fibers & pixels & beads oh my!

Awesome Ornament Wreath

I will absolutely be doing this!!!

First up…a stop at the Dollar Tree. I don’t know if you frequent that place, but being a teacher, I swear I’m there ALL the time. The last time I was there, I saw that they had a pretty cute little selection of ornaments, so that’s where I scored what I needed for this fun little do-it-yourself project.

Here’s what you’ll need to get started…

A glue stick, a wire coat hanger, and ornaments. I love the look of different sized ornaments, so as you can see, I have a little assortment of both big, medium, & small for mine :)

Take your wire hanger and bend it into a circle…or in my case, something that’s in the ballpark of being circular?!

Now. This next part is VERY important. I didn’t think so at first, but it is. You need to secure the metal hook to the ornament with hot glue. OTHERWISE, your balls will pop off in all different directions and it’ll take you 10 x’s longer to do something that should only take 30 minutes out of your day. I tried to do this without the hot glue and this is what happened…

Thank the Lord I was only about 4 ornaments into the project or I’d have been BEYOND annoyed!!! Once you’ve secured your ornaments, just thread them on to the hanger. It’s gonna look like it’s not working at first and you’ll wonder if you’ve missed a step. I mean, this hardly looks like Eddie Ross’s version…

But keep going…and make sure to alternate colors and sizes as you go. I used my teensy ornaments to fill in the gaps and it worked perfectly! The more you add, the better it looks. See?!…

I was getting SO excited as I kept going. Okay, my excitement might’ve been interrupted with the occasional cuss word when I burnt my fingers with the hot glue gun or when one of my cheap little ornaments broke, but all-in-all, I was PUMPED!!! When I was finally finished, I couldn’t believe it was actually as easy as Eddie said it would be!!!!

I mean, c’mon y’all. That’s dang cute. Word to the wise…if you do use the Dollar Tree ornaments, just beware that the hooks break easily :) I used a total of 70 ornaments for this little project, but I could’ve probably used a little more!!! When you’re finished, you might have a little workspace that looks like this…

And if you’re anything like me, you might actually think about leaving everything where it is for your husband to clean up the next day.

Now I need to figure out where to put it!!!!

Total cost: $11.

Not too shabby, right?!

Little Lion Man, Mumford & Sons. I love their sound.

Epsom Salt Candles

Easy and cheap decorating idea.

Just roll your candle in Mod Podge and then in Epsom salts. These two photos are Emily’s, but I am for sure doing this with my daughters this year.

Easy Screen Printing

From Avie Designs Blog- Screen Printing

I‘ve seen a lot of easy screen printing set up in my time but this has to be the easiest and most genius. Heather over at Skinny Laminx is teaching a class on the easiest screen printing and it looks amazing.

I think I can do it based on this one image alone. Get an embroidery hoop, some silk, a credit card, fabric paint, contact paper and get printing. All you have to do is cut your design out of contact paper, adhere it to your little screen and get printing. The credit card acts as a squeegee.

This may be next weekends project. Now I just need to find something that needs screen printing.

(Source: aviedesigns.blogspot.com)

Make your own chalkboard paint in any color

HOW TO MIX CHALKBOARD PAINT IN ANY COLOR

We love using chalkboards as backdrops for displays and parties (like this one here!). So we were super excited to learn that you can create your own custom colors-and it’s really easy! We first learned how from Martha Stewart whose tutorial you can read here. She recommends that you use latex paint, but we tried it out with acrylic paints with much success. Here’s how you too can create your own chalkboard paint…

Supplies: 1/2 cup acrylic paint (choose any color you like, or mix colors together to make the perfect shade!), 1 tablespoon unsanded grout (this can be purchased at most hardware/home improvement stores, we got ours at Home Depot), mixing cup or bowl, spoon, paint brush and an object or board you plan to paint on.

1. Measure out your paint and grout. The unsanded grout is a fine powder so be sure to work in a well ventilated area.

2. Stir the grout into the paint until no lumps remain. 3. Paint your surface with your new custom chalkboard paint! The paint will begin to harden once it is mixed, so only mix what you need at one time as it won’t store as well as other paints.

Once your chalkboard has fully dried be sure to slate the surface before using it for the first time. To slate a chalkboard lightly rub chalk along the surface and then lightly rub it off.