CREATE - Inspired Art!

 

I am FINALLY done with my inspired art!!  I mentioned a few weeks ago that I have been dying to do my own version of this design that I saw on The Pleated Poppy.  After I finished my neutral wreath last weekend I finally sat down to paint.

 

I used two pieces of wood just like my thread holder and pushed them together.  I used metal brackets on the back to hold the two pieces together.  You could just as easily buy a sheet of plywood and have it cut to size (this would probably be cheaper) but I just used what I had lying around!Eventually this will be hanging above our bed in the bedroom.

 

My project differs from the original in that I painted on wood instead of canvas.  I'm just a sucker for warm wood tones and bright pops of color!

 

This beast took FOREVER to complete - partly due to my ADHD and my general slowness.  Totally worth the end product though!

 

Progress shots taken with my iPhone:

 

 

And now, feast your eyes on some eye candy, cause there's a TON!

 

Side note: These adorable ceramic egg crates are at World Market for only $4.99!!

 

 

Cheers!!

 

A New Wreath!

 

It's about that time for a new wreath!  As much as I enjoyed my winter wreath I was getting tired of it.  I originally wanted to make a wreath with a light background and tons of bright accents, but this is what I had in my craft stash so it's what I ended up with!

 

 

I wrapped one small section with a cream colored yarn then went over it again with a tan yard to add contrast.  The rest is wrapped in strips of muslin (I think that's what it is).

 

 

I added a very simple embelishment of burlap, topped with a yo-yo flower and one of my DIY wood buttons.

 

 

I liked the "Cheers" portion of my winter wreath so I added a similar banner by folding fabric over burlap.  I used my mini stamp letters to stamp on the word "Cheers."

 

 

I was feeling crafty this weekend and also started on the inspired canvas I saw on The Pleated Poppy.  I hope to have it finished by next weekend!

 

Cheers!

CRAPTASTIC's New Look!

For months now I've been thinking I wanted to pay a blog designer to update the look of CRAPTASTIC to something that I love and is custom to my taste.  The reality of it all is that I'm cheap and just couldn't justify forking over the cash since my blogging has been so sporadic lately.

 

So I turned to google to find some tutorials about blog design and was lucky enough to stumble across  Something Swanky!  She has an entire series about DIY Blog Design!  Even better, she dumbs it down enough so those folks like myself that aren't very tech savvy can customize their blog!

 

Thanks to awesome free sites like Pic Monkey and Image-Maps I finally have a new look that I LOVE!

 

Yeah, I spent all day working on it, but a lot of that is because I'm OCD and spend an absurd amount of time tweaking things.

 

Here's to hoping the new do will inspire me to blog more!

 

 

Cheers!



Discreet Pad Pouch!

Where in the world has this past month gone?!  I can't believe it's already Feburary!

 

Our new house is coming along quickly.  In a little over three months we will finally be moved in.

 

They've got most of the brick put up on the exterior:

 

 

Even though the interior is still bare, we have a lot of fun walking through the house each time we visit and envisioning what the house will look like once we're moved in!

 

 

Although we still haven't sold our current house, we've had a TON of lookers.  We're hoping to get an offer within the next month!

 

In the meantime I haven't really done any craft projects.  Between trying to keep the house spotless to sell and starting a new schedule at my job I haven't had a lot of time or energy.

 

I did, however, find this project that I never blogged about.  It's a discreet pad pouch!

 

I don't know about you folks, but I always have my lady supplies floating around my purse.  I always accidently pull them out when I'm trying to find my debit card, or I can't find one when I need it.  So I made this cute pouch to keep things discreetly stored.

 

 

I just made up the dimensions as I went along.

 

 

The front has a patterned flying geese design while the back has a coordinating solid color flying geese design.

 

 

The strap is velcro for easy access and closing.

 

I love this pouch for work.  I can tote it around in my lab coat pocket without anyone knowing what I'm toting!

 

If I have time tonight or tomorrow I might get started on this painting project:

 

 

I've been completely smitten with this cute painting from The Pleated Poppy and I've been wanting to try my on take on it!  I'll be sure to share it once I'm done!

 

Have a great weekend!

 

Cheers!

Cheap and Easy DIY Christmas Ornament Storage!

We finally got around to cleaning up our Christmas decor and are starting to feel some normalcy again. Over the years we've continued to acquire more ornaments, and I've added a few DIY ones to the mix. We have finally reached the point of needing more than an old shoe box to store everything.

This is an incredibly cheap and easy way to store all your Christmas ornaments and knick-knacks. I bought the supplies last year, so I don't remember the exact amount, but it runs around $10 or less.

You can purchase the wood rod, 3/4" at Lowes or Home Depot, and find a large plastic storage bin at Target or Big Lots.
 

 

I made sure that 1/2 the length of the wood rod would be long enough to fit across the bin with some excess.  It fit perfectly, so I used my jigsaw to cut the wood rod in half.  It came to 24".

 

I then used my drill attachments to drill four holes in the plastic bin.  My wood rod was 3/4", so I used my 3/4" drill bit.

 

 

The two halves of the wood rod fit nice and snug into the holes.  This is perfect because I didn't want any wiggle room.

 

 

I placed my burlap tree skirt in the bottom of my bin, followed by an old wreath.  Then the hubby and I walked around the tree looping ornaments onto the two halves of the wood rod.

 

I got this sweet little guy from my Mom this Christmas and wanted to keep him out year round! Isn't he cute!!

 

 

Once all the ornaments are hung on the two rods just slide them back into the slots and you're all done packing!

 

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The bin is still very lightweight, and there is no wiggle room for the ornaments to fall off.  Any ornaments we have that don't have a loop I just hung off one of the other ornaments.

 

 

Here they are all snug and packed away for next Christmas!

 

 

You may find that my posting is sporadic for the next few months.  The hubby and I are finally moving into a home closer to where we both work!  It's being built now and our closing date is May 24th.  I won't be completing as many projects as I did last year since we need to keep our house clean and I don't have anywhere to put new stuff now!

 

Here is the view of our new lot!

 

 

This is the beautiful tree line behind out property.  There is a creek not too far from our house so there will never be any homeowners behind us!  We're ecstatic!

 

 

I hope you all have had a good start to the New Year!  So far 2013 is looking good for us!

 

Cheers!