Merry Christmas!

My Sick Day Christmas Project

     What is there to do when everyone, including yourself is sick?  It needs to be something easy, relaxing but also something that as you are sitting there on the couch (not wanting to move) you see needs to be done.  So mine was having something to do with Ella's hand prints for her first and second Christmas that I put on some felt and never did anything else with. What to do, what to do.  Well I recently bought some empty frames from the thrift store and have a recently emptied wall place.  So I cut some cardboard and linen napkin to fit the frame and used that as my backing.  After that I used some string and sewed on the hand print and stitched (free-hand) out some extra decor on them.  I think they are cute and I made them Christmas colors so they really fit in the living for now.  I'll have to make one more for this years hand-print but that can be after the Christmas hustle and bustle (unless there is another sick day before that).

Glitter Tree Tutorial

Glitter Tree Tutorial

Gather up your supplies:

• Styrofoam cone
• Candlestick
• White glue, on hand
• applicator brush
• Beacon's 527 glue
• Glitte
• Ribbon
• optional: Monogram embellishment

I picked up the candlestick holders and the Styrofoam

cones at the Dollar Store.

Start by applying the white glue (I used Aleene's Tacky Glue) with the applicator to the styrofoam cone, be generous.  Work from the top down.  When you start getting towards the bottom you may want stick a pen or something into the bottom of the cone to apply the glue on the bottom.

Next get out your glitter and make sure you have something on your workspace to catch the extra glitter. Then start to sprinkle the glitter on the cone.  Keep sprinkling until the tree is completely covered.  Try to let the glue dry a little bit before moving on to the next step.

Apply the Beacon 527 to the lip of the candle holder, once again generously.  Then attach the tree to the candle holder and fill in any holes on the tree in the glitter, that your fingers may have caused.

Cut your ribbon to fit around your tree, plus about a 1/2 inch.  Now attach it to your tree using double sided tape or glue to attach it around the tree.  This is optional, but I put an embellishment on the ribbon.  My embellishment happened to have prongs that I was able to just push in but you could also use glue to attach it. As you can see I actually attached the ribbon after but either way works.

 Here's my final product!

How to Make a Serving Platter on a Pedestal

With the Holiday parties coming up, here's a cheap way to add a little something to the food table!  This is a super easy craft.  First collect odd plates/bowls and candlestick holders around the house or at the dollar store.  Then pick up some multi-use glue (I used Beacon's 527).

Decide what pieces look good together.  You may want to even make yours with tiers. Generously apply the glue around the top lip of the candlestick holder.

 

Flip the plate upside down and place the glued side of the candlestick holder in the center of the plate.  

Now don't touch it for about 2 hours.

Flip them over right side, and that's it! You have a new addition to your tableware!

My Great Find

So I'm totally excited about my find.  I'm always checking the curbs for some great find but I can't remember a time when I actually found something worth taking.  Well Sunday, I left church and was on my way to CHINA LAKE (the best Chinese food in the area) and find this on the side of the road:

 When I saw how nice it was I stood there looking at the house, waiting for someone to come out and tell me not to take it.  I thought it most be some kind of mistake.  But no one did.  The tag on it said it was from a local library.  It's a really well built and solid wood.  I was thinking of  using in for my crafting supplies but not sure how best to prepare it for this purpose.  It still has all the internal hardware for the filing system. Any ideas? I do know, I would like to refinish the wood on the doors to match the rest of the cabinet.

This thing was really heavy.  When I got in home I find about 100,000 of these   --->

They are sorta fun to look at!





So here's another project to put on my list.  But one that I'm very excited about.  Maybe after Christmas I'll have time to work on.

Paracord Survival Bracelets

sBehind this crafty lady is an even craftier man.  I decided to make Christmas gifts for the ladies in our family and then he decided he was going to make crafts for the men.  He found these cool Paracord Bracelets to make over at Homemade Gifts Made Easy.

So he bought some paracord online and anchor shackles at Home Depot. 

Then he got to work.  He's the finished product.

They're pretty cool right.  So I'm living vicariously through my husband.  I don't have much time on my hands lately and the time I do have I've been spending on house projects.  I miss my crafting, so I'm living vicariously through my husband.  Hope you enjoyed the post!

Sorry, I got nothing!  When life calms down and normalizes, I'll come back!

I've had a crazy week (this is a bit of an understatement) so I'm sorry to this is a short post, but hope you enjoy it anyway.

First before I share a great craft idea, I just have to tell you what my daughter (who is 2-1/2) said to me this morning on the way to church.  "I'm Elmo, Daddy is Big Bird and Momma is Oscar the Grouch!".  My reaction got a rise out of her and then of course she repeated over and over again.  To tell you the truth sometimes I feel like it, specially after a week like I had.

Ok, so tomorrow I have to make sure that one of my meals includes a can good so I can give this
 $1.50 & Under Craft a try. Go on over to
Sewing In No Mans Land and check out the great tutorial for these cute (and most likely free) lanterns!

I hope you enjoy!

$1.50 and Under Monday: Mod Podge Pumpkins

I had my MOPS craft for October all picked out and all the supplies purchased, when I was over visiting The Other White House blog.  I came upon this super cute Fall Craft.  Fall is my favorite season, I mean really could it be any prettier?  So I decided, I'm sure I could do this for $1.50 or under, and my mind was set.  I was going to do this craft with 75 people.  The Scrabble Tile Pendants were just going to have to wait.

The challenge was to get the pumpkins CHEAP!  This ended up not being so difficult.  I went to the Cider Mill with my little girl, watched cider being pressed and donuts being made and then went outside to their little market where I checked out the prices on pumpkins.  I found them for .75 cents each.  I had the great idea of buying the white ones so I wouldn't have to paint them but there wasn't very many and a lot of them had warts.  Ella and I picked out 75 of the nicer ones and put them in the cart and went up to the counter.  There the cashier told me she would sell 2 for a $1.25, making them $0.625! So, of course I was excited this saved me like $11.

So I ended up creating a mini version of  The Other White House's Mod Podge Pumpkins.

Supplies:
Pumpkin
White spray paint
Mod Podge (the red bottle)
sponge brush
Napkins (I bought mine at Target, I like The Other White House's better but we don't have a Hobby Lobby)

1. Make sure that you wash your pumpkin and make sure that it is completely dry, then spray paint it.  I suggest spraying the bottom first letting it dry, and then the top.

2.  While your pumpkin is drying you can get out your napkins (actually for a mini pumpkin you probably will only need one), separate the layers in the napkin so only the printed layer remains, then cut it into stripes about 1 inch wide.  Then cut them how ever long your pumpkin is from the bottom of the stem down along the pumpkin until where it would be just about touching the table (this is so you can dry it without it getting stuck on something).  I actually did the whole height of the pumpkin and it made it hard to work with and difficult to dry.  I would also suggest you remove any type of border your napkin may have.
 

4. Now apply a good layer of Mod Podge with your brush on your pumpkin, just a little bigger then your stripe of napkin, vertically, starting from the base of your pumpkin's stem.  Then lay a stripe of napkin over top of it.

I hope it doesn't confuse anyone that I've used three different napkins, experiment (take note the light color of the napkin doesn't show very well).

5. Now apply a layer of Mod Podge over top of the stripe making sure to press down into the crevices of the pumpkin.  It's ok if there is some folding and bunching of the napkin in order for it to take the shape of the pumpkin.  Then continue to apply more Mod Podge on the pumpkin beside the first stripe and lay your second stripe down, making sure to overlay the first a little, and applying the top coat of glue.  Repeat until you have made it all the way around the pumpkin.

6. Once the Mod Podge is dry you can flip the pumpkin upside down and apply the stripes on the bottom of the pumpkin (make sure to over lap with the top stripes of napkin).  Once this glue dries, you have your finished project.

I'm really excited to see 75 of these babies on the the tables at MOPS!

"Dear stripes, I love you." post.

Remember my great Grab Bag buy at Michael's, well I decided to make a quick candle gift.  I didn't have to buy anything other then the candle for this.  I just used things around my crafting room.  With the candle only being .12cents, I think this easily qualifies as under $1.50.

Start with a plain candle

Cut a stripe of scrapbook paper to wrap around candle

add a little embellishment: I used a little string and a button I found in my craft room

For the special touch wrap it up in plastic.  Tie a ribbon around it and add a personalized tag.

This makes a cute little gift for someone.

Go over to sisters4saymoreismore and check out Sophie's

"Dear stripes, I love you." post.

She spent $1.50 and made a great skirt.

Stylish Book RecoverTutorial

Do you have books that you would like to keep around but are in bad shape or would you just like some books for decorative accents?  Then let me show you how you can recover a book for "$1.50 and Under".  For me, this project is pretty much free because I have all the supplies on hand!

Supplies:

• fabric (I used an old table cloth)
• Spray Adhesive
• scissors
• a book
• Duct Tape (if your using a book that needs repair)

 1. First use duct tape to re-enforce any weak areas in the books cover.

2. Now open your book up, lay it down flat, and cut out your fabric to have about a 2 inch overhang on each side.

3. Turn your book, opened with the pages down, and spray your adhesive on the cover.  Now lay your fabric down over the cover and smooth it out. Close the book and begin to smooth the fabric out along the spine and then the backside of the book.  Make sure to push the fabric down into the seems of the book's cover.

4. Now cut a straight cut on the overhang on the side of the spine (the top and bottom of the book).  Please refer to picture.  Now spray a small amount of adhesive on the fabric tabs you just cut and push them into the inside of the spine's cover.

5. Next open the book and spray the adhesive on the instead of the fabric's overhang on the inside of the cover.  Fold the top and bottom fabric pieces down and then the side piece.  Then fold the corners in (use a little more adhesive if needed) and push them down flat, like in the photo.

6. Finally, to cover the raw edges of the fabric  you can do one of two things. You can cut a piece of cardstock (the same size as your pages) 

or you can use the inside page of the book (which is what I did).

 

Here's the finished project!  Cute right!