Mel Designs

Jewelry Holder with Buttons

Pendants and beaded necklaces are the one jewelry item that I cannot go without. I needed a place to store some of the

Handmade Pillow from Fabric Scraps and Buttons

In an effort to scale down my fabric scrap stash so I will not feel guilty about buying more, I have been creating lots of fabric scrap projects. I got the idea for this pillow after seeing a similar one being sold for $100 from a pricey boutique.

I immediately knew I had all the materials I needed to make a similar one, including a cloudy and rainy but open Sunday afternoon that would allow me the time I needed to make the pillow from start to finish. 

I started by deciding how large my circles needed to be, then making some card stock patterns that I could use over and over again to trace the circles from the fabric and felt. This part is easy, either grab some food cans, use the bottom of cups and glasses from your kitchen, etc. and trace them on card stock with a pencil. If you are more technical by nature, use your computer to draw circles to your exact needed size and then print them out on card stock. Trim them out with a pair of scissors.

Next, use an iron and pressing surface to fuse Lite Steam a Seam by The Warm Company to your fabric scraps.

Trace the circles on your felt and fabric scraps with a pencil and a fabric marking pen. I opted for felt for my larger circles and fabric for the center of each felt circle since felt has finished edges.

I like to use wool felt by National Nonwovens. For this project I used whatever bright cheerful felt scraps I had leftover from previous projects. Peel off the paper backing from the fused fabric scraps, and use the iron to fuse the fabric to the felt circle.

As you can see, I opted for a cheerful colorful palette, but you can change up the scraps you use and match your own individual taste and decor. I had a blast using my sewing machine to free form stitch the felt and fabric scrap circles. There are several stitch options I have not tried before on my machine. Experimenting with the different types of stitches was fun.

If your machine is more basic, as my last one previously was, a straight stitch and zigzag used alternately will still produce a fun look.

Next, use a rotary cutter and self healing cutting pad to cut two pieces of felt for the pillow front and back. To do this, add a 1/2" seam allowance to the dimensions of your pillow. So, I used Fairfield Processing Corporation's Home Elegance pillow form in a 12" x 16" size. I cut my two 13"x 17" felt rectangles, using National Nonwovens "Haybale" colored felt.

Next, grab some colorful buttons and sew them to the center of each of the circles. I used Laura Kelly's Hand dyed Buttons from Buttons Galore and More in Candy Apple, Sunshine Yellow and Outrageous Orange.

I considered using a fabric glue to attach the sewn buttoned circles to the pillow front but decided to take the extra time and sew them on using a hand sewing needle and black sewing thread. Arrange your felt and fabric scrap circles to the pillow cover first, noting how many rows will cover the pillow from left to right, then top to bottom. (remember your 1/2" seam allowance). I needed about eight circles across and five circles down for mine.

This pillow was so much fun to make, I am going to make one for Mother's Day and another for my neices birthday to match her room.

Happy Scraping!

Live Life Creatively,

 

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Elmers Neon Pink Foam Board- Girl's Room Chalkboard Sign

 

 

Do you have a sign or project that needs to get noticed? Elmer's recently introduced this vibrant version of their Foam Board In a vibrant Neon Pink color.  It is available in a 20" x 30" sheet that is 3/16" thick. Elmer's Foam Boards are lightweight but strong and rigid enough to resist denting and crushing. The resilient polystyrene core bounces back after cutting to keep the board uniform edge to edge. The smooth surface satisfies a wide range of mediums including markers and paint. Perfect for crafts, school projects, framing and mounting!

 

 

When I decided to create this girl's chalkboard room sign, I immediately knew I wanted to try my hand at die cutting some foam board using my Sizzix BigShot Pro and layered flower dies. I used Elmer's White Foam Board in 3/16" thickness and die cut several flowers to embellish my sign. But before running pieces through the die cut machine, I cut them down to rectangles measuring approximately 6" x 8" so that they would fit through the die cutting machine. I used an X-Acto ® knife to cut the rectangles from the 20" x 30" sheet, using several passes with the knife.

 

Die cutting flowers from all the pieces cut from the foam board sheet  yielded several flowers.

To add just a bit of interest to the flowers, I used Elmer's Painter's ® Paint Markers in black to color details onto the foam board flowers, varying the patterns used

I stacked my flowers together, and used Elmer's CraftBond® Fabric & Paper Glue to hold the stacks together.

 

While the glue was setting up on my flower stacks, I painted the center portion of the Neon Foam Board with Chalkboard paint.

 

 

Chalkboard paint is widely available in both craft, home improvement stores and the DIY department of your local discount department store. I applied a couple of coats, let them dry and then lined the edges with the stacked flowers.

 

I also used the Black Painter's ® Paint Marker to dry brush the edges of the board. To do this, gently push the nib of the pen onto the surface of the board, allowing it to create a very small pool of paint. Then, with your index finger, swipe the paint across the surface for a dry brush effect

 

This Neon Pink Foam Board makes an adorable addition to Girl's Room Decor. Here are a few other ideas to inspire you;

• Make a vibrant cupcake stand. Using an X-acto knife, cut the board into several circles of different sizes and stack them. Place pretty cupcakes on your tiered stand to serve as a colorful centerpiece for baby showers, birthday parties, weddings or other Spring and Summer celebrations.
• Its a Girl! Wondering how to creatively welcome home the baby girl and the rest of the family? Imagine their delight when they arrive to see this explosion of pink embellished with appropriate motifs such as storks, baby rattles or the babies initials (all cut from Elmers's Foam Board). If the new addition is not a girl, consider making a cute sign for the big sister that proudly exclaims "Im being promoted to Big Sister, August 31st, 2013." She will adore and cherish for years to come!
• Create a wedding party or shower sign that gets noticed. Stencil on letters instructing guests which directions to go to arrive at the festivities. Decorate with flowers, birds, or other appropriate motifs in the couples wedding theme. Another hot wedding trend is the addition of the candy bar at receptions. Use the Neon Pink Foam Board to create a colorful and delicious sign for your candy bar.

 

Live Life Creatively,

 

 

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Recycled Wine Bottle Chalkboard Messages

Do you keep scores of recycled glass jars and bottles, wondering what to do with them? There are so many adorable ideas for recycling these days, its's no wonder we can't seem to part with normally discarded items such as these emptied, cleaned out and decorated wine bottles.

Lately, Ive been experimenting with DecoArt's Gloss Enamels. These paints, perfecy for painting on glass comes in a variety of finishes 3D Gloss Enamels, an opaque finish that has a raised effect because it has a precision nozzle but like regular brush on Gloss enamel is opaque.These paints are suitable for multiple purposes and adheres to glass, wood, papier maché, plaster, resin, ceramics, and many other craft surfaces. It can be baked at 325°F for 30 minutes for a dishwasher-safe finish. For those of you that prefer a more transparent effect on glass, for instance, check out Crystal Gloss Enamels, 3D Gloss Enamels or Crystal Gloss Enamels Glitter.

 
For these bottles, I brushed on Gloss enamels in Bright Orange and Calypso Blue. Once I had several coats on the bottle in the desired opaque finish, I baked them according to the manufacturer's instructions to cure the paint.

I then used a rectangular card stock template to trace the shape using a black permanent marker.

To add the chalkboard paint to the bottle, I used DecoArt's Chalkboard Paint for glass and a 1" brush to paint inside the traced rectangle. It will take more than one coat to get a nice opaque covered here.

  While my paint was drying between coats, I used a push mold and white Sculpey III to form several leaves and flowers. I baked the pieces according to the manufacturer's instructions and let them cool.

Use DecoArt's Americana Acrylics to paint the pieces in shades that coordinate with the Gloss Enamel colors.

I also dry brushed my pieces with Lamp Black for a vintage look.

Finally, I used a super strong adhesive to glue the clay shapes to the edges of the bottles, while the bottles were laying on their sides, working one area at a time.

Finally, I added some hemp from Hemptique to the neck of the bottles, wrapping around several times and securing with tacky glue.

Switch the messages out depending on whatever sentiment inspires you or with the changing of the seasons. These colors will be suitable through Spring, Summer and well into Fall.

Hope you enjoyed this idea from Mel Designs!

Live Life Creatively,

Handmade Laundry Room Organizer- "Missing Socks"

If you are like me and hoards of other people, you have scores of mismatched socks. Where do missing socks go once they leave the dryer, if they ever really do? I guess the logical conclusion is that they cling to the insides of paints, arm sleeves, etc. On more than one occasion, I put on my yoga pants only to discover a renegade sock stuck to the inside leg. 

Sometimes they take longer to turn up, if at all.  After a couple of months of hanging onto mismatched socks, I usually just give up and find other uses for them. Some of my socks have turned into sock monkeys, draft stoppers (I once fashioned a long white sock into a snowman draft stopper, it was quite cute actually) or sock puppets. My dad uses them to wax the car.

I once designated a basket in my laundry room for the purpose of tucking away mate less socks in hopes that they would eventually be reunited with their partners. And do you know what, I did eventually match them up about 95% of the time, which still left a few for becoming snowman draft stoppers.

The missing sock phenomena inspired me to create this wood board plaque, perfect for storing mate less socks until a successful reunion can be made with its partner sock. Its more decorative then my basket and I can see which socks are missing at a glance.

 I raided my fabric scraps and torn them into strips, each measuring about 2" x 8." (The length and width of your torn strips will vary according to the size of the die cut you will be using, discussed a bit later) To join the strips together, I simply overlapped the pieces slightly (1/4") and sewed a straight stitch down the center. I joined together three strips, mixing and matching prints and solids.

Since I was using the Sizzix BigShot Die Cutting Machine and Bird die, I cut a card stock bird out first to make sure the fabric strips covered the entire die, and I didn't end up with a bird with no tail or beak or something.

Once I was ready, I set about die cutting my birds from the joined fabric strips, three of them.

Here is a quick look at my die cut fabric scrap birds.

Pretty but I thought the needed a bird more detail. I used my sewing machine and black thread to free form sew around the edges of the birds.

These turned out to be cute little scrap fabric embellishments for my laundry room organizer!

I chose DecoArt's Americana Acrylics in Lamp Black and Cadmium Yellow to paint the wood pieces. Bear in mind that Cadmimum Yellow is a transparent paint. It will take several coats to cover the board or you can use a more semi-opaque paint such as Lemon Yellow for a similar shade and color. I painted the sign board, which came from Walnut Hollow, black first, along with the clothespins, which I painted all black.

To create an aged effect on the board, which gives it a little more interest and matches my shabby chic decor, I painted yellow over the black and sanded the surface to let some of the black show through. The opposite applies to these teardrop shaped wings. I painted them yellow first and then black.

If you desire different colors to match your existing decor, DecoArt has a multitude of paint colors to choose from.

Once I had all my pieces painted, It was time to begin assembling the board. I used DecoArt's new medium, "Deco-pauge" with a foam brush to apply the birds to the sign board.

I used a heavy duty adhesive such as Beacon Adhesives Gem-Tac to attach the clothespins. Make sure you use a liberal amount of the adhesive as these clothespins will be handled frequently.

Finally, I used some 1" alphabet stamps and black pigment ink to stamp "missing socks" on the surface of the board. Several small bits and pieces of embellishments later, and a handmade laundry room organizer was born perfect for keeping track of those "missing socks." Maybe this will save me money replacing all those socks I never found and matched up with its mate!

Live Life Creatively,

Elmers Cork Foam Board- Creative Space Organizer

Elmer's ® has a new innovative surface called Cork Foam Board. It is the perfect solution to getting
better organized in your home office or creative space. I got lucky recently
and was sent some Cork Foam Board Sheets to "experiment" with. I came up with this organizer project using the Cork Foam Board along with Elmers's Foam Board and of course their adhesives. It was stenciled with Crafter's Workshop Stencils and Elmer's Painters ® Paint Markers. The Cork Foam Board is lightweight and features a sturdy construction which makes it a great alternative to heavy cork boards. It is 3/8" thick so it will withstand push pins without them going through the
back of the board.

I placed my stencil on the surface of the Cork Foam Board. I used Painters Paint Markers in Black, Brown and Green to color in the birds, branches and leaves respectively. I loved stenciling using the
Painters Paint Markers because the medium point of the pens allowed perfect
precision.

The surface of the Foam Cork Board was smooth and easy to use the paint markers on. I stenciled on one side of the board to use for tacked notes,fabric swatches, inspiration photographs, found objects, etc. The other side I plan to use to organize some of my creative supplies so I constructed some
lightweight yet durable boxes from Elmer's Foam Board.

To construct your own organizational boxes, determine the desired finished size of the box. So for pencils, I thought 5" x 6" box with an open top would work nice. So I marked and measured that on the Foam Board and cut out the pieces with an X-Acto ® knife on a self-healing cutting mat. Next, determine what sized pieces you need to use for the sides and bottom of the box. Cut those pieces out with the knife.

Construction of the box is easy. Just place Craft Bond ® Tacky Glue on the edges and join the two
pieces together. To hold in place, insert some straight pins into the sides. You can remove them once the glue sets. Or, you can leave them inserted, just make sure they are pushed all the way into the foam so you will not stick your fingers when you use the boxes.

Color your boxes with the Black Painters Paint Marker or your color of choice. Plan to use two or three coats and let the coats dry in between. Note that I also stenciled designs onto these boxes.

I divided my organizer into sections by adding a Foam Board strip colored with black.

 

If you want a smaller version of this organizer, the Cork Foam Board cab be easily cut into smaller sections.

Ths is one creative way to organize your space. What is your favorite way to organize your creative space?

Live Life Creatively,

 

 

Shabby Chic Napkin Rings with Buttons and Brads

Hop on over to the Buttons Galore and More Blog for instructions on how I made these pretty shabby chic napkin rings. I used Cozy Brads, wooden buttons from the Haberdashery and cameos to make a mixed media assemblage perfect for decorating your Spring table. Leave a comment while you are there and let me know what you think!

Live Life Creatively,

 

Dyed Hemp Wrapped Bottles

Jump to the Crafts n Things Blog where I am a guest designer to discover how I created this eco-friendly craft. Using Rit Dyes and hemp products from Hemptique, these bottles can be personalized with house address numbers, lucky numbers significant dates, etc. Step by step instructions can be found here.

Live Life Creatively,

Metallic Mosaic Box with Elmers Painters Pens

 

Creating sophisticated, beautiful home decor is easy to do with painters pens. When I received these  Painters ® Metallic Shimmer Paint Markers from Elmers, I instantly fell in love with the pretty color palette and the precision the pens offer. 

These colorful opaque acrylic paint markers are perfect for decorating, drawing and personalizing almost any surface.  They can be used on wood, plastic, clay, ceramic, glass, metal, foam board, fabric, terracotta and other surfaces.

I decided they would be perfect for creating a mosaic box using this wooden keepsake box and creative metal products from Walnut Hollow.     
I used a Sizzix Bigshot die cutting machine and embossing folder to create a pretty pattern on the metal sheets before I colored them.

I love how the pens offer great precision and are less messy than using a brush.

I used the black pen found in the Bright Colors package to paint the box. Getting into small crevices is really easy with the paint pen tip.

I used all of the pens in the Metallic Shimmer package to color the embossed sheets.

Once the sheets were painted, I cut them into various sizes using a paper trimmer. I measured the sides of the box lid and box bottom so that the width would fit nicely and made the length variable.

I arranged the sheets into a pattern resembling a mosaic, leaving small spaces in between each sheet. Once the pattern was arranged, I used a the CraftBond™ Permanent Dot Runner on the back of each sheet.

Finally, I used Elmers Super Glue to attach a pretty vintage brooch to the lid in the center of the box.

This box was so fun to do without the usual crafty mess. I loved that I could use the pens on both the metal sheets and the wooden box. The result? A sophsticated and shimmering mosaic box. 

Live Life Creatively, 

                                                                                           

Chalkboard Napkin Rings

These days, chalkboard adorns everything from wine glasses to fabric pillow. So many varieties of chalkboard paint are available on the market that it is impossible to escape this super fun trend. Take a quick look at Pinterest and you will discover all kinds of recipes for creating your own chalkboard paint in any color imaginable plus a multitude of fun projects to use this paint on.

I ran into these fun 2" x 3" mini chalkboard pieces in the unfinished wood craft supply section of my local JoAnn's Fabrics and Crafts. They are made by Darice. I immediately knew I wanted to do something with them but wasn't sure exactly what right away. I remembered I had purchased some wood beveled napkin rings in bulk so of course! Napkin Rings.

With the addition of some polymer clay and paint in bright colors, I knew they would be unique as a table accessory/place marker.

I chose DecoArt's Americana Acrylics in bright, fun colors.

I painted the wood pieces in alternating colors.

To add a little embellishment to them, I used a plastic mould made for polymer clay and Sculpey III by Polyform in Silver.

When using plastic moulds, it helps to dust the surface with corn starch. This allows the clay to peel away from the mold more easily.

A little conditioned clay was pressed into the mould, shaped and peeled away.

This is a shot of the clay pressed and formed into the mould.

Now the clay is being peeled away. And here you have the finished shape!

I also opted to decorate the center of the wood ring with clay strips. I rolled out the clay into thin strips using an acrylic roller. I used a clay knife to cut thin strips to fit into the center of the beveled wood napkin ring.

I used solvent ink and a script font stamp to add some texture to the strips.

I wrapped the strips around the center of the wood ring and baked them along with the fancy moulded shapes according to the directions on the package.

 When the clay was cured and cooled. I dry brushed the fancy shape, glued it to the center top of the chalkboard frame and added a little flat backed gem stone.

  I used a super stong glue to attach the chalkboard frames to the wood rings. These napkin rings can be used over and over again. I love napkin ring projects. Almost any material can be used to make them including recycled materials. They can instantly bring an entirely new personality to table decor. Thanks for letting me share my idea with you!

Live Life Creatively,