10 Great Valentines Day Mantle Ideas

Tomorrow I will reveal my Valentines Day Mantle Decor...FINALLY!  Uh, it's taking me forever to get motivated for some reason.  If you are still working on yours here are some really lovely displays to get your creative juices flowing.  Make sure to come back tomorrow to check out my display!

I love the red & turquoise in this mantle. 

And make sure you check out here X & O tutorial, so cute!



Positively Splendid

Tatertots & Jello

The Shabby Creek Cottage

Landee See Landee Do

Crap I've Made

Decor Chick

Craftaholics Anonymous

My Blessed Life

The House of Smiths

The Sunny Side Up Blog

Super Bowl XLVI

With the Super Bowl playing next Sunday February 5th I thought I'd help you with some last minute party and food ideas to really make your party a hit.  And even if your like us and you really have no idea what is going on in the game while your watching...you just watch it because your 8 year old son has been obsessed with it for the past 3 years...these ideas are for you too!  And is anyone else thrilled that the team colors coordinate with each other?  No, is it just me?!  Oh well.

Let's start with some great decorating ideas:



Super Bowl Party

Super Bowl Party

Football Party

Super Bowl Party

Now for the FOOD:

Cheeseburger & Fries Bites

Party Time!

I'm so excited that it's the weekend (it feels like it's been a long week). 

If your new to The Crafted Sparrow every weekend I feature some of my favorite parties that I've seen over the past week.  There are so many ideas and let's face it...I love planning a party! 

Infact I'm about 2 months away from my son's 8th birthday and this year he has chosen a ninja/karate party.  Which wasn't what I wanted him to pick, why you ask?  Well I had made lots of penant garland from our son Kaison's 3rd birthday this past September that was a Circus Theme Party.  I still have more triangles I could sew to make more too, so I wanted to be able to use them again since they took a while to make.  I was thinking a vintage superhero party or candyland, neither of which he was sold on.  What?!?  No to a party full of candy?  Crazy kid.  So now he's gone with the whole karate theme, which I'm already compiling ideas for and bought some things...it should be great.  I guess my garland will have to wait until the next party.  Maybe Kaison will have a vintage superhero theme for his 4th.

Okay, okay now on to the awesome parties I found this week!



Sesame Street Theme

Movie Night Theme 

Valentines Day Wreath

I decided I'd better buckle down and put up some Valentines Day stuff around here since it's only a couple weeks away.  Although I didn't want to spend any money on making a wreath since it will only be up for a few weeks.  So I didn't.  I made this one for.....FREE!  A box + left over fleece from my "X & O" pillows + a glue gun = One sweet wreath! 

Here's what I did. 

Step 1.  Find cardboard box in garage

Step 2.  Remove everything from that box that was destined for goodwill

Step 3.  Nicely put those removed items in a pile for your husband to now deal with

Step 4.  Draw a heart shape on your cardboard box & cut it out

Step 5.  Make felt flowers, seen HERE

Step 6.  Paint cardboard to match flowers

Step 7.  Glue flowers to cardboard, be sure to fill in all the spots

Step 8.  Glue on some ribbon to make a hanger for it

Step 9.  Hang wreath

Step 10.  Step back & enjoy it

It should look like this.



23 - Awesome Ideas for Kids Valentines Day Treats

It's time to think "Outside the BOX"!

This Valentines Day why not do something different and avoid buying those generic boxed cards?  Don't get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with purchasing them, so if that's your tradition by all means buy on!  I think it's so much fun to use your imagination to come up with a clever Valentine that your kids will be super proud of helping you make!  There are so many awesome ideas around blogland.  Last year for Corbyn's class we made Asian twist to his Valentine.  I made a printable card for his classmates, and we took fortune cookies and chocolate dipped them and added sprinkles.  Having the hubby working for Pei Wei comes in handy, buying fortune cookies in bulk is awesome!  And the kids loved them!

Now check out the rest of these ideas!



 Sweet Treat

@ Eighteen 25

Bananas for You

@ Fiskars

A Fishy Valentine

@ Tammy Mitchell Photography

Valentines Day Card Printables - 32 Designs!

Let me just start by saying...

Why don't they make Valentines Day cards like these anymore?



I'm in {LOVE} with these vintage Valentines Day cards.  I wish they would go back to these simple almost cheesy cards...they have so much character and who doesn't love vintage things?!

Now on to the rest of what your here for.  There are some really great FREE Valentines Day Card Printables available.  Here are just a few for you to choose from.

Pumpkins and Posies

Did Someone Say Party Site

No Source, but right click and save to print.

The Pink Ink Doodle

Wild Olive

Nellie Design

One Charming Party

Sweet {Valentines} Treats

Whether it's baking a sweet treat for your sweet love, family, or great friends these recipes are sure to knock their socks off!  These would all be great gift ideas, or party food if you planning something special for that special day of LOVE!



Red Velvet Brownies with White Chocolate Buttercream Frosting

@ Smells Like Home

Red Velvet Cake Batter Dip

@ Something Swanky

Fancy Oreo Cakesters

@ Crissy Crafts

How to see what's being "Pinned" from your site

Ever wondered which one of your projects has been "pinned" or are being "pinned" like crazy!?!  Well if your like me...YES!  It's super easy to see what items you've created have been "pinned".

Head over to Pinterest and in the address bar put this:

http://pinterest.com/source/yourdomain.com

{except you will want to replace "yourdomain" with your domain name}

So for example mine is:

http://pinterest.com/source/thecraftedsparrow.blogspot.com

And it should pull up all the most recent "pins" from your site.  It's such a fun little boost to your day to be able to go in every once in a while and see what people like.  I just took a peak at mine and here are what people are "pinning".

Top 6 Pins:

*  Penny Covered Letters  *

*  Felt Flowers Tutorial + Template   * 

* Faux Pearl Baby Onesie *

*  Felt Flower Ring  *

*  DIY No Sew Ruffled Tree Skirt  *
{still super popular even after Christmas}


*  Fabric Covered Marble Necklace  *

Here is a great post written about this topic over at Savvy Blogging, you should read it...it had some great pointers on how to utilize those pins to benefit your site.  Now that you know (if you didn't already know) how to see what people love, what are your most popular "pins"?