I had a request to post instructions for the no-sew fleece blankets and I try to meet requests whenever possible! Before I share the instructions, let me say thank you to those of you who have shared with me photos of the crafts you have made using my instructions! It’s really neat to see the creativity of others. If you’ve made something using instructions that I have posted, I’d love to see it! Or if you have ideas for a project I should attempt, let me know!

On to the no-sew blankets…… These blankets are so easy to make and would make a great... more

Have you seen the cute memory boards in trendy stores? I love them but they are usually pretty pricey so I just make my own! When Charlie and his family moved into their new house about five years ago, I asked A. if there was anything that was needed for Charlie’s new room and she said she wanted a memory board for his room to put photos and other memorabilia on so I offered to make him one. I had never made one before but played around and figured it out pretty easily. I made one for Charlie and one for his sister. A loved them and they are still hanging... more

Another therapeutic activity that is a personal favorite of mine is scrapbooking.

I’ve written before about Charlie’s life book. Creating his life book was empowering, healing, and therapeutic for me. His life book contains pictures, information from my childhood, and other miscellaneous information about my side of his biological family history. When creating his life book, I found comfort in the fact that through the life book he would always have something... more

I almost forgot about the craft post for this month until a reader reminded me of it! This month’s craft is a very simple, fun, and easy craft that you could do yourself or you could do it with your child(ren).

I will be showing you how to embellish plain and inexpensive photo frames. Adoptive moms and their children could jazz up a simple frame for the child’s birthmother and birthmoms can make a fun frame to hold a special photo of themselves and their child. I made three different frames, all using the same method, but each different and... more

In a recent post, I told you all about Adoption.com’s 2007 Loved Photo Contest. If you are anything like me, you probably have a ton of photos!

What should you do with all of those photos? Well of course, there is scrapbooking but today I’d like to share a fun and new idea for a photo, a photo puzzle.

Photo puzzles are simple... more

“A picture is worth a thousand words.”

Photographs are priceless memories that can not be replaced. Photos describe memories that we may not be able to find the words to describe them accurately. Photos give us a tangible way to remember a fleeting moment, event, or memory.

I have many treasured photographs of the time Charlie and I spent together in the hospital following his birth as well as oodles of photos of him alone, of us together at visit, of him and his adoptive family, and of him and Noah. Each photo represents... more

In a recent post, I introduced you to my efforts at digital scrapbooking. In this post, I will share some of my favorite digital scrapbooking websites and the programs I personally use in my own digital scrapbooks.

Just like with old fashioned scrapbooking, digital pages are created by layering photos with backgrounds and embellishments. Many of the digital scrapbooking programs come with lots of backgrounds, embellishments, clip art, etc. that can be used to enhance your pages.... more

Digital scrapbooking is a new trend in the scrapbooking circles. Technical geeks like me love it! I’ve been digitally scrapbooking for about a year now and have come to prefer it over the old fashioned form of scrapbooking. I made Charlie’s lifebook (a page from the lifebook is the photo for this post) using digital scrapbooking software and don’t think I could have completed it as quickly as I did had I used the old fashioned method.

Perhaps you want to make a scrapbnook full of milestones and pictures of your child for his/her birthmother or you want... more

Journaling is such a healing process for many birthmoms. (And adoptive moms too!) For April’s crafting segment, I want to share “Journal in a Jar” which can be adapted to fit adoption situations.

Journal in a Jar is a really neat and easy idea that you can make for yourself or for a friend. If you are intimidated by journaling or do not think you can journal well, this is a great tool to get you started and introduce the habit of journaling. Journaling in a jar provides you with prompt questions to get you started.

By visiting this website,... more

I actually got a request for more “Crafting with Coley” and scrapbooking posts! I figured I was boring you readers to tears with my Martha Stewart wannabe ramblings!

But you ask and you shall receive. I’ll try and do at least one “Crafting with Coley” post a month and yes, it will somehow have some relevance and relation to adoption.

So this month’s Crafting with Coley segment will be Decoupage Picture frames. Birthmoms could make a decoupage picture frame to hold a special photo of your child or you could make one for your child to hold a special... more