

I know Cassie is so very close to welcoming their little one into the world and I wish them nothing but happiness and smiles on their upcoming day.

That's how old I am as of yesterday. This age doesn't bother me at all. Even knowing that my foot is already in the door to 30, I am not freaking out. At most I wonder where time has gone, because...uh wasn't I just 21!?

Over the years I have started enjoying my birthday less and less. Be it because of the lack of festivities or because bad juju just seems to pop up on or around the day, I find myself wanting to celebrate it less and less. It's almost easier to not do anything for it.

Which sucks, because I absolutely love September. It is my all time favorite month. I love that we're on the cusp of seasons. I love cold weather and everything that goes with it and September is the gateway month for it all. But every year September and I have a rocky start as my birthday inches closer.

This year was no different.

I don't want to not celebrate my birthday, but sometimes I wonder if that's the best idea. Maybe down the road I will change my tune and my birthday and I will get along better. Maybe I'll look forward to it. Who knows. But at least for now my birthday is over.

Even though it was just another day in my books, I was able to spend it with my wonderful husband. So wonderful in fact, that he made me Merry Unbirthday cupcakes to celebrate that today was, in fact, not my birthday.

I'm going to go have another cupcake and bask in all of this wonderful merry unbirthday-ness. That sounds like a great plan as September and I get back on track.

I set to work, gluing on the crayons.

A lot of the DIYs I found were using hot glue...and while I do LOVE me some hot glue, I decided to go with super glue. It didn't seem logical to use a glue that melts with heat on a project that gets melted with...heat.

I lined up all of the crayons with the logo up in my best attempt at ROYGBIV.

We then headed outside with my blowdryer.

Nate was super excited...

Especially when it started working.

We worked on the crayons for awhile, but while a hairdryer gets hot, it doesn't get hot enough to make the melting process happen quickly. We also didn't like that the force of the air was pushing around the wax. It was making for a splatter-y look that nether of us liked. Nate kept saying that a heat gun would be perfect for this job and that's when the light bulb went off in my head. I went and grabbed my embossing gun.

It was perfect. A little too perfect. Lets just say that if you let the embossing gun stay in one spot for too long...the paper wrappers would start smoking. Once we figured out the prime distance and sweeping motion we were golden. We were really able to start get the look we were looking for. Melted, layered wax.

After we had a good look going on, we decided that we didn't love all of the white space left at the bottom of the canvas. We didn't want to lose the layered look we had going, so we decided to add crayons to the other side of the canvas.


Seeing as I had glued the other row with the label up, I had no idea what colors what the colors were and I wanted to line them up the same on both sides. So I set to work laying the fresh crayons on top of the melted.


Again, I glued them down with super glue. I glued this row with the color name up, so you can see which color is which. At this point I totally took over. Nate had his fun and it was my turn!


Watching the wax melt, drip and pool was beyond entertaining. I kind of want to do 20 more just so I can play with the wax. Though with as anal as I am...I did melt and remelt the wax a lot. I like finding perfection in chaos.


I must say, it was an easy craft...unless you are me. I did, after all, say that I like things to be perfect (or what is perfect to me) and it was easy for me to get carried away. I wanted to add my personal touch, which was the super layered look. We also love that we can hang the art a few different ways. Though having it sideways so that the crayon drips look like they are fighting gravity is our favorite way to hang it.


Anyone who knows me, knows I am a sucker for texture. And once I figured out that you could layer the wax...I went to town. Hello texture!

Honestly, this was one of the easiest crafts I have done recently. It's even easier if you aren't crazy anal like I am. I mean if I weren't so crazed I probably could have had this done in hours instead of 4 days of messing around. What can I say...I find ways to make simple things harder than they should be!

...Use Crayola Crayons because the cheap ones just won't cut it (we didn't test this, but we have seen self admitted fails from other people that used brands like Roseart). Also, while the canvas was good it wasn't perfect. With the canvas having an open back the wax had a tendency to crack or pop off if disturbed too much. You can fix this by placing something solid (like cardboard) in the opening. Or you could just attach the crayons to foam board and then place the foam board in a frame. It's really personal preference. And last thing, seal your wax with a clear coat. It should help lock the wax in place and hopefully keep it from melting (not that our house would ever get that hot).