Salt dough pendant

Have you ever played with salt dough?  It's a great, inexpensive, tactile crafty product that I can almost garuantee you have everything to make it in your kitchen already!  (If you don't then you should!)  What do you need?
2 parts flour
1 part table salt
water

That's it!  I used 1/2 cup flour, 1/4 cup salt and then added just enough water to form a dough that resembled pie crust and we were able to make these:

as well as a few smaller hearts.  (The impatient mom tried to turn them into necklaces and ended up breaking them when trying to force the ribbon through the hole!)

Just knead the dough roll it out or shape it then either bake it at 250 F until completely dry or stick it in your dehydrator overnight (which is what I did).  For the silver pendant

 I used one of my rubber stamps to get the floral impression then used a tooth pick to poke the word peace in it.  Painted with regular acrylic silver paint.  Once dry I watered down some black paint, applied it and let it sit for a minute or so and then gently rubbed the high spots.  Allow this to dry and seal with a spray polyurethane, sealer, or even nail polish!  It is deceptively light.

This is a great craft medium for the kids, but it's also fun for adults.  Look at some of the creations I found on the net:

 

source

these are EARRINGS!

What are you waiting for?  Go raid your cabinets!

Until next time,

Last Minute Christmas gifts

Here are two easy, inexpensive, and impressive last minute Christmas gifts you can make.  Let me apologize first for the really horrible picture quality but most of my crafting is currently being done after dark so getting good pictures is next to impossible.

The first, some elegant coasters cost me about $5 a set.  All you need to make them are:
 Travertine 4 by 4 tiles (these come in packages of 9 tiles for about $4 at you local home improvement store which gives you two sets and an extra tile)
tissue paper
cardstock
glue stick
printer
Modge Podge
spray sealer
Felt protective furniture pads or self adhesive felt
picture of your choice


Sorry there aren't any pictures for this tutorial.  I hadn't planned on sharing this project, but it is just to good not to.  I loved how elegant they turned out!

First, resize your picture to fit on your tiles and convert it to black and white.  For my cousin I used a picture of her new house and added her last name to it.  If you don't want to go that route you can use sayings like the ones below:  (feel free to use them)

Using the glue stick run line of glue around each side of the cardstock and very carefully place your tissue paper over the cardstock being careful to avoid wrinkles.  Cut around the cardstock.  This will allow you to print onto the tissue paper.  Be sure to let the glue dry and only apply glue right along the edges.  The point isn't to get a permanent adhesion, but simply to tack the tissue paper to the cardstock REALLY close to the edges.

Using any program that will allow you to put the pictures on one page (even a word processor will allow you to do this) and print them onto the tissue paper.  Allow the ink to dry.  Some people have recommended spraying the inked tissue paper with the sealer and allowing it to dry for 24 hours before using.  I tried it and didn't really find a difference between using the sealer and not, so use your best judgement on this one.

Cut out one image REALLY close to the printing.  It's easiest to do this if you leave it attached to the cardstock while cutting.  Apply a thin layer of Modge Podge to the top of the tile and center your image on the tile.  Carefully apply a coat of Modge Podge over the tissue paper being sure to remove any air bubbles.  If there are any "dents" in the tile where your tissue is I would gently use a paint brush to push the tissue down into the dent.  Allow this to dry completely and then apply 2 more coats of Modge Podge being sure each coat dries before adding a second coat. 

Once dry, spray each tile front and back with the sealer.  I used 2-3 coats on each side.  This will make it much more water resistant.  Once this dries, apply your furniture dots to each corner.  Wrap with a pretty bow and present your gift.

The second is a cute little Christmas tree that I originally made to use as an Advent tree for Princess A (we add an ornament sticker to it every day) and then made a second to give to a family member who decided not to go through the trouble of putting up a big tree this year. I paid less than $2 to make this!

 To make this you will need:

(ignore the apples in the background that Princess A requested only to remove them all from her plate, place them on her placemat and then refuse to eat them.  I had hoped that she would return to them later, but alas she did not!)

cardboard cone (I purchased mine for $0.50 in the doll making section but you can make your own from a cereal box)
green paint ( I was to impatient to use acrylic paints, but they would work just as well!)
4 standard sheets of felt (I chose to use two shades of green)
a glue gun
bamboo skewer
yellow paint sample cards
scissors or rotary cutter and mat

Start by painting your cone green.  This helps just in case some of the cone peeks through between your felt strips.

(yep, we are working on the stove because I am not one of those fortunate people with a craft room, so I craft where I can and since I am using a glue gun the stove is where I work.  It's near an outlet, high enough little hands can't grab a cord, extra lighting and it's flat.  The drawback?  Gotta stand up the whole time I craft!)

 While the paint dries cut the felt into 2-3 inch strips across the long side. (The undecorated tree used 2 inch strips and the decorated tree used 3 inch) 

(Cut along the black lines where the numbers are)

Fold them in half hotdog style and using a very small amount of hot glue, glue the long sides together really close to the edge.  If you use to much glue it won't want to conform to the curve of your cone and won't lay pretty.  To little glue and it won's stay shut. 

 cut a slit from the folded side almost up to the other side about every 1/2 inch. 

Starting at the bottom glue your first strip on so that the folded edge extends below the bottom of your cone.  Do not cut your strip to length, just glue and when you get to the beginning then cut.  Try not to stretch the strip as you glue around.  Save your scraps.  As the tree narrows you can use the scraps rather than whole strips.

Position the second strip so that the folded edge overlaps the top of the previous strip and glue around as before.

  Continue all the way to the top.  Once you get to the very top cut a strip about 4 or 5 tabs long and glue the edge to form a circle.  Apply hot glue to the top of the tree being sure to leave the hole at the top of the cone glue free.  Position your circle over the glue and kind of smoosh the top so that it is more pointy.

On the back of one of the paint cards freehand draw a star.  Cut it out.  Place it on the second paint card so the the pretty sides are touching each other and the printed sides are facing outwards.  Cut around the star. 

(eww! Time to clean the cutting mat!)

 Apply glue down the center of the backside of one star and place the skewer.

Apply glue all over the back of the card and place the second card over the skewer being sure to line up points on the stars. 

Allow to dry, slide the skewer down the center of the cone and mark where it comes out the bottom.  Cut off excess.  Congratulations of your first easy felt tree!  You can decorate it with stickers like I did or hot glue some miniature ornaments on, or just leave it plain. 

Plan on making these?  I would love it if you would share your finished projects on the Sunflowers at Home Flickr group!

Until next time,

taking a yarn break

I have been working off and on making this baby afghan for a friend.

 Honestly, more off than on because this afghan seriously eats yarn and feels like you are going nowhere with it.  Basically you are making two afghans at the same time so it is going to be really warm and soft, but making it seems endless.  It is about 1/2 done and has alread used 4 skeins of Simply Soft yarn!  (You can find the pattern here.)

I have also just begun knitting an afghan (if it is knit is it still an afghan?) for Princess A as well.  I picked up some peach acrylic yarn at AC Moore in the mill ends box.  With the 40% off coupon I paid about $4 for a pound of yarn.  I am converting this knit potholder pattern.  I am doing 5 repeats across and 7 repeats tall to create an afghan for her toddler bed that matches her sunflower room.  Hopefully I will finish it before she outgrows the bed!

Ocassionally though, my hand itch to pull out the sewing machine. With J and H heading to middle school in about 1 1/2 weeks (yippee!) I decided to work on something school related.  When I saw this notebook cover tutorial I just knew I had to make some for H.  She has her girly moments.  Besides, who wants to have a composition notebook that looks like everyone elses?  These look much better!

(Totally do NOT look at the awful finish of my dining room table!  It was a 10 year old hand-me-down when we got it 13 years ago.  It is so due for a refinish but I just can't work up the gumption to pull out the palm sander and do it!)

Then J informed me that most of the teachers want the subject and student's name on the front of the notebook.  May have to add a clear vinyl pocket to the front of these.  I told H that she would have to see what her teachers say before I make anymore.  Besides, I secretly hope they tell her that the covers are a no-no so that I can keep that frog one for myself!  That was the last of the material I had left from the purses I made almost a year ago, and even then it was several years old. 

Until next time,

LOVE

Just wanted to share an easy home dec. project with you.  In case you didn't know, we are teaching Princess A sign language.  When I started this all I really knew was that it was easier for a child to learn a second language when they are young and that I really like sign language (even though at the time I couldn't even fingerspell the entire alphabet!).  So I began researching a word or two at a time and teaching Princess A as well as J and H as we went.  Now I know that this is supposed to really help with language skills, spelling, communication, recall etc.  Hmm, who would have known?!?

I tell you all of that to get to this.  I was sitting at the house one day trying to think of what to hang on my wall when I thought of those picture frames that have the openings for different photos.  In my hallway I have a 10 by 13 of the family and on each side of it is a frame with two openings.  Last year I had 4 kids living in the house so that was perfect.  This year I have an open hole.  (sniff sniff)  I was trying to figure out what to do with that.  Then I thought of fingerspelling a word and patching it together into one picture.  Okay, I haven't done that yet since my new laptop doesn't have my awesome photo editing program on it because the install disk has disappeared and the new one hasn't arrived in the mail yet.  What you say?  Do it on the desktop computer that does have the program?  Have you lost your mind?!?!?  You do realize that computer is NINE years old and has been taken over by kids games and is so slow I can push the power button, take a shower, straighten my hair, put on my makeup and come back just in time to hear the Windows melody as it starts up!  I am almost serious!

Any ways, that concept lead to the creation of this:

A seriously simple project requiring only a camera, printing and a frame.  I used J and H as hand models since Princess A was sleeping.  I switched my camera to black and white mode, had them hold up their letter in front of a piece of black material (okay, black swim trunks but they are MADE of material right!?) and snapped several pictures.  Make sure your lighting is good and take all the pictures at the same time.  (Had to take pics of the "e" later because the sun decided to hide for a while and as a result it turned out lots brighter than the others.)  Also, be sure your batteries are good before you begin shooting.  Otherwise you get fuzzy photos.  Pick your favorite shot of each letter, print or have them printed and then insert into the frame.

I think I may do one that says FAMILY and just cut the little bars between each photo in the mat out so I can fit them in the frame.  Too cheap  frugal to pay for custom framing.  Hope you enjoy the project, now get back to flower making!

Until next time,

Pot of Gold

I know it is a bit late for St. Paddy's crafts but I really wanted to share these cute little table decorations that I made for the tables at church.  The little leprechauns are from Wee Folk Art and the directions can be found here.  When I first saw them I knew I had to make them.  I had a set sitting on my hall shelf as my March decorations and started thinking that they were missing something.

Then I saw this post over on Canadian Living and something in my head clicked and these little pots of gold were born.  While they are really rather simple to make I thought I would share the directions with you. 

You will need:

 

a rainbow pack of Chenille Stems,

baby storage cups (I got these at the Dollar Tree but any 1/2 cup storage container in the right shape will work,

cotton balls,

black paint

cardstock (not shown)

paintbrush (not shown)

Glue Gun

Directions:

First toss all the lids into the junk drawer to be raided later for a recycle craft, you don't need them for this project.  Paint the outsides of each container with the black paint.  I know the picture shows the rims painted on the inside but I discovered that it really wasn't necessary.  Allow them to dry and then add a second coat of paint.

(Yes that is a plastic bag under my painted cups.  Didn't want to move the tablecloth or paint it so I used what I had on hand as a drop cloth!)

If you want a shiny pot I would suggest adding a coat of clear spray paint after the black has dried.  This may help prevent scratches appearing on the paint also.  That is just a guess but it sounds good right?!

Once you pots have dried, or even while you are waiting for them to dry if you are in impatient crafter like I am, go turn on your glue gun and grab your chenille stems.  You want to line up your stems so that they are even and they are in the correct color order (cuz mine are NOT in the correct order in the pictures.  Fortunately no on noticed and I am not telling them!).  The correct order is red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet/purple.  Also cut a cloud shape out of your cardstock.  You want it to be about 1 1/2 -2 inches across but you can really just eyeball it.

Next you are going to pinch the ends together so that they are flat but really tight.

Finally run a bead of glue across this and hold until the glue sets.  To be honest, I usually wet my finger and kind of smoosh the glue down to get better adhesion here.

No flip it over and run some glue along the back side as well to doubly secure the stems.  Repeat for the other end of the stems.

Now, here is the bad news.  H arrived home from school about this time, Princess A awoke from her nap and I had to venture out to pick up Little Man J from school as well as help with homework, start dinner etc.  I tell you this so that you will hopefully understand when I tell you that I had procrastinated on this project and I had to complete it THAT DAY so the rest of the steps were done in the midst of controlled chaos and the camera didn't come out of hiding so I have no more pics.  Even the completed project pics were taken with my phone since I rushed out and forgot my camera when I went to decorate!  Hope you guys have a good imagination for the final couple of steps.  They aren't really hard, so I am sure you can figure it out!

Okay, without bending the stems, find the middle and cut across all the colors of the rainbow so that you now have two six inch rainbow pieces.  I laid them on the counter and gently curved the stems.  Hold in place without pinching tightly and again glue the stems together on both sides.  Your chenille ends will not be a straight line, think more of an angled line with the bottom stem being longer than the top.  You don't need to be neat with the glue on this end since we are going to hide it in the cloud.

Once the glue is dry, stretch out a cotton ball until it is fluffy and glue to one side of your cardstock cloud being sure to cover all of the paper.  It is okay for you cotton to extend past the paper.  Put this side down on the counter.  Place your slanted end of the rainbow on your cloud and glue it in place.  Again fluff a cotton ball and now glue this one over the rainbow and cover the cardstock.  

The final step is to take the unfinished end of the rainbow and hot glue it to the inside of your painted pot.  Taadaaa!

Your pot will be top heavy and won't stand up on it's own.  To fix mine I took some found rocks, painted them gold and hot glued enough into the bottom of the pot to hold it up.  I did this because I wanted the pots of gold to remain standing after the kids at church raided the gold candies so that the grown ups could at least see them!  

On a side note, I wanted to show you my very first leprechauns that I made

I didn't realize that there was a difference between people turnings and Doll Pins  These are made from doll pins that I ended up cutting down to size.  I had to adjust the pattern widths quite a bit, but I still think they turned out cute.  Besides, I am sure leprechauns come in all shapes and sizes despite being magical creatures!


Until next time,

Prayer bracelet

Okay, so I am no photographer, but this is my newest crafty project.  The idea has been floating around in my head since a friend at church became ill with cancer.  The church printed up a bunch of those rubber bracelets and handed them out for everyone to wear as a reminder to pray for him.  One side said pray for ______ and the other side had a line from a song.  We wear them with the pray for side out until his cancer is gone and then we turn it over and the line (41 what a beautiful day - a reminder that even though we went through the trial -think 40 days in the desert- we will come out the other side and that it will be wonderful!)  will show reminding us to thank God for what He has done.


That got me thinking about the other people in my life that I want to pray for.  My husband, my kids, friends etc.  I love the idea of a bracelet because I can keep it with me.  Also, when it aggravates me it reminds me of the people and I say a prayer for them.  So this was born.

If you want make one also, here is what you will need:

Polymer Clay in you choice of colors, try to personalize this to the person
AMACO Pasta Machine, this is optional and I didn't use it because I used small amounts of the clay but if your clay is especially hard it will help to soften it for you
AMACO Tri-Bead Roller to roll the beads, or you can roll them in your hands.  The bead roller just makes them uniform
Alphabet Stamps this is optional but if you want to personalize each bead with initials I really recommend using stamps!
jewelry pliers
Eye pins I used a gunmetal color but you can use the color of your choice or make your own eye pins
a clasp for your bracelet
some extra jump rings just in case
piece of cardstock or recycle a cereal box
fine grit sand paper



First condition your clay by either rolling it through the pasta machine 10-15 times or simply squish it in your hand until it softens.  The Tri-bead roller comes with a tool to measure the amount of clay to use so measure your clay or simply eyeball it. Roll out your beads using a single color or mix the colors up.  Then slide your bead onto one of your eye pins being very careful to center the hole on both ends.  Now you can use your alphabet stamp to impress initials into each bead if you want to.

Take your cardstock or the front of a cereal box and fold it accordion style to get two mountain folds and one valley fold.  Place your beads on it like this:

I made a few extra solid black beads in case the bracelet wasn't big enough.  I also made one bead in a rock like color (the grey one looks like granite with the inclusions) and in a different shape than all of the others.  I wanted one to represent God to put in the middle of my bracelet to remind me that He is my rock and that He should be at the center of it all.  Once you have made all of your beads, bake them according to manufacturer's instructions.  I baked mine at 275 degrees for 30 minutes.  Allow them to cool completely.

At this point you can sand off any imperfections.  If desired you can also add a coat of polymer clay glaze to give them a shine.  Slide your bead to the eye side of the pin, trim the pin and create another loop so that there is now a loop on each side of your bead.  Connect the beads using the loops.  Attach your clasp and you are done. 

If you decide to make one I would love to see it!  You can share it on the Sunflowers at Home Flickr group


Until next time,


PS:  The line "41...what a beautiful day" is from this song by the Turn Around, a local band