Bows, bows, bows....

So I'm back now that our new house is somewhat unpacked and under control (haha) and while I've taken a break from blogging about my projects I've still been crafting away so I've got a lot of catching up to do.  So today I'm writing about some bows I've made Lizzie.  I have 1 miserable fail, 1 so-so bow and 1 bow that turned out pretty well.
I've been trying to use up some of my patterned ribbon because its cute but doesn't always work so well in ribbon sculptures very often.  So I attempted some basic bows that can be ANY color or pattern.  The first one I attempted was this cutesy bow:


Here's my attempt:

Ugh... Uneven, doesn't do the little pop on each level of ribbon... Now that I look at it again, I realized a few things: There is an extra layer of ribbon below the 3rd but its shorter so maybe that's what gives the layer the pop.  Also the white ribbon goes around the layers but NOT the clip.  When I did that it makes it impossible for the clip to close.  I don't think I'll be trying this one again.  Its not really my favorite look and it failed miserably the first time so that's it for this style.

Next I decided to attempt Korker screw bows.  I LOVE these bows.  They are relatively easy to make and can be customized to any outfit or needed color scheme and they are also a great way to use patterned ribbon.  So here are my 2 attempts, one is better than the other and I'll explain how I made the difference in the second one.

 Now the first one I was following a blog that told me to lay all the ribbons in a pile, wrap a thread around them and pull very tight and then tie it again to make a knot.  This method is ridiculous! My hubby had to put his finger on the thread to hold it down so I could tie it again and even then the thread didn't stay tight enough to keep all the ribbon in.  I eventually had to run a small line of hot glue on a ribbon and put that around the middle (and I'm still praying none of the ribbons fall out!) In addition the white ribbon I used was not grosgrain ribbon so it didn't hold the curl very well.

For the second I had a hunch that I needed to run the thread through the ribbon instead and did a quick search on how to make these bows (again!) and found a video on youtube that showed how to make the bows this way.  So I tried again and success!   The only thing I'll do differently when making these again is to get dowel rods (when I have money again- haha) because right now I'm just using pencils to curl the ribbon (You curl the ribbon around the pencil, use clothespin to hold them in place and then bake them at 200 degrees in the oven for about 25 minutes) and its taking longer because I can't find as much ribbon on them as I could a dowel rod, but someday :-)

So there you have it- 2 kinds of bows.  Now I'm off to finish more bows and felt food (my 2 current crafting passions).  Hope to be back soon and catch up on my finished projects!

2 Hair clips and a Nail design

So today's post includes 2 new bows and an attempt at a new nail polish design. So here are the original bows.



Both of these are on sale at Etsy.com so I won't share all of how I made these, just a few tips again.
The purse is pretty simple.  As always make sure to take the time to cut and test out the size of your ribbons (especially in comparison to the clip) before ANY gluing.  The hardest part of this clip was the bow on the purse.  There is a really easy video on YouTube to help make the bow.  I like this pattern because the purse is really easy and you can make it in lots of different colors and styles.
The caterpillar is REALLY easy.  Its simply 5 colored ribbons of your choice and roll them, then glue them onto the clip.  I LOVE this clip because it doesn't take very much ribbon so it would be a great way to use up some ribbon scraps. Plus its easy to customize your caterpillar to your liking.
Here's my results

Then I also tested out a nail design.  Here is the picture: 

So I changed the colors to gray and pink because I didn't have these 2 but obviously this is an easy design to change the colors.  When doing this design make sure to pick 2 colors that are pretty solid, otherwise its hard for the colors to show up on one another. This design is relatively easy, you just have to have a steady hand, which I do not so my line didn't turn our as straight as these but it is still pretty cute.  Here's my results: 

Good night all! 

Felt Strawberries and Turkey and Pumpkin Hair bows

So first off is felt strawberries!!
Here's the blog/tutorial and original picture:
http://twelvecraftstillchristmas.blogspot.com/2010/05/farwell-to-felt-food.html


So cutting these is super easy, I simply traced 2 sizes of cups and then cut them in half.  The rest of the tutorial is super easy to follow but I will admit that they are kind of tedious to make.  Here is a picture of my result:

Ta Da! Easy, cute, and awesome! 

Then I needed a break from felt and sewing so I decided to make some new hair bows for Lizzie. These don't have any tutorials because they were pictures from Etsy so I just had to figure out how to make them myself.  Because this isn't linked to a tutorial I don't feel right about sharing my directions but I will share some tips and suggestions to making it easier.  

So I made a turkey hair clip first.  Here is the original picture: 

So the hardest part is making the feathers behind the turkey the right size BEFORE you start gluing them down.  Also you can't see it in this picture but I covered the clip behind the turkey in brown, but you can't really see it.  Also make sure you put both yellow feather on first, orange second and then the red so each color you add sits on top of the previous one.  The body is pretty easy- again make sure you have ALL of the pieces cut right before you start gluing.  I didn't put the beak or eyes on because that was just too tedious for me, kudos to the person that did.  So here's my result: 

Next was pumpkin bows :-) Here's the original:

This one is super easy! I simply covered the clip in green.  Then I cut 4 equal pieces and then glued them together by making loops and gluing them all at the bottom.  I'm not really sure how they make the stem with the vines coming off it but I think I did ok.  So here's my result: 

One is a little squished but still cute! 

And now I must head to bed! Good Night!! 

Felt Food- Orange Slices, Fried Eggs and a Cinnamon Roll

So yesterday I made baby bean more felt food.  I made a pair of fried eggs, a pair of orange slices and a cinnamon roll.  The link for the eggs and the orange slices are the same and found here:
http://melissagoodsell.typepad.com/day_to_day/2008/07/tutorial---felt-food-egg-orange-slices.html

Here's the original picture:
 

I'm not crazy that the orange slices are flat, I'd really like more 3D type items but they are still cute and easy so I thought I'd try them.  Here are my attempts:

So I pretty much followed the tutorials exactly for these.  The only change I made was to blanket stitch the eggs because I'm not very good at sewing curved lines on the sewing machine but I think they still turned out pretty cute :-)

Next is the cinnamon roll, also pretty easy.  Here's the original picture: 
And here is mine:

So I thought it was pretty simple so I started it while the tutorial was still loading.  I cut 2 strips about and inch and a half(one tan and one dk brown) and  started rolling them. Then when I looked at the site I saw that you are supposed to cut a strip of each color in 2 and 1/2 inches and then fold them in half.  I think this explains why mine looks kinda skinny.  So an easy fix.  What I like about this piece of felt food is that it looks really easy to customize to your desires.  I could easily make it fatter by stacking more strips to roll or by adding more strips onto the end to roll it more.  Or I could even made the strips wider to make a taller roll.  Either way I super love this piece. :-) 

Felt Play Food

So lately I've decided to start making a set of play food for Baby Bean from felt.  Its cute, inexpensive and actually pretty easy to make (most of the time).  Its going to be slow going since we're going to be moving at the same time and Baby Bean is moving non stop. But I'm going to take some time to blog a couple pieces at a time so I don't have to blog about them all at one time.

So today is doughnuts and a bag of potato chips.  Here are the links and pictures:
http://www.skiptomylou.org/2011/05/24/felt-food/


http://snazzlecraft.blogspot.com/2009/01/free-felt-food-pattern.html

(I'm working on the sandwich right now but just finished the chips)


So when I went to make the doughnuts I couldn't open the tutorial for some reason so  I just kinda made it up! Here's the result:

I cut 6 circles out of tan felt and then cut the middles out of them.  Then I sewed 2 together leaving a small opening and stuffed them with batting and then sewed the opening closed.  I cut a 3 circles- one from from felt, one from pink felt and one from white felt.  I cut them the same size as the tan circles and then trimmed a little around both the outer and inner circles.  I used a hot glue gun to attach one icing to each doughnut and then used puffy paint to add sprinkles and... Ta Da! Doughnuts :-) 

Now, the chips are actually a LOT easier than they look :-)  So I cut out the pieces for the bag from yellow felt. I actually cut it from the pattern but trimmed it down about half an inch off the bottom and off one side because the bag was really big when it was cut.  Then I sewed the two side together on 3 sides and left the top open.  I am going to add Velcro to the sides to make it fun to open. I did cut the circle from the pattern and then used puffy paint to write chips on it and then hot glued it to the bag.
For the chips I just followed the directions on the blog, just make when you cut out the chips make sure when you cut the chips out the lines are vertical :-)

Next I'll be writing about the results of the sandwich and its many pieces!

Jelly Fish in a bottle

So I tried this project a long time ago after seeing it on Pinterest.  I saw it again recently and decided to share my experience with it because it was a complete failure.  Here is the original picture: 

Looks amazing, right?

Well, here's how mine turned out:


Hideous looking!!


So.... what went wrong??? First of all my plastic bag was apparently not transparent enough to give that cool see-through look, but I don't really think that that is the major issue here.  If you look at the pictures the strips are supposed to dangle down into the bottle as the "head" floats near the top.  However my plastic bad just decided to clump at the top.  So basically its just a plastic bag cut into strips and shoved in a bottle of blue water.  Needless to say I'm NOT trying this one again.  It took quite a bit of effort with no positives to the result and no clues on how to spread the strips into the rest of the bottle.  Good luck to anyone else who tries this!

Homemade cheezits and Baked "hard-boiled" eggs

So since we eat a ton of crackers I thought making our own would be a great idea. So here is the link: http://missanthropistskitchen.wordpress.com/2011/06/22/homemade-goldfish-crackers-with-a-homemade-goldfish-cookie-cutter/

I can't get the pictures to come up on my computer so I can't show you what they looked like when they made them but here are my results:

Not very appetizing huh?  So I had LOTS of problems with this recipe.  First of all the recipe says to mix the ingredients in a food processor which I do not have so I just decided to use the pulse feature on my blender. It did not go well... The ingredients did not mix well despite much poking and prodding.  Finally I added some water and started to get some movement, unfortunately then my blender started to smoke ( I think its toast, I'm not sure though because I'm afraid to try it for confirmation that I'll need a new blender).  So since I thought it was pretty well mixed I let it chill for about an hour and then rolled it out to cut and bake it.  Now I'll admit it had gotten late and I was a little tired so I may have rushed this a little.  The "dough" didn't get rolled even enough and obviously didn't get the squares are square or even as I could have.  But even after they baked they didn't taste very good.  They aren't very cheesy or salty.  They just have a weird floury, kinda cheesy taste.  Even bean (who eats just about anything made a really nasty face when I gave her one)

All in all not something worth doing for me.  I'd rather just buy a box of goldfish or cheezits.  It may save a little money but they aren't good at all and really not a lot cheaper and I have better things to do with my time.  

That night I also attempted baking hard boiled eggs.  When I give bean snacks I try to give her protein to stay healthy.  Eggs are a great source of protein but I hate having to scramble eggs every day and I really hate hard boiling eggs.  So when I heard of this idea I thought it would be great.  So I tried this.  I put 6 eggs in a muffin tin and then preheated the oven to 325 (the suggested temp) I baked the eggs for 30 minutes and then took them out and gave them time to cool.  When I peeled them...Voila! Hard boiled eggs! Exciting!!!

Just a few issues that I think are fixable.  A couple of the eggs were just a little uncooked in the middle and most of the eggs had a weird grey ring around the yolks.  I think these issue can be solved by cooking the eggs a little hotter and a little longer and then dunking them in cold water.  

I'll try again soon and update.

Good night!   

2 Ribbon Projects

Alright to this post it 2 for one- mostly because I have both of the pictures on my SD card but its also good because they both use ribbon.  They are also similar because I don't even know if I actually pinned either one but do remember seeing them on pinterest. So all that to say I don't have the pictures but its ok because they pretty much turned out the right way.

So here is project number 1:  Ribbon in a wipe box :-)  (Lame title but that's the best way to describe it )

(sorry my picture is sideways I'm not sure why they upload that way or how to fix them so if anyone can help that would be great)

So this project is pretty straight forward and simple.  All you do is save a wipe box and buy a roll of ribbon.  Then you hot glue one end of the ribbon to the bottom of the inside of the box.  Then unroll the ribbon and poke it through the hole that you would pull wipes out of.  

I haven't decorated the box yet  but I would love to I just haven't found something that I feel safe decorating with for Lizzie.  I don't want to use anything she can pick off like foam pieces or paint.  I'm thinking coloring it with Sharpies. I'll post another picture when it is finished.  The only other suggestion I can make is that if you cut the ribbon at all you'll want to seal the end of the ribbon by using a lighter.  All you do is turn on the flame and run the ribbon NEAR the flame- you don't want to actually put it in the flame because it might set on fire (and that's bad... lol). You will see the edge of the ribbon melt a little.  

So this project is super simple but currently baby bean is not really interested in playing with the ribbon, she just wants to play with the lid.  Hopefully she doesn't break it before she can figure out how fun it is to pull the ribbon out. We'll see.

Next I used a clever idea to store cards : 

So these are the Christmas cards we received this Christmas.  I simply punched a hole in the upper left hand corner of each card.  Then I cut a ribbon about a foot or so. Honestly I didn't measure I just ran the ribbon through the holes and made sure I had enough ribbon on one end to right the holiday and date and then cut the other side to match.  Again I used a lighter to melt the ends of the ribbon just a little to seal the ends. After tying the knot, again with room to write the holiday.  Then I used puffy paint to write the holiday and date on the ribbon, then let it dry.  

Again a simple easy project that it a cute way to store cards and organize them by holidays.  One helpful hint make sure to stack the cards in the direction that you want them to be organized before you start punching.  Other wise its super confusing where to hole punch as you're going along :-) 

Enjoy!  

Crispy Cheddar Chicken

Alright so here's a post on a recipe.  So here is the picture of what the final product is supposed to look like :


And here's the website: http://quick-dish.tablespoon.com/2013/01/15/crispy-cheddar-chicken/

Now I didn't get a picture of mine but needless to say, it didn't look like this.

Taste wise also not so great but I have a few theories as to why.  But let me go over the recipe first.  So its basically cut the chicken breasts into strips, dip it in milk, then shredded cheese, and then breadcrumbs. Then as they bake you simmer the progresso cheese soup starter and then drizzle over the strips when they are finished.

So shredded cheese on chicken strip and drizzled in cheese soup should be delicious right? Ummm not so great. Now I admit part of the problem is that we didn't drizzle it with the cheese soup because by the time we made dinner and it baked we (and baby bean) were starving and thought it would be fine. Also  part of the directions say that they added a splash of garlic salt to the bread crumbs but I didn't because I didn't have time and didn't think it would be that important.   But in addition I couldn't get a lot of the cheese shreds to stick to the chicken strips so it didn't come out very cheesy.

So the jury is still out on this recipe.  We're going to try it again- with the garlic salt in the breadcrumbs and make sure to get the soup on the strips.  I'll repost on this recipe when we retry it.  

Melted Crayons On Canvas Picture

So here is the original pin and picture:

http://pinterest.com/pin/25543922859484989/

And here is how mine turned out:

All in all not too bad.  I do wish that the crayon would have run evenly down the canvas better but much better than those pictures of failed attempts at this where the crayons are duct taped to the top and there is just a mass of melted crayon everywhere.  So here are some tips for making this work:

• COVER THE AREA WHERE YOU ARE GOING TO WORK!! I cannot stress this enough! The table I made this on is covered in blue drops. (luckily it my craft table so all's good- Just glad I didn't try this anywhere else.)
• You'll need about 45-50 crayons of the shade you want to make your picture. My canvas was 16in and I needed 45 crayons so you can figure from there.
• I hot glue all the crayons across the top and then propped it up so I could melt the crayons using my blow dryer. 
• When you start melting the crayons you want to aim the blow dryer in the middle of the crayons.  Too high or too low makes the crayons splatter.  You can run the hot air over the tips of the crayons a few times to help melt them but once they start dripping aim the air up.
• I would recommend melting the crayons in small sections.  The wax dries really fast and think that is why I got a big lump in the middle.  Aim your blow dryer at the crayons and let the wax melt and run until the section runs down the canvas to your desired length and the move to a different section.  That is what I did towards the end (aka the side without the silhouette) and I think the results are much better.
• Also I know that with the fact that you are running a blow dryer for an unknown amount of time it can get very hot where you are working but resist the urge to turn on a fan or open a window- IT WILL BLOW THE WAX in crazy ways! 
• Last I simply found a silhouette I like on the internet, printed and cut it out.  Then I colored over it with black marker to make sure the coloring was the same.  Then I used spray glue to cover the area where I want it and pressed it into the glue.

Ta-da!!! Question? Comments? Let me know! 

Ok, so here I am going to start recording my results of my Pinterest projects, the good, the bad and the ugly.  Hopefully I can share some insight into how I made (or failed completely) the Pinterest projects that I've attempted.  I'll share tips that aren't on the pin and anything else useful that I find.  Enjoy!