Personalize Your Door Hanger

You Need:

• twine
• hot glue
• cardboard cutout letter

Wrap the twine around your letter, add a loop at the top and you're done! Be sure to hot glue every 3 wraps or so to secure the twine. If you want to jazz your letter up, add things to make it colorful. Instead of twine, you can use yarn, ribbon, fabric, etc.

This has become my go-to present for holidays lately because it's so simple to make and I really like the way it ends up looking. I made this for a friend for Mothers Day with the letter of their last name in twine, then wrapped tiny letters (the first letters of her children's names) in different colored yarn for embellishments.

*You can make these for baby showers and hot glue little Hot Wheels on it for a boy or Polly Pockets pieces (do they even make those anymore???) for a girl.
*These can be given for bridal showers with the bride-to-be's new last name initial.
*If you're good at writing in bubble cursive, you could even wrap up a word and hang in anywhere in your house.....hmmmm, I haven't thought about doing that until I just typed it...I think I just found my next project.



Cheers.

Upcycle old silverware!

I made this for a Chinese Auction at my families Christmas party last year and everyone loved it. You can hang your measuring cups from them, dish towels, keys, oven mitts, etc. This is a super easy and inexpensive project that is bound to liven up any kitchen!

You'll Need:

• 3 handrail rosettes 
• hot glu
• 2 forks and a spoon or 2 spoons and a fork---using a knife just looks weird
• spray paint
• 3 picture hangers

1. Spray paint your rosettes first so that they can be drying while you work on the other pieces of your project.

2. You will be surprised how easy it is to bend the silverware with your hands (especially, if it is the dollar tree brand). 

3. After the paint has dried, hot glue the silverware on the rosette and apply the picture hanger to the back.

4. Hang on the wall and enjoy. You can even make these into magnets!



Cheers. 

Customized Plates

Customize your own plates with Sharpies! You can do this project with anything glass, it does not have to be plates...Draw, write or color on whatever it is that you are wanting to customize with your Sharpies and bake it in the oven for 30 minutes at 350 degrees. (After baking, the ink is permanent and dishwasher safe.) These make perfect gifts and great decorations.

*No idea of what to get a friend for a wedding present? You could make personalized wine glasses paired with a bottle of wine.
*Never know what to get your in-laws? Make them a set of plates for their table or personalized glass vases.
*Always get your sugar and flour containers mixed up? Buy glass ones at the Dollar Store and customize them.
*Speaking of the Dollar Store, buy cheap glasses there and personalize them as party favors. I would pair it with a coaster or with a mini bottle of wine.
*If you have children, let them draw on a plate and let it be the plate that you leave Santa's cookies on!

Those are just some ideas of what you can do with this simple project! Hope you have fun with it!! (Helpful hint: Toothpaste takes permanent marker off hands and clothes. Scrub it into your clothes before washing them on cold...)


Cheers.

Childrens Headbands

I have to give credit to Alishia for teaching me how to make these cute little things! Make sure you check out her blog by clicking on her button on the side of my page; This DIY Mom's Diary.

A friend of mine is expecting a baby girl soon and I thought these would be the perfect little headband for her perfect little head. Who doesn't like to make things that are simple, quick and leave little to no mess when you're done?! I know I do. So, here we go...

You Need:

• fabric
• thread/needle
• scissors
• hot glue gun
• a button
• a hair pin/clip
• stretch headband
• old CD 
• pen

1. Pick your favorite fabric. On the backside, trace around your CD then cut the circle out. (If you're wanting to make the smaller ones, trace something smaller than a CD)

2. Starting from the underneath, sew a running stitch along the edge of your fabric. When you have sewn completely around, make sure the printed side of fabric is showing. Pull the thread tight and push center down so it looks like picture below. Your needle should be coming up from the middle, so thread it once back through the middle so your thread is coming out from the bottom.

3. Sew your button on (or anything else you want to use in the middle--broach, bead, etc). Tie thread off and cut off the access. Then hot glue it on a hair clip and attach it to headband.

BAM! You're done.

I love making these and I swear I find something new to put them on all the time. I've decorated picture frames, filled a bowl with them of all sizes and different solid colors to put on the coffee table, used them as the bow on presents, all kinds of stuff!


Cheers.

Wine Cork Shoe Mat

If there is one thing I love, it's my wine! I save every cork and usually buy them at winery's as well, not really knowing what I was going to do with them--until I figured out they would make a cute shoe mat! The corks soak up water and are easy to clean.

1. Acquire many, many, MANY corks. (Again, you can usually buy corks at winery's or craft stores--I didn't drink that much wine to make this DIY)

2. Lay them out however you'd like your mat to look. I used the back of a canvas to fit them all together.

3. Hot glue them all together. I used a separate canvas to transport the corks to so the ones I had fit together wouldn't lose their shape as I moved them to be glued. (It took way more glue sticks than I thought it would when I first started gluing.)

4. Add shoes.

AH! I love it and I hope you do too! If you don't want to use it as a shoe mat, the corks can also serve as a cork board for tacking pictures, recipes or whatever else you want to display.



Cheers.

The first of all my Olives

I've never done a blog, but I've kept a journal for as long as I can remember..and by 'journal' I mean ripped pieces of paper with things I did that day, sticky notes as reminders stuck everywhere in my house, movie stubs with names of who I went with, receipts from special occasions, and wine corks with dates on them...soooo, I guess it's not really a journal after all. I'm not sure what all this blog will consist of, other than my rambling about who knows what. I hope it will be an interesting, little opening into my life.

Speaking of how I have kept my 'journal' for so long, isn't it funny how things that really hold no purpose at all can be the hardest things to get rid of? I have a shoebox absolutely crammed full of notes that were written from fourth grade all the way up to my senior year in high school that I fear I will have until the day I die because I literally cannot bring myself to throw them away. I have movie tickets that are so old you cannot even read any of the print on them. The only way I know that they are in fact a movie ticket is because they're the funkiest green color and they are printed on the thinnest, slickest, little pieces of paper. I sure can't tell what movie we went to see, but the ink of the names are still plainly legible. Every planner I had in school never had my homework written in them..they consisted only of who I liked, who I didn't, what my weekend plans were and, of course, my mothers signature so I could go to recess (without a signature, you couldn't go to recess because that meant your parents hadn't been keeping up with your homework, that you were supposed to be keeping up with in your planner...however the teachers never looked at what you actually wrote down, they were only interested in the signature..which i always had).

Trying to put my thoughts together while listening to Pandora is ridiculously hard, especially when every song is a throw back one hit wonder that I know every word to and feel as though I MUST along! I bet Kathy The Cleaning Lady that is right outside my door is loving my high notes! Every time she comes to clean and I have to buzz her in, she always say's "it's me, Kathy, the cleaning lady", so it goes without saying, that that is what everyone calls her. I definitely do not have my own cleaning lady, I don't live in a ritzy house where I get to buzz people in or have the funds to afford a cleaning lady...I'm at work and she cleans the offices. However, I wish I had my very own Kathy The Cleaning Lady, she's entertaining and she cleans...what more could a person want? That is, unless I was mad, then Kathy The Cleaning Lady would have to just sit back and watch me make my entire house spotless. Sometimes I think Mitchell, my slightly taller other half, pushes just the right buttons on purpose so I will clean my little heart out, and dammit--he always wins.


Cheers.