spring fever

After a week of sunshine and above-average temperatures, I've got some serious spring fever. We're getting back to more February-like weather this week, but I'm hanging on to spring by rounding up some fresh and springy craft ideas for around the house:

Quilted coasters from A Pretty Cool Life on Tatertots & Jello

Painted acorn wreath from MADE

Spring napkins from the Purl Bee

Grass candles from Martha Stewart

Eggshell votives from Martha Stewart

Colorful silhouettes from Tatertots & Jello

leather wrap bracelet

I finally got around to my first Project ReStyle project this weekend... One item I've been wanting to restyle into something new was my leather gloves, because one day while I was in the shower, the dog managed to get into my purse and do this to one of them:

Now that one of my gloves was not so much usable as a glove, I thought I'd repurpose the material into a wrap bracelet.

First I removed the fuzzy lining and then used a straight edge and rotary cutter to cut loops. After detaching the stitching to turn the loops into strips, I attached three of them with grommets, and then added more grommets for embellishment.

After that I put a ribbon clamp on one end, wrapped around my wrist to determine the right length, trimmed a little off the leather, and then added the other clamp with clasp.

felt fan necklace

Here's another necklace I made recently, inspired by this one from Anthropologie:
I thought it was kind of whimsical, and something I could definitely pull together very inexpensively with all the scraps from my felt flower mania.

Supplies:

• Felt
  
• Beads
• Chain
• Jump rings/clasp
• Glue gun

To start, cut out felt circles from three different colors; I used a spool of thread as my template for size. You'll need 5 of each.

Using one of the circles as a base, fold a circle and glue half of it to the base; repeat on the other side of the base with another folded circle, leaving a small channel between them. With the last two circles, put a very thin line of glue down the center so they hold their fold but still fan out a bit. After placing the chain between the circles that are glued to the base, glue the two folded circles on top.
Add a bead on either side and repeat with the other felt colors. Finish with another bead on either end, cut the chain to desired length, and add jump ring/clasp.
(I think the original has a spherical fan of felt. I decided to go with a flat back so it lays nicely, but it would be easy to add 4 more circles to the back to make it into more of a ball....)

bow necklace

I think it might be the month of jewelry making around here, since I am participating in Kendi Everyday's 30 for 30 challenge in which I have to make new outfits out of my 30 items (not including accessories) for the month, plus there's no shopping allowed.

But that shopping ban doesn't carry over to craft stores... and so it's a perfect time to finally make some of the necklaces I've been planning for a while as new accessories are handy in putting together interesting new outfits.
My inspiration (I hope not plagiarism - but this blog is COPY-craft) for this one is from these absolutely adorable necklaces from Etsy seller ulala. I almost bought one of hers, except for the aforementioned shopping ban - plus I had several of the supplies on hand already, so I thought I'd try my own.

Supplies:

• Suede scrap (got this one in jewelry aisle at Michaels)
• Bow template (got mine by doing a Google image search for "bow silhouette")
• Scissors/hole punch
• Chain
• Jump rings
• Clasp
• Wire cutters

I started by tracing my bow shape onto the back of the suede piece, and then cutting it out and punching a tiny hole in each top corner. Then I figured out how long I wanted the necklace to hang and cut two lengths of chain accordingly.

Attach a jump ring (these just twist open pretty easily with your fingers, if you haven't used them before) to each hole along with the piece of chain and close the ring. Attach a jump ring to the other end of both chain pieces as well, and add the clasp to one of them before closing.

And that's it!

doily valentines

We've never done much with Valentine's Day as a couple (especially now that we have an anniversary so close - now we can go out ahead of time and avoid the restaurant crowds!), but I've always loved Valentine's Day and treated it more like a friendship holiday. My mom still gives us little gifts, and I still like baking treats and handing out cards to friends like I did in elementary school. These days I make and mail cards; it's a perfect excuse to send a little note to friends and family.
Last year, inspired by these cards, I made Valentines using doilies as stencils.

Supplies:

• Variety of paper doilies
• Acrylic paints
• Fine paintbrush
• Cards/envelopes

This is really easy - all you need to do is use the doily as a stencil and stipple on the paint a little bit at a time (you may need to use a toothpick to punch out some of the doily shapes if the holes aren't entirely opened). Remove the doily while the paint is still wet so it doesn't stick.

You can make a variety of designs by using the whole doily or picking out pretty details. I also decorated a few of the envelopes.

And here's an idea for a different card, cutting up and using parts of the leftover doilies (of which I had a bunch after this project - so I might have this year's card design!); these envelopes are also pretty.

cake banners

Please excuse the unplanned hiatus... still too busy with working this week to be allowed the time I'd like for crafting and blogging!

But here's a quick little project I did today: Peter recently was pining for a from-the-box yellow cake, which he used to bake in college and remembers fondly. I thought our anniversary would be a perfect time to treat him to one.

An anniversary 10 days before Valentine's Day is handy for taking advantage of all the heart and love stuff out there, so I used this template from Martha Stewart as a starting point for a sweet cake topper.I added the text before printing, and then after cutting out the shape I used my handy glue pen to outline the borders for applying clitter. I heard somewhere that hairspray helps keep glitter in place, so I did a quick spray - wouldn't want to be eating the glitter, now - before propping onto my cake. Voila, a regular cake is now an anniversary celebration cake! (Of course, those of you who will be celebrating your love on February 14 instead of February 4 could make a Valentine's cake with "happy valentine's day" or "be mine" or the like.)
In my clip art searches, I also came across this banner template (also from Martha), which would be cute to do a similar thing for a birthday or a congratulatory cake if you added text and glittered on the border lines. You could put them on toothpicks to stick in individual cupcakes too.