Beading Time?

After visiting my crafting closet, I have come to the conclusion that these beautiful beaded boxes need a little loving. I have been neglecting them and have not made a single piece of jewelry in some time. Most likely because between work and the kids and house work I really have not had time to frequent my crafting closet.

Perhaps this weekend I will get a chance to make something nice to be able to share with you guys. Maybe I'll even have a tutorial to share?! 

With these pictures I wanted to give you a little inspiration and color selection so that you too can feel inspired. Let's get inspired together, what do you say?!

Is there anything you would like to learn to create when it comes to jewelry making? Feel free to write me a comment or email me and I will be happy to do a tutorial for it.

Happy Beading!

Gnome Sweet Gnome

I found these cute little gnomes just in time for Valentine's day!!

I thought they were so adorable and I just had to share them with you guys. I know Valentine's Day is a month away, but time passes by so fast that I could not help to get your creative juices flowing before Valentine's day. Make your "Valentine" a special treat.

All you need is:

• Glue
• Googly Eyes
• Pen/Marker
• Felt
• 3/4" Office Dot Sticker or paper cut into a circle
• Hershey's Kisses
• Soda Can 
• Paper Clip(s)- to create multiple at a time.

Instructions:

1. Create a 3" circle of felt by pressing the bottom of the can into the felt and cutting along the impression it leaves. Cut the circle into quarters.

2. To form the hat, run a thin line of glue along a straight edge of one felt quarter and press it to the other straight edge. Use a paper clip to hold the edges in place. When the glue is dry, remove the clip. Save the other quarters to make hats for more gnomes.

3. Glue the hat in place on the kiss, then stick or glue on the eyes. Allow the glue to dry. Use a pen or a marker to write a dot sticker and press it to the bottom of a kiss.

Red Damask Coasters

I have a fancy idea of what I would like to give to my employees for Christmas. I want to make something unique, fun and perhaps something they would enjoy. Since we all need a little jolt of energy in the mornings to get us through the day, I figured a coffee something or another is how we would start.

Then I got to thinking how our desks are quite sensitive to the hot/cold of drinks and always leave stains, so I figured that some nice little coasters would work for this gifting idea. I decided to make mine using fat quarters I found at Wal-Mart that were pretty inexpensive. I purchased them in red and the damask style to make the ruffles.

**Tip: You can create the ruffles by setting your sewing machine to the longest stitch and the highest tension to create easy ruffles.**

With that in mind, I decided to add a little flair to the coffee mugs I plan on giving them. The whole thing is going to be a coffee mug, some baked treats or something edible (maybe even like pretzels dipped in chocolate with green/red sprinkles or hot cocoa dippers made with marshmallows partially covered in chocolate and sprinkles), the coasters (of course), cellophane and a pretty ribbon of some sorts to top the whole thing off.

I have been looking online for some ideas and found this awesome idea to use some porcelain paint to add a little personal message or design to each mug. Therefore, making it more personalized for each employee as an individual. Perhaps different size and shaped mugs would also make this a little more fun as well.

Let's see what else I come up with? Let me know what you think?!

Styrofoam Christmas Tree

I saw this pretty little Christmas tree somewhere online the other day and I wanted to make one for my dining room table centerpiece. I thought you might want to make one as well, so here I am sharing my tutorial with you on how you too can create one.

This is a really simple project, which I think you'll absolutely love!

First, you'll need to pick any cone you want from your local Art Supply Store. In the pictures below I have one made of cardboard and one of foam. I decided to go with the foam one since it was larger.

Next, you'll need to cut at least 4 rolls of ribbon into 4" pieces and fold them half way. Glue them together with a glue gun. I chose two different colors since I wanted to give it a bit of contrast, feel free to use as many as you like.

This is not part of the tutorial! lol. This is my sister, Jax, having way too much fun with the cones. I made her do the tutorial this time as payback for making me do some BORING homework for her the other day. ;) Looks like it's not much of a payback since she's having too much fun with my project!! Oh well...

Then, you glue the top of each of the strips and place them all the way around covering the foam cone, one row at a time. I chose to do one layer the darker green and then the one above the lighter green.

This is a more detailed picture of what it starts looking like.

This is what the tree looks like when you have a few layers in.

I ran out of ribbon since I only purchased two spools. Guess that means another trip into my local arts and crafts store ;) [I am not complaining]. So I will post my finished piece once completed.

Stay tuned!

Minions

Let's just say I am a big fan of the movie Despicable Me. The part that got my attention, besides the entire movie of course, were the cutest little minions and their funny little voices and laughter. They're all about having fun I suppose! I enjoyed all of them and the uniqueness to each individual one.

While looking at an empty spot on my desk I made a special request to my husband that I would like a minion. After looking online and getting an idea for which one I really wanted, we went off to our local craft store, Michael's, to find the polymer clay colors that I did not have readily available.

Originally my trip there was not for this, it was actually to purchase some stockings for Christmas that I really liked and were on sale, but if you're crafty, I am sure you know what it's like to go into that store and walk out with more than what you went there for. At times, you even come out with nothing that you even went there for in the first place. I guess you can say that's what happened to me.

Anywho, I really wanted this cute little guy to just place him underneath my monitor, although I feel I may regret this decision later. You see, the 2 little rugrats I have (those are my kids by the way), that live with me, might end up just destroying it completely. I might have to rethink this whole thing through a little better before the minion gets out of the oven from his little tanning session. He doesn't have much longer to go, so I better think fast.

I think he did a fine job recreating this little guy, with the exception that he got a little toasty in the oven...hahaha. He blames it on me for putting the temperature too high and I blame it on him for not watching the oven. We're playing the blame game ;)

Overall he came out really cute and I'm happy with him.
i love my little minion ♥

Fabric Beaded Necklace

I had this material on hand that really is for a curtain. I enjoyed the material so much since it has a natural sheen to it. I also had some large gold beads that I found rather difficult to put it into place of any accessory, it had been sitting in my bead box for about a year.

Figuring that this was the perfect opportunity to use it, I decided to make this fabric beaded necklace. I had a vintage pearl pin as well that had always called my attention and I was going to use it for a clutch, but it just looked great with this necklace...so voila!

Tools and Materials:

Sewing machine

Fabric of your choice

Thread

Sewing scissors

Chalk

Yardstick

Look Turner (or safety pin)

1-inch wooden beads

How To:

1. Use a thin piece of fabric (preferably silk or rayon).

2. Cut fabric so that the length is 55 inches and the width is 5 inches. (If your fabric isn't long enough, piece together two swatches to make the right length.)

3. Sew the sides of the fabric together to form a tube. Leave ends open.

4. Take a loop turner and turn tube inside out. (Or using a safety pin, to turn fabric inside out).

5. Take a 1-inch wooden bead and slide the bead to the center of the tube.

6. Hold the bead tightly to mark the center. Tie a tight knot on each side of center bead. Repeat process until you have about 8 beads inside fabric.

7. Sew ends closed on sewing machine.

8. Leave enough fabric on the ends to tie it around your neck (about 11 to 12 inches total).

Padded Journal

I must admit that I LOVE journals. I guess because I enjoy writing. I remember I borrowed a crafting book from my aunt once that showed how to make a padded album. This project is very similar to that. Now that I think about it, I have never had a plain composition notebook. Every time I had a notebook I always covered it up with whatever I could find, whether it be magazine pictures, boys (I think us girls always did this), fabric or just anything in general.

Here is a picture of my journal.

I use this journal for my blog ideas, crafting ideas, mailing lists, custom orders, etc. It can be used to add clippings of actual pictures you've found online of items you would like to create, etc. I decided that after every couple of pages I would add some tabs that I found at my nearest office supply store in order to divide my sections and keep my thoughts a little more organized.

My journal is a brown and teal color since I love the color combination.

Someone recently donated a few composition notebooks to me and I was thinking what a great Christmas or Birthday gift this would be.

I don't actually have a tutorial on this, but I found someone on YouTube that does and I had no idea she enjoys crafting. You will find her tutorial very resourceful and easy to follow: check it out!

Altered Books

What is an altered book: An altered book is any unloved book that is turned into a work of art.

I like to use hard cover books such as children's books in order to create my altered book. I usually just purchase my books at the Dollar Tree. You can finish books quicker this way, by using the thick paged children's books, if you're looking for a shorter less time consuming craft, but want to do something unique and special. You can really use any book you'd like by simply gluing interior pages together to create one page or by cutting pages out, etc.

To me an altered book in a sense is like scrapbooking, in that you get to add a lot of embellishments. I usually like to paint the pages or cover them in scrapbook paper in order to conceal the wording behind it.

There is no limit to what you can do with this project. You can paint it, stamp it, emboss it, color it with crayons & oil pastels, attach pockets and envelopes...(I'm out of breath here)....and so much more! It's all up to you and your imagination on this one.

The best thing about it is that there are NO RULES!

 

My Little Monster Altered Book  I am currently working on.

Inside of Monster Book