CraftWells

I was intrigued by all of those DIY t-shirt-to-tank-top tutorials on Pinterest and decided to try it one day. I used these instructions from the website Dollars, Sense and More: Des Moines Living on $10 or less (totally relevant to my life) and liked that she made a couple of amendments through trial and error. I decided to cut the straps thinner for comfort and breathability.

This is how mine came out:

It’s super comfy and the back is adjustable, you can tie it up higher or lower depending on the fit you’re looking for.  

The ladies of Pretty Delicious talked about my homemade pizza on their website.

They also let me do a guest post tutorial of my Scrabble Tile Coasters a while back.

Thanks, Lia and Erin!

I had an old throw pillow whose cover was getting worn and boring, so I decided to change it up. I also bought a pack of four Dwell Studio cloth napkins on clearance at Target a long time ago, knowing that I would eventually do something with them. Match made in heaven!

First I lined up the seams of two of the napkins and attached them by sewing three buttons down the middle.

I laid the napkins face down, and placed the pillow on top of it, directly in the middle. I then folded the ends of the napkins in towards the pillow, just like you would wrap a present.

I pinned each corner in place, and then sewed them down to the pillow to keep the cover secure.

That was it! Altogether it was a 30 minute project. 

Check out my Etsy shop and tell all your friends about it. You’ll notice a theme- I plan to stick to Scrabble tile crafts, which are my favorite to make and seem to be a big hit.

I found this idea on Pinterest and couldn’t believe I didn’t think of it myself. I got a set of popsicle molds from Casa.com, sliced up some strawberries and kiwi and threw them in. Then I filled them with pineapple juice, popped them in the freezer for a few hours, and they were good to go! So delicious and good for you too!

My friend Sharon made this adorable bulletin board, which I’ve hung in my new office at work. I love the color and it really helps brighten up the place a bit. You can snag one of your very own on her Etsy shop, OnlyLally. 

I don’t plan to post many recipes, but this one is my absolute favorite and is super easy. Legend has it that my friend Jenn’s aunt (who is named Alicia, so I take partial credit for it) created it. It takes the amount of time it takes to make pasta, plus another two minutes. So quick!

You will need:

• Spaghetti or whatever pasta you have in the house
• Grape or cherry tomatoes
• Black olives
• Feta cheese
• Fresh basil
• Fresh garlic
• Olive oil

Cook the spaghetti and drain it in a colander. Sauté the garlic in olive oil in the same pot you used to cook the pasta, just for a minute- don’t burn the garlic. Take it off the heat and dump the pasta back in, mix it up with a little more olive oil. Toss in all the other ingredients. 

I turned this thing that holds yogurt:

Into this thing that holds a plant:

I took a swatch of fabric that was leftover from the fabric-lined tray project, and cut it to the length of the container plus an inch to wrap under the bottom. I used modge podge to adhere the fabric to the container, and then put another couple of coats of modge podge on top to water- and dirt-proof it a bit. I used my handy household drill to punch a few holes in the bottom for drainage:

That’s it! It took all of 7 minutes plus drying and planting time.

I don’t have a before picture for you, but a while back I bought a lamp for $5 at a thrift store. It was off white with ugly brown flowers (I’m pretty sure brown flowers don’t exist in nature). I really liked it’s shape, though, so I bought it with the intention of doing something to fix it. I bought a glossy navy blue spray paint from Home Depot, laid out a bunch of garbage bags on the front stoop, and went to town. The lamp has four rings around it that I wanted to pop, so I decided to paint them white. This was the hardest part. I used painting tape around the bottom and top of each ring (one at a time) and carefully painted on layer after layer of white craft paint. I had to wait until each ring dried before moving onto the next so that I wouldn’t mess up the one before with the tape.

The rings still aren’t perfect, if you look closely, but I’m OK with that. I like the way it came out overall.

I don’t know if I came up with this idea myself or if I saw it somewhere. I have about 1,000 of the little replacement button bags that come attached to clothing. I never once have used these buttons, and the little bags pile up in a box on my dresser. So I dumped the buttons into my sewing box, saved a handful of the bags, and intend to use them for this:

To keep earrings safe when I travel! Or small necklaces. I’m not a sophisticated packer and tend to throw everything in a bag, so this will at least help to corral them and keep them from getting tangled.

Craftiness runs in the family! My sister-in-law made me these Scrabble tile coasters for Christmas. They combine three of the things I love the most: word games, crafts, and drinking wine.

Oh, she also found the idea on Pinterest and was the one to introduce me to the site (my new favorite time killer) in the first place. Does she know me or what?

I came home late one night after going out with friends and this gem was just sitting on this sidewalk outside my neighbor’s house. Why would you ever get rid of this?? Sure, it’s in rough shape but I’ve never seen anything like it. My mom says it’s a writing desk from way back when (but the “when” is unclear. I have no idea how old it is).

So I rescued it from the curb and brought it inside. I don’t have the room or the know-how to do fairly major restorations like this, so I brought it to my parents’ house. Over the course of the next few months, my dad helped me refinish it whenever I came home for a visit. 

First we unhinged the legs to make them easier to work on, and then stripped and sanded the whole table. That’s the worst part. Seriously, it takes forever. There were a few layers of brown stain on it that had to be removed, which took several rounds of sanding and stripping. I have to be honest and confess that Dad did most of this step in the process. What? He’s just better at it than I am. I’m not lazy, I swear.

Then the fun part is painting it! Dad and I went to the paint store and picked out a lovely yellow-gold, which we were a bit nervous about it being too bright, but willing to take the risk. We did a couple coats of paint, making sure to get in all the crevices on the side-panel details (again, took forever). We hinged the now-painted legs back on and put reinforcing brackets on the inside of the legs to make the table a bit more sturdy (it was slightly wobbly before).

Here’s the finished product. I love it, don’t you?

My advice for taking on this kind of project would be to A) Be ready for some hard work and elbow grease. B) Allot much more time and energy than you think it will take. I’ve done projects like this before and expected to get it done in an afternoon. Foolish. C) If you don’t have your dad or equally handy adult help you, make sure to read up (or You Tube up) on how to do this type of project. There are lots of little tricks (like the direction you should sand in) that I never would have known. D) Don’t be afraid of color! I initially thought of going with a neutral like brown or grey, but I love the yellow and how it brings a pop of color to my otherwise-neutral living room.

I bookmarked this post on Centsational Girl a while back and finally got around to giving it a shot recently.

I bought a white tray from the clearance end cap at Target (you know what I’m talking about) and spray painted it silver. Rather than using a cloth placemat, I used a swatch of fabric that I had picked up for super cheap at Michael’s. I measured the base of the tray and folded over and ironed the edges of the fabric so that it matched the exact dimensions.

I used modge podge to glue down the fabric to the base of the tray, and for good measure put a layer of modge podge on the top of the fabric as well. This makes the tray less fabric-y, but I like that it’s more protected now.

This is what Kate’s (aka Centsational Girl) final product looks like:

Now, because I prefer to make things that have at least a small purpose and aren’t merely decorative, I put mine to a more practical use on our coffee table:

And now for one of my favorite projects! I’m thinking of starting an Etsy shop for these but with work and school, I’m not sure I’d have the time. Especially since they need to be custom made for each order and can’t be made in advance. Is this something that you, my readers, would buy? (they make great bridal shower/housewarming gifts). Any veteran Etsy-ers have any words of wisdom? 

I won’t post step-by-step instructions in case I do one day want to make a move on this million dollar idea, but basically they involve picture frames, scrabble tiles and glue.

As promised, here is a behind-the-scenes look at the kid’s name shadow box making process. I made one for my niece for Christmas with an outer space theme. I don’t know if maybe I’m psychic, but after picking this theme I received a message from her mother saying that she wanted “outer space stuff” for Christmas, so this couldn’t have been more perfect.

I first laid down black sparkly paper, traced a “moon” on silver paper with a bowl, and painted her name orange (her favorite color). I used hot glue to start laying down the space accessories.

Items that needed to stand up were glued to the base of the shadow box.

Like last time, I put a flat-headed nail in the back of one of the pieces to make it float. Sounds macabre but it works.

Here’s the finished product!

Want to impress everyone at a one-year-old’s birthday party (though the one-year-old may not be so interested)? This project is easy-ish to make and packs a big punch. 

My nephew has a sea-themed bedroom and when I stumbled across this Coral Reef Toob at A.C. Moore (cheaper at the store than on this website) inspiration struck. I picked up some wooden letters, a sheet of sparkly blue sticky foam for the background, a black shadow box, and a boyfriend (not from A.C. Moore) and I was good to go. I painted a sun on a sheet of light blue card stock for the sky, and then Tom was in charge of setting the scene and doing the manual labor to cut some of the animals to the size needed to fit inside the frame. He also came up with the genius idea of putting a nail in the scuba diver and gluing the head of the nail to the background to give him a swimming effect. The objects were all glued using Amazing Goop Craft Glue.

Here’s another view where you can kind of see the nail (painted blue to blend in a bit more):

The niece is getting an outer-space-themed box for Christmas (shh don’t tell her), so be on the lookout for that in a couple of weeks. I’ll try to remember to get some in-progress shots.

Need a one minute project? Take a bottle cap that you like- your favorite beer, perhaps, and super glue a magnet or two to the inside.

I used the cap to a bottle of GatoNegro Chardonnay because I liked the kitty. So does Spidey Magnet.