DIY Quote Painting

I’ll start this post by saying 1. I needed a picture above my bed. Blank walls make me sad. 2. I have some blank canvases laying around. 3. My favorite book in the world is Practical Magic by Alice Hoffman. I decided to do a simple painting of one of my favorite quotes from the book to fill a space on the wall.

I typed the quote into Word processor to make sure it would fit on a rectangular canvas, and so I would know where to put the words.

Once I had the words printed, I folded the page in half, and in half again, and again the other way. That way I knew where to place the words on the canvas. I measured the canvas for it’s halfway point and wrote the words onto it.

 

The last few lines were crooked when I was writing, so I made sure when I painted the words to straighten it out.

Here’s my finished work. I painted the black words, then I painted in white around it. Sure it took a long time, but It was worth the finished look. I like how the white isn’t even in the background.

 

I also took some old sconces that I found at a garage sale for $6 and spray painted them black to match and go on the sides for a finished look.

Looks better black!

 

I love the finished look! Plus, I get to re-read one of my favorite quotes as often as I want to.

Price of canvas: $8 for a 2 pack. Sconces: $6. I had the candles and the paint, so this project cost me $10. Happy decorating!

Coconut Oil to Renew Wood

I got this chair from my father as a hand me down. Well, the true story is he had it in storage and I begged and bothered him for this chair until he dug it out. It’s something I remember from my childhood, and it’s broken and missing cushions, but knowing me, it wasn’t going to stop me from wanting it. The wood on this old teak chair was dry and looked just sad. There were 2 choices I had, I could polyurethane it or find something to renew the wood itself. I came across a blog post about rubbing coconut oil on old dry wood to renew the luster. I thought it was worth a shot. After testing it on the underside and liking what I saw, I went ahead and did the rest of the chair.

This is what the chair looked like before, dry and aged.

Here’s another shot. Cats love to help. They also love coconut oil.

Here’s what it started to look like once I rubbed the oil on the chair. It looks amazing! The downside was that I had to rub and rub and rub to get the oily feeling out of the chair. I wanted that refreshed look without the feel, and went through quite a few paper towels.

Here’s the arm of the chair after I finished it.

The finished chair! With no cushions, I just draped a blanket over it and added a folded blanket to the seat.

This is the arm in the sunlight. The chair looks great next to the table by it (that WILL get refinished this summer.)

I think the chair looks great. NOTE: Don’t start using coconut oil on chairs and furniture around your house to freshen them up if you plan on refinishing them. You’ll get the oil into the grain making the color weird or keeping a water based poly from sticking to the furniture. I would only recommend this for pieces like this, natural wood that’s been dried out that you just want to bring back to life. Happy re-finishing!

Home Made Sweat Shirt Re-Do

Some of you may remember the last post I did about a sweat shirt re-do I did about a year ago. I didn’t post a tutorial about it because I just saw an inspiration picture that I wanted to make, and went ahead and did it. Most people that left comments wanted a tutorial, and I went ahead and made another, trying my best to take pictures along the way.

The finished product! I will show you how we got here. You need: One sweatshirt that’s too big for you. And a half yard of accent fabric. You can use any light weight cotton fabric. You also need 5 of the buttons you cover with fabric, you can get them at your local craft store.

This is an unflattering photo of the sweater before, when I got it.

Here’s a side shot of the sweater before. It’s a jansport and came from an outlet mall for about $15. It’s REALLY soft on the inside, so I knew I wanted to use it for this project.

It took me about 45 minutes to take the pocket off carefully. There were a LOT of seams, and the entire bottom band had to be separated from the rest of the shirt. That’s ok, you’ll need it to be done for later. And save the pocket, I put mine back on later.

This is Bogey. He loves to help.

Yes this shirt is covered in cat hair. Yes I have a cat and he loves crafts, as shown above. So, the next step was to put the shirt on to figure out where to take the sides and the front in. The bottom band fit perfectly, but it was very flying squirrel like around the mid waist and armpits. I took some of the fabric from the front of the shirt, and separated it visually into thirds. I took it and folded it over onto itself to create a little seam, to later sew fabric into, and pinned it over. You can see that in the picture above. You also see where I took the excess side fabric and pinned it to know where to sew the sweat shirt to fit.

You want to do the same to the sleeves. DO NOT pin right up to your arm. You will have a hard time getting into a sweatshirt that’s too tight. Leave yourself a little room You can always make it smaller, but not bigger. Carefully take the shirt off without poking yourself with the pins.

Next I cut about a half inch over from where I pinned on the side. Do the same for the other side. You can omit from having to pin both sides by taking the piece of fabric you cut from one side and laying it over the opposite side, and cutting around it.

I then looked at where I had pinned up the shirt in the front. I cut at the fold, (shown above) then once I had cut along the fold, I cut the sweater where the fold touched the other side, because I knew I was sewing it together anyways. When you’re done cutting those two slits up the sweat shirt, it looks like you have a really tall thin football shaped piece of fabric left over. You can keep the sliver of fabric that comes out after you had cut it and save it. I will tell you what for later.

Go ahead and turn the sweatshirt inside out and sew the sleeves together.

Cut a piece of your fabric you will use for the inside trimmings and cut a 1″ wide piece by the length of the sweatshirt. Lay it right side facing right side on the opening of the front of the shirt. You will end up tucking it in when you sew it together. I will show you.

Starting at the top, sew the patterned fabric to the slit in the shirt.

After you’ve sewn it all the way down, fold it inward, so you see just a little bit of the fabric. pin it to the other side of the front of the shirt. You can just overlap onto the raw edge of the other side. It doesn’t have to be neat from the inside, mine isn’t.

Go ahead and sew the front shut again.

I sewed mine from the bottom to the top, it was easier that way.

Once I had sewn the accent fabric in, I went ahead and sewed the bottom band back together.

This is the point where I put the pocket back on. I made the pocket a little smaller, and then put it on upside down, because the openings were bigger at that side once I narrowed the pocket down a little bit.

Next I had to look at the hood. I wanted to line it with my accent fabric so I took that fabric, and laid it on top of the hood, and traced it. I traced two side pieces and one middle piece.

This is what the top of the hood looks like from the outside.

I sewed the three hood lining pieces together then pinned them into the inside of the hood so I could sew it around the brim, and the back.

Sew it around the inside of the brim, being careful not to hit the drawstring, if your sweat shirt has one.

It should look something like this when you’ve sewed the hood in.

You’ll want to buy a 5 pack of buttons you cover in fabric. The set comes with a button cover, backing, and the mold and press to make the button. Follow the instructions on the package.

Set your buttons aside.

Remember that little sliver I told you to keep? Cut it into a little rectangle, about 2″ x 4″ and sew the edges under and stitch. You’ll be using this as a little top accent piece.

Once you’ve sewn the rectangle’s edges over, sew it onto the sweater under the center of the opening of the hood.

Next add your buttons and you’re done! I added one on the rectangle at the top, and then the other 4 along the side.

Closeup of the pocket and side.

Another close up of the pocket.

No more bat wing!

This is what the side of the sweat shirt looks like. Yes I’m not wearing make up, but hey, I had a craft day. Who am I looking fancy for.

This is a close up of the top of the shirt.

My hand fits in the pocket perfectly.

I’m very happy with my new super cozy sweatshirt! Because I started with a large shirt, it’s long enough and the sleeves fit great, but it is now slim and flattering. I hope you are able to re-purpose some of your old shirts too! Happy sewing!

Glitter Crafts!

So I found some cheap glitter at Hobby Lobby and wanted to try and make some crafts. I know, “glitter is the herpes of crafting.” because once you use it you can’t ever get rid of it. But it’s so pretty! Craft number one: the Anthropologie tree in a jar. I’ve seen these little guys at Anthropologie for $28, and thought to myself… I can make that.

Tree in a Jar

Tree in a jar. Simple looking and adorable.

First I collected what I needed. Jars from Peanut butter were better shaped than the jars from spaghetti. You can use actual Mason Jars if you choose. I didn’t have a small tree on me (you can get them at craft stores in the model town area) so I clipped a few sprigs off my faux garland and decided to hot glue them together.

Here’s the glitter I found for just under $5. What a steal! So much I can do with this…

I gathered these things out of my ornament box since I wanted to add a little more to the jar than just a tree.

I hot glued the little sprigs together then trimmed them into the shape of a tree. The next step was to paint the branches white for the snow.

I used a dry brush technique, where you dab a brush in a little bit of acrylic paint, then lightly dab some off of the brush, and lightly touch the edges of the branches till you get the look you are going for. Let this dry.

I needed the tree to stand upright so I used an old wine cork to do the job. I cut it in half with an exact o blade, then carved out a little hole in the center and hot glued the branch wad into it. Let this cool / dry.

Here’s my little santa in the jar! To finish the jar, you glue the tree into the lid, I also put some quilt batting around the tree and glued it to the lid for fluff. I glued the little santa in there too. I put about a half tablespoon of glitter in the jar then screwed the lid on, and there you have it!

All I have to do now is paint the lid a different color. Since I had everything I needed at home all I had to pay for was the glitter. This would be a great gift idea!

Glitter Clothespins

Next I wanted to make some glitter clothespins for gifts. This is one of the easiest crafts. You need:

• Clothespins
• A roll of magnet tape
• acrylic paint
• glue like Elmer’s or Mod Podge
• Maybe Gorilla Glue

Take your clothespin and if you decide to use white glitter, paint the clothespin in a color of your choice, the color will show through the light glitter.

If you use the gold and silver you can just paint on some glue and sprinkle on some glitter. Shake off the excess glitter, let dry, and paint a coat of Mod Podge over the glitter so it doesn’t keep coming off.

I painted some in blue, and used the white glitter to let the blue paint show through. I had to cut the magnet tape into a skinny strip to fit on the back of the clothespin. Once I stuck the magnet tape on I realized it was starting to curl and come off. Not fun! I tried hot gluing them back on and it worked better, but they slightly peeled off again. Maybe use some gorilla glue and make those puppies stay on there.

These are the colors I ended up with!

Finished! The magnets aren’t the strongest, so think twice before putting something heavy in them. Happy Glitter-ing!

Don’t Buy New Gift Wrap This Year! Ideas for Alternative Wrapping.

Gift wrap. One of those things birthday candles and a Starbucks cup that hold excitement for just a little while then 5 minutes later, it’s gone and wasted. Yay… That was fun. So why spend the money this year on wrapping when you are already spending money on the gift? You can make your own wrapping with just a little creativity that will cost you less than one of those fancy glitter covered gift bags.

How about stamping old tissue paper? You can also get a large pack of tissue paper at the craft store for $1. Not too bad! Plus I bet you already have some laying around the house somewhere.

While we are on the subject of stamping, how about using the insides of paper bags? You can use a ball of twine or jute you get at the hardware store for tying your gift for under $2. I know you’re thinking, “Roxanne, stamps aren’t cheap you know. You need ink, and the stamp, and that will add up.” You’re right. It does add up. Not if you use a coupon to your local craft store you get online for 40% (in most cases) or look at the dollar store or shop when there’s a sale. I know Michael’s craft store has dollar bins in the front of the store with stamps. Look there. OR: Try making some.

Link via Say Yes to Hoboken.

Check out this post from Ellinée about creative gift wrap ideas.

More Ideas to wrap with:

• Road Maps
• Table clothes and linens
• Old Cookbook pages from a thrift shop. Just the recipes you would never cook… Or ones you want to share.
• Fabric Scraps- stitch the edges and tie around the present

• Paper from Christmas past. Why not re-use? I tend to keep old tissue paper, I like to use that inside of a clear plastic bag tied with ribbon.
• Newspaper. Find a funny headline and circle it. Or circle words to create a sentence.
• Comic Books from a re-sale store.
• Use strips of tule as ribbon, it’s very easy to tie.
• Shoeboxes- use some acrylic to paint them.
• Wallpaper samples from a paint store. I went in one year and got old wallpaper books and used the large squares to wrap all of my gifts. The paper is so thick you can make boxes out of them Click here for a template.
• Coffee Filters. Why not lay them all out, tape some together from the inside, and wrap a gift in it, finished with some nice ribbon?

How about using wrapping from a thrift store?

These thrift store finds are some great creative and cheap solutions. And low on the carbon footprint.

And speaking of Jars:

Why not use some Elmer’s or Mod Podge and make your lids personalized?

Use some lunch bags for gift wrap and make them pretty.

How about an old lunchbox? Check out this site for ideas for gifts under $5.

I LOVE this idea with the tissue paper:

So cheap, and cute. You can even keep it and re-use it again. Or decorate with it.

So, save some time, money, and trees and think about making your own gift wrap. After all, it’s what’s inside that counts. Happy Holidays!