Technical difficulties

I'm dying to show you all our Halloween costumes and tell you why my hair is STILL green, but darn it if I didn't run out of photo space on Blogger at the most inopportune time! I've purchased more photo storage space but it hasn't updated yet, so I still can't upload any photos. Don't give up on me--I'll be back as soon as I can!

House of 3 Halloween banner

I know we're in the final stretch toward Halloween, but I still have things to show you that I've made--this October has been almost unmatched on the level of crafting I've managed to squeeze in. One of my favorite projects was this cute Happy Haunting banner.

The banner pieces are actually a printable purchased from House of 3. The printable pdf file is only $4.00 and you get the images for both the small banner (seen here, the letters are about 2.5" tall) and the large banner (letters a bit larger than a playing card). And the bonus is that you can print as many of them as your little heart desires--use them for gifts, send them in swap packages (that's what I did), so it's really an economical little project.

To make my banner, I printed the letters on white cardstock and cut them out (I think this banner would look really neat printed on fabric too!). The original letters had a bit of brown shading around the edges but I wanted them to be a bit darker, so I used brown craft chalk around each letter. I hauled out my sewing machine and stitched them together along the tops, spacing them evenly. When they were all done I thought it needed a something more, so I sprayed the whole thing with Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist in Pearl. The moisture did make my letters curl a bit but I don't mind and I like how it's a bit blotchy. You can see a bit of the shimmer at the top of the N in this photo; it's subtle, but really pretty. If you wanted more sparkle, you could use glass glitter or Stickles glitter glue to accent each letter.

I punched holes in the end letters and hung them with black seam binding lace on the mirror in my entryway. I like how the colors of the banner match the colors on my antique oyster plates, silhouette coaster plates and the vintage group photo. It was a fun, easy project and this definitely won't be the last printable I purchase from House of 3!

Gummy Candy Kabobs

Dear friends, there are a few things you should know about me.
I love:
1. Candy
2. Festively colored candy that matches the upcoming holiday
3. Gummy candy
4. Food on a stick

So when I opened up the October Better Homes & Gardens magazine and saw this page, I about passed out. (I can't save the photo to show here and my scanner's on the blink, so click the link and go check it our for yourself. I'll wait!)

See what I mean? The gummy candy kabobs checked every box on my list up there, so I knew I had to make some for myself.

The best part for a candy freak like me was shopping for the candy, of course.

Sources: Wal-Mart for the orange slices, caterpillars, and peach rings, Target for all other candy. Blackberries and sour jelly pumpkins from bulk bins in Target candy aisle. Lollies and pretzel bags from Michael's. Not shown: Peeps ghosts, also from Target. (I tried to stay away from black licorice-flavored candies which made finding black treats a lot trickier.)

Some tips:

• If you use the pretzel bags, keep in mind how low you can push the bottom candy and still have it fit in the bag.
• Spray the skewers with non-stick cooking spray first; it helps the candy slide a bit easier
• Gummies with a layer of white marshmallow on the bottom (rings, frogs, caterpillars) are tougher to poke through. The worms were easier.
• The licorice I used was the Australian-style, which comes in all kinds of flavors (and hence, colors)
• For the top gummy, only poke the skewer halfway through so the pointy end doesn't come out the top.
• Peeps ghosts were darling on the skewers but just a smidge too wide for the pretzel bags to fit over easily, so it was a struggle to get them bagged neatly.

Aren't they cute? The bright colors and shapes are so fun and festive. Maren helped me pick out the candy for each skewer but she was a bit too young to make the kabobs herself. I would recommend this project for kids a bit older who a) have stronger hands and b) won't stab themselves accidentally with the skewer. Maren did help in checking the candies for freshness and quality by sampling them liberally.

When I was waiting in the checkout line to buy the pretzel bags at Michael's, I noticed these lollipops with long skinny plastic sticks and thought perhaps I could make candy kabobs on those as well. They were only 39¢ each so I grabbed three to give it a try. They actually worked really well because the candy slid easily over the slick plastic stick, and they already have the cute lollipop at the top. The ends aren't sharp, so for some of the tougher candies I poked a starter hole with a skewer.

Gummy candy kabobs would make a cute centerpiece for a party! For my photos I poked mine into a piece of floral foam in a crock that totally doesn't match--I was in a hurry and it already had the foam inside, so I grabbed it--but if I were doing it for a real party, I'd use a cuter container and hide the top of the floral foam under a layer of something like crinkled shredded paper. The BHG article suggests using a vase with jelly beans to anchor the skewers. The lollipop kabobs didn't work well for this application because after a little while the plastic sticks bent and they splayed out to the sides of the arrangement.

I'm kind of obsessed with this idea now and I want to make gummy candy kabobs for every occasion! Gummy and chewy candies are available in all sorts of colors, flavors and shapes and they make those Peeps for just about every holiday now. I'm having visions of an arrangement of skewers made solely of those great big gumdrops (last year's gumdrop craft) and I'm obsessed with the idea of making rainbow kabobs with a giant marshmallow at the bottom to act as the cloud. I have no occasion to make them for but I just think they'd be so pretty!

What occasion would you make gummy candy kabobs for? What kind of gummy or chewy candy is your favorite? Would it be wrong of me to plan an entire party around my rainbow gummy kabob idea? ;)

Good Junk: Silver Ice Bucket saga

I found the cutest set of faux vintage flashcards at a scrapbook store recently:

They're by a company called October Afternoon and they were from a line called "The Thrift Shop" that has all sorts of other paper crafting stuff that is just perfect for lovers of both papercrafting and old stuff like me. You can't buy directly from OA's website but you could search for an online scrapbook shop that sells the line.

The cards are punched on one side and come with rings and matching chipboard covers so you could actually turn them into an album--wouldn't they be darling with some photos of your very favorite finds? I especially like the one that says "Good Junk" so I thought I'd make that into a feature on my blog, rather than saving my finds for Thrift Thursday--because sometimes, they're too good to wait until then!

Today's Good Junk is fresh--I just bought it yesterday and I could hardly wait until it was light this morning so I could take photos and tell you my story.

On Wednesday afternoon I took the kids to my favorite thrift store to look for components for my Halloween costume. I've been staying away from the thrifts and estate sales lately because I'm trying to save my spending money for my upcoming trip to London, but since I was already in the store I had to take a look around, right? ;)

I didn't find much but just before we walked out the door something caught my eye. It was an ice bucket, black with tarnish but even though it was behind the counter on a shelf I could make out engraving: somethingsomethingsomething...1950. ~gulp!~ I had the cashier get it for me so I could have a look and read the engraving more clearly:

And I knew then that spending freeze be darned, it would be going home with me! Except for one problem: it wasn't priced, and this thrift has a policy that they won't sell an item if it isn't priced (too many nogoodniks trying to cheat and get lower prices, apparently.) It was obvious that I didn't remove the price because the item had been behind the counter, but even the manager wouldn't help me because the pricers were already gone for the day. What? Noooo!

The clerk said that she'd put the bucket in the back room with the other unpriced items so that the pricers would see it first thing in the morning when they came in at 8:00. Then she advised me to be there when the store opened at 10:00, but she couldn't guarantee that they'd be sure to put it back behind the counter again rather than out on one of the normal shelves.

I drove home, defeated, and plotting what I would do in the morning. Thursday at that thrift store is a day that VIP members can get 25% off, so there are always people waiting to go in when the store opens. I couldn't stand the thought of watching someone get there steps ahead of me and get MY ice bucket, so I made sure that we left the house early so that we could be first in the door. I even briefed Maren on the plan so she'd stay with me and not slow us down by going for a shopping cart first. I was ready to go, but when we arrived a few minutes before 10:00, people were already going in the door

We hurried into the store and went around to where the ice bucket had been the day before, but there was a conspicuously empty spot on the shelf where it should have been. My heart just sank, because I thought someone must have gotten in the door right before me and had snapped it up and worse yet, I'd see them walking around the store with MY ice bucket in their arms (I've had this experience at an estate sale more than once. It stinks.) I asked the clerk if she knew anything about the bucket, and she directed me to her supervisor. I repeated my story, and the supervisor pushed me off to another employee to go ask the pricers in the back room if they had seen it. The pricers said they hadn't seen the bucket that morning, and she apologized and said she didn't know where it could be.

I decided that as a last-ditch effort, I'd walk around the store and look for it on the regular shelves, and told Maren what to look out for so she could help. This thrift is in a space once occupied by a supermarket, so it's HUGE. There are probably 12 long aisles that are jam-packed--and that's just the kitchen and home decor-type items. The ice bucket could have been put down anywhere; it wouldn't necessarily be with the kitchen stuff. And I was still in competition with all of the rest of the shoppers in the store--it was a bit like a junking video game, now that I think about it. New for the XBox and Wii: THRIFT STORE SHOPPER! Navigate the aisles full of people looking for treasures. Obstacles are carts from the employees putting out new merchandise, slow shoppers, a 5-year-old who has to look at everything and a baby who refuses to stay buckled in the cart! Hurry to gather up your vintage goodies before other shoppers snatch them up or before the time limit is up, which is signified by your 5-year-old complaining loudly and your baby screaming!

We looked quickly through all the items but came up empty-handed. I was so disappointed and wished that I'd never even seen the darn thing in the first place and then, but lo--what did I see on a bottom shelf in the kitchen section? It was MY BELOVED BUCKET! I grabbed it up and Maren and I did the Snoopy Dance right there in the middle of the aisle. Our antics were summarily cut short when I realized that the bucket still had not been priced, which meant there was a possibility that the manager would invoke the No-Price-No-Sale rule and refuse to sell it to me AGAIN. And I almost cried.

Thankfully, when I went up to the counter to rehash my story a third time, one of the pricers took pity on me and tossed off a number so I could at least buy the darned thing. I paid for it and was out the door before I could lose it again! I came home and set to work polishing the bucket and the items that were inside: a pair of silver tongs, four tiny silver cups and what I assume is the bottom of a silver cocktail shaker, also engraved.

It took two aluminum foil-baking soda-salt baths to loosen the tarnish and plenty of Wright's Silver Cream and elbow grease to do the rest, but now my pieces are nice and shiny and beautiful again! The silver plate on the cocktail shaker is pitting and it's missing its lid, but I think it will make a darling vase, don't you? I'm assuming the ice bucket once had a lid too, but I don't mind one bit that it's gone because I love the engraving so much.

So that's the Silver Ice Bucket saga. Good junk, indeed.

Halloween craftiness: Candy Corn Wreath

I don't often pay full price for magazines on principle--I either find a super-cheap subscription or I use a 40% off coupon at JoAnns, but when I saw the cover of the October Woman's Day magazine at the grocery store I threw it in my cart without a second thought and happily paid full price.

image copyright Woman's Day magazine

The cover image is of this great candy corn wreath and I thought it would make a fun project for Maren and I to do together. The step-by-step instructions are here on the Woman's Day website, so I won't go through those in detail.

I used a 16" green foam wreath from JoAnn's--it was $7.99, less my 40% off coupon. I got the kind of wreath form that has rounded edges on the front, but the back is flat. I love my Dollar Tree $1 green wreath forms but for this project I wanted a wreath that had some flat space so the candy corn didn't slide off when I laid it out. The instructions suggest to cover your wreath form in black duct tape but I didn't want to waste my good Gorilla Tape, so instead I covered the wreath form with strips of black fabric like I did for my paperback book wreath.

 I used approximately two 22-ounce bags of Brach's candy corn. It's hard to tell exactly how much I used because I let Maren eat some before I started the wreath, and then you have to pick out the wonky corns as well. I did end up opening a third bag but I was only short by about 20 corns, so I know if we hadn't eaten any beforehand two bags would have been plenty.

I did place out my candy corns before gluing like the instructions suggested, but I only did one ring at a time. I put my hot glue on the candy itself rather than the wreath so that it wouldn't show. It was really quite easy--Maren helped me lay out the corns, then I glued them down.

I had one big issue that makes my wreath look different from the one on the magazine cover. On the WD version, all of the orange middles of the candy line up, giving it a really symmetrical look, kind of like spokes radiating out from the center. The corns aren't necessarily touching head-to-toe; there are some gaps between them so that the orange middles will line up but the gaps are pretty small, which means that all the candy corns were just about the same size.

When I laid out my first ring (and I started from the center out), I put them head-to-toe. When I laid out the second ring, I put them head-to-toe going the other direction, but because of the bigger ring and the variation in the size of the corns, the oranges didn't necessarily line up. By the third ring I realized that my wreath didn't look as neat as the WD version, and I tried to do a better job of lining up the oranges rather than having the corns touch. That worked at first, but after a while it resulted in some pretty big gaps where the black showed through, and that bugged me. So then I went back to doing the head-to-toe again. In some place the oranges line up, and in some places they don't.

I do like how tidy the rows of candy corn on the WD wreath are, but I'm sure WD has editorial assistants who get paid to make sure all 435 candy corn are exactly the same size, and I'm trying to glue on candy corns in between cooking dinner and shoving snacks at my 13-month-old to keep him from screaming. So my wreath is imperfect, and that's just how it's going to have to be.

I hung my wreath with wide black satin ribbon and I think it's pretty darn cute! I like the bright festive colors but the shape itself is very unfussy; from a distance it makes a really cool pattern and almost looks like it is beaded.

On the Woman's Day website there's an additional page of instructions on how to preserve your candy corn so your wreath will last longer and not end up as insect food. Those weren't in the magazine and involve letting your candy corn dry out for several days, then spraying them on both sides with clear preserving spray. Honestly, that sounds like a giant pain in the bum so I'm glad I skipped it! I might give my wreath a coat or two of clear Krylon spray to make it shinier, but that's only if I can find my spray--I'm not going to go out any buy any specifically for this project. I live in a very dry climate so I don't have to worry about my candy becoming sticky and bugs aren't really an issue for us.

There are some other really cute candy corn craft ideas in that magazine that I'd love to try, like a candy corn garland and cool candy corn balls but I'm not sure if I'll get to those this year--they might have to be on the crafting list for Halloween 2011.

Wardrobe refashion: Cardigans

Last week I showed you the tank tops I did in my recent wardrobe refashioning session, and today I'd like to show you the cardigans I worked on as well.

I purchased three cardis at Target back in August when I found them on clearance. They're perfect for early fall in Colorado because they have sleeves that go to just below the elbow so they're warmer than a t-shirt but not as hot as a full sweater. The first that I worked on was the turquoise cardi:

I purchased the pretty peachy rose trim months ago from this etsy shop and I've been wanting to add it to a shirt, but just never got around to buying matching thread so I could sew it on. I loved how it looked with the turquoise sweater and I couldn't figure out how I would sew it on anyway, so I just took the easy way out and adhered it with fabric glue!

The flowers are sewn together on a strip of peachy tulle, so to add a bit more embellishment I went to my bead stash and found some bright orange seed beads and pretty fire-polished glass beads in the same turquoise as the sweater. I sewed the beads on randomly in little groups and although they're a bit hard to see amid the flowers, I think they add just a little bit of extra sparkle and interest.

Since I used fabric glue, I was a little worried about how well the flower trim would hold up in the wash, and I was careful not to let it dry all the way, but it seems to have come out just fine.

The second cardigan was easy too. For inspiration, I used this cute sweater by Jen at Tatertots and Jello. She in turn used a cardi from Anthropologie for her inspiration and when I was looking at her photos, I remembered that I had some very similar ruffled trim in my stash.

I laid it out on the sweater in a zigzag pattern and pinned it to the sweater, making my zigzags all different widths. Then I took a deep breath and gathered my courage and sewed it straight down the middle of the trim. It was easier than I thought and I love how it turned out and that I was able to utilize more ribbon from my stash.

I still have one more cardi to work on. I saw this cute sweater at White House Black Market back during the summer.

I think it retailed for around $90 and I knew that I could make a similar one for a whole lot less, so I bought a white cardigan with that project in mind. I picked out some vintage black glass buttons from my stash and I need to sew those on the next time I'm watching a movie.

The swirls on top were made from different fabrics and trims and those will be trickier to replicate, but I think I have enough stuff in my stash of fabrics and ribbons that I can come up with something similar. Hopefully I can get around to it soon so I can wear it before real sweater season in Colorado sets in!

The paper bag wreath: Halloween version

Back in August I made a paper bag wreath.

Actually, I made two. Once I got gluing those little flowers it was hard to stop! I loved how it turned out so much that I started thinking about what other kinds of paper I could use to make a wreath besides brown paper sacks, and the first thing that came to my mind was book pages.

One trip to the Dollar Store and $2 later, I came out with another wreath form and a paperback book and plans to make a black and white version of the wreath that would be perfect for Halloween!

I used the same technique as on the brown wreath, but I punched my flowers out of pages torn out of a really bad sci-fi book instead. (I read snippets of the book as I was punching out the flowers and trust me, being made into a wreath was a serious improvement. That thing was dreck.) One small difference from the brown wreath was that I covered the wreath form in strips of black fabric so the green foam wouldn't show through. You could also use black tape, but I had the fabric close at hand so that's what I used.

I liked how the black and white looked on its own, but I wanted to use it for Halloween so I drew some bat shapes with a white pencil on the back of some glittery black cardstock from my stash. I hot-glued them to the wreath and then bent and curled the wings with my fingers to give them a bit of dimension. For the second wreath, I found a package of velvety black diecut Halloween shapes at Michael's. I used the bats again but the package also contained spiders, which would be a fun addition to the wreath with a bit of that cottony fake web stuff stretched across it.

I still love this wreath technique and I wouldn't mind making another one without the shapes because I love the graphic look of the white paper and black text. I'm also thinking of other kinds of paper I could use to make this wreath--white kitchen waxed paper crossed my mind, but I think that might not produce nice clean edges on the punched shapes. What other kinds of paper do you think would make a pretty wreath?

(PS--is anyone still having problems with Blogger's 'new' uploader? Why do I have to reload my photos EVERY SINGLE TIME I go to post one? It didn't start out like this.)

Halloween project: Embellished Soda Carton

Today I have a quick and easy project to share with you. This took about an hour on a rainy Sunday afternoon.

This is simply a six-pack of Orange Crush soda. I covered the cardboard holder in cute My Mind's Eye Halloween paper that I received in a swag bag at Spark in September. I measured the sides of the holder and cut corresponding pieces out of patterned paper, then adhered it right to the cardboard itself. You could probably get away with not measuring and just tracing the shape with a pencil, but I'm picky that way. I used Zip Dry adhesive but I think a glue stick or double-sided tape would have been a bit easier.

The ends of the carton are covered with a coordinating striped paper, since one sheet isn't enough to do all four sides of the box. I also measured roughly and cut a strip to go around each bottle, and used the remaining paper from that to cover the top part where the handle is. I used some of the die cut shapes that came in the package to decorate the sides, tied on a few pieces of ribbon and rickrack from my scrap jar, and now I have a cute little treat to give to a friend, all for the cost of the soda!

Image copyright Stampin' Up! 1990-2010

I love this embellished soda carton from the Stampin' Up! Holiday Mini Catalog. They have a great package of patterned papers in greens, black and orange with the raven theme, so they've used the Key Lime Stewart's soda to match. To further embellish the soda bottles, they've applied a skull rub-on to the neck of each bottle and topped the lids with a square of black tissue paper and a bit of twine.

I enjoyed making this treat for our friends, and I think I'll do a few more for the families that The Mister and I Visit and Home Teach. The idea could easily work as a neighbor gift, a birthday treat for a co-worker, or even for a teacher. It's inexpensive but visually impressive and it's a treat because few of us probably buy soda in glass bottles on a regular basis.

Wardrobe refashion: tank tops

On Saturday I decided that it was time to repaint our living room/kitchen (the 30% off coupon for Sherwin-Williams in the paper that week might have had something to do with that) so I bought paint and supplies and informed my (long-suffering) husband that on Monday, we'd be painting. In an unusual twist for me, I didn't agonize over paint choices--I took the advice of the nester and many others is blogland, and went with Rice Grain. It was a snap decision and I hadn't even seen the paint chip until I walked in the store, but it seems to look okay and at any rate, it's too late to change our minds now, right?

We painted all day yesterday so the house is just torn apart. Today I hope to get everything put back together because the mess is making me twitch. I still have the Halloween boxes to put away, too so literally the entire first floor of my house is a disaster and there's not a clear vertical surface in the place.

A few weekends ago when there was enough clear space on my table for my sewing machine, I made a few fun things to add to my fall/winter wardrobe. Old Navy had these tanks on sale for $7 so I picked up three to see if I could do something with them.

For the first, I tried making ruffles with ribbon, a technique I've wanted to try for a while. I used wide red-and-cream striped ribbon from Stampin' Up! and sewed a long stitch down the middle with my sewing machine. Then I pulled the strings to create the ruffles, and pinned the ruffles around the neckline of the tank.

It was tricky to figure out what to do with the ends of the ribbon. I ended up cutting them into dove tails, which reminds me that I need to pick up some Fray Check at the craft store. After I pinned the ruffles, I sewed down their middles.

And now all I can think of is bacon. Is it just me? I made kind of a mess of sewing the ends, so to help hide that I clipped on a flower pin I'd just made that fortuitously is in just the right color of red.

I like it, even though it's not perfect. I'd like to try it again but use different ribbon or even buy another tank to cut up and make ruffles out of the knit.

The next tank was much easier. For inspiration, I used this refashioned skirt that I bought earlier this summer:

To make my design, I cut a simple leaf shape out of a cardboard scrap and used it as a template to cut more leaves out of scrap fabric.

I chose pale green vintage skinny rickrack from my stash, and pinned it down the side of the shirt with the leaves spaced out.

I used red thread to sew them all down, because one of the things I loved about the original design on the skirt was the use of bright, contrasting colors. I sewed the rickrack first, slowly and carefully. If I did this again, I'd wait to cut the rickrack until it was all sewn down. I thought I had measured enough but once it was sewn down, the rickrack came up a bit short at the top of the shirt. I think the knit stretched or something and it's annoying and I can't fix it so I'll just have to live with it and remember next time to sew from the top down!

When it came to the leaves, I tried the one on the bottom first (since if I messed up a little, it would be less visible) and completely screwed it up. Sigh. So I cut another leaf using my handy template, and this time I used a bit of fabric glue just in the center of the leaves to tack them down to the shirt so they wouldn't move when was trying to sew around them.

That worked much better! I thought about using an iron-on fusible product underneath but if you do that, you don't get the cute fringing on the outside of the leaves after they've been washed.

I'm happier with this shirt and it was so darn easy! I think both tanks will be fun to wear over long-sleeved tees this fall and winter. I still have one navy tank left to refashion but I'm waiting for inspiration to strike.

Vintage chic Halloween platters

I've had such fun lately making these cool Halloween decor pieces. I used vintage plates and platters, vinyl decals and rub-ons and I LOVE how they turned out! I'm keeping the raven with the chandelier, but all of the others are for sale in my Etsy shop.

I'm still up to my eyeballs in Halloween decorating, but I'm nearing the end. Thank goodness, because trying to keep the baby out of the boxes is nigh unto impossible! I'm having fun putting together new vignettes this year but I'll be relieved when I can put away the boxes and enjoy the decorations without all the mess. What are your plans for the weekend?