Stuff

Did you ever get some news about someone that was so horrible you just wanted to purge it out of your mind so you didn't have to think about it and its affects every waking minute?  Maybe unload the information onto other people so they could help carry the burden for you?  I am sure everyone has.  As I get older, I seem to be collecting more of these moments and it just plain sucks.  I know that life will continue to have ugly, gut-wrenching moments because that is the rule, not the exception.   I know that we don't get to pick and chose the people to which these moments occur and I wouldn't want to do that anyway.  I know there are no exemptions.

I haven't done much craft projects lately but when I get ugly news, I am compelled to busy myself making something pretty.  Obviously it won't fix or change anything other than distracting me and that is ok.

A special little lady is turning 4 tomorrow and it was the perfect opportunity to DIY one of those adorable fabric take along dollhouses.  I used this tutorial.  It has pictures of all the steps, which I failed to do and usually fail to do because I am typically in such a hurry I can't stop to bother to photo document the process.

Basically, you cut some pieces out of some plastic cross stitch sheets for the house sides, bottom and roof.  Then you wrap them all with quilt batting and I used duct tape to secure the batting.

Then you layout your fabric after you have sewed your roof material to your house material for the outside.  Place your pieces over that piece of fabric which should be place "right side in."

Then you will need place your fabric for the inside of the house and "garden" over the top "right side in."  It is during this step that you include the sides of the house as well (see linked post above for diagrams and much better explanations).  Sorry, no pic for this step:(  Pin down the long sides and one of the short sides.  Make sure to add some elastic loops for closing the house up (I used elastic hair ties) and rope, ribbon or fabric for handles during this step (I used rope).  Remove the pieces and sew the pinned sides.  Turn "right side out" and place your pieces inside.  Pin along the pieces and then sew the pinned lines so the pieces are each in their own compartment.  Sew up the last short side.  Once that is done, you can fold up the house and hand stitch the sides to the back of the house that does not have the garden. Add buttons for closure and embellish with fabric or felt.

DIY fabric take along dollhouse:

These are so adorable.  I enjoyed just having this sitting on my dining room table the past week.  I am about halfway done with Sully and Sydney's houses for Christmas.  Options for what to put in and use with the houses include Polly Pockets, Disney princess palace pets, animals (if you chose to make a barn) or cars (if you chose to make a garage).  Now to pack up this house for the birthday girl!

Christmas Crafting

Now that we have had snow that stuck around for more than 24 hours, it is taking every ounce of will power not to rip down all fall decor and get my Christmas decorations up.  Why not do it, you ask??  I would but I am hosting Thanksgiving here AND it happens to be my boy's 4th birthday that day so I would like to keep up the fall decor and add a little fun details for what Sully tells me will be his "race car birthday."

So in lieu of Christmasizing the entire house right now, I have settled for a few Christmas crafts to get us ready for my favorite holiday.

And I recruited my eager little guy to join me.  He was all for it:)

I had picked up some holiday paper a few weeks ago and knew I wanted to do something fun with it.

When you don't know what to do, make bunting banners.  I held the paper and while he cut.  Then I strung some yarn and had him lay out his pattern.

Surprisingly, he did not care about my suggestion not to have two of the same colored triangles next to each other.  I have a lot to teach him yet.

After he went to bed, I glued the triangles in place and they dried overnight.  Yes, I left the pattern he designed even though I completely disagreed with his placements.

This morning, we decorated his door.

The sign is from the Target dollar bins.  We taped the banner up with washi tape (also from the dollar bins at Target).

(I am not sure why but he now equates Santa only coming if doors are decorated. I told him that simply was not true.  He is still dubious.)

Next up, converting this standard Christmas tree candy jar into something for my mantle decor.

You have all seen these.  Your grandma probably has like 6 of them in her basement.  I picked this one up at an Agrace Thrift Store in Janesville a few months ago.  I never intended on using it for candy and still don't.  However, I do love the shape and lines.  And I am totally into gold decor right now so it was a no-brainer, it was getting painted gold.

I wanted to keep the glossiness and smoothness of the glass, so I painted the inside.  I just used some gold craft paint I had laying around.

Sully also had to help with this project so he squirted the paint in the tree base and we used a foam brush to swirl it around.  We used a generous amount of paint because I am lazy and only wanted to paint this once, not several thin coats.

I let it dry for about 5 hours and here it is.

Its perfect:)

While this was drying and the baby was still napping, I strung up some twine in the living room and we went to attaching some bobbers to it.  I was way easier for him to attach them upside down so the ones I put on were right side up and his were upside down.  I don't have an action pic of this process but here is our bobber garland, just waiting to be decked.

Its only T minus 10 days, 3 hours, 21 minutes and 6 seconds until it will start looking more like Christmas around here.

Craftastic

Guess I better start sharing some of these crafty art projects I have been doing.  They are piling up around here.

First up, embroidery hoop art.

Step 1- get embroidery hoops.  I got mine from JoAnn fabrics for about $1.50 each.

Step 2- decide on what fabric or paper you want to use.  I am in a burlap phase right now so burlap it is.

To be honest, I got a bit stuck after this part as the possibilities were endless!

Step 3- decide on your art.

I decided to do something different on each of them since they all had a burlap background that would tie them all together.

 Black felt with pink stitching.

 Black tulle in a spiral pattern.

 White buttons and a brooch.

 Letters and paint.

Step 4- hang them!

Viola!  Easy, fast, cheap and took up some negative wall space in my craft room.

Next up, I needed a piece of art to go on the shelf above the TV.  After I took down the Christmas decor, it was seriously lacking in style and visual clutter (which for me is a bad thing).

Pinterest is full of ideas for "state art".  I decided to make my own with some stuff I already had.

A frame and some left over laminate flooring from the craft room redo.  I measured out how big I needed the flooring and had the hubs jigsaw it to the right size (we almost both got frost bite during this process since we did it at like 9 pm on the coldest day of the year in the garage).  I would just like to add that I am more than capable of jigsawing it myself but the hubs gets all freaked out about me cutting my fingers off so he made me wait for him to do it.

 (Like how I got a pic of the laminate for the art with the actual laminate on the floor- super artistic)

Then I printed out a state of WI from the interwebs, cut it out and taped it to the laminate.

Then I dry brushed some white paint on the laminate.  I included the pic below so in the event that you try this on your own, you don't freak out when it looks awful and you still try to salvage it.  I had to add some water to my brush and really smooth it all out since the paint dried too quickly to do it without adding water.

 Crappy.

 Better.

Take your state off and this is what you will have.

I then painted a little red heart in the area we now call home and then glued the frame on.

Then hung it up and re-accessorized.

 

I think it would be cool to make one for all the states you have ever lived in and hang them all together.  Too bad I have only lived in one.

Happy crafting!