A little of this and a little of that…

So I am all alone here at home this week. The boys are on their annual 50 mile back packing/hiking trip, and Em is with G-ma hanging and crafting and picking out kittens. So Momma gets a little alone time! Yay! I had a fabulous weekend full of friends and fun. Then Monday morning came and it was time to get to work. My job this week was to get the garage clean..That’s a big project.. so that we can participate in the neighborhood garage sale. I figured it would take me 3 days to get the garage done and then I would have a full day to get the sale stuff ready..Well, I must be very productive when I am alone. I got the garage done in less than 3 hours! So that left me with today to play! Here is what I did. First I finished my 42 swap cards..

This card is made using the Mischief paper pack and the new Art Philosophy Cricut Cartridge for Close to my Heart. I think it turned out ok.

Then I had to decide what to do next…

Have something to eat… read my book.. or make a burlap table runner and 4 matching place mats… decisions decisions…. I decided to start the runner and mats then have a snack.. then I was gonna read but then my Mom sent me a picture of her new kitten.. So reading was out..

Isn’t he so cute!

Ok so here is how I made the runner…

I started with my burlap and this edging stuff I found on clearance.. I really like it!

I got this kind of thread… incase you were wondering…

I measured it to the size I wanted on my table. Then it was time to cut it. Do you know the  trick to cutting Burlap so that it is straight? When if not I will show you.

First you make a snip to start where you want your cut.

Then pull it apart a little bit and get one thread in the middle..

Now pull it carefully… it will probably break but that is ok. Find the end and using something pokey (poky?… hmm.. which one is right… not sure.. oh well you get the idea)

pick it out and pull some more until you get to the other end..

see how it leaves a little line where the thread was.. Now take your scissors and cut down that line!

I cut it then I had to wash it.. Boy is it messy! Take it outside and give it a good shake and let it dry.. It doesn’t take too long for it to dry. There is a great tutorial Here. Very simple actually! Here is my runner all done!

If you look to the right of my runner in the picture below you will see a pile of threads from the process! WOW! this was a messy job!

'

This is one of the place mats I made.

That’s it! I actually Still have to sew the other 3 mats but it is all ready for me to finish them up in the morning.. I can’t wait to get my table cleaned off so I can put my new runner on!

When I do I will post a picture of it in action! Let’s see what I end up doing tomorrow!

Thank you card set

Hey there, It’s been a while since I last posted some crafty goodness. My family and I were on vacation and I had house guests for the last month and a half so I haven’t had any crafty time..Well, I decided I needed to fix that so instead of getting dressed and showered and cleaning the house this morning I decided to play around and be crafty! It was so much fun! Here is what I did…

It’s a Thank you card set in a Fry box. I cut the fry box using the new Art Philosophy Cricut cartridge that is exclusive to Close to my Heart! It is awesome!

I cut the fry box at 11 1/4 inches using our double sided B&T papers from the Lucky paper pack.

The star and the ticket are also cut using the cartridge. The Stamped image on the ticket is from one of the 3 stamp sets you get with the cartridge. I really love how they work together and I was able to cut all 6 out in a snap!

And of course I stamped a coordinating image on the envelope for a special little touch!.

I was totally inspired by this fry box set by Lori Miller. Thanks for the inspiration Lori!

4th of July projects #4

So the last couple of projects were super fast spur of the moment kind of things.. Really I just had to keep spraying.. I am now addicted to pray paint! It is a lot of fun! So I took this cute little bird house I found in my Mom’s garage with a $.25 sticker on it.. She couldn’t sell it so I took it off her hands.. Again I didn’t take a before picture.. I guess I wasn’t thinking about blogging it. I think it turned out so cute!

I sprayed the roof red and brushed on some white on the face. I left the rest natural it looks like the fence.. Then I took some rub-on thingy's and added them to the front for something cute. I hope to see a happy family of birds in it some day. If not it still looks cute on the fence.

The other project is a little weird but hey, you have to think outside of the box sometimes right?

My back yard and fence are very boring right now.. I have been working on it with the help of my Mom with planting flowers and stuff but the fence is really boring, so I have looking for things to brighten it up a bit. I was wandering through the garage looking for anything else I could spray paint and I found a little basket and added some paper and  decoupage and hung it on the fence..

It just adds a little color.. to a dark spot.

The two sunflowers are from my kids. They each made them in second grade. They help brighten it up too.

Well, that is all of the fun projects I did this weekend… I did a lot more but they just weren’t fun… sorting, organizing, cleaning.. Boring! Anyway I hope you had a fun and productive weekend like I did!

Up Next …

Let’s see what I can do with this… It’s has to match the desk and I am thinking it needs some legs…

4th of July projects #3

So I bought this table about 6 years ago at a garage sale for $1 with the intention of doing something cute with it.. Excuse the pictures.. These are “before” pictures of the yard and they happened to have this old ugly table in them. Yay! since I didn’t take any before pictures of the table..

Here is what I finally did with it!

Isn’t it cute! I should have done this a long time ago! I love it painted! I have to admit that I really loved it primed white but I had bought the red for the table and I felt I had to use it.. I think it turned out quite nice actually! You can see another project I did last weekend to get my creative juices flowing. It’s some firecrackers for the 4th!

Hope you are having a great week!

4th of July projects #2.

So while working on the desk, and since I had the spray paint out I thought I would tackle this little table.. I didn’t take a before picture though : (  But here it is.. Isn’t it cute! it’s also fabric covered. Though I haven’t added the resin.. I didn’t have enough. There are about 8 coats of Mod Podge on it though…

This is going to go in my daughter’s room as a night stand. Cute isn’t it!

4th of July weekend projects

So in a couple of weeks my best friend and her family will be here for a once every three year visit. I am really excited but also a little stressed because we just moved and I want to get the house and spare room ready for when they get here. So this weekend I have been busy getting a few things done. It all started with this desk…excuse the messy garage…

As you can see it was pretty hideous. So I started sanding and realized that the top was Formica and it was chipped so I decided to take it off…

That left a yucky dinged up plywood top. I had to think about what to put on top so in the mean time I started painting.. It took a lot of paint.

Looking better already! But I still had to figure out what to put on the top..Last weekend we went garage sale-ing and I bought a box of beautiful home décor fabric samples from a friend for $5. Such a deal.. So inspiration hit and I decided to cover the top of the desk with a piece of fabric… now off I went to see how others have done it.. because there is no reason to reinvent the wheel. So I googled it and found a great tutorial on Tatertotsandjello.BlogSpot.com. This is just what I wanted to do! Yay! And I already had some of the Pour on Resin that I have been too afraid to try..Well, as my daughter said, I had to face my fears. And so I did.. and I LOVE IT!

This fabric is gorgeous and I have left over that I am going to cover the lamp shade in the spare room!

Can you see that shine! Oh I love this stuff!

The handles were black and I spray painted them a hammered bronze. I love how it turned out. I am thinking about doing an antiquing glaze on the desk. I think the white is a little stark. But for now it looks pretty good! This is one of 5 projects I did this weekend. I will post another tomorrow! Happy 4th of July!~