Mosaic

I took a mosaic class a while ago with Kate  at Mercury Mosaic. We got a good deal with a Groupon and it was really fun. The class was about 3 hours long and they explained how to do everything, provided examples and helped with your design. They have so many containers just full of tiles to choose from. It took a while to decide what type of colours I was going to use and how to design my mosaic. 

They also do custom mosaics in homes and the examples of their work I saw were amazing. It makes me want to do a tile back splash in our kitchen. Maybe someday. 

In the class you could choose to either make a mosaic around a mirror or just a plain mosaic on a rectangular piece of wood. I chose the plain piece of wood.

It’s been sitting on the floor in my living room for a while;  really need to figure out where to put it. Maybe in the guestroom once we do something with that room…maybe the living room? No sé.

Adding closet space

When we moved into our house we knew that the lack of closet space in our bedroom would be an issue. Each bedroom has a tiny closet – not enough for just my clothes. After we moved in N fixed up the closet in our bedroom and changed it from one bar to two bars. Even with that my clothes filled the closet and an armoire in our room; N’s clothes have lived in the guestroom closet since we moved in. 

Since eventually there will be a tiny human living in the guestroom we wanted to try to get all of our clothes into our bedroom. We moved the armoire out of the extra indent of space and moved it to the guestroom.

The plan was to figure out a way that all (or at least most) of my clothes could fit there and N’s clothes could go into our closet. We took measurements and took a trip to Home Depot.

I didn’t want to use the same shelving/bar system as we had in the other closet since there would be two big white tracks going up the wall. We decided on basic brackets and bars.

The first bar is up! 

I wanted to make the best out of this little nook so we decided to put up three bars. This means that the top bar is pretty close to the ceiling but we made sure that it’s low enough for hangers to easily fit and I bought a tiny step stool just in case. I have only used it a few times and can easily reach the hangers to get clothes down.

All done! The bottom bar was cut shorter than the rest so that I can hang my dresses on the middle rack without them hitting the bar below.

All I have left to do is buy a curtain and hang it. I found one I want at Ikea but the last time I was there it wasn’t in stock. Hopefully I can get it soon.

 

Ocho!

Eight has always been my favourite number and magically it is N's favourite number as well. So when we got married we decided to get married on 8-8-08 and now I like the number even more.

While we were out shopping at random antique and knick knack shops and came across a few cool eights. After finding more I thought it would be a great idea to use them in some decor project. After gathering a variety I decided that they would look nice in a frame so on the way home we stopped at a thrift store and bought a frame.

I spray painted the frame black.

Once the frame dried I arranged the eights in the frame. It took a while to get it arranged and I think it still needs maybe a few more small eights.

Here are some close up shots of the eights. I love that we were able to find such a variety. Some of my favourites are the word eight, the domino and the clock.

It took a while to get the wights all in the frame on the wall.I moved the eights around a lot until I was happy with it.

Final project!

 

Easter Egg Garland - Happy Easter!

I've seen a few bloggers that have made en egg garland using paint samples. I loved the look of it so decided to make my own!

I made an egg template and using a few pastel-coloured paint samples I cut out my eggs.

 After all of the eggs were cut out I had to decide how to string them together. I tried sewing them together (like I did for my heart garland) but for some reason it wasn't working. I made a quick trip to Michael's for a 1/8'' hole punch and some ribbon and decided to go that route.

I made a template for the holes so I could get them all in the same spot and punched two holes on each egg.

  

Then I started stringing them together.

 

All done!

I'm excited to hang it up again for Easter next year!

Even more napkins!

Here is another set of napkins that I made for another birthday - my sister's birthday.

I used the same method as before for these napkins but instead of using regular fabric paint and brushing/sponging it on I used spray on fabric paint. I think it worked much better and definitely will use the spray on paint for future projects like this. 

I couldn't decide on just one image so I decided to put a different image on each napkin. Again, I just found these images online and altered a few aspects to make them stencil friendly.

 

All of the napkins together.

More napkins!

I haven't posted in a while but hopefully I can get back to doing crafty projects and getting them up on my blog!

I made these a while ago for a friend's birthday and am finally getting around to posting. I used the same method as the dala horse napkins. My amiga really likes owls so I looked online until I found a cute one and then I edited the image so it would work as a stencil.

 

Next I ironed on the stencil.

 

I gathered my painting supplies...

... and painted two layers.

 

I waited until they dried and then I  used the iron to heat set the paint.

 

All done!

Meal Planning

We try to plan out our meals for the week before getting groceries. It helps save money and emergency trips to the grocery store. We order our groceries and pick them up (it's amazing - we just drive up to the pick-up door and they bring out all of the groceries nicely packed in bags) so it's nice to sit down and make our meal plan and order groceries at the same time.

In the past I would write down our general meal plan but we always strayed from it, forgot what we wanted to make (sometimes I lost the list), etc. I decided I wanted to put the meal plan on the refrigerator so it would be easier to follow. So far we've had it up for 1 1/2 weeks and have managed to follow the meal plan. :-)

I found this cute meal plan online that the you can download for free (or you can buy a different style in her etsy shop) and decided to use this.

I had a frame that I had purchased form a thrift store and painted black but never used. It is really lightweight and I can write on the glass with a dry erase marker so I decided that it would be perfect for this project.

I took off the flap on the back that makes it stand up.

I had a bunch of magnets laying around so I grabbed six and used epoxy to glue them to the back.

Then I put in the weekly meal plan template and was finished!

I thought it looked nice on the refrigerator and I think seeing the meal plan will really help us keep organized and know what we plan on making and this way we only buy what we need and have less food go bad. I only write dinners (sometimes lunches on the weekends) on the calendar since for lunch we bring either leftovers or other basics (bagels, sandwiches, etc.).

I'm hoping to make something similar so we can write down shopping lists, to do, and our weekly schedule. Hopefully I can fit that all into one frame...we'll see.

Old T-shirt = New Bag

While collecting white t-shirts for my latch-hook t-shirt rug (I still need so many more...) I acquired a few t-shirts that I don't need but won't work for my project. Not wanting to just get rid of them I decided to try my hand at making bags out of them.

I've only done one so far but might start making a bunch of t-shirt bags - a few for each car, some for the house, one for my purse, etc. I always make sure to bring a bag shopping and these are pretty small so they'd be handy to bring.

Supplies:
-T-Shirt
-Scissors
-Sewing machine or needle/thread

To start I cut off the sleeves (to form handles). I cut right on the edge of the seam so that once the sleeves were cut off I had a raw t-shirt edge for the handles. To make the bag opening bigger I cut away an oval of material around the collar. I just cut and hoped for the best but you could also use a big bowl to outline the opening if you want to make sure it's even.

I flipped the shirt inside out and sewed along the bottom of the shirt. I sewed across the bottom twice for extra strength.

This bag was made from a small t-shirt but if you have a bigger one and don't want the bag to be too big you can trim off some of the bottom fabric to make the bag shorter.

To make the handles look a little nicer I cut two short strips of material from the sleeves and sewed them around the tops of the handles. I think it added a nice touch. :-)

Here is the finished bag!

I've already used it and it worked well. I bought two bike seats and a candle - everything fit into it and the bottom was strong. The nice thing abotu t-shirt material is that it stretches so you can fit more in the bag.

I am definitely going to make more out of the random old t-shirts I have laying around the house.