Idea Queen Tips & News

Looking for free scrapbooking supplies? We’ve found a great supplier that has them! ComputerScrapbook.com offers some really cool freebies. I mean there really is some cool ones here, and not just junk no one is buying. Remember though, these are digital supplies for the most part, although some are printable too.

I was amazed at the selections and awesome prices of this site (free is always a great selling point for me!). Even the things that aren’t free are way cheap - as far as scrapbooking goes anyway. Scrapbooking is not a cheap hobby that’s for sure, but digital scrapbooking has cut that cost down to almost nothing. Especially when you can find cool free scrapbooking supplies like at this site!

If you need some ideas on what to do with those supplies, you can always drop by the community boards at The Scrapbooking Source. There’s also information on the site about place to score other cool scrapbooking supplies.

Have fun!

Did you know we actually have our bath & body recipes within the money saving ideas section of Idea Queen? We figured there’s no better way to save tons of money than to make your own bath and body items. This includes homemade soap, bubble bath, bath salts, and lots of other recipes.

Anyway, here is the easiest homemade soap recipe we found:

Herbal Glycerin Soap

1 pound Glycerin
1/2 ounce fragrance oil or 1/2 to 1 teaspoon essential oil, amount depends on oil used.
1 T. herbal powder of your choice and/or 1 T. dried flower of you choice

Melt the glycerin in the microwave until completely disolved. This usually takes one to two minutes. Avoid stirring as much as possible because stirring causes bubbles. Pour in herbal powder, dried flowers, and fragrance oil while still in liquid state. Stir lightly to evenly distribute the ingredients.

Pour in the mold of your choice and let set for 1 to 2 hours or longer if desired. If you have trouble with the bar releasing from the mold, place in the freezer for a few minutes and the bar should release easily. I have found that the bar of soap lathers better when it is allowed to cure for 3 to 7 days before use.

This recipe yields 4 - 4 ounce bars of Glycerin Soap.
Need more bath & body recipes? This one along with over 250 more can be found in the Bath & Body Recipe ebook available at Idea Queen.

Pumpkin carving is a Halloween tradition. You just can’t get through the holiday without having at least one pumpkin sitting in your window or on your front step. Even though it’s a tad early to start breaking out the pumpkins, we like to be prepared don’t we?

There are a few patterns and resources listed on our pumpkin carving patterns page at idea queen. If you want the basic stuff (ghosts, skeletons, etc), then this will probably be the only place you stop.

Two of our other favorite resources for pumpkin carving patterns online are:

Dot Com Women
One of our favorite resources for just about anything. It hasn’t let us down for pumpkin carving patterns - there are some really great ones here!

The Pumpkin Wizard
Wow, it doesn’t get more unique than this. Fantastic new designs are added all the time on this site. Guess what? They are FREE to boot! Hurray!

Hopefully these sites will keep you busy and you’ll find the absolute perfect pumpkin for your step this Halloween!

Your baby is one! Hard to believe, isn’t it? It’s a bittersweet feeling - you love to watch them grow, but sad to see them growing up at the same time. Never the less, you want to make this party great.

After holding multiple birthdays for both my kids, I can tell you it does get easier the more you do. So the first thing you’ll want to do is take a deep breath. They are not going to remember this party in the least, so you do not need to stress about it. No need for massive amounts of decorations or anything of the like. In fact, if there aren’t going to be other kids you might want to skip the balloons. They get popped (possibly even by them, which of course wouldn’t be good) and become a hazard to your little one.

Instead you’ll want to just worry about the cake and inviting relatives. No need for invites unless you really want to - just give them a call instead. Just make sure you have your cake and all items you’ll need for the cake (and ice cream too!).

For a list of supplies and some helpful tips, be sure to see our baby’s first birthday party page at idea queen. You can also check out party supplies at The Party Works.

Just remember to keep it simple so the focus can stay on your baby!

No matter what the season, a handmade card can be something very special. There are two pages at Idea Queen which can help you out if you need some ideas for handmade cards.

Card making ideas for kids can be found within the craft section. This page gives you a list of possible supplies for decorations, and even a list of holidays to send a card. If your kids are bored or you just want to do a craft, cards can be a fun idea.

Handmade Christmas card ideas can be found within the holiday idea pages, and are for kids and adults alike. On this page you can find some patterns to use on your cards as well. Hopefully we can add more in the near future!

What kid hasn’t wanted to be Spongebob for Halloween at least once? This is such a popular one, I just had to post some resources on where to find it. Actually, I’ll do you one better and hand you an entire site for nothing but Spongebob.

Spongebob and Friends has loads of information on your favorite sponge. You can find information on music, characters, episodes, and merchandise all in one place. Because the Halloween costumes are so popular, there is a link right there in the navigation that leads to the best place to buy the costume. (Scroll down to the bottom of the site, you’ll see the picture of the costume which leads to the place to buy it).

My son was already Spongebob several years ago and has long ago gave up the costume. Although for what you can get it for from this site, be very lucky. I’m pretty sure we paid more in the store to get it, and of course he just HAD to be Spongebob. It’s hard to say no to a 3 yr old!

There is no shortage of dessert recipes. The more chocolate the better I always say. Oh, but desserts come in more than just chocolate, so maybe I should say the more sugar the better?

Regardless, we picked up an ebook that had over 600 different recipes included. Talk about a sugar high that never goes away! There’s no possible way we can test them all out, but we have tried out several of them. All were wonderful, and it was easy to find just what we wanted when the sugar craving hit.

Some of these recipes can be found on our easy Christmas dessert page, but you can find all of them in the Chocolate Lover’s ebook. I shouldn’t say it’s just an ebook, because actually it’s 19 different ebooks rolled into one package. This way you can find EXACTLY the recipe you want instead of searching for it the hard way. It’s broken down by TYPE of dessert.

Trust me, this is one cookbook we cherish in this house!

The hardest person to buy for has got to be a teen girl. You almost need to spend every single day with them to figure out just the right present. Being the adult, they of course don’t WANT you to spend any amount of time with them. Figuring out a present when you don’t have a clue….not so easy.

Other than a car (the top of the list for every teen), the next best thing is probably going to be clothes or music. Speaking in general that is, since not every teenage girl is all about clothes, make-up, and music. However, it’s usually a safe bet.

Teenages love independence and shopping for themselves. Your best bet? A gift card. While it’s not always a good idea to give cash or gift certificates to adults, it’s the perfect gift for a teen. Let them get exactly what they want the first time around.

If you have a little better idea on what they like, you might try a gift basket. This is especially nice for sweet 16, when you need to make a big deal out of their party. You can stick in multiple gift certificates and other personalized item all in one basket.

The best gift idea, though, for any teen - cash.

What kid doesn’t like magnets? You can come up with tons of fun projects using magnets. We’ve got an outline of magnet crafts for kids on Idea Queen, but here I’ll share with you my favorites.

The type of magnets we usually use are the printable sheets. Granted they don’t hold as well as the stronger magnets you cut (which you can get from any craft store), but they work perfect for printing. What we do is find printable paper doll stuff online, and go from there.

My daughter’s favorite is Strawberry Shortcake that we found about a year ago. We printing off the dolls and clothes on magnet paper, then cut them out. She has a blast sitting in the kitchen and playing with those on the fridge.

Now of course you can use the better magnets with something stronger like cardstock. They will hold up a lot better, and stick a lot better too. While the printable magnet sheets are easy to work with and inexpensive they aren’t very sturdy.  This is a personal preference really, but we are happy with “cheap” because the kids are rough on toys anyway.

So this may not be a “fun” activity, but it’s an activity all the same (thus the reason you are looking at it in the “Crafts & Activities” category here at the blog).

Here is my personal chore list for my kids, but you can add your own of course. This list actually comes from the chores for kids page on Idea Queen.

- Wash windows & mirrors
- Wipe down counters & walls
- Vaccum & Mop
- Pick up toys & clothes
- Put away laundry
- Wash dishes or load/unload dishwasher
- Clean out or wash cars
- Clean out gutters (older kids)
- Mow the yard (older kids)

If your kids are older, you could actually add doing laundry to this list. I know us moms tend to be picky when it comes to what is added to the washer. But if you set aside baskets for them to do it can work. My oldest who is now 7 actually shows interest in putting clothes in the washer.  This really is an important skill for them to know, too, as some of us (like me) didn’t know how to do laundry until we moved away from home!

Now of course if you want to keep track of all those chores, a chore list comes in handy. You can either make one yourself (which I recommend, you can actually do a craft with the kids while making something useful!), or buy a handy chore chart (these are nice too, often coming with a list of chores). Either way, the above should give you some ideas for chore lists for kids!