Halloween decorating and making your own spell book
I hate scary movies, but I love creepy Halloween decorations. Go figure.
To think I bought these apothecary jars for a baby shower I hosted last year! This one now holds my son’s rubber snake!
I hate scary movies, but I love creepy Halloween decorations. Go figure.
To think I bought these apothecary jars for a baby shower I hosted last year! This one now holds my son’s rubber snake!
Looking for an easy-to-make “Welcome” sign? I made one today and thought I’d share the simple steps.
First, find an old kitchen cabinet door. You can get them a few places. Try searching Craig’s List – a lot of people give them away for free when they are redecorating. Or search your local Habitat for Humanity restore. (find a list of stores here)
Then paint it to your heart’s desire. I used Annie Sloan’s chalk paint. Here’s a video of Annie on The Hallmark Channel doing a tutorial.
The next thing I did was apply a Simply Said vinyl “welcome” design. And here’s a video showing you how easy they are to apply. This is so much easier than the way I used to apply designs or enhancements to my painted furniture, which comprised of time-consuming transfers or stencils.
Here’s my Simply Said website, where you can order a welcome design. I think this would be a great idea for personalizing with your family last name and the date you moved into your home, i.e. “Peterson Est. 2010.” Or even a sign for a wedding, with a design that says something like, “Matt and Nikki, April 21, 2014.” You get the idea – the possibilities are wide open!
My last step was to drill two holes through the wood with a standard drill bit, and run a ribbon through for hanging. Voila! A simple, fast way to spruce up a front door, entrance, or anyplace in and around your home.
So what is wallscaping you ask? It’s my made-up word for dressing up your walls. You’ve probably heard of gallery walls, where you group photos into a pleasing arrangement on your walls. Wallscaping takes it to the next level. Like landscaping where you plant flowers and greenery in various heights and colors to achieve a cohesive look, wallscaping follows the same principles.
You can use a variety of photos, mirrors, frames, collected items, antiques, sports equipment – really just about anything – and arrange it on the wall in a pleasing manner. Wallscapes can be coordinated by color, theme, size, or shape. Sometimes the groupings are symmetrical, others haphazard. Always completely interesting!
Here’s some examples from the Pottery Barn catalog that inspired me to create my own wallscaping.
Of course everything Pottery Barn does looks great and the above example delivers. Love the Americana theme, and use of items in a variety of shapes. The oars are unexpected, yet create the rectangular shape and draw the eye across the top.
Here they keep the look consistent with black frames, and throw in a few circular pieces to keep it interesting! This is one of my favorites – its like a museum exhibit!
Again, this space makes use of the black frames, but throws in a few antique-inspired pieces to keep it interesting.
A few of my friends have wallscaped their spaces, too. My friend Tara did this wall in her rustic-themed basement (it’s so cool, there’s real whiskey barrels down there serving as side tables!). I love the use of large and small pieces.
Tara is a professional photographer (you can see her work here), and takes full advantage of her gorgeous children as models. Here she created a gallery wall along the staircase. Awesome frames!
My friend Hillary is a master of wallscaping! Check out the nursery she designed for her new baby. Of course, the theme here is little-boy inspired with a fishing rod, antique toy cars, alphabet letters, and more. Isn’t it downright adorable!!
Here’s a pretty display in her living room, too!
So, after all the drool-worthy inspiration, I was motivated to create my first wallscaping, too. I thought I would document the process for you here, so you can create your own wallscaping.
Even though its only 30 degrees outside, I know Spring is knocking on the door. Even some of the trees are sprouting little buds. I wouldn’t doubt that green shoots will be out of the ground soon. So, what better time to start crafting items to enhance my outdoor space!
And I have the perfect book to help!
Handmade for the Garden, by Susan Guagliumi. Published by STC Craft | A Melanie Falick Book.
This new book publishes next week and includes 75 do-it-yourself projects for all kinds of pretty and functional backyard goodies – like mosaic pots…
or self-watering planters made from recycled garden hoses…
There’s a section of the book that even includes projects for making gifts from your garden, like garlic braids.
Susan’s kitty, Buster! (you know I can’t resist sharing a photo of a pretty cat – especially one enjoying a bird bath!)
Last night was our monthly craft club meeting. Our lovely neighbor Tara hosted, and she taught us how to turn a regular photo into a framed work of art! As a professional photographer, Tara has a houseful of amazing photos that I thought were printed on canvas. One hanging in her hallway is stunning, and inspired this month’s meeting!
I know its hard to see in photos, but when you walk up close and touch the surface, they have the delicate texture you find on a canvas. Last night, she let us all in on her secret. And now you can craft your own canvas look-alikes, too (for a fraction of the price I might add)!
Here’s what you will need:
-A standard printed photo of any size (a great place to get prints at really reasonable prices is Costco)
-A frame
-A piece of foam board (you can buy this by the sheet at any craft store with a framing section)
-Mod Podge and foam brushes for applying
-A straight edge, cutting board and exacto knife (if you need to cut down your photo, or foam board)
-Sponges
-Rolling pin thingy
-Black and gold paint (optional)
Isn’t this a great photo? Another one of Tara’s awesome shots!
You dab fast, hence the speedy hand photo here!
When you are done, your entire print will look like this. Don’t worry, the mod podge dries clear, and will only leave behind the texture – giving it the canvas look! We waited for it to dry, and then went back and did a second layer of the stippling.
Here’s the white stippled mod podge on my horse.
After they dry, you simply insert your piece into the frame!
Here’s two Kelly did!
Tara turned her kitchen into a serious studio for us with long tables covered in paper!
I LOVE how it turned out. I know its really hard to see the texture in my photos, especially on the white areas – but trust me, its there, and it feels so cool!
While I’ve been redecorating my front living room, I’ve had lots of suggestions from my Facebook friends on what to do. Someone suggested I needed another pop of my accent color – red. I have a stash of gorgeous red geometric Robert Allen fabric that I’ve been dying to put to use, so I pulled it out and made some pillows tonight.
Sewing definitely is not one of my strong points. I remember learning how to sew by hand from my great-grandmother, and taking sewing in high school home economics – but that’s the extent of my education. Thankfully, making pillows is as simple as it comes, and a sewing machine makes the task easy-breezy. And perfection is not necessary!
So for anyone who hasn’t tried their hand at pillow-making, take it from me, it’s not hard. Here’s how its done…
You’ll need fabric, your pillow insert, or old pillows like the ones I was using (and planning to just recover), a sewing machine, thread, a needle and a pair of scissors.
Lay your pillow down over your fabric.
I left a good two inches around each side of the pillow’s edge and cut. After you cut the first sheet, use it as a template and cut another sheet the same size.
Lay your two sheets down so the printed sides are facing each other.
Sew up the left and top sides of the sheets. I sewed about a quarter inch from the edge. Don’t worry about the fabric not being even. You can cut this away after you are done sewing, and it will be on the inside of your pillow, so no one will know its there!
Once the left and top sides are sewn, tuck the pillow inside, snug against the edges.
Next, using your fingers, gather the extra fabric along the right side of the pillow and insert pins along the edge of your pillow insert, so you know where to sew. (see below)
Once the right side is sewn up, again cut the excess fabric away.
Now turn your pillow case inside out, and insert your pillow.
See all the extra hanging at the bottom. We’ll pin it along the edge of the pillow, just like we did on the right side.
Once I had the whole line pinned, I cut away about half this excess, so I was left with about an inch from the pins.
I folded the excess inch under…
And pressed the edges together. I hand sewed this side together. I am not sure what this stitch is called, but basically I went in one side with the needle, and the side I exited from was the side I went back in with for the next stitch. So in and out. On the first pillow I took my time and made very small stitches that were nearly impossible to see.
For the next pillow, I decided I would try that closing trick I see people do online – you know, the pro’s. They sew up the last side of the pillow about half way, and then stuff the insert in, and hand-sew the remainder.
This is how much space I had left unsewn. Maybe a nice soft squeeshy pillow insert filled with features could have been stuffed in there, but my pillow wouldn’t fit. I tried folding it in half, rolling it, pressing it. (I had flashes of giving birth and Saxon’s giant head trying to squeeze through…well, I don’t have to say it, you know what I mean.)
By the time I was done stuffing, I was starting to break a sweat, and I had torn the opening this wide! Oh well, lesson learned. For me, I was doing just as good a job hand-sewing the last side. So, I quickly sewed this shut by hand. Done!
And here they are, adding an extra pop of red to my living room!
Charlotte, the Green-Lantern wonder dog, approves!
Recently I received a catalog to one of my favorite home decor retailers. It included gorgeous holiday items, like it does every holiday season. And every year, I sit, turn the pages, and day-dream about decorating just like the pages. (enter the loud, shrieking sounds of a tractor-trailer braking here) Why – because the stuff in this catalog is salty! I mean, geeze, why does everything have to be so friggin expensive?
When I spied their cute stacked burlap trees, I knew I had to have one. But wait, wouldn’t they look much more adorable in a little grove of trees – yes! However, each tree was nearly forty bucks! Damn, to get the three trees I really wanted – I’d have to spend the kind of money I spend on crap like, oh I don’t know – groceries!
So I made them…
Here’s how you can make your own stacked burlap trees, too.
Materials (all purchased at Michael’s craft store):
-Unfinished wooden plaque – I used small oval-shaped pieces – $1.49
-3/16″ wooden dowel (one dowel will make 3 12-inch trees) – $.39
-Wood beads with a hole through the middle – about .10 each
-Burlap – I got 2 yards of the red for $9.99 and a roll of the natural for $7.99 (You can get about 3 trees per yard)
-Paint, if you want to paint the wood base and bead
First, I painted the bases and beads white. After they dried, I drilled a small hole in the wood plaques, which became the tree’s base. Use a 3/16″ drill bit. Then I used a hand-saw to cut the wooden dowels down to 12 inches each. I inserted a dot of hot glue into the hole and inserted the dowel.
Grab your scissors and start cutting! You’ll be cutting and stacking strips of burlap that gradually go from about 4 inches in length down to a half inch. There’s no exact science here, in fact I never used a tape measure. As usual, I winged it.
Find something to make a small hole in the center of each piece. The tip of a pencil would work perfectly.
(okay, my finger nails are really not crusty, I swear – this is white paint!)
Slide the hole down over the dowel.
Start stacking your pieces of burlap. You want to turn them so that they are angled differently with each layer.
Get a good base going, and then start working your way up the three by cutting the strips a bit shorter in length. I used the previous layer’s length as a guide – I laid the last strip against the burlap and just cut the next row about a half inch smaller.
You will cut a lot of strips! While this is an easy and inexpensive craft, it does take time.
By the time you get to the top, your strips will only be about a half inch in width.
If you feel like the tree isn’t graduated enough, take them off and go back. I did that several times!
When there’s about a half inch of dowel left, it’s time to put on the bead.
Insert a tiny dab of hot glue into the hole.
And slide it on the top.
There ya have it!
I couldn’t be happier with how they turned out. They look exactly like the pricey-retailer ones. Next I want to find white burlap and make a few more. Enjoy making your trees!
I’ve seen sweater pumpkins all over the internet and Pinterest. They are adorable, especially when made in several colors and textures. And they look so easy. Guess what – they are!
Last night I was in my closet preparing to go to bed. I spied a sweater I’ve been hanging onto since last year, even though it wasn’t even close to fitting. My mind immediately went to the images of the cute, plump pumpkins from the net. Before I knew it, I was cutting it up.
First, I cut one side of the sweater out. As you can see, I cut around the arm openings.
Then I scoured my house searching for something to stuff it with. Ideally, you would want to use fiber fill or craft stuffing. I didn’t have either. But, I had an old body pillow from my preggo days 6 years ago. It’s just been sitting in a closet, so I thought, “let’s tear that baby open!” CRAP! The stuffing inside was a mixture of shredded up paper, styrofoam and craft fill. What a mess I made pulling handfuls of it out!
After I plopped down a few handfuls of stuffing, I gathered up the edges and wrapped my hands around what would become the pumpkin stem. (Wow, I need to work on my photography skills – suddenly the sweater is grey!)
Then I tied a long piece of twine tightly around the stem.
Next, I took the long pieces from the stem and wrapped them down along the sides of the pumpkin and tied them at the bottom.
And like wrapping a Christmas gift, I then wrapped them back up the opposite sides, and made the final knot on the stem. This gives the pumpkin its ridges.
Next, I cut another piece of twine. And wrapped it up, up, up the stem. I knotted it off and that was it!
I also trimmed the tops of the sweater from the stem, so there wouldn’t be so much hanging off.
I had the other side of the sweater, so I made a second pumpkin. I love the rustic, hand-crafted look of these pumpkins – they just feel like Autumn!
I made a couple of decoupage vases the other day, and thought you might be interested in a quickie tutorial – since I bet we all have several of those plain glass vases that come with our flower deliveries.
It had been several years since I decoupaged anything, and I’ll warn – if its your first time trying to decoupage, maybe skip using a vase, and try this on a flat surface, like a table-top. The process is the same, no matter what you are decoupaging. The difference is that adhering to a flat surface is a little easier, as you can smooth out the paper. With the curved surfaces of a vase, its a little trickier. But, still easy enough for a beginner (don’t let me scare you out of trying this).
So the first thing you want to do is choose the paper you want to use. I used plain old scrap-booking paper.
Then I poured some Mod Podge into a plastic container. Mod Podge is the brand I use – but there’s several to choose from at your local craft store. It’s very similar in consistency to regular white school glue. You’ll need a sponge brush or a regular paint-brush will work too.
Dip your brush into the glue. Not too much, just a small amount until you feel comfortable working with it.
Next take your piece of paper, cut to whatever size you choose, and put the paste on the side you want to stick to the vase. For me it was the white side of the paper. Cover the entire piece with glue, making sure to get even the edges. Don’t worry, I worked on the granite counter, and the glue wiped right up with a wet rag.
Put the sheet on the vase and smooth it down onto the glass.
Don’t spend too much time positioning for perfection…because you’ll want to quickly cover the entire piece you just layed down with a layer of mod podge. Smear it over the whole piece of paper. You’ll notice how it now lays and adheres to the glass much better.
Smooth out as many of the wrinkles and air bubbles as you can with your brush or your fingers.
I folded the edges at the bottom of the vase down and pasted them into place too.
Cut your next sheet and repeat the process. For this square-shaped vase, I used 4 sheets and pasted them all on. It was a quick and easy project. For the vase below, it was a bit more time consuming, because I chose to paste small pieces on, using the flowers on this paper.
The glue will dry clear after a few hours. Obviously, you don’t want to get the outside of the vase too wet, or the glue can come loose. And you wouldn’t want to stick the flowers to the inside of the vase unless you were only planning on putting in dried flowers or branches that don’t need water.
Here’s how the vases looked the next morning after drying:
And here they are today – ready to be given to Saxon’s teachers for Teacher Appreciation Day. He signed the bottom of each vase with permanent marker, and we made little tags with their names on them.