Think Crafts Blog – Craft Ideas and Projects – CreateForLess

By Sparkle Crafts Contributor, Sparkle E. Glitter from the blog “Sparkle Studio”.

Sewing is not my forte.  If I can figure a way to make a project without it, I am happy.  Not having to sew to put this pillow together also makes it a good project for kids to tackle. There are so many interesting bandanas available these days, you should choose two that you like and change the colors so they suit you.

I used Sparkle 21 mainly because it is washable, but it also has amazing color and sparkle!

This project does not take much time, let’s get started.

You need:

• Sparkle 21:  Blue Suede Sparkle (or your favorite color)
• 12″ x 12″ pillow form
• Bandanas: solid black, zebra print (or pieces of fabric  21” square)
• Four 24″ lengths of black cord (ribbon will work, too)
• Printed pattern
• Chalk pencil 
• Computer/printer

Try this:

Lay the black bandana flat on your worktable.  Place the pillow form in the center of it.  Cover the pillow form with the zebra bandana, so the edges of both bandanas line up. On one side, roll the bandanas together toward the pillow form.  Roll an adjacent side in the same way. 

At the corner, where the two sides meet, tie a cord.  Repeat on all sides and corners.

On your computer, find a font you like and print the word you want. A name would be great too! Print and enlarge to the size you want to fit the center of your pillow. On the backside of the paper, trace the lines of the word or name with chalk pencil. Place on center of pillow, chalk side down.  Trace letters with pencil, transferring chalk to fabric.

Draw letters with Sparkle 21. Add lines, swirls, or dots as desired.

Another great thing about this pillow is that it is easy to disassemble for washing or changing designs.

Glitter on!

Sparkle

By General Crafts Contributor Amy, from the Blog “Mod Podge Rocks!” 

My parents re-did their backyard, so I decided to make them a birdhouse in celebration.  They aren’t as kitschy as I am, but I still think they will appreciate this gnome and mushroom birdhouse.  If they don’t love the gnome or the mushrooms, they will surely love the woodgrain roof.  It’s magical! 

To make, you’ll need to gather these supplies: 

Wood Birdhouse
Mod Podge Outdoor
FolkArt Paint – Fresh Foliage, Burnt Umber, Pure Orange
Martha Stewart Woodland Collection – 12” x 12” paper pad, stickers and letters
Cardstock scraps
Craft Glue
Flat Paint Brush
Scissors or Craft Knife
Ruler
Pencil
Outdoor Sealer  

Choose a few sheets of paper to cover the sides of your birdhouse (except for the front).  Using your ruler, measure the size paper you’ll need and then cut it down to fit with the craft knife.  Set aside. 

Paint your birdhouse.  I chose to paint the roof with Burnt Umber and the sides with Fresh Foliage.  The only side you’ll have to completely cover is the front – all of the other sides are going to be covered with paper. 

You can’t see it here, but later I went back and covered the perch with some Pure Orange.  It needed a special touch! 

This is the fun part.  Keep in mind that Outdoor Mod Podge is thick, but that is intentional.  Working one side at a time, spread a medium layer of Mod Podge on your birdhouse. 

Immediately smooth your paper down thoroughly.  Use an old credit or gift card to get underneath the roof, and make sure to smooth *really* well.  Complete the other two sides and the roof.  Allow to dry for 15 – 20 minutes. 

You are now ready to coat the entire birdhouse.  Give it a medium layer of Mod Podge, allow to dry for 15 – 20 minutes and then repeat.  Allow to dry. 

When it comes to the front, that is your embellishment area, so decorate it how you like!  I added my parents’ last name, the gnome and then some mushrooms I cut out with my die cutter.  I had some extra cardstock lying around.  This is the time to decorate to your heart’s content.  Seal everything with the Outdoor Mod Podge and allow to dry overnight. 

Once your birdhouse is dry, it will be slightly tacky – to remedy this and to give the birdhouse an extra protective layer, I highly recommend using a clear outdoor sealer so that your project will last for years to come.

Congratulations to Rose who was randomly selected as the winner of Free Stuff Friday and the Kandi Professional Rhinestone Applicator! 

Kandi Applicators are just the tools you will need to add sparkle, glitz and glamour! Using this applicator makes embellishing so quick, easy and fun that you will want to use it on everything: sewing, quilting, jeans, t-shirts, hats, purses, scrapbooks, crafts and more. Use to apply crystals, pearls, nailheads and rhinestudes. Simply heat the tool and you are ready to go.

Rose’s winning answer to “Who is your crafting hero?” was…

“My Grandmother. Born and raised in the Great Depression, this woman is more creative than anyone I know – she knits, she crochets, she paints, and she even quilts from old clothes and fabrics. To say the least, in her 80 years of life,my grandmother has inspired her 3 sons (one of which is my dad) into learning to sew and quilt; encouraged all of her 5 granddaughters to learn at least one of the many crafts she does; and has now started on her 3 great grandchildren.

Most amazingly, my grandmother was the one who noticed that I couldn’t sit still in church and was wise enough to put a crochet hook in my hands and get me to see what I could create on my own. From there, I learned to crochet, then draw, paint, and craft. To this day, as a family (even the men) we’re constantly talking about our handcrafts and how we can improve on them. Every year, we trade names and look forward to handmade gifts from one another. They’re cherished above all others. She is an amazing woman, and I’m proud to call her my grandma!”

By Kid’s Craft Contributor, Gillian from the blog “Dried Figs and Wooden Spools”.

While I sew quite a bit for my kids, particularly for my daughter, I rarely make things for myself anymore. It wasn’t always true. In highschool I  regularly made gotta-get-there-before-closing trips to the local fabric store to pick up a few yards for some outfit that I NEEDED for the next day. In fact, I was far more likely to run my bank account dry those days on fabric purchases than anything else. I helped my mom make both my prom dresses and my wedding dress and continued to putter around with making clothes through college when I could afford to buy material. But as the years went by, I stopped sewing things for myself altogether. For one thing, fabric started getting more and more pricy, and clothes could be found on the cheap. And I got into quilting which took up a lot of sewing time. And then I had kids and switched over to making things for them. I still think about it at times though. Particularly when I’m in a fabric store and see something lovely that would make the perfect dress or skirt or pants.

So when I saw Sew U from Wendy Mullin, I was intrigued. I loved the idea of brushing up on my tailoring skills and was fascinated by the thought of using base patterns to make something the way I wanted it, not just they way the pattern called for it.

The book is, for the most part, divided into two parts. The first is one of the best primers on sewing I’ve seen. Both for beginners and for more advanced seamstresses. It goes over pretty much everything you should know to get sewing – from shopping for a sewing machine and learning how to use it to choosing fabrics to how to read and use patterns. It also includes basic instructions for making the three types of projects, skirts, shirts and pants, that come in the second part of the book. There you find three or more options for each project to help you design different looks. It also has hints on how to make further variations  and a place to record your own project notes. At the back of the book is a pocket with the three base patterns for the projects which is roomy enough to keep the patterns even after you have unfolded them, which isn’t always true of pattern envelopes.

Because skirts were always my favorite thing to make I decided to start there. That and I had the perfect piece of linen that just begged to be a light weight, a-line skirt sitting in my “current projects” box. Using the premise of “the Summer Skirt” I made a few changes that I thought woudl better suit the skirt I was looking for (and that’s the whole point of the book, isn’t it?) I decided against adding a ruffle to the bottom and cut the fabric on a bias, since I like the way linen hangs when cut that way.

Her hints for adjusting patterns to fit you helped a great deal since most skirt patterns end up too wide in the hips for me and I ended up with just about the perfectly fit skirt. ( I had to go back and adjust the waist size a bit) In fact, now that I’ve made one, I’m hunting for some more fabric to get working on my new, adjusted pattern. I can see a lot of linen skirts in my future!

I’m hoping to get my hands on her other two books, Built by Wendy Dresses and the other one is Sew U Home Stretch Book. I don’t wear a lot of button up shirts so I’m curious to try my hand at making some tee’s and tanks for myself and, next to skirts, dresses are my favorite thing to make. Wendy also carries a line of stand alone patterns but I think this book is still the best place to start, even for an experienced sewer.

Do you sew for yourself? What Wendy project would you like to try?

Adapted from “80 Awesome Ideas for All Your Old or Unwanted Books”  from OnlineColleges.Net.

Maybe the semester has passed and you forgot to sell back your text books, or perhaps you just held on to too many books over the years and now you need to figure out what to do with all of them. You don’t want to throw them away, so what is left to do with them all? Here are awesome ideas that will have you realizing that books aren’t just for education.

Use your old books around the house in creative ways with these ideas!

Book safe. Cut out the center of old books to hide valuables, such as extra cash or jewelry, in plain sight.

Lamp. Use three books to make this fun lamp.

Picture frame. Using a children’s board book, you can alter it slightly to create a custom-sized double picture frame.

Wall art. Turn eye-catching covers or brightly-colored pages into wall art to decorate your home.

Create art. Check out these art projects done with old books to spark your creativity for your own project.

Tabletop. If you have an old table that could use a facelift, use the pages of a book to decoupage a table top.

Word plates. Use old plates and text cut out of old books to decorate in an unusual way.

Wreath. Make an attractive wreath from an old paperback book.

Origami. If you are learning how to do this ancient Japanese art, practice with pages from your unwanted books.

Wall book shelf. Make a book shelf on your wall from a few old books.

Pen holder. Make a pen holder out of the spine and pages of a phone book or other soft back book.

Make an envelope. You will want to have one side blank so you can address the envelope, but you can use pages for making envelopes for personalized notes or cards.

Flowers. Make paper flowers from the pages to create a sweet gift for the book lover in your life.

Basket. Instead of magazine pages, use book pages to weave a paper basket.

Gift tags. Make unique gift tags from comic books or even the regular pages of any book.

Stationary. Use pages of a book as the recycled paper needed here to create your own stationary.

Gift bag. Instead of using expensive gift bags, make your own from book pages when it comes time for gift giving.

Click HERE for more awesome ideas for your books!

Enter to win the Kandi Professional Rhinestone Applicator! 

Kandi Applicators are just the tools you will need to add sparkle, glitz and glamour! Using this applicator makes embellishing so quick, easy and fun that you will want to use it on everything: sewing, quilting, jeans, t-shirts, hats, purses, scrapbooks, crafts and more. Use to apply crystals, pearls, nailheads and rhinestudes. Simply heat the tool and you are ready to go.

Every Friday we’ll post a giveaway on Think Crafts and all you have to do is comment on the blog post answering the question of the week. We’ll pick the winner and contact them via email. Deadline is midnight tonight and the winner will be announced Monday. One entry per person please.

Question of week “Who is your crafting hero?”

By Kid’s Craft Contributor, Gillian from the blog “Dried Figs and Wooden Spools”.

The beginning of June, in our house, signals, not just the start of Summer Vacation, but also the kick off to our families birthday season. All four of us, plus the dog, have summer birthdays. And, thankfully, the one who requires the most over the top birthday (that would be my little princess) comes first, so I have almost a years worth of birthday energy stored up to deal with all the pink and fluff and dresses and glitz that my own little Fancy Nancy deems necessary.

This year we are planning a Mad Hatter’s Tea Party, which opens things up for all sorts of fun, including these puff balls. The perfect thing to hang from the ceiling or scatter over the table to add a little Wonderland to the scene, I like them so much, I might just recycle them into a decorations for my office.

Here’s what you need

8-12 sheets of tissue paper per flower
Floral wire or a heavy duty stapler
Scissors 

How full your puff looks depends on how many sheets of tissue you use. Eight full sheets makes a looser, flower looking puff with a slightly open center, 12 sheets creates a more solid, dense puff. You can also scale these down to make different sizes for a more varied look.

Layer all your tissue into one, even pile. From the narrow end, begin folding in an accordion  fold, 1 1/2 inch wide folds for full size sheets, 1/2 inch for quarter sized sheets.

Once you have folded all the way up, wrap a length of floral wire or punch a few staples into the center of the strip and cut the ends to a point (rounded or straight ends would look cute as well.

Fan out the sides and carefully (the tissue is very easily torn) pull up one layer at a time until you are almost halfway through the layers. Flip over and repeat, doing the last few center layers at the end to ensure an even look.