A Pintrest Vacation

This year I had planned a week off in July but then Steve got a new job so he couldn't join me.  So instead of cancelling my vacation, I decided to spend my week doing some Pintrest projects I had planned on doing for some time!  I was so excited!  I visited a local thrift shop and picked up some goodies to help me out and then hit up Home Depot to buy loads of spray paint (caution:  buying spray paint may lead to finding items all over the house you can paint!).

My first project was a rusty old rake that I removed the handle off of, spray painted, and hung upside down in my closet to act as a necklace/scarf/belt rack. Cost = $2 for the rake and the medallion was from my scrapbook stash. Next project was my cake stand which was a candle stick, platter, and string of beads all glued together and then spray painted ... cute non? Cost = $4 for the patter, candle stick and beads. After that was my key rack! An old frame I spray painted with scrapbook paper behind it and some hooks screwed in and it now hangs in my laundry room. Cost = $1.50 for frame and hooks, the paper I already had in my stash.

And as I cautioned above, once I started spray painting I couldn't stop.  My scrapbook room had a tiered basket system that was black and an old gum ball machine that was green that now co-ordinate beautifully!  These two projects cost me nothing as I already had the spray paint.

And finally, the piece de resistance ... my gallery wall.  I have wanted to do this for years and finally found the time needed to do it.  I bought a whole bunch of mix and matched frames at the thrift store and then spray painted one of three colours (off white, blue, and yellow).  I backed some of the frames with a favorite scrapbook paper collection from Echo Park.  It was so much fun picking which photos I wanted to use and where to place them (I still have one frame to fill cause they printed the photo in the wrong orientation).  You will notice a couple of frames have different items it.  One has our family initial, another our first house key, and another with our lucky number.  I also used two frames to try and disguise the thermostat and doorbell!  So far everyone who has seen it loves it and I can't wait to start switching out photos when some new ones come along.  This project cost me about $74 for all the frames, scrapbook paper, and photos. Not bad if I do say so myself.

So all in all I spent $108.57 on all my projects and the spray paint to do them.  Not bad really!  Originally I priced out the gallery wall using all Ikea frames it was going to cast almost $300!  So I figured I saved myself almost $200, got to do several more projects because of my thriftiness and also got to have a lot of fun!  I am already trying find a way to take another week off work so that I can do some more projects!

Mother's Day Gift Box and Blog Hop

Welcome to the Mother's Day Blog Hop! I would like to take this opportunity to with all you Mom's out there a very wonderful Mother's Day! You should of arrived here from Moongirl's blog and if you got lost along the way you can go back to Amanda's blog to get your bearings!

For this Blog Hop, we were challenged to create a page about your mom, about you as a mom or even go past scrapping into a gift idea or paper crafts project for Mother's Day. The interpretation was left up to us so for this hop I decided to make a pretty little box to put the gift for my Mom in. The box is very easy to make even if you don't have the Scor-Board like I do. So let's get started! Pick out two co-ordinating double-sided papers; one for the bottom of the box and one for the top of the box.

I trimmed my bottom piece to be 8x8 and then scored it at the two inch mark all the way around.

After scoring, I folded all of edges inward so that the pattern would end up on the inside of the bottom of the box.  The lid will cover most of the bottom box so the pattern is better used on the inside!

Pick opposing sides and trim the two of the folds to the perpendicular fold line.

You will now adhere these folds together and you will see the box start to take shape.  Repeat on the other side.

Now, it's time for the top.  I cut the top of the box to be 8.5x8.5.  I wanted the edge of my top lid to have a decorative edge so I took out a border punch and fancied it up a bit.  Once I had the decorative edge done I then scored my lines so that the finished top size would be 4.12 in size.  To get this it will depend on the size of border punch you use.  For mine the score lines were at 1.75.  Now fold and adhere the box for the top just like you did for the bottom one. 

I had some reminants left over so I decided to make a paper rosette for the top of the box.  I have done a tutorial on this technique here if you are interested in how I did it.

I stuck the rosette on the top of the box.

Added a crochet flower and a button with ribbon.

And there we have it.  The most adorable little gift box that took me 20 minutes to make.  Knowing my Mom this will end up on display somewhere so that is why I wanted to make it extra special for her.

So how about a give away?  Leave me a comment and become a follower and I will pick a lucky winner on Monday to win a scrappy prize!  So next on your hop head on over to the talented Adele's blog and thanks for stopping by!

Supplies: Patterned Paper: My Minds Eye - Kaleidoscope Collection; Embellishments: Button, Crochet Flower, and Ribbon; Tools: EK Success Large Scallopped Edger Punch and Martha Stewart Scor-Board.

Be Mine Banner

Valentine's Day is fast approaching and once again I made another attempt at a Valentine's Day Banner. Last year's didn't work out so well. A friend and I got together for a craft day, a break from our usual scrap day, and we were going to troll Pintrest for something to make but we came up with this puppy all by ourselves instead! Every step of the way through there were lots of excitement as we came up with a new idea or twist to it!  It was so much fun!

This banner was pretty easy to make using cheap felt from Michael's, a real neat kind of fat yarn for the top, embroidery floss, and various Valentine's Day embellishments from my scrappy stash! Each pennant has a pocket on the front to store a little surprise for your valentine.  You could do little chocolates or even little love notes and use it as a count down to the big Love day!

Winter Wreath

There's this little website called Pintrest ... you may of heard of it! I am super addicted to it! There are so many neat ideas and for someone crafty like me, it's an inspiration overload site! If you haven't checked it out ... do it! And if you need an invite leave your email in the comments and I will send you one.

So one day while checking out the ideas on Pintrest I found this wonderful winter wreath that I loved and decided to do for myself. It only took me a couple of hours to do and it looks awesome hanging on my front door!

Here's the link to the original wreath that I used for my inspiration if you wish to see how it's made, Snow Ball Wreath.  Now, like most things, I used theirs as inspiration for mine and added in different little things to suit my tastes and I made mine a little bulkier because I wanted that look, but other than that it pretty much the same.  Here's a close up shot so you can see all the little details I added.

And here's a little tip for you if you decide to make this wreath. Your first stop should be at a dollar store. It's amazing what you will find there. Plus it is way cheaper! For example, I looked at the Styrofoam balls at my local Michaels and for 4 balls it was $4.99 but the Dollar Store had them for 6 balls for $2.00! Sure makes this wreath way more affordable to do!

In case you are wondering, it took me 4 packages of 6-2" Styrofoam balls, 3 different designs of silver ornaments - 4 of each, 3 large silver snow flakes, 4 Skeins of Yarn in different colours, 2 packages of raffia, 1 10" foam wreath, burlap to wrap the wreath, various little items to fill small spaces (ie: small wintery ornaments, pine cones, twigs of pearls, etc) and a boat load of hot glue gun sticks - I ran out twice!

Homemade Holiday Blog Hop Giveaway Winner!

Thank you everyone for all your kind words about my blog hop project! I really appreciate them and enjoyed reading each of them. I am glad to see that a lot of you have similar memories as I do attached to ribbon candy!  It's funny how little things like that bring the memories flooding back, isn't it!  As promised I have drawn a random number using the Random.Org webiste and the winner is lucky number 5!

Congratulations Steffanie! Please send you mailing info to jenniferdewolfe (at) gmail (dot) com and I will send your package out to you!

I noticed a couple of questions in the comments as well as some things I forgot to mention so I figured I would do it hear and now!

• For my ribbon length I didn't really use a specific length. Each ornament I made is made using what ever the length of ribbon I had seeing as I was using leftover pieces. I did have a minimum size as I wanted more that two loops so I made sure they were at least 6 inches long.
• To create a mostly uniform loop I used a finger width between the pearl and loop.  If they weren't exactly the same size I did not worry about it.  I thought it gave it character, plus I've never seen a perfect asymetrical piece of ribbon candy either.
• Every couple of pearls I would knot the fishing line into the ribbon.  This would give the ornament some stability that made it way easier to work with.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank Amanda again for hosting another fantastic blog hop! I always enjoy participating and seeing what everyone else does.

Homemade Holiday Blog Hop

Hello and Welcome to the Handmade Holiday blog hop! I am so happy to have you stop by my humble little blog! If you did not arrive to my blog from the uber talented Becky's blog please return to Amanda's blog to follow the hop in order so that you don't miss any wonderful inspiration from the amazing ladies participating with me!

This year is our second year doing a homemade Christmas in my family.  It is something we started last year because we decided to take a family vacation to Jamaica over Christmas and it was done in an effort to save a little money.  It ended up being one of my favorite Christmases!  I do come from a crafty family so all of the gifts were super creative and had such heartfelt meaning!  So much so, that we decided to do it again this year and this blog hop is perfect with that goal!  We were challenge by Amanda to create a handmade project using our scrappy stash or tools.  It can be a gift, home decor item, food/recipe that somehow uses our scrappy items.

So for this blog hop, I had hard a bit of a hard time because all of the projects I am working on have to be kept under wraps until I can give them to their new owners at Christmas!  So I had to come up with an idea just for this blog and something that will be just for me!  I have always had a fascination with Christmas candy.  I think it's because it reminds me of my beloved Grandmother.  I remember bowls and bowls of candy all over her house at Christmas, especially ribbon candy!  I went through my stash of ribbons and looked for a bunch of striped short pieces of ribbon that I could use to make my own ribbon candy ornaments. 

Using some fishing line and pearl beads I got at my local dollar store I stung together these super cute ornaments for my Christmas tree! I love them! I am actually thinking that I might make a garland or swags for my tree when I have more time and can get some pretty ribbon on sale in large enough quantities to go around my tree!

And now you have your chance to win! I am doing a giveaway to one of you. Simply comment on this post and become a follower. I will do a random draw on Monday morning for all the materials you need to make one of these adorable ornaments and maybe I'll even throw in one I made; make sure to check back then to see if you won.

Now for the next stop on your blog hop, please head on over to very funny and super talented Shanon!

Supplies: Embellishments: Ribbons, Pearls, and Fishing Line.

Acrylic Stamp Storage

For a change of pace I though I would do a post about how I store my acrylic stamps. One I think it's pretty nifty and two I am working on a wedding album for my cousin right now and I can't post any pictures until I give it to her! So for the next couple of posts my topics will still be scrapbook related but not necessarily layout related!

If you are anything like me, you have a mass amount of acrylic stamps in your stash. For the longest time I just kept them on the clear sheets they came on in a drawer. But this made using them very difficult because you had to shift through them all to find what you were looking for. Because of this I found myself using them less and less.

We were cleaning out our entertainment system when I came across some old CD cases and I thought they would be perfect for storing my acrylic stamps. So one night I sat down with a movie on and started to organize my stamp set into the CD cases. The nice thing was that I was able to use both sides of the case.

The CD cases fit perfectly into my storage cubes with enough room to store my acrylic blocks on the side.

Each case got a label saying which theme of stamps were contained within and when I put them in the drawer I grouped like themes together. This way when I now open the drawer I can quickly glance through all the labels and find the theme area I am looking for. And because the CD cases are clear I can slide each one out and quickly glance at what is inside and if it's not what I want I put it back and move to the next case. It has streamlined the search for stamps so well and I am excited about using my stamps again!

I hope you found this idea useful and if you have any neat storage ideas I would love to hear them.

Featured Artist

I am so excited to be a Featured Artist again over at the Ideas for Scrapbookers blog today!  Hop on over to Ideas for Scrapbookers to check my neat ideas for personalizing your gifts!

Have a great weekend!

My Scrap Room

I was wandering through the Creating Keepsakes Blog, which this week is featuring fellow scrapbooker's  Creative Spaces, when I came across Thursday's featured Creative Spaces.  Was I ever shocked to find my name in the list of featured spaces!  I feel so honored!  If you are interested this is the link to it and if you comment on each days feature you will be entered to win a fantastic prize! 

Hve a great day!

Add On Sketch Day

It's Add On Sketch week over at Sketch Support and today is the day my project is featured.  I had so much fun with one and I am sure you will love my take on the sketch!  For all the details on this cute project, please go to Sketch Support where you will see lots of photos and all the necessary info to recreate it. Please feel free to leave me a comment as I love reading what you have to say and if you like my work why not follow me too! Have a great weekend and Happy Easter!

Card Sketch Day

Hi and Welcome Everyone!  Today is the Day and I am so excited!  My first project for Sketch Support is now posted for your viewing pleasure.  When Allison sent me the sketch for this week, I had a swarm of ideas which lead me to creating two projects for the same sketch!  For all the details on these two projects, please go to Sketch Support where you will see lots of photos and all the necessary info to recreate them.  Please feel free to leave me a comment as I love reading what you have to say and if you like my work why not follow me too!  Have a great weekend!

Love

I love to decorate!  And I will use any excuse to decorate my fireplace.  To me, it always looks great all decorated.  So, in honor of Valentine's Day, I decided to give my fireplace a little love and make a little love banner to hang on it.  It was very easy to make and I had fun decorating each one.

Paper Christmas Tree

This year I decided I wanted to create my own Christmas Village made entirely of scrapbook paper for the table that I display all the Christmas cards we receive on.  While my shopping spree on Black Friday I bought three Styrofoam trees in varying sizes.  I then chose the paper I wished to use which was Basic Grey's Jovial Collection; I just loved all the colors!  Then using my Cricut Design Studio, I created an entire sheet (12x12) of one inch hearts.  I then ran this through my Cricut for every pattern I choose, which I think was about eleven.  After I had all of my hearts cut out and stacked by pattern in the order I wanted to apply them, I got to work on layering one by one.  I would take a heart, curl the wide end around the end of my paper piercer so that it would flip up, apply a little bit of Fabric Tac to the point of the heart and then place and hold onto the Styrofoam.  Continue all the way around and then start on the next row.  I did about three to five rows and then set it aside to let it dry.  I found this necessary as I would keep bumping lower rows that were wet and knocking the hearts out of place if I didn't.  I tried the glue gun but found it way to bulky and I liked the play the Fabric Tac gave me so that I could make minor adjustments if my row was a little crooked.   I worked all my way to the top and then covered the top by placing three heart points together on the top with glue, allowed it to dry, and then folded the overhanging part down and curled it with my paper piercer.  I am now on the look out to find some stars that will work perfectly for tops. 

I was hoping to at least get one house finished as well, but the tree took a lot more time than I anticipated so it doesn't look like the houses will be ready this year.  If anyone would like the cut file for the hearts let me know and I will email it to you.

This will be it for me until the new year as I am off to Jamaica for a week!  I want to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a healthy and prosperous 2011!

Holiday Candle & Blog Hop

Hello and welcome to my first ever blog hop I am so excited to participate and would like to Thank Amanda for letting me join! I am the last stop on the blog hop and you should of arrived here from Laurie's Blog, but if you didn't you can go back to the begining and start here at Amanda's Blog .

With the holidays almost here, it's inevitable that at the last moment I will realize I forgot to get a gift for someone.  I've done this too many times to count. Well today I want to show you a quick and easy gift you can make with supplied you probably already have in your stash.

You will need a candle, patterned paper, ribbon, a marker in any color doesn't matter, liquid glue, glue gun and some embellishments.  First thing you need to do is cut the strips of patterned paper that you will roll into tubes.  Measure the height of your candle and this will be how high you will need your tubes to be, my candle was just shy of 4 inches so I cut at 4 inches.  Be careful when making this cut that the pattern paper is facing the right direction other wise when you roll the tubes your pattern might go the wrong way.  Now you will need to take this cut piece  and cut it into 2 inch strips.  Now how many strips you will need will depend on how big around your candle is and how small you make your tubes.  This candle used 29 tubes.  I used various pieces of Basic Grey's Eskimo Kisses collection which made co-ordination a breeze.  So now that you have your strips cut, starts the fun part.  Take one of your strips and lay it face down in front of you and take a marker out of collection.  I used a Zig maker which the 2 inches wrapped around just perfectly, if your marker is different in size you might have to adjust for that.  Roll the strip around the marker, not too tight or you might have a hard time sliding off.  One thing to be careful of is if your marker is tapered and if it is you will have to play with this to make sure the roll is as even as possible.  At the edge apply some liquid glue and hold around the marker until the adhesive is set.  I used glossy accents and it took about 20 seconds to set.  Repeat this with all your strips until they are all in tubes.  Arrange all the tubes in the pattern/order you want to apply them as it will make it a lot easier for work your way through.  Now take a hot glue gun and run a bead all the way down the length of the candle and quickly set your first tube in place.  Hold it there until the glue cools.  Now work your way around the candle until you have gone all the way around.  Take a piece of ribbon or tulle and tie it around the candle and embellish as you please.

Please leave a comment telling me what you thought of this post and what you might like to see in the future and I will do a random draw on Dec 20th at noon for a little Christmas RAK for one lucky winner.
Now back to the Blog Hop, along the way, you have been collecting words. The word from my blogs is IT'S. Now if you have followed the blog hop as intended you should have 8 words/phrases. Unscramble them and leave a comment on Amanda's Blog, she will draw a random winner Monday Dec 20.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you enjoyed the blog hop!
Merry Christmas!

Spring Cleaning

Well the weather this weekend was the pits so I decided I would do some spring cleaning in my scrapbook room. I needed a change of scenary so I reorganized all my cubies into a new configuration that gives me more surface to store things on top of, giving me more room on my desk. I love how it turned out!

I also recently did some reorganization of the some things that were driving me nuts.

1. I bought a clip it up system to hang my favorite go to items that I use often.
2. I decorated some boxes to put my titles I bought and my scraps which I cut to photo mat size in. The photo mat idea is an awesome way to use scraps. Whenever I have leftover paper scraps from a project I cut it into one of two size (4X6 or 4.5X6.5) which I can use on cards or another layout. It's an awesome idea and I find I am using more of my scraps now.
3. A Huge glass that I throw all my loose out of package embelishments in.

Hanging Out

We spend hours and hours creating the perfect layout, pouring our heart and soul into everything from the photos chosen to the bling pain stakingly applied and then what do we do? We put it in a Album to be pulled out every once in awhile to be looked at.

Well I saw this idea and thought it was totally awesome - display your hard worked on layouts as pieces of art in a gallery. To get this look simply go to any local store (Walmart, Ikea, etc) that sells curtains and rods and buy curtain rod and loop clips. Remember the longer your rod the more layouts you can clip up. Mine is the length of the couch and I can fit five layouts on it easily. Hang the rod somewhere in your house where it can be seen and enjoy. Just remember that sunlight fades paper so either hang the rod where it doesn't get direct sunlight or switch out the layouts very regularly.

I love this as it allows me to display favorite layouts, recently completed layouts, or themed layouts (like Christmas ones at Christmas time) as decoration. I think it is so clever!

Chez Jen

Here's a picture of one of my favorite rooms in my house; my scrapbook room.


One of the best parts of moving is that I actually have a scrapbook room now, instead of an unfinished corner of a dark basement. I'm sure once kiddies come along, I will be banished back to the basement again but until that time I am enjoying this.

I got new tables for my scrapbook room after my old table became an unfortunate victim of a scrapbook weekend. They match my storage cubes and I am so happy with the final look. They were a really good deal, both for $140, although I need to save a couple more pennies to get glass tops for them in order to protect the finishes.