Personalized Wooden Picture Frames

Each year I get pictures of my son and give them to family in a picture frame.  This year I found wooden unfinished frames for $4.00 and decided to paint and personize them for each recipient.  I also made a moasiac wooden frame that hang the pictures from wires that I converted from dollar store “canvas” signs.

This was a great way to add a personal touch using colors and themes enjoyed by each individual for little cost.

MATERIALS NEEDED:

• Wooden Frame
• Dollar store “canvas” signs
• Acrylic paint – in desired colors
• Crafting jewels and scrapbooking adornments as desired
• Staple gun and staples
• Hot glue gun and glue
• Paperclips or small clothes pins
• Crafting wire
• Needle nose pliers
• Wire cutters

Since you don’t really need a step by step tutorial on painting the frames I will just provide instructions for building your moasiac wooden frame that holds pictures from wires.

1. Tear “canvas” paper off of the frames.
2. These were approximately 9 x 6 inches tall, so I measured 1.5 inches on each side to mount together with space in the center for a smaller picture.
3. Hot glue together and then add a couple of staples for added support.
4. Paint the frame as desired.
5. Staple each side where you want to secure the wire to hang your pictures cut wires and sucure wire using needle nose pliers to make a knot around the staples.
6. Use paperclips or mini clothes pins to hang pictures.

I love DIY because it allows for a personalized touch, but also if you think outside of the box you can do it for little cost too!  Happy Crafting and merry Christmas everyone!

Advertisement

Dave Matthews Band Fire Dancer Decorative Ornament

My sister is probably the biggest Dave Matthews Band fan to walk the face of this planet.  She’s been to so many of his concerts I think that she’s even lost counts, following him all the way to the east coast and back!  

With that in mind I decided to sculpt a Fire Dancer ornament to give her as a Christmas gift this year and I think it came out pretty amazing considering it was made from aluminum foil, sculpey and acrylic paint.

I separately sculpted the legs, torso and arms and pieced them together by smoothing out the clay together the same way I did in my Bumble sculpting (Mini Sculpting: The Bumble).  I screwed a small eye bolt into the head area to hand it before baking it.

After baking it and allowing it to cool off, I painted it red and yellow allowing the paint to bleed into each other to make an appearance of flames.

Mad Tea Party Christmas Ornaments

Clean cup, clean cup, move down! 

I’m not crazy, my reality is just different from yours.

Off with her head!

I saw a version of these on Etsy a really long time ago and always wanted to have them because I always loved this movie as a little girl.  Now that I am a glitter ornament making diva I thought no time like the present – speaking of presents I’ll be giving them away for Christmas too.  

Maybe I will just have to make them for myself later on, but for now it’s the time of year to give and honestly it makes me feel really wonderful to give my crafts away.  I love the home made stuff, to me it shows how much you care about someone by giving them your time – anyone can make a quick meaningless purchase but home made involves customization and thoughtfulness.

These were really simple, you only need the following items:

• Clear plastic or glass ornaments
• Glitter – red, light blue, light green, and purple (most can be purchased at the dollar store!)
• Mop and Glow
• Acrylic paint – black, yellow and white
• Fine tip artists brushes
• Ribbon – black, green, purple, and light blue

Since they’re silhouettes they’re actually really easy and if you mess up just use a qtip to erase the mistake and try again!  You’ll be amazed at how simple they are to make, especially since the price tag on Etsy was fairly high for the amount of effort and cost of materials.  

For instructions on the glitter filling follow this link: DIY Glitter Ornaments.

Happy crafting and merry Christmas!

DIY Glitter Ornaments: The Grinch and Believe

Have you ever wondered if making those ornaments using glitter and Mop and Glow really work?  Well thanks to finding glitter in various colors I decided to give it a try and to my surprise in really does!

I purchased some clear plastic bulbs from Michael’s in a big pack with DIY in mind and once I found the green glitter at the dollar store it was decided how I was going to use them!  It really is easy and once you fill them you can decorate them in various ways!

MATERIALS NEEDED:

• Clear bulb ornament
• Glitter green and red
• Mop and Glow
• Acrylic paint – black and yellow
• Elmer’s glue
• Fine tip art
• Optional* silver plastic glue on jewel
• Wire red and green ribbon

GRINCH:

1. Fill ornament with Mop and Glow and swirl around the inside, pouring out excess.
2. Fill with glitter and plug the end with your finger tip and shake until glitter covers the inside completely.  Add more if needed.
3. Paint oval shaped yellow eyes.
4. Once dried trace the eyes in black adding lashes and under eye bags.
5. Add half open circles for his pupils.
6. Draw his mouth, nose and wrinkles.
7. Tie a bow with the green ribbon around the ornament caps loop.

BELIEVE:

1. Complete steps 1 and 2 from the Grinch ornament using red glitter.
2. Using Elmer’s glue write the word believe on the ornament and cover with glitter.
3. Glue optional star as the dot over the i.
4. Tie a bow with red ribbon around the ornament caps.

These are so cute and easy! I hope that you enjoyed this tutorial! Happy crafting and merry Christmas!

You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch

I saw the cutest plank wood Grinch project on Pinterest and I have been dying to try it.  The only problem – I don’t have that materials on hand right now but I do have several large tongue depressor sized crafting sticks so I can make a miniature version of my own! They’re cute, easy to make, and work well as a wall hang, door knob hang or ornament.

MATERIALS NEEDED:

• Crafting sticks (large tongue depressor sized)
• Acrylic paint in red, lime green, white, yellow, and black
• Scissors
• Green feathers
• White pom-pom ball
• Green floral wire
• Hot glue and gun
• Fine tip paint brushes

1. Add hot glue to the edge of each stick, be careful not to get big smears on the front.  Rub it smooth after it cools down slightly. Glue five of the side by side.
2. Paint them red across the top and mix the green with white to make a more Grinch like color.
3. Cut the ends off of one stick to get a straight edge and paint white.
4. Once dry, glue across the top to separate the hat and his head.
5. Cut another stick down and paint it red and once dry glue to the back of him sticking out slightly for the dangling part of the Santa hat.
6. Next glue a white pom-pom ball on to the end.
7. Paint merry in red, Grinch in the green color you mixed earlier, and mas in red on the brim of the hat.
8. Paint the eyes in an pointed almond shape in yellow.
9. Using a fine tip paint brush, outline the eyes, draw the eyebrows, nose, mouth and other facial details in black.
10. Cut green feathers and glue to the rim of the brim of the hat. Trim as necessary so they’re not too long.
11. Cut a few more feathers and glue to the chin trimming as needed.
12. Cut floral wire to desired length and hot glue into place on the back.

These are so cute I am planning on attaching them to the outside of presents for decoration and an additional gifts for my family.  Merry Grinchmas! 😉🎅

DIY Dollar Store “Snow-Tex”

For Christmas this year I am making my own snowman head ornaments and I need a large amount of Snow-Tex, but the cost of it being $3.99 for a meager 4 oz jar is not happening!  I decided to try my own recipe for it fresh from the dollar store – well mostly anyway.  

This product is simple, easy, and will most certainly save you money!  It’s just two simple ingredients:

• White sand
• White acrylic paint

Mix sand and paint until you get a thick, spreadable paste and voila!  You won’t be able to see a difference – except in your wallet!

On the left DIY version and on the right $3.99 4 oz jar of Snow-Tex!

Christmas Party Snowman Toss

Tomorrow is our company Christmas party and my section was assigned to coordinate the activities. I decided to create this pyramid of Snowman cups so they could toss “snowballs” at them to knock them down.

These are cute and easy to make; it was 4 years old tested and approved! 😉

MATERIALS NEEDED:

• Orange craft foam sheets
• Black craft foam sheets
• Glue stick
• Hole punchers in two sizes
• White paper cups
• Foam craft balls

1. Punch larger holes and glue on to cups for eyes.
2. Cut carrot shapes in varrying sizes and glue on to cups.
3. Punch smaller holes and rub a generous amount of glue on to the cup in a mouth shape and add the dots to shape the mouth.

I did 15 to stack them about 14 inches high.

Merry Christmas and Happy crafting! ⛄☃️

Snowman Ornament with a Knit Hat

You all know how much I love the dollar store and this year I saw a cute idea for making knit hats as ornaments, but I thought it would be even cuter if you combined it with a snowman head!  I was disappointed when I went this weekend and saw there was no more foam balls, but then I realized that I could actually get the ornaments in a larger quantity and do the same thing! – a total bonus! These are so cute and easy, they’ll have you running straight to the dollar store right away!

MATERIALS NEEDED:

• Small plastic ornaments from the dollar store (or foam balls of equivalent size)
• Snow-Tex to make it look like real snow
• Diamond Dust for sparkle
• Yarn
• Toilet paper tubes
• Small bells
• Air drying clay
• Black acrylic paint
• Pink acrylic paint
• Orange acrylic paint
• Hot glue and gun
• Ornament hooks

1. Start off by covering a generous layer of Snow-Tex to cover the whole ornament.
2. Prop on toilet paper tube to dry.
3. Cut off the end of a toilet paper tube to the desired width for the rim of your knit cap.
4. Cut a lot of yarn at least 10 inches long.
5. Now we simply make a loop and we put it in our little circle, completing this all the way around.
6. After you have finished the ring, pull all the ends through the tube and tie it off with a bell on a piece of yarn.
7. Cut off the extra length to create the pom-pom on top.
8. Once the Snow-Tex is dry, sculpt a carrot by rolling out a cone shape from the air drying clay and rub onto the head. 
9. Use a clay too or side of a tooth pick to make indentions to make it look like a carrot.
10. Hot glue the hat to the head.
11. Once dried, paint the eyes and mouth with black paint.  Add the rosey cheek color in a pink circle and paint the carrot orange.
12. Add an ornament hook and done!

Super cute and easy! These are a great dollar store make over to wow your friends and family with a nice ornament for a Christmas present, you can even use it on the outside of present to compliment your wrapping job!  Merry Christmas everyone!

Christmas in the Office

Two years ago we had a double “D” (desk decorating) challenge where myself and my co-workers had a contest to decorate our desk for a bragging rights as the prize.  My boss turned it into a whole event where we had a building Christmas party and allowed everyone to cast their votes – he even allowed our higher headquarters to vote via email! 

In this challenge I had an ugly desktop hutch that I had on the floor because it didn’t fit on my desk (we had old mismatch furniture) so I had the brilliant idea to transform it into a fireplace.

I used old boxes on each side to create the frame of my fireplace and then I used my white recycling bin paper to make the white”mortar” and red paper cut into rectangular bricks using a paper cutter and taped them on top.  I used cardboard tubes from a roll of wrapping paper to make logs for the fire and then cut different colored cardstock paper in the shape of flames and glued them to the inside.

After I was done I went to the dollar store and scored some stockings, poinsettia garland, nicknacks to give it the “lux” homey Christmas vibe and I painted a window on posterboard from the dollar store with a scene of Santa and reindeer to complete the scene.

This was a lot of fun and was nice to be the first place winner! Merry Christmas!

Get me the Elf Dust, S.T.A.T.!!!

Today my son touched Tattle !  I had to tell my son that touching his elf made Santa sad because it put the elf to sleep forever unless we sprinkled elf dust to wake up Tattle .   At first he didn’t want to  until I told him that Santa would be so sad he may not come this year…