More Frugal Finds!!

Over at Practical Scrappers, we have our monthly feature of our frugal finds edition going on!  This is my favorite feature!!!  Something about repurposing regular old everyday items brings out the best in my creativity.  Even though it was my choice for the item this month, I decided to let the team decide between the two so I did a poll.  After a very close race, jar lids won out.

Here are my two projects I came up with.  This first one is my new all time favorite layout.  It's not too often that I create one of me and the DH together (usually the kiddos get all the glory).  Saturday will be our 11th wedding anniversary and I made this as a gift for him.  I actually altered up a white wood shadow box that I did some dry brushing of red acrylic paint and sanded down with some light-weight sandpaper.

This is just the layout...I got a little crazy with using things I haven't touched in a long time like the sewing machine (probably a year since I sewed on a layout), stickles, mists, gesso, and even pulled out the white journaling pen!  I used my "mostest", "favoritest" ( yes, I know they aren't real words) paper manufacturer, Crate Paper.  All pattern papers in the layout are from the Peppermint Collection as well as the buttons, trims, and other embellishments.  I used American Crafts (Marquise) Thicker letters on for the title.  Mist is from Tattered Angels (Santa Baby Glimmer Mist). 

 

 close up of the jar lids

 

 the dimension shot:  I cut slits in the canning jart lid so it would slide down over top of the pickle jar lid.

 

This is not the greatest photo, but the best I can do late at night...sorry you get the shadow cast on the top. Here, you can see the frame I doctored up a bit.  I dry brushed some red acrylic paint on the edges of a white wood shadow box.  Took an old rag then quickly wiped it off.  Followed that up with some sanding with light-weight sandpaper.

 

 

The second project, I decided why not just use the entire jar!  I saw these similar item online when I was searching for items to make for craft fairs.  

 

What you will need:

1 can of Krylon Frosted Glass Spray (can but anywhere they sell spray paint or craft stores)

1 glass jar

1 LED battery operated tea light

wire

scraps of fleece/felt (hat)

ribbon

bell

snowman face parts (I cut on my Cricut)

hot glue gun

Glossy Accents

Crackle Accents

 

You can seen that this is a very simple projects and takes no time at all to put together.  It took my cricut longer to cut out all the faces than it did for me to put a dozen of these together.  First spray your jars.  The frosted glass only takes about 10 minutes to dry to touch. After that was dry I cut my wire and to rim of the jar to create the handle. I used Glossy Accents to adhere the face to the jar itself then also went over the eyes and mouth with the Glossy Accents.  For the nose, I also attached with Glossy Accents, but this time went over top of my diecut with the Crackle Accents to create those lines in the carrot nose ( you can see a close up of this below).  For the hat, I cut a 6 1/2" circle of fleece and hot glued to the lid.  I tied off the hat with some red ribbon. Added a little ribbon, twine, and bell to the handle then popped in a battery LED tea light ( making it safe to keep the hat on and use indoor and outdoor).

 

Here he is lit up

 

Close up of the Crackle nose which I just LOVE!!

 

Thanks for stopping in today and hope you enjoyed my projects!

 

 

 

Be(SILVER)ware!!

I am CRAZY in love with our Frugal Finds Feature over at Practical Scrappers.  How Christine, Erin, and I continue to out-do ourselves and inspire the ladies to create with things you would never think possible for scrapbooking and cardmaking blows me away.  The best part is, I don't know where I come up with my own ideas-- you never know where your crafting is going to take you. 

I have two projects to share.  This was the first one I created. I was inspired for this creation when, after Christine announced what her choice was.  Now I'll admit, I was not happy with her when she told us her choice -- even promised severe payback with my choice for next month (bwaa ha ha *note* my evil laugh). I found my groove and "dug right it".

Supplies:

Broken ends of plastic spoons (flower petals)

Cardstock: The Paper Company (kraft)

Pattern Paper: Crate Paper (Emma's Shoppe, Random, Seasons, & Peppermint Collections)

Tools: Cuttlebug

Dies: Provo Craft (maple leaf cut and emboss combo), Die-namics: rolled mum die,

Spellbinders: Lacey Squares

Stamps: Studio g (thanks so much)

Ink: Tsukineko VersaMagic Chalk Ink (red magic and hint of pesto),

 Copic Markers (Y06, Y08, Y17)

Bling: pearl from a random string of pearls

Hot Glue Gun

I cut off the ends of my spoons, colored with my copics to highlight the center of the flower, then hot glued them together to form a flower.  I placed the rolled mum in the center to hide the broken bases and topped that off with a little pearl.  For my leaves, I used the maple leaf cut and emboss combo die but I cut it up to only use one of the three points.

 

The second card I have up here I got a little crazy--no surprise there!  This one might be considered dangerous because even though it's plastic, but the fun I had creating this card is PRICELESS!! So much fun, that it is my new favorite all time project EVER, and I doubt I will surpass this (though I will try).  On this one, I used some clear pastic knives--take a look:



Supplies:

Cardstock: The Paper Company (kraft and white)

Pattern Paper: Little Yellow Bicycle "Hello Fall"

Ink: Studio g (light blue chalking ink),

Copic Markers (R35, YR04, Y17, G05, B29,V09)

Dies: Spellbinders (Lacey Circles)

Punches: EK Sucess- Cupcake punch (clouds)

Cuttlebug (D'vine Swirls Embossing Folder)

Brown Letter Stickers (unknown from a swap)

Clear Plastic Knives

Wire Cutters (cut off plastic knives)

Metal File (file sharp points of knives down)

Hot Glue Gun

I stared and stared at a box of clear plastic knives for at least two hours.  I even joked with the ladies on the design team (while chatting on facebook) that the only thing I could think to do with them was throw them across my office at the sytrofoam wreaths hanging from my office doorknob.  And no joke, I did take a few stabs at that due to mental block.  But the more and more I stared at them I saw the arch shape and thought of a rainbow. 

Coloring the spoons with my Copics worked so well with the spoons, I decided to give it another go with the clear plastic to get more of a stained glass/transparent look.  I colored each one of the serated ends first on the front side. Now, here's the trick!  When coloring on plastic, you have to be careful not to do too many layers.  It becomes streaky (you can kind of see it on the green), but it did trigger me to go back and color the other side to enhance the color (doing both front and back) which worked great for the blue and violet leaving no streaks at all!  Finally, I hot glued them down to my card and staggered the embossed clouds inbetween to get that 3-D effect.

Hope you enjoyed my silverware inspiration today!  You can head over to Practical Scrappers to see the rest of the gals' inspiration!

A Little Picky??

I have two projects to share with you today for our monthly frugal finds feature over at Practical Scrappers. Today, the ladies and I are using toothpicks. They were a lot of fun to do!  I did have a meltdown while creating my layout and ripped the entire project apart, but it was all for the good.  It also inspired some more crafty ideas on how I could use those little picks!

On this layout, I placed two round toothpicks together and wrapped a double layer of Martha Stewart twine around them to create my flagpole embellishment! By the way, this layout is well over due!  This weekend will mark a year ago that Layton took his journey to Canada!

 

Here I went for the not so obvious! Not only can you use them to embellish, but you can use them as a tool! I took a stab at quilling on this card.  Here I used my round toothpicks to roll  the pattern paper strips around the toothpick to create her flower petals and leaves. Not only did they do the rolling, but I used them to apply the glue to the rolled petals and leaves.

Frugal Finds: Bobby Pins

Hi All!  Very busy weekend here and just getting around to posting these projects that went up earlier today on Practical Scrappers.   We brought back our monthly feature this week of frugal finds and I challenged the ladies to create a project using bobby pins.  I was inspired back in the end of February when my Delaney went to a Fancy Nancy theme birthday party and I was pinning her hair up and thought, " how can I use these in my crafting?"  It was a lot of fun and I still have a few other ideas I will be trying, but here are the two projects I came up with for today's post!

On this layout I  painted my bobby pins white with white acrylic paint then used them to create the journaling lines in the bottom right hand corner of  the layout.  Now I have to say that I am quite proud of the hand stitching I did around the page on photo on this layout.  I used the holes from MS border punch as my guide ans stitching around it with the embroidery floss which took me 53 minutes to do.

Product List:

Pattern Paper:  Crate Paper- Peppermint Collection

Cardstock: Core'dinations (smooth red)

Embellishments & Buttons: Crate Paper - Pepperiment Collection

Alphas: Studio g

Punches: Martha Stewart Framed Dots combo set

Tools: Creative Memories Circle Cutter

Twine:  Martha Stewart Bakers Twine

Red Embroidery floss

Bobby pins

White Acrylic paint

Black journaling pen

How about a little R&R here--Restoration & Random that is from my favorite manufacturer, Crate Paper. Here, I was inspired by the layout of this card from my online SAS sister,  Cassie D'Ambrosio. Cass is fabulous person of inspiration for me.  I love her clean and simple style and always look forward to seeing what she shares with us in our SAS gallery.   From Cass's design on her one of her cards she shared with us, I decided to add my own twist by adding some more painted bobby pins and then embellishing them with some dew drops from one of our past sponsors The Robin's Nest. 

Product List

Pattern Paper: Crate Paper Restoration & Random Collections

Chipboard Embellishment: Crate Paper Restoration Collection

Punches: Stampin' Up Ornament Punch

Tools: Creative Memories Circle Cutter

Stamp: Studio g

Ink: Tsukineko- Jumbo Java Chalk Ink

Dew Drops:  The Robin's Nest

Bobby Pins

White Acrylic Paint

Twine

Thanks for stopping in!  Hope you enjoyed my bobby pin inspiration!

 

What Can You Do with Candy Wrappers??

Today at Practical Scappers we are doing our monthly frugal finds feature. With Valentine's Day in the past and all that candy that your kids have brought home from school from the parties, we have some fabulous ideas on how to recycle those wrappers and create some fun and interesting projects. Here are two of my projects that I had a blast making!

 This idea was inspired by an article in the Disney Family Fun Magazine to create your own Valentine's that look like your kids are holding giant lollipops.  You can check out the link here.   I just went with the giant lollipop theme and got rid of the real lollipops (no problem with three kiddos in my house) and created fake ones.  I wadded up a tissue and covered it with the wrapper then tied it off with some Martha Stewart baker's twine.  Also, I used the dum dums wrappers to create the accordion flowers on the ends of her banners.

If you are one of the scrappers who has a hidden stash of chocolate bars in you office then this project is for you!  On this card,  I  used some mini Hershey bar wrappers to embellish her card.  I altered some brads, used the wrapper as a layer of paper in her banner, and created an accordion flower out of them.  What a perfect way to get rid of the evidence-- no one will ever know ;)