Typical Me.....

Ok... so I am gonna be really up front. I think I have obsessive personality disorder. LOL. I am only half kidding. I get into something... go full steam ahead and then suddenly I tire of it and move on.

After I created this blog, and was all gung ho about creating and craft stuff. I ended up doing a nail blog. I obsessively bought nail art products and jumped right in.... and VOILA.... I gave up on it a month or so later. Well, I gave up on blogging... I did keep doing my nails. But I felt I didn't have anything exciting to offer... so I just let the blog go.

I let this blog go too.... and the reason for that is because I got back into doing graphics. I made a new blog for my graphics stuff. I was heavily into that for awhile, then I took a few months of a break and then got back into it.

Realizing I have ignored these other blogs, I decided to update them as well on occasion. My brand new crafting adventure is Quilling. It's done with paper... and it fascinates me.  I bought a beginner kit and some papers to play around with. It's kind of fun, but I cant seem to just dive right in.

My goal is to make a big letter and fill it in with all these pieces I am making and hang it on my wall. If you Google "Quilling" and look at the images you will see what drew me to it. Remember... it's QuiLLing not Quilting.

But the main point is, I am going to try and post to my blogs a little more often and try to keep them updated.

See you soon with some new creations and ideas!!!

Jaided


The image to the left was found on the internet and used as an example of what I hope to create. I do not know the original poster of this work. 

Some Sewing

I've had this small coin purse I have used for at least seven years. It finally broke and I was bummed out because it was so convenient. So after complaining about it long enough, I pulled out my sewing machine and decided to make a new one. 

The first step was to dig out my seam ripper and take apart the old one to use as a pattern. The coin purse had 2 zippers on it, and I have only worked with zippers once before. I looked up some tutorials and figured I could give it a try. 

The Tutorial I used for the zipper was from a blog called "Make it & Love it".

My first attempt was frustrating. The tutorial I used shows how to make a hidden zipper. MY biggest problem was cutting the zipper to size, and not having the pull constantly come off. My end result was pretty good, but I made it too small to hold my credit cards. So... Looks great, but I consider it a fail. This is the first one I made.

I have this great Bandanna fabric that I thought would be perfect. I didn't have any interface, which I needed, so I ended up using some embroidery sheets that gave it some stiffness.Once I knew it wouldn't work, and having learned a few valuable lessons about Zippers, I decided to make another one, only this time I would make a much easier template. I cut out the whole second zipper idea. Didn't need it. 

This is the one I consider a success. Very beginner but it works really well, I am proud of the result and it works for me!

I didn't rotate the picture... Oops! Anyway.. it really came out very well. All the lines on the fabric are lined up inside and out. It has some stiffness to it and the zipper works perfect. :)

Redoing a Card Table

On my trip to Catholic Charities I found a nice small card table for 3.00! Of course I happened to buy it during the 50% off sale... so it was 1.50. How could I pass that up?? It seemed pretty old and it was obvious the previous owners had done their own remodel using contact paper.

The second I saw the table I knew I would try decoupaging it. I have been wanting to decoupage something... and at 1.50 I wasn't going to be heartbroken if it came out poorly.

Ironically, on my Pinterest run that very same day, I found a link to a table just like the one I purchased showing how they did theirs. Very smart idea using a table cloth as a cover. You can find that Tutorial at The Bearded Family Blog.

These are the best before pictures I could snag. 
I had already started to take it apart. I get very impatient.
(Zoey was checking it out and sniffing it all up)


Impatient... This is an understatement! Thanks to the blog post I found as referenced above, I did learn how to take the table apart. Great first step. From there... it was all on my own. I wanted to decoupage as I said, and I wanted to use Fabric. The only reason I wanted to use fabric is because it was wide enough and I did not want any seams... Plus I have a ton of fabric laying around so it just made sense.

I didn't have Modge Podge, so I used the homemade version, which is Clear Glue mixed with Water. I bought a small container of Polyurethane at Catholic Charities, so I decided to splash some in there as well. No idea why... I just thought "Why Not?".

The first thing I did was spray paint the metal base in white. Below is the before and after. You can click the images to see them larger.

I told you I was impatient right? Well.. I didn't bother to wash down or sand the metal base. I knew I should, but I just wanted to get it done. Weather is getting cold up here and we were expecting a frost that night. Ok... I am making excuses, I just didn't bother.

Next I took my home made Modge Podge solution and using a sponge roller, I started to apply it to the fabric on the table top. Mistakes? Of course I made a few. The first one was that I didn't wash down or sand the table top at all, and to boot, I didn't put any of the solution on the table part itself to adhere the fabric to it from the under side. Not very smart all in all.

The Sponge roller was not working well. There were tons of tiny bubbles all around, so I took a soft bristle brush and brushed all the bubbles out.

I forgot to mention, I forgot to remove the glaring orange price sticker which was showing right through. Dopey Move! LOL! I decided I would just tell people that I did it on purpose to show the bargain I got. :)

I have to be honest... as it was drying, I just dreaded not having done any of it the right way. I would go and look at it now and then over the day and kind of groan at myself. 

Eventually it all dried and from a distance, I have to say, it looks really good! The table top is kind of rough to the touch, but I believe that is because I put a thin coat over fabric, which in itself is already a rough surface. On one side the fabric bubbled up. I am sure if I had glued the fabric down like I should have, it wouldn't have happened.

In the end... I really like it. It looks great, and it will function. What more could I ask for? Yes, I will follow the rules better next time I try and decoupage something and I promise you, I will be doing it again.

So here it is... the semi finished version of my very first decoupage project.
Voila! (The picture below was taken before I trimmed it all up etc)

I will post better pictures when the sun comes up. :)

Looking forward to my next project.

Kelly

Good Stuff Cheap!

Every now and then I like to stop in at Catholic Charities of Maine to poke around. I have enough of my own junk so I don't usually buy much. But if I am ever in need of anything, I do check there first. I also like to donate stuff that I  am ready to get rid of. Catholic Charities uses the money they make in the store to help Feed The County and fill their food bank. I am pretty sure there are Catholic Charities Stores all over... so you might want to check them out. Get some good deals and help your area.

Anyway.... Now that I am into crafting, why not go and check the place out and see what I can find. The best part is... they were having a 50% off EVERYTHING sale, so that made it more enticing. When I go there, I try and look at everything and say "What can I do with that?" and my mind goes into overdrive. But then I have to ask myself "Will you actually do it?" and then I can edit my cart.

Over the course of 3 visits, I spent 40.00 in total (Which includes the 50% off) and I got a whole lot of stuff!!!

This was one of the best sprees I had. Everything in this picture cost me just under 10.00!!! Some of the best finds were the card table for 1.50, The Ironing Board that attaches to the wall for 1.50 and the breakfast bed table for 1.00!

I will edit this post later and show you more of the stuff I bought, but honestly, CCOM is a great place to find stuff to craft with at really good prices.

Below are the rest of the items I got in the 10.00 batch.. minus the ironing board and card table.. because I am crafting them as I type.

Coffee Filter Roses.
A Completed Rose
In a previous blog post I showed you my attempt at a tutorial for Coffee Filter Flowers. I really enjoyed making them and they came out pretty good! The tutorial I followed was really easy, but being the kind of person I am, I wanted to find my own way of doing it. I also wanted to try to make them smaller for other projects I have in mind. So I took to playing with Filters, Acrylic Paints, Tape and more throughout the day.  Finally, later in the evening, I struck gold! I made a beautiful rose that I was so proud of. So I decided to write up my own tutorial on my new method and share it with anyone who might want to give it a try. If you look at the post I did before.. you will see that I found the hardest part was dealing with the masking tape... so in my new method that was the first thing to go!
Supplies Needed :	A Coffee Filter Acrylic Paint in your choice of color A Little Water Paint Brush or Sponge Brush Hair Dryer (Optional) Q-Tip Hot Glue Gun Scissors Tweezers (Optional)
The first thing you want to do is get a little of your paint out, and without adding any water to it, take your Q-Tip and roll it around in the paint covering all the cotton. I roll the Q-tip around a little more to make a more elongated shape. Then set aside and let it dry. Note : The Q-Tip is going to be the very center of the flower... if you look at the picture on the top of this post, you will see my bud is yellow. I was experimenting. So you can use any color you want, or a variation of the color you are using for your filters. For this tutorial I am making a yellow flower, so I wanted a yellow center as well.
Now pull out your Coffee Filter and lay it flat. Splash a couple drops of water into your paint and blend it together. This will help you to saturate both sides of the filter at once. Don't use too much water though, or else your filter will be pretty delicate to work with. Once you have the entire filter painted, flip it over to check for any spots that may not have gotten the paint to soak through and paint it up. Pay special attention to the outer edges of your filter because that is the part you will be using most.
Once you have your filter covered... it's time to pull out the hair dryer and blow it dry. I usually place the filter in the palm of one hand, spreading out my fingers so it won't fly away or rip and aim the dryer in the center of my palm and just wiggle it around to the edges. Your filter should be completely dry in less than a minute. :)
Now that your filter is dry, it should feel a little bit stiffer and more sturdy. It's time to fold it. Fold it in half, 4 times. It should look like a elongated cone. I can't tell you if folding it 4 times makes much of a difference, but that's how I do it.
Now we want to cut straight across, about one inch down.  Unfold the piece you just cut, and cut one slit so you now have one long piece instead of a circle. You'll notice when you lay your strip out, one side is kind of curvy, and one side is pretty straight. The straight cut side will be the bottom.
Next comes the creating!!  Grab your painted Q-Tip drop a little dab of hot glue on the stick part just under the cotton area. With the straight side of your filter strip down, attach it to the Q-tip but have the cotton area a little lower than the strip so that the "bud" will stay indented into the flower.
Now we are going to twist the strip. I lay my thumb down and then gently twist the strip twice, around every inch or so. You need to be pretty gentle so that the strip doesn't rip. But don't worry, little rips are fine if they happen. This makes a sort of bowl shape in the strip. You want to try and make sure that the edges of the bowls are all cupped inward, these will be your petals. Click the thumbnails to see larger images.
Now to roll our flower... Hold the Q-Tip by the unpainted end in your hand and start to roll the strip around the top of the Q-tip. You can do some shaping as you go along. I do my rolls fairly loose so I can have some room to play with the shape when it is done. Drop a dab of of glue down at the bottom of every other bowl to ensure they all stick together. You may have some spaces where you can see through the rose don't worry about that during the rolling process. We will take care of that at the end.
Now your Rose should be all rolled and glued together. This is your chance to play around with it's shape a little. Move some of the petals around if you want to, spread some out wider etc. This part is all on what you want to see. Once your rose has the shape you are happy with, from the underside of the flower glue down any areas that are not stuck on. Then just clean up any glue strings you may have. (I use tweezers for this part so as not to mess up the shape with my fat fingers).
VOILA!
I hope you enjoyed this tutorial. I tried to add a lot of images because I am a more visual learner. Feel free to show me your results!!  Thank You! Kelly

  

My Attempt at Coffee Filter Flowers

The tutorial I used can be found at :
Lovely Crafty Home.

It is a very easy tutorial to follow. The first rose I made, I followed the tutorial 100%. Once I had a feel for it, I did make some alterations to the technique.

This was all done on the spur of the moment actually. My Sister had called and asked if I wanted to bring Zoey over (my puppy) to play with Dellmar (one of her dogs). We like to get them together so they can play and wear each other out. We had both recently taken quite an interest in Pinterest, so we had been itching to do some crafting. The very first Pin I ever made was the one for Coffee Filter Roses and since I had everything I needed on hand why not? So I gathered up the few things I needed and headed over.

Now since this was spur of the moment, we didn't really have a crafting space to use. So we would be doing it at her really nice Kitchen Table. My idea was to lay down some spare grocery bags on the table so as not to get paint everywhere, but then my Sister thought of puppy pads, since I left some at her house, why not. Honestly, it was a great idea! Clean up was easy, and the paint absorbed into the pad. (Thanks Chris). 

I didn't take pictures from the very beginning, but the tutorial I followed has pictures of what I missed.

Supplies Required : 
Acrylic Paint in your choice of Color(s) (I used 2 different colors)

3 Coffee Filters (It requires 3 for each rose)

Scissors

Sponge Brush or Paint Brush (I used a sponge brush)

Masking Tape

Supplies I added : 
Hair Dryer

Green Duct Tape.

---

First thing I did was squirt a little paint color onto my plastic covered paper plate. Then I splashed a little water on top of that... maybe 2 Tablespoons worth. Then I swooshed the paint around in the water. I laid my coffee filter flat on my surface and painted away covering the whole thing. I only had to do one side because the water/paint mixture seeped through really well.  I wanted to use a couple of different colors. So I chose Orange and Pink. I did one filter in Orange, one in Pink and the third one I did as a mixture of both.

---

This is just a shot of my colored filters drying....

Side Note and Tip : 
In the tutorial I used she hung her filters up to dry on a clothes line. We didn't have one, so we laid our painted filters on top of stuff and waited for them to dry (as seen above). Ever the impatient person that I am, I decided to try a hair dryer to dry them and it worked like a charm! I held the filter in the palm of my hand and blew them dry! Literally less than a minute and they were ready to use.

---

Once all the filters were dried, I stacked them on top of each other. 

Then you want to fold them in half and then in half again. It should look like a cone shape. (Nope... didn't take pictures of that part either because I was getting really anxious! LOL  Then you want to cut the bottom part in a circular shape. My description isn't doing it justice. So you can see an image of this step by Clicking Here and view it on the Lovely Crafty Home blog.

Note about this step : When you look at the example I linked to on Lovely Crafty Home, you will notice the edges of the filters are scalloped. This was done manually, so if you want the scallops you need to cut them yourself. I did on my first one, but skipped it on my second one and I thought it looked fine. This is up to you, but I wanted to point that out in case you get confused like I did for a second.

---

Once I had the filters all cut out, I cut a slit in the big circles, one slit in the same spot through all three. Then as she described, I took the small whole circles and twisted them into a figure 8 shape. 

Note : What I discovered is that these three pieces are going to be the center inside of the rose. I wasn't sure where they would land when I was done.

A closer look at my twists.

---

Next I laid out a strip of masking tape around 15 inches long or so. Honestly this part was the most frustrating! It kept ripping as I was trying to get it off the roll and then when I would get a long enough piece, it would curl onto itself and stick. Ugh! So finally I curled the end backwards and stuck it to the table as I unrolled the rest of it. Silly I know.. but that was the worst of this whole project for me!

---

The next step, I attached the three figure 8 pieces at the beginning of the tape, and then right after that, I started to attach the big rings down the line of the tape. I was kind of folding them along as you can see.

Note : As I said before I didn't know this at the time, but the figure 8 pieces are the center inside of the rose, so my suggestion would be to have those figure 8 pieces come a little lower than the rest of the pieces you will be attaching, or at the same height. 

---

Yeah... so for the next part I didn't take any pictures either. :/

What I had to do next was roll the masking tape strip onto itself. Starting at the figure 8 side, I rolled the tape down the line until I reached the end.

Then... VOILA! A little pulling and twisting and plumping and I made my very first Coffee Filter Flower!!!

Not the best picture... but it shows the end result. I was kind of pleased! My sister also made one and she did some variations on hers and it came out beautiful. Truth is I liked hers better than mine, but that's just how I am.

---

This is my Sisters Flower. She didn't scallop her edges like I did. She cut them into sharper angles. If it were a different color I would swear it was a water lily. Very pretty. 

Good job Chris!!

---

A while back, one of my psuedo daughters Stephanie was into making Duct Tape crafts. One of the things she made were Duct Tape Flower pens. She used green duct tape to cover the pen as the stem. So with that in mind, once I finished rolling up the flower, I decided to cover up the plain masking tape and roll it with the green duct tape and make a stem. I liked it!

So my tip would be to use green duct tape and skip the masking tape all together.  :)

---

I decided to try and make another flower,  but this time more free style and see if I could get more creative with it. On the second one, I substituted the masking tape with Green Duct Tape... and I didn't lay it down in a strip on the table, I actually made it all in my hand, by rolling the strip of filter around. This process took much longer than the original way, so I would go back to that for my next one.

Below is a small gallery of the second one I made... and my freestyle attempt. I liked this one better to be honest... because I had a better idea of what I was doing. You can click on the thumbnails to see them in a larger size.

---

So in closing... I just want to say I was really happy with this project. It was very simple, and the end result was pretty good. The more I make them, the better I will get I am sure. But really, it was just fun to do a craft while spending time with my sister, and seeing it through to the end! So there you have it! One craft project completed! YAY me!!!


PS - It took a heck of a lot longer to write this blog than it took to make these flowers!!!