Wake Up And Be Awesome

Wake up and be awesome is my motto. Everyday you have a choice of what you want to be and awesome is my answer. It is not always easy, but I do try.

So what better way to show my love for awesomeness than to make a wall hanging? It is fun to look at first thing in the morning and they day is always better when you start off with a smile.

Materials:

~old painting that you are willing to cover up. I found mine at Goodwill

~ paint (I am using acrylic paint that I found at the craft store)

~ Alphabet stickers, I was looking for big stickers and I found mine at Target near the poster board section

~ Rhinestone (of course I need rhinestones! I think this is a prerequisite for all my crafts )

~ Glue to glue on the rhinestones (I am using Aleene’s Jewel-it glue)

~ Foam paint brush

 

Instructions:

~ Take your old painting and wipe clean. A damp paper towel should do the trick. I found this painting at Goodwill. It is not an actual painting but a print on canvas. The style doesn’t match my décor but the colors do. So I thought it would be perfect for this project.

~ Gather your supplies

~ I cut out the letters and laid them out to make sure everything fit.

~ Stick the letters on the canvas. Really press them down to make sure no paint seeps under the letter

~ Start painting.  Cover the entire canvas. Take your time and make sure it is all covered and looks good.

~ Before the paint completely dries take the letters off and throw them away. Check for sections where the paint might have seeped under the letter and clean it up. I used a Q-tip to make the letters look crisp.

I am not sure how anyone gets anything done without a little cat help. It seems like every time I start a project Starlight has to be in the middle of it. But she makes it more fun.

~ Then I started adding rhinestones. I think everything is better with a little sparkle. I just added a few to the left edge of the each letter in the word Awesome. I think it added just the right amount of sparkle.

~Hang it on you wall (mine is in our bedroom) and get ready to wake up and be Awesome!

DIY Mason Jars for the Fall

Mason jars are the best. What is not to love, they are the perfect storage container for just about anything. Also, when I get a jar from my mom there is a good chance that it might already be filled with yummy jelly or jam or salsa or something else equally as good. And that makes the jar that much better.

But for this DIY I am using empty jars that will be filled with candy corn. For us the candy corn season is a major event. And yes, we celebrate the candy corn season very enthusiastically, from beginning to end.

 

I decided to make a festive mason jar that can hold our yummy candy corn and look cute at the same time. Also, we live in a very small house and any decorations need to be small, or very versatile. These mason jars are easy to switch out with the various seasons. In Dec I will show you my Christmas mason jars. So lets get to the tutorial.

Materials:

• Mason jar. I pick up some at the dollar store and used ones from my mom. Any jars will do as long as they have the lids with them.

• Fake flowers, I picked mums for the fall, but any will do

• Hot glue
• Ribbon
• Window clings. Here are the ones that I found at the dollar store, I love how it looks fall and festive, with out being over the top.

• Candy Corn, or any candy you want to fill your jar with

Instructions:

~ First cut off the stems to your fake flowers. You still want the green part under the flower to hold everything together. I used 3 flowers per jar, but depending on your flowers you might use more or less on your jar.

~ Using hot glue, glue the flowers to the top of the jar.

~ using hot glue, glue your ribbon to the ring of the jar. by only gluing things to the jar lid and the ring and not the jar you are able to switch out the lids (rather than switching out the entire jar) for different holidays.

~ add a window cling to the jar for more festivity. Window clings are non permanent and reusable making them perfect for this project.

~ Add your favorite candy and enjoy! That is it! Enjoy  this easy DIY for fall!

If you want to know how I made the lanterns you can go to this blog post.

And if you want to know how we made the fireplace mantle you can go to this blog post.

Guest blogger- Kim teaches us how to transform old costume jewelry.

Not long after I started this blog I mentioned it to my friends and family that I had a blog and if anyone wanted to be a guest blogger to just let me know and I would feature them. Well I wasn’t surprised that my oldest sister was the first to offer.

Here is a picture of me and all 3 of my siblings.

(Sam, Linda, Valerie, and Kim)

I can’t believe that this picture is 4 or 5 years old (yikes, it is time for us all together and take some new pictures. My hair hasn’t been red in years…),but you work with what you got and this is it. That is the problem when everyone lives all over the country, it is hard for all of us to be in the same city at the same time.  And when we do get together we don’t think to get the camera out and take pictures. I think this has just become one of my new priorities, get new family pictures.

But before I go into the tutorial I thought I would give you a little background about my family. When I was typing this blog post I realized that I haven’t spent much time talking about my family, other than my husband and son. I have 2 older sisters and a younger brother. So that puts me in the middle of the kids. It was fun having so many siblings growing up, but sometimes I got lost in the mix. I am sure that anyone with lots of siblings feels the same way.  Today’s guest post is from my oldest sister, Kim.  She is about 7 years older than me and I always looked up to her. She now lives in Arizona so it is hard to get together, but when we do see each other we always have fun! Kim has a wonderful talent making jewelry. Whether it is her own creation or taking something and reimagining it. I love seeing what she comes up with just some beads and wire.

Here is the beautiful bracelet that she made me soon after my son was born.  It is silver and garnet (his birthstone) and gorgeous and and it fits perfectly and every time I wear it I get tons of complements.

In today’s guest post I will show you the awesome jewelry that Kim made from old costume jewelry that she inherited from our Great Grand Aunt Nancy.

Kim’s Guest Blog Post!

Ever find that fantastic old piece of jewelry but you cannot wear it in the condition you found it in. This happened end to me. My sisters and I were helping our mom go through her jewelry and found that she had our Great Grand Aunt Nancy’s jewelry box and I found this pendant and earrings and I cannot resist some good sparkle.  (Sorry took this picture after I had taken one earring apart)

The pendant was easy just a longer chain. Aunt Nancy was 4’8″ and a petit dancer. I am not.
Then the screw on clip earrings were next.

I removed the dangle. The key is to examine the loop and find the one that has the break. Then twist the ring open. Most of the time in these cases the ring with the break is found on the clip side and the dangle is whole.

When working with old jewelry be sure you check the integrity of the ring. If it is showing significant wear then it may need additional repairs before continuing. (If I find one that needs repair I will show this in a future posting)
I then added the dangle to an ear wire. By using a modern long ear wire I was able to update the look without compromising the original charm.

I found these ear wires at Hobby Lobby but they can be found at any number of craft and bead stores or online. I liked these because the “diamonds” on the ear wire complement the crystals in the dangles.

I also love that the dangles are so easy to remove because then I can make a bunch of different dangles and change them out.
Have fun with old charm and modern looks.

Thanks for sharing Kim, the earrings and necklace turned out beautifully! I can’t wait to see what she comes up with next!

DIY Cinderella draw string bag

Last weekend while I was at the dollar store I saw these magic towels. I had seen them before and I thought they looked neat, but I don’t like using them as actual towels. They are thin and scratchy so I have never purchased them. When I saw them this weekend my crafty, creative juices started flowing. So I bought a few or 15. Whatever. I am sure I will find uses for them.

Here are some of the awesome magic towels I picked up. So many choices! I can’t wait to get my crafting on!

For this project I thought I would decorate a plain drawstring bag. I have to say that everything is better with sparkles and Cinderella!

My son is so patient and tolerant modeling my new bag. He didn’t even protest when I asked him to model my bag. He makes my heart sing

This is pretty easy to do and you can use any magic towel to customize it to  you heart’s content.

Materials:

~ magic towel (prewashed and ironed. You want to make sure it is flat and ready to use)

~ Wonder under or any iron on fusible web. ( I just used what I had on hand)

~ Fabric Paint

~ Scissors

~ rhinestones

~ Rhinestone glue. ( I used Aleene’s Jewel it)

 

Instructions:

1. Wash and dry and iron your magic towel. That gets it ready for its transformation.

2. Iron your drawstring bag. I got my bag at JoAnns, but I am sure you can find them just about anywhere.

3. Iron your fusible web on to the back of the towel.

4. Carefully cut out Cinderella.

5. Peel the backing off. You can see the Cinderella wording and shoe, but I decided not to use them.

6. Iron Cinderella to the bag.

7. When Cinderella is cool start going around the edge with fabric paint. I found that I had to make a thicker line than I usually do because of how thick the towel is. I wanted to make sure the towel won’t unravel and that Cinderella stayed in place.

     

 

Once that was done I had Cole try on the bag and I decided that it didn’t have enough sparkle. I am sure you surprised that I didn’t think it had enough sparkles, right?

8. I had these packets of rhinestones that I found at the dollar store that I thought would work perfectly. They are connected together in strips, which worked perfectly.

9. I laid the strips out in a pattern that I liked

10. Once I got it how I liked I glued the rhinestones down. This is to make sure the rhinestones stay on the bag.

11. let dry over night and then you are ready to rock an awesome Cinderella bag. Doesn’t Cole look great rocking the bag? He is a great sport.

 

Update your handbags, purses, and clutches!

So I bought these really cheap handbags. It came in a set of 3 bags. There was a clutch, cross body bag and a handbag. They are fine on their own, but a little boring, so I decided to fix that.

With a little help from my clearance statement necklaces that I found at Walmart and a little glue I was able to update my purses and create a whole new look.

Here is the clutch. Love.

Here is the cross body bag. So cute!

And here is the handbag. Perfect!

 

It is easy to do, here is what you need

Materials:

~ handbag or purse that needs a little updating

~ glue that will work on metal (I used Aleene’s jewelry and metal glue)

~ Statement necklaces that you can take apart or jewelry or bling that you want to add to your purse.

 

Clutch instructions:

Here is the clutch looking all boring and sad because it didn’t have any embellishments on it.

 

Whoa! Too many embellishments! This statement necklace is certainly making a statement. I am not sure what that statement is, but it is making it. I decided to take it apart and only use 1 rose. I will use the rest in another project.

Much better. I think it looks great! BTW, don’t you love my red couch as a background color I think it adds awesomeness to the pictures.

 

Cross body bag instructions:

Once again a sad, boring cross body bag.

I added this necklace to the bag. Much better, I think. If you can’t find a necklace like this on it is easy to make with a jewel and different lengths of chain.

I think it looks ok, but I think it can look better.

Ah yes, this is it! If you can believe it I think it was looking a little plain towards the top

Hooray! This is what I am talking about! Perfect!

 

Handbag instructions:

Boring handbag.

Add a cute flower statement necklace

And tada you have a new hand bag!

As  you can see this project is pretty easy, but it adds so much to your purses and handbags. Just make sure you glue on everything really well and let it dry completely before you use it.

Paint Your Couch!? Say What?

I know what you are going to say, that is crazy! Painting your couch! There are better ways to update your couch. I will agree there might be better ways, but this is a great solution for my dingy, old couch that needed an update.

This couch is great, it has individual sections that can be moved if needed, and the ottomans can have the soft footstool side facing up or a hard table surface facing up. It is very versatile and we have enjoyed it for many years. The downside is that the couch is made of a light colored micro fiber that stains easily. over the years the couch has become a collection of stains. I have tried to remove them, but after awhile nothing would work. So I had the option of recovering the cushions or to paint them. I decided on painting because I thought it would be easier.

See stains (I am actually embarrassed to show you guys this stain, and I just couldn’t bring myself to showing you the bigger ones.) And this was just a small one…

Overall it was pretty easy, but time consuming.

Here is how I did it if you are interested in doing the same with your furniture.

Materials:

~ Fabric Spray paint. I used Simply Spray Fabric Paint in Sage green. For my couch I used 12 bottles, which was about $120. Not the cheapest solution, but cheaper than recovering all the cushions but cheaper than buying a new couch. I bought my paint from Amazon.

~ Furniture that you want to paint.

~ Plastic covering for your work area, and room for your items to dry

~ Rubber gloves

 

Some notes:

Before I evens started I watched a ton of YouTube videos on how to do this and I read all the instructions and I looked over the company website. I took my time getting to know the product and how to use it. Before doing this yourself I would recommend doing your own research and practicing before you do your entire couch.

You can see here that our couch was a very light beige color. It blended in with the walls and the floor and it was very boring. Not to mention dirty. I thought the green would make it more interesting and make our living room more inviting rather than bland. Lyle was skeptical, but he was on board with my experiment.

Here is a picture of beige town that was our living room.

I will tell  you that you should do it all at once rather than space it out over a few years….

Yes you read that correctly, I did this project over the span of 2 years. I am sure you all have had a project that you started and didn’t get back to for a while, well this project was one that took me a whole to get back to. I started it one weekend and got half of the couch done. I didn’t have any pictures of it because I was embarrassed that I didn’t finish in a timely manner    well eventually I decided to finish the project. Lyle was very patient and didn’t nag me toooooo much about the unfinished couch in our living room. But I did go back and finish. That is why the colors are a little different from cushion to cushion. The 2 year time span is evident. My technique changed a bit and some fading happened. Oh well, it is done and we are happy with the final result so that is all that matters.

 

Instructions:

1. Clean your furniture. You want to make sure you have a clean slate so the paint will adhere to the cushion.

2. Take your cushions to your work area. We put plastic all over in our garage so that I could work in there. The cushions could dry without being outside where dirt and leaves would blow on to the wet paint. And if it started to rain I could close the garage door and keep the cushions dry.

 

3.Put your gloves on. Spray a light coat on the cushion, then rub the paint into the fabric. I did this and I think it coated better.

          

4. Let it dry and spray and rub again. I did 3 coats, that seemed to get the best coverage. After the first 2 coats you will think to yourself “What on earth have I done? This looks like crap!” But hang in there, by the third coat everything looked better.

5. Let the whole thing dry over night then put it back on your couch.

 

 

Enjoy your “new” couch.  This project has been completely finished for over a year now and I can honestly say I still love the final result. The paint has stayed on the couch and doesn’t rub off on your clothes (this was a concern of Lyle’s) and it still looks good. At first the fabric was a little stiff and not as soft as it was before the paint, but over time the paint loosens up and the fabric becomes softer. It won’t ever be as soft as the original micro fiber, but it is getting better.

So, is painting your couch something you might do? What else do you think I should paint?

Most Popular Pin From Blog and and easy DIY for your calculator

 

Most Popular Pin

You get a two for one today!

I wanted to share with you on Throw Back Thursday one my most popular pins on Pinterest from my blog. I love seeing what is popular. But this is a fun one that I still love.

Drumroll please……

 

 

The most popular pin is the

No Soliciting sign!

   

Just a simple print out framed in a cute frame I got from Hobby Lobby and that is it.

It always amuses me when the pizza guy wants to take a picture of the sign. It usually works and it has held up well over the years. Keep on pinning, I love to see what you guys pin. If you want to follow me or any of my boards on Pinterest you can follow me at https://www.pinterest.com/linsam/

Now I can’t just leave you with that throw back, I need to show you a DIY as well

 

DIY Rhinestone Calculator

I was wandering around Hobby Lobby the other day and I saw a very cute pink rhinestone calculator. I loved it, but I thought to myself that “Hey! you have a calculator and rhinestones, why don’t you make it yourself instead of buying a new one?” So that is what I did.

It was easy to do and the side benefit is that no one takes it off my desk anymore and if they do take it, it is easy to find and for me to take it back.

Materials:

~ calculator (mine was an old one that I have had forever. ) Since my calculator is tan I went with tan colored rhinestones that I had at my house. I wanted this to be a cheap DIY with materials that I had on hand. Maybe not as cute as the pink one I saw, but cute anyway.

~ Rhinestones (I got my package from the dollar store.)

~ E-6000 (of course, I think I am a little obsessed with this glue….)

~ Something to clean the calculator

~ sandpaper or something to rough up the surface.

Instructions:

This is a very straight forward project.  Just sand, clean, and glue. So here we go:

1. I sanded my calculator because I thought it would be easier with a sight rougher surface. Just a light sanding will do.

2. Clean. I used a wipe and cleaned every crook and nanny, I don’t think my calculator had been this clean since I bought it.

3. Start gluing. I used these awesome syringes that I bought from Amazon (here is the link) You don’t to use the syringe, but I find it makes it easier and more precise to apply the glue. This is especially important when you are trying to glue tiny rhinestones.

I know you can still see the blue Texas Instruments logo and model number, but that is ok for me, it really doesn’t bother me. But if it bothers you then I would use smaller rhinestones and try and fill it in more. Or you could paint over the blue part to match the rest of the calculator before you added the rhinestones, then it wouldn’t be as noticeable. Lots of options for what ever look you are going for.

  

 

4. Let dry before using.

That is it. I am well on my way to blinging up my entire desk. I wonder what should be next on my list. Suggestions?

   

What office supplies have you enhanced?

DIY Mickey Messenger Bag

When we went to Disneyland I decided that I “needed”  a new bag to hold my wallet and essentials. I didn’t want it too big, just big enough to carry what I needed for the day. Of course I decided that I needed this bag the day before we left. And of course I wanted to use a product that I have never used before. Nothing can go wrong with this scenario, right?? wrong! All kinds of things happened and and few tries later I ended up with a new bag. It only took me 3 times as long, but it did get done  

 

I will give you the instructions on how you should do it  and I will even tell you what not to do, haha!

Materials:

~ messenger bag

~ stencil of what you want to create

~ Graphite paper

~ rhinestones

~ fabric paint

~ E-6000 glue

~ Silver Sharpie

 

Instructions:

1. Pick out the messenger bag you want to decorate. I found this black on at Hobby Lobby, and I used a coupon so it wasn’t too expensive. Much cheaper than anything I would find at Disney in their stores . It worked very well, except with all the decoration the flap was a little heavy and when I snapped it the flap would fold weird. So I just never snapped the flap and let it hang, and that worked out just fine.

 

    

2. Print out what you what to put on your bag, I found a Mickey head silhouette and the quote. I downloaded a free Disney font and typed the quote in a word processing program and printed it at home. (here is the first problem I had. Instead of the stencil I cut out the Mickey shaped with  glitter iron on transfer paper. then I tried to iron it onto the bag.  It didn’t iron on well and was pealing up. I decided to try again, so I picked off the first one and made a new Mickey head and ironed it on again. Once again it did not work. So I picked off what I could and went on to plan B.  I am going to have to figure out what I did wrong. Do you guys have any thought or suggestions?)

3. Place your stencil and quote on the bag.

 

4. Cut out some graphite, big enough to put under the quote. Trace the quote onto the bag and the graphite paper will transfer the quote onto the bag. The graphite paper I had was hard to read, but manageable

    

5. Trace the words with a silver Sharpie. I traced it about 3 times. A fabric marker would work as well.

6. I used Stickles in 2 colors to fill in the stencil. This is another example of a project not working as well as I thought. Stickles are not really good for fabric. We all know this, but if you remember I was doing this the night before we left so I had to use what I had on hand and that was Stickles. I put 2 coats of Stickles on then put a coat of E-6000 glue over the top to seal it in. It worked ok and held up for the week, but I think it would have been better with fabric paint.

7. Once your Mickey is on and your quote is good to go then add Rhinestones all over. Originally I planned on the bag with no rhinestones, but it was a little too plain for my tastes and I added the sparkle.

 

That is it. It held up all week with only a few rhinestones falling off, but that is not bad considering all the problems I had along the way.

What ideas do you have for a bag?

What problems have you had with your crafting projects and how did you fix them?

Turn a plain cadet hat into something that will turn heads

As you all know by now I can’t leave well enough alone. I had these two cadet hats that were fine plain, but not I knew that I could make them better with just a few items.

    

 

Materials:

~ Hat, almost any hat will do

~ Bling, whatever you want to decorate your hat with

~ E-6000 glue

~ scissors

 

Instructions:

Black Hat:

1. Plan out your design. This is important so you can make sure you have room for your wonderful design

~ The black hat I used pieces from Hobby Lobby. The big flower is a Fashion Tid Bit and the swirls are from the scrapbook section. I forgot to take pictures while I was working so I went back to Hobby Lobby and took pictures after the fact. That is why you can still see the price tag in the picture.

~ I just cut the swirls out and shaped them to get the look I was going for. I didn’t use the whole package, which is good because that means there is more for me use on a different project!

2. Glue the design down with E-6000. Even though the swirls have adhesive on them I sill glued them so they would stick really good.

3. Wait 24 hours before wearing to make sure the glue is nice and dry.

 

Tan hat:

1. Plan the design

2. Glue the row of rhinestones on near the brim of the hat. I had to cut one of the rhinestone rows to make sure it fit.

3. Glue the patch on the center of the hat.

 

4. Wait 24 hours before wearing to make sure the glue is nice and dry.

 

Here I am wearing the black hat before I went to Disneyland for the day (so please excuse the lighting ). It held up great, the glue held perfectly and nothing has fallen off yet!

 

And here I am wearing it at the Hoover Dam with my son.

It is always a lot more fun to wear things you make, do you think? What are your ideas for a new hat?

 

Turn an ugly statement necklace into a new beautiful pendant

What do you do when you see such an unfortunate necklace on deep clearance at Walmart? Well, you buy 2 of them and take it home with the hopes that you can find something  to do with them when you get home.

So that is exactly what I did.

Now, you make like this necklace as is and I apologize if I hurt your feeling by saying it is ugly. But it is rather ugly. All of the colors are different and they are all on this weird vinyl that will surely turn yellow with age.

 

This project is so easy it was well worth the embarrassment of buying such and ugly necklace.

Materials:

~ Necklace

~ Glue (I used E6000)

~ Jump rings

~ needle nose pliers

~ Chain

 

Instructions:

This is easy as 1, 2, 3

1. Cut the jewel off that you want to turn into a pendant. I cut the vinyl around the pendant, but I left it in the middle. This was just incase I needed more area to glue on the jump ring.

2. Glue the jump ring on the back with E6000. Let it dry over night before you add the other jump ring.

3. Once dry add the other jump ring (open it with the pliers) and chain.

 

 

That is it. Then rock your new pendant that is now beautiful instead of gaudy.

I just have 4 more clusters that I can make into something fabulous. Any suggestions?

Fair warning, I did purchase a bunch of these statement necklaces that are all different shapes and sizes, so you will be seeing them a lot as I get busy transforming them.