Tuesday, March 15, 2011

A little love for my earrings

Last week I spent a few days in the {801} and visited DI a few times. I found some great spoils! One of which was an empty picture frame painted gold and white with no back or glass for 50 cents. It was pretty ugly.

I saw potential.

Originally I thought I wanted to paint it black and hang it empty in my new cedar city living room to give some character to a picture frame collage, but that idea is a little overdone for my taste.
On a late night trip to Walmart, (one of my favorite Ashley past times) I saw some lace that I couldn't live without.

Then the light bulb clicked on...

I love the result!


Painted it "Celery", tried out the glazing technique, starched the lace and hot glued it to the back, threw on the earrings. Total cost: under $5

I'm a fan.

In case you aren't into lace: my ShaNeil friend stores her earring in ice cube trays. One pair per slot, and they stack up neatly in a drawer. Yeah, I though that was a fantastic idea too!

Sunday, March 13, 2011

Wish I had something cute to post...

With chaos on the craft table, a mountain of moving mishmash, and an apartment too small to relocate it all anywhere that the carpet tiger won't get to it, I haven't felt much like crafting anything around here...but I do have some fun ideas... Hopefully I'll be able to do a little here and there, and then get back into it as soon as we have settled into our Cedar City abode.

Thursday, March 3, 2011

Old McDonald

...he had a farm.

(I know you are fond of photos taken of craft projects placed atop my fancy white chest freezer...)

Now I do too! Well at least the animals...

I made some hand puppets from the tutorial I found at Just Another Day in Paradise. I'm so glad I stumbled upon that gem of creativity!

I'm pretty excited for Oliver to get a little bit older so we can play with them together.

I'm also pretty excited that they are finished. They were rough! Lots of pieces to keep track of...lots of felt hunting (I didn't have a huge stash so it took some time to collect it all...but don't worry, I have a stash now.) Lots of unpicking due to the lack of speed control on my spiffy new sewing machine (it was pretty cheap...definitely better than nothing though!)

My favorite part was when I ran out of bobbin thread almost at the end of a particularly difficult section and had to rewind the bobbin for a measly six inches of thread to finish. This happened three times actually. It was quite comical. (I kid.)

I might have sworn at the whole project a few times.

The important thing is that they are done, I love them now, and Oliver may just love them in the future.

This little project was a little more expensive because I couldn't buy the felt one sheet at a time...my only option was the 4 dollar multi color pack at Walmart...it took a couple of those. I also had to buy more bobbins for all the different colors of thread I needed. All in all it came out to just under ten dollars and about 3 weeks for the whole thing. The rest of the supplies I begged or borrowed from my crafty Bree friend. Thanks a bunch Lady!

Wednesday, March 2, 2011

King of the Jungle

One of the songs that I can't wait to sing with Oliver J. is about a lion.

Leo the lion to be exact. And his jaws are big and wide.

So when one of the ward members had a lion puppet for her daughter, my creative juices started flowing...and then I forgot about it all. That was a year ago.

Last month I was browsing a craft blog and found the tutorial for the exact lion puppet. Since I had plenty of felt leftover from the package I bought for the fishing set, I printed out the pattern and got started.



This puppet was free to me.

Now Oliver J. and I will have a fun prop to  help us sing about the King of the Jungle.

Until then I will toss it in my box labeled "future Ollie gift ideas" and call it good.

Silhouette Throw Pillows

Get this!

My silhouette pillows are done! And I love them....even though Jesse has a big head complex and my silhouette looks like an old lady. The best part is that they were SUPER inexpensive!

You want to see them?


I know the bed still looks a little drab, but I've got three more pillows in mind to liven it up a little.

So whats the method and how much did they cost me?

Well now,  I started by taking pictures of our profiles, cropping them to the right size, printing, tracing and cutting them out. Add a little chin definition for Jesse and an upper lip for me and Voila! Silhouettes.

The cream fabric? Yeah, those are my old worn out sheets...tea dyed to disguise the dingy. That probably cost me 3 dollars upfront (cost of the box of tea bags) but I certainly didn't use it up so I have plenty for tea dying in the future. So when you get to the nitty gritty, I only spent fifty cents or less.

The border? I had to buy a roll of freezer paper and Kent's was my only option (that was expensive)...that made it seven dollars up front. But as with the tea, I have a TON left over, so I don't really figure that into the equation.  I borrowed some black paint and that was that. For the amount that I actually used, I spent less that seventy five cents.

I used three dollars worth of poly fill for the stuffing, and the back of the pillow was made with one dollars worth of this pretty black damask fabric.

That's about $5.25 for two pillows...two pillows that I LOVE!