Doggone Cute Cupcakes

I am a pet person. Like REALLY a pet person. Unfortunately for me (and fortunately for my Husband who IS NOT a pet person) we live in an apartment. One day I will have my Irish Wolfhounds, a big back yard and my one sassy cat.

 

Until that day I live vicariously through Pinterest whose obsession with pets 1) Can be a bit alarming  2) Sometimes hilarious  3) Maybe a little over creative and 4) Awesome because pets are awesome and we love them to death. Also 5) Grumpy Cat...because I love her (my apologies Tardar Sauce, you are in fact a girl...misprint!).

http://blog.catmoji.com/2012/09/cat-of-the-week-10-tard-the-grumpy-cat/

 

 

Michell sent us this pin she made for a friends birthday. She said her friend really loves her West Highland White Terrier pooches.

 

If you don't know what that is...exhibit A:

http://blog.catmoji.com/2012/09/cat-of-the-week-10-tard-the-grumpy-cat/

 

Adorable right!?!

 

The Original

http://www.familycircle.com/recipes/desserts/decorate-playful-puppy-cupcakes/?page=1

 

Can I just say that people are SUPER inventive with cupcakes?!

 

Well Michell went to make these and first go round this happened...

 

 

The Pinstrosity

 

 

These puppies look more like an undercover Miss Piggy ( I think the eyes look like sunglasses lol)!

No worries, Michell had patience and persistence and tried again with MUCH better results!

 

The Pin-Win!

 

 

 

 

I think Michell's are WAY cuter than the original!

She said her kitchen was WAY to hot making all the icing melt on the cupcake AND the proportions of the ingredients weren't a good match.

She changed up some of the supplies, cooled down the kitchen and went to work. The size of the large marshmallows as the snout were way too big for her cupcakes, I think she either cut the marshmallow in half and used that as the base of the snout or just built the snout out of icing. Either way it looks awesome! Unfortunately you have to be subscribed to the original website to figure out all their design secrets, so she was going off a picture here! She did great (second go round), her final product turned out adorable!

 

Hope you all have a awesome Tuesday!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Costumes, Paint and Minding the Details

I love Halloween. Okay, I know...I say that with every holiday. I just love holidays. So let me be more "pacific". I love creating costumes for Halloween. I get such a kick out of it. As Merle is due Nov. 1st, I have no idea if I'll be super duper pregnant on Halloween, or if I'll have a baby on Halloween. If I have Merle by Halloween, I'm pretty sure Halloween is going to slip by pretty unnoticed this year. If I'm still pregnant, maybe I'll go sit at the trunk-or-treat as Violet Beauregard (from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) or something like that. Or Darth Pregger. We'll see what happens. But I'm not too worried about it at this point. Years past though we've tried to make our costumes ourselves and to even help out my siblings one year when my parents had to be out of town. For those of you already thinking on ideas and trying to figure out how to do costumes on the cheap, let me show you a few of the costumes we've come up with over the past few years (there is a Pinstrosity associated with all of this, I promise):

Wind blown and a Scandinavian Troll. 

Mine didn't turn out so great...I tried to slick my hair straight back and it just ended up looking like a greasy mess. But I did have a scarf that I threaded a wire through so it would stick out straight behind me. For the trunk or treat I also had a newspaper wrapped around my leg. 

Cameron's costume that year is still one of my favorites. We used an old shirt and an old pair of pants that were worn out (but you could find some at the thrift store). We shredded the edges, rubbed them in dirt and ashes in spots, and then added patches. You can't see it in the picture, but I made an awesome tail (wire wrapped in layers of fabric so that the tail stuck out) that pokes out of a patch in the back;it's my favorite part of that whole costume. The vest is just gunny-sacks from the local feed store (they just gave them too him). We did have to buy the wig and the nose (it's a witch's nose technically), but those were our entire purchases for that costume). 

  Captain Cam the Pirate

For this he just wore the troll pants (and tucked the tail in a pocket so it didn't show) and shirt, and then we added the rest. I found the jacket robe thing at the thrift store for $2 (it had rips in it, which we were fine with) and then found pirate buttons at one of the local fabric stores. I found the red fabric for the sash in my stash, and then we found a tutorial online to make the hat (it called for felt, but I had this faux cheapo leather stuff someone gave me so I used that). Simple, cheap, but way fun!

 Em and Quorra

Last year I decided to go as Emilee for Halloween. While at her house one afternoon I quietly stashed some of her clothes and jewelry in my bag, hehehe. Then I just bought a can of that temporary hair color spray and the costume was complete. Cheap and super super fun. Emilee was Quorra that year and pulled it off great. You can see how she put the costume together in one of our previous Show-and-Tell Saturday posts. 

 The Girl With the Pearl Earring

I know...it's not exact. But a number of people where able to tell what I was going for (most were art students). I just rummaged through both mine and my mom's closet and fabric stashes and sorta pieced my outfit together, and then the frame was one I had bought at a thrift store for $4 a few years before. 

 Darth Vader

He already had the mask, but I helped him get a cape put together and we painted cardboard to look like the panel on Darth Vader's suit. 

 Sir Bedevere from Monty Python and the Holy Grail

This costume for my brother took a black shirt and pants, a black belt, a sheet, a paper grocery bag, and a large piece of cardboard. We pulled up pictures online and painted the sheet and cardboard shield to look like Sir Bedevere's coat of arms, and then tried to fashion a helmet out of the paper bag to match Sir Bedevere's. He pulled this off awesomely and even talked and walked like him all night, it was hilarious. 

Cartoon Character

This was my first attempt at anything like this. We didn't have a specific cartoon character in mind...just an anime sort of character I guess. I didn't have face paint, so we just used craft acrylics (which worked great and washed off with no problems). I'd do the eyes a little different if I did it again, but that wasn't bad for a first try. One thing though that would have helped to make her look more cartoonish would have been painting her lips, but I didn't think of that at the time. So...if you're wanting to be a cartoon character of some sort...don't forget the lips. In fact, there's a great pin about painting good cartoon lips floating around out there on Pinterest. 

The Original Pin:

http://beautifyandcreatify.blogspot.com/2013/06/cartoon-lips.html

Those really would have been perfect for my sister's cartoon costume. And it looks so easy! It is easy...but there are a few tricks and things to remember when doing this. Chelsee and her sister decided to try making these comic lips and sent us their results. 

The Pinstrosity

Still not bad, but they don't quite have that comic book/cartoon character look they were going for. A few small tweaks though and they would have it spot on. 

• First, exaggerate the shape of the lips. Most girls and women don't have the "perfectly" shaped cupid's bow (or tubercle). That's the center of your upper lip with the two points and the curve. I had to look up the "official" names for it. Most of us (including most of the women in magazines...they just have makeup artists and photoshop to enhance their features) have super defined peaks on our lips, but if you exaggerate the shape with both the base color and the black lip liner you can get that look. If you look in the original instructable, you can see that when they added the black liner they made the two peaks look closer together and more defined than they really are. 
• Second, go thin on the black crease lines in the center of the lips. You do need the black crease lines there, but you'll want them to be thin and for there to be around 5 main lines on both the upper and lower lip. This can be hard if your pencil or paintbrush isn't very thin, I know. But if possible go for thin lines and at least 5 major lines on each lip. 
• Third: make the white stand out. This is really what is going to make the lips pop. Add layer upon layer if you need to to get the white to show up really well. 
• Fourth: Go Bold. Bright lip color. Dark black lines. Bright white lines. 

Don't let yourself get frustrated with this. It may take a time or two to get it just right, but you can do it! Just don't rush it and don't fudge on the details...they are what make any painting pop. 

So I hope this helped jump start your Halloween ideas...and if not, I hope it at least entertained you. Give DIY a try this Halloween. You don't have to go super fancy and be sewing for days...you can get a fun and super cheap costume with supplies you have on hand and cheap add-ons from the thrift store. And going that route you know you  or your kid/spouse/sister/brother/dog/etc. will have a unique costume, rather than the same store bought one as the kid down the street (not that it's a competition...it's just super fun!). 

10 (or more) Thoughts on Hair Chalking

**As with ANY hair tutorial, I have to emphasize that all hair is different, it all reacts different, and depending on what products you are using you will get different results. This is a general post to help with some general do's and don'ts.**

 

So if I was a blonde at this moment I would head right over to my bathroom and try this out, however currently I am a vibrant red head so that wouldn't quite work as well ( give it two weeks though and my hair will be completely different, so goes the life of a hairdresser).

 

 I'm sure you all have seen the Hair Chalking Pins on Pinterest, and well I too have wondered if they really work.

 

Tonya sent us her and her daughters attempt at this pin, check it out!

 

The Original

http://media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/originals/0f/19/c1/0f19c1a0564f3bf1a2d81906ccaf0ae2.jpg

 

This pin uses chalk and wet hair to put a kind of stain on the hair of vibrant fun colors. Lets see how it worked for Tonya:

 

The Pinstrosity

(Super Fun Graphic By the Way)

 

I love that she put this all together just like you see it on Pinterest.

 

 

1.So here are a few of my thoughts on this, first off the original says to take a section of already styled hair and get part of it wet. That makes no sense, the girls in those pictures would have to have gone through and blow dried each piece and then styled it, after styling all the rest of their hair, you might as well do this with all of your hair wet. Seeing the results of Tonya's experience I don't feel like bleeding will be an issue.

 

2.Another thing to consider about this from the get go is that it IS NOT PERMANENT. This is not "dying" your hair, it is a stain. Like when you drink red Kool-aide, your lips are pink or red for a bit but not forever, in fact if you get your lips super wet after that it tends to fade off into oblivion. Some people have said this stayed for a day, while others a week or more. Like I stated before, it all depends on the product and the hair.

 

3.So the directions say to wet hair, wear gloves (you don't have to do this, it is after all just chalk), and then go through and color the piece of hair to the desired shade. Keep in mind here wet chalk always looks darker then when it is dry. Then you dry the pieces of hair and hit it with a heat tool to lock in the color. Some people suggest twisting the hair while chalking, others don't. Play around and see what works best for you.

 

Again keep in mind, this isn't permanent. By "hitting it with heat" you aren't magically coloring your hair, this is simply allowing the chalk to stain a little more.

 

4.Now looking through everything I see that Tonya wet the hair, then wet the chalk, I don't see that step on the original, and I don't feel that that will do anything to help this process along really. It might not even make a difference so take that to mind when doing this as well. I have seen some tutorials use soft chalks with great success, so that might also be an option.

 

5.Tonya used a heat protectant on the hair before hitting it with any hot tool, I would like to suggest you do this as well. High heat is damaging to hair and this will prevent any damage from happening. I don't think this should have any adverse affects on the coloring either.

 

She used a wet-to-straight flat iron. I wouldn't suggest that simply because they get REALLY hot and your hair really doesn't need that much applied heat. This is a personal opinion, I AM NOT saying that if you use a wet-to-straight that you are a bad hair person or that your hair will be super damaged. I have used one before and I really didn't enjoy the process or results so this is merely a personal preference. I would suggest using a heat protectant spray, then blow drying ( or air drying if you are patient enough), then using a hot tool to "lock" in the color.

 

6.I have also read that using hair spray then a  hot tool can help the color stick around as well. Now bare in mind I haven't tried this, but I have done a some research here and there and these are all just suggestions.

 

7.Another suggestion: This is for girls who have bleach blonde hair this can stain for a REALLY long time, if you are ok with that go for it, if not be warned! Your hair is more porous from lightening and can tend to pick up colors really easy. You probably already know this if you go to the pool a lot (green tint anyone? Be cautious Gwen Stefani's of the world! Even the one day color spray (think Halloween) can have BAD affects on your light locks!

 

8.Tonya stated that the hair had a stiff icky texture, I would venture to say that sounds about right. If we look at it really we are ironing chalk into the hair. Don't expect your hair to feel silky smooth, but it also won't be sticking straight up either. It will feel different, but its not forever and if you can handle parts of your hair feeling a little stiff for a bit of colors sake then I say go for it.

 

9.Here is where I think Tonya ran into trouble: brushing. While going through and doing some research a lot of places said to get rid of the color before trying to wash it out they brushed it really good. So there you have it, if it is intensely tangled LIGHTLY comb through it with a pick or your fingers but be gentle and don't over do it. Tonya brushed her daughters hair after all the steps and the color all but disappeared....just a heads up! Its a bummer too because I wouldn't think that that would make all the difference, and if the hair was tangly I too would think " Well let's just brush it real quick and then we'll be done!" but now we know. Thanks for testing that one out for us Tonya (and daughter), and I'm sorry it didn't work for you because that color was just fabulous!

 

10.I need to also add that blues and greens are hard tones to keep and it may take more "chalking" then you anticipated to get your hair to the desired shade.

 

So there you have it, my ten thoughts on Hair Chalking.

Try it out, try different colors, brands, methods and let us know! Anyone have any experience with this?! I am writing this from a  hairdressers experience and expertise but if you have done this before and have some fun pointers we would love to hear them!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



Duct Tape Craze, Creative or Crazy?!

So Marquette is off in the throws of our church's girls camp and so your stuck with me this week! Muahahahahah!!

 On a bright note, we have fun stuff for you this week so make sure and check in with us all week! Woohoo!

 

Stacey is feelin' the heat, the summer heat that is, and I have to admit I have been too. It is IMPOSSIBLE to work out when it is humid, I feel like I can't breath!! For those of you who aren't familiar, Marquette and I live in Southern New Mexico and have been enjoying the heat, however seeing as it is monsoon season it has been HUMID (for us anyways) and all of us down here feel like we are going to DIE! I don't know how all ya'll in Florida, Georgia, anywhere where it's humid really do it! How do you deal with it?! I feel like I am dying! :(

 

 

Well anyways again with the heat, Stacey sent us this Pinstrosity, she told about how it is just too hot to send your kiddos outside to play and I can't blame her, so she stayed inside and they did Duct Tape crafts!!

 

This is a big trend right now, and the Duct Tape company even holds a Duct Tape Prom competition every year. If you haven't seen this Google it, its really pretty amazing! It's a bunch of super talented creative kids! I love it!

 

**Enough chatter lady, where are the pictures?! Cue impatient blog hungry reader haha ;)**

 

The Original

http://pinterest.com/pin/187532771953710242/

 

http://pinterest.com/pin/31032684902244361/

 

Stacey used two pictures as her Pinspiration, however she had a hard time finding an actual tutorial for a duct tape hat.

With that being said, here are her and her kiddos creations!

 

The Pinstrosity

How cute are they?!?! (the kids lol)

 

Well they aren't exactly baseball caps, but they do make hat status, I'm thinking more of a Peter Pan look?!
What do we think readers?!
She had a hard time with the amount of tape on the roll depending on what type of pattern you got.

Note to readers: Glow In the Dark does NOT have very much on it haha

 

Her first misstep was buying the tape and then deciding on a project.

Always decide your project and then grab your materials.

The other snag she ran into here was that there weren't any written directions just pictures.

Well I think I have an answer for you Stacey...Drum Roll Please!!!

The duct is put on top of an actual baseball cap.

 

I feel this would be the best way to do it anyways, it gives you the structure you need, the shape, and well it's just dang convenient.

Not to mention I think that is what is going on in the original photos as well.

 

So there it is, mystery solved! If you don't have a hat on hand, this would be a great time to go to the thrift store and get a cheap used one, you can wash it in the washer and then tape it up. Or the dollar store for that matter, it doesn't have to be cute so it can be any color or logo really.

There are few things in this world I WILL NOT buy from the thrift store including but not limited to:

Underwear

Swimsuits

Lingerie

Robes

Hats

Socks

Food

Lotions/soaps etc. (some leniency given to unbroken seals and packages)

 

Well HATS are USUALLY on the list, but seeing as the hat itself will not be near the skin (lice anyone? head sweat? Being a cosmetologist I just have lots of horror stories). I think you will be ok using a thrifted hat for this since it is fully covered by tape when it is all said and done.

 

With that being said I would like to mention the sad ordeal her little man had to go through with exposed sticky portion of the tape being exposed on the underside of the hat. Make sure that there is no sticky exposed on the inside or you will have some balding going on! Ouch!

 

All in all I think this is completely fixable, and her kids loved doing the project, and the ending product so for that I say it was a win that day!

Any Duct Tape experts out there willing to give us some "Insider Tips and Tricks"?!

Sound off below! We love your feedback!

 

 

 



Supply Cake

We should have internet at home again on Monday. I can't wait! I'd forgotten what a nice luxury it is. I'm sitting at the library with my dinosaur lap top (with a screen that is broken, so you have to prop up books and bags behind it to keep it up), trying to get things done on insanely slow public wifi. These first-world problems are killer, I know. What a rough life we live (please read that with sarcasm you Sheldon Cooper's out there).

Welp. We're nearing the end. It's been a good run, but all things must come to and end sometime unfortunately. The clouds here today reminded me of winter clouds and I had a mini panic attack. I'm just not ready for summer to be winding down, but sadly it is. School is just around the corner (a few school districts start up next week! I think that's insane!). Luckily we still have another month before school starts back up here, unless you're taking summer courses...poor unfortunate souls (please tell me at least a few of you thought of Ursula). A while back we were sent in  a great idea for a supply "cake" that you can give as a gift. Know a recent high school graduate heading off to college? A teacher you just really love? A new teacher jumping into the pool of public education? This could be a really fun idea to do for them to help them jump start their semester. Or...give this project a pin spin, as our submitter did, and adapt it to any occasion. I have a friend who will be leaving with the Peace Corps and this may be really fun to do for her!

The Original Pin:

"Pack up a shower caddy with tools and essentials for surviving freshman year in college – all the little things they might forget. A small sewing kit, shower flip flops, laundry instructions, ear plugs, and a screwdriver." http://www.studentadvisor.com/articles/12-cheap-and-diy-graduation-gifts-that-youll-actually-use

Fun stuff, no? I love it. Bri took this idea and morphed it into what worked for her and her sister. Here's her story:

"My name is Bri and I have a story for you!! I am LDS and my sister last week got called to serve an LDS trial mission. She lives in Salt Lake City and had 5 days to get ready for the first 3 months of her mission where she will stay in Salt Lake for the time being. I currently live in Oregon so I hopped on a plane the day after we found out what was happening so I could help out. So I had ZERO crafting supplies with me. My mom decided to throw a party together and I knew that she would need "supplies" Like paper and pens and notepads etc. So I headed off to Wal-Mart. My first "failure" was going while my sister was with me... I would come back to the cart with all the things and she would be like "Your doing that Pinterest thing, aren't you!?" And she would wink her eye. However there was no way to go to Wal-mart without her. So I just brushed it off and said "Heck No! I have not crafting supplies and would I really buy stuff for a Pinterest project for you while you are here, these are for the poor people mom drives by everyday." She of course knew this was the worst excuse in the world and came back with "why would homeless people need pens and paper!?" By this point I was out of comebacks so I smiled and walked away. And every time I saw her she would ask how the homeless people would use the various thing I would find. I just went with it and I sure the people around us were laughing at my crazy stories.  Her party was on Sunday and I got the stuff Friday night. But I knew looking at the picture and not being able to find any instructions I would have to have help with it. So my friend came over and brought even MORE pens and pencils. And we got to work. I had gotten 2 beach towels to use as the center. I tried stacking them on top of one another and taping the crap out of it. But it kept toppling over. So we stood the towels next to each other on the big notebook. We then took wider items and placed them around the "bottom". I was dead set on having this thing look like the picture, but newsflash 3*5 cards when stacked together do not bend. My mom even told me to unwrap each pack and "layer" the cards into a circle! I about died. Cards would have flown everywhere. This would have been ten times worse than 52 card pickup. So I finally had to give in and make it "square", If you can call it that. So we took the next items and made a second layer. Luckily we had some smaller items that could be put in the corners and it made that layer "roundish". The top layer had a pen holder and going to Wal-Mart at 11 at night made me forget that's what I needed. So the pens, pencils, and highlighters I bought we used for the cake part. And the loose pens, pencils, and highlighters my friend brought we used as fillers. My friend also made a cute jar with thoughts and quotes to help my sister out so it was decided that would be top. However when we placed it right on top of the towels it looked sooooo stupid. Luckily my friend brought my sister some snacks. So we taped the boxes together and put those boxes on the towels and then the jar on the snacks. Now if you look very carefully you can see scotch tape around each layer. We call this our insurance plan. We tried to get the ribbon to hold onto everything (which I only bought one spool. I thought it had to be enough! Wrong I was!) So we dug through my moms black hole of a craft room and found sequins and thin green ribbon. We tied the ribbon on and decided the tape had to stay or the whole thing would collapse. When it was all done we were turning it and the jar toppled over. So ribbon went up and down it as well, as the secondary insurance plan. Over all it turned out okay."

The Pin Spin: 

"Was it what was in my head? Heck no! But she liked it. There is a picture of her holding it and after she held it the whole thing fell apart. And we hadn't even got to the party yet. So we did a quick fix. A lot of people were confused and asked if it was a tower. After a while of having to explain that it was a cake I gave up and said "sure is! I was trying to make the tower of babel!" I guess only the crafty women get it! On the GTC scale I would give it a 3. I think if I had instructions maybe it would have turned out more cake-ish!" -Bri

I've never made a supply cake, only one diaper cake and one diaper tricycle (I know...some of you think those things are hideous, just bear with us). It's easier to get a round cake with diapers because you can fold and mold them. I imagine making a bunch of square items into a round cake would be hard. I love that they just went with the and made a square tiered cake (aka, tower of Babel). Sometimes you just have to do what works! Thanks for the great idea Bri!

Pin Spin/MIYO Wall Hangings

What do you do when you see something on Pinterest or Etsy, but you can't just bring yourself to shell out the money to go full hog with the project or product? You do it yourself. My house is full of DIY projects...some were great successes, others lined the trash can. One thing we've struggled with is what to put on our walls so it's not completely bare. Even just one or two wall hangings can make a huge difference in a room (it's always depressing when moving to take the stuff off the walls because that's when it doesn't feel like home anymore). Prints can be expensive. Canvases can be expensive. Shoot, everything can be expensive. Sometimes we can work with the expense, and other times it's not even an option. So what do you do when you are trying to decorate on a budget? Get creative and do what I call a "Use it Up" project. Some call it upcycling. Some call it "Crap to Crafts". I've seen all sorts of names for this. 

Some months I have "Use it Up" months where I'm not allowed to buy any craft supplies (no glue, no fabric, no paper, nothing) and anything I make has to be from things I can find around the house. Today's post features two of these "Use it Up" projects, showing ways to get projects done cheaper and how to use things that might normally be thrown away. 

Jessica sent us her Pin Spin (or we called them MIYO, "Make it Your Own" projects at the time) back in November. She found these prints that she fell in love with, but "for $45, then still needing a frame, I couldn't pull the trigger".

The Original Pin:

click here for the link (it's really long, so this is shorter)

Isn't that pretty? I think so at least. So serene and pretty. Jessica decided to get creative and use what she could find at home and at the craft store. 

The Pin Spin:

She started with a set of shoe paper box lids (thanks for keeping me in line everyone):

And then covered them in paper and stickers:

And hung them up on either side of her awesome clock:

I love how they look! And I love that she thought outside the box (or that she thought of using the box, hehehe) to get the project done. Great job! 

When the "upcycling" trend started, I started a box of "trash to crafts" items. I put in shoe boxes, cardboard edges that would work for mini shelves, and various odds and ends that I could use in projects. It's been fun to go through the box and be able to make useful thing out of objects that would have otherwise gone to the trash heap. 

A while back I started saving some of the empty cardboard fabric bolts from the fabric store I work at. 

I actually have a whole stack of these. I had visions of painting shutters on them, doing panel paintings, making them into "canvases", etc. They've been sitting in our "spare oom" (only ours never opened up to Narnia) for a while and I was finally able to put some of them to use. 

I've always loved the long skinny canvases...but it seems like the less "mainstream" the shape/size of the canvas is, the more expensive it is. Our specialty art store in town has various canvas sizes, but not usually these "funky" ones...and they are super nice quality and I just can't justify paying the super nice quality prices just to craft with them. If I were painting a masterpiece, maybe that would be a different story, but since I'm not at the masterpiece level...it'll be a while before I splurge on a canvas that nice. So for now I'm resigned to making my own, or stopping at a cheaper craft/art store when we're in a big town/city. 

So for my project I grabbed 5 of these bolts (I only needed 4, but I thought I'd get one extra one prepared just in case I messed something up), a container of gesso and I got slathering. 

It only took 2 coats of gesso to get a nice uniform coverage and I LOVE the texture that it gave the board. Never used gesso? Give it a try, you'll love it. It made such a great base to paint on and was so easy to use. 

They didn't take long at all to paint. By the time I got all 5 painted with the first coat, the first board was dry and ready for its second coat. Great stuff. This bottle cost me about $12 at Walmart (a regular white acrylic craft paint bottle was a buck cheaper, but I'm sure I had to use fewer coats of this and it gave a much better texture...so the extra buck was worth it to me). 

In the future kid's room we have a painting by my Great-grandmother of some circus clowns, and some clown figurines that we saved from my sister's trash can and thought it'd be fun to add just one or two more clown touches to the room. We're not going all out clowns, but thought just a few would be fun. So I got looking for clown pictures to put on these boards and finally happened on some great Aunt Martha's Hot Iron Transfers called Clancy the Clown. I wasn't sure if they'd work with the gesso or not, but I gave it a try anyway, and it did pretty decent! 

I picked the four Clancys that I wanted, ironed them on, and then pulled out my stash of craft paints. 

Like my painting mat? The DDR game pad doesn't work any more, but it serves as a great crafting/painting pad. 

Basically if you can color in the lines, you can paint these. That's all I did. It was relaxing and fun to sit there and paint these. I finally go them done, dried, and eagerly ran to the room to see how they look. 

And here they are a little closer up: 

I'm pretty pleased with how they turned out! The only thing I bought for these was the $2 Iron-On Transfer (which can be reused a few more times), and the $12 bottle of gesso (which I didn't even use 1/4 of, so I have it for future projects). 

So if you're decorating on a budget, just giving yourself a "go cheap" challenge, or if you just don't want to go to the store but you really want to make something, take a walk around your house. We all have things we can use for projects, we just don't normally think of them as "project fodder". 

What Pin Spin/MIYO projects have you done? Send them our direction and tell us what you did!

Tumultuous Torn T-Shirts

I love creating new things from old things that no longer serve their purpose. Marquette and I were just talking about that Saturday when we had a Pinstrositeers Day (it had been WAY too long). You all will get to see our creations from the weekend in Thursday's post!

I am super excited to show y'all what we made!

 

Well Nikki tried just that, making something new and fabulous out of something old and icky. Hers didn't end well however, check it out!

 

The Original

http://buntefreunde.blogspot.de/2012/06/tutorial-t-shirt-cutting-weaving-braidi.html

 

Unfortunately, the website is in German. I don't speak German (although I wish I did, anyone want to online tutor an awkward Irish lady?!). I tried Google translate but there are always going to be some language inconsistencies, the instructions were pretty close to exactly what the picture shows though. I should also add that the original blog had a few variations on this shirt and Nikki's is kind of a combination of them.  Here is Nikki's version!

 

The Pinstrosity

So what happened here?

 

I think the main problem here is that her first cuts weren't long enough, that would be step number 3 on the tutorial picture. Other than that I think it looks a little off center but not so much that I wouldn't wear it. If she were to try this again and correct those two problems I think she would end up with something much closer to the original picture, and hopefully something she would be happy with. With that being said I think this is cute, it's a little detail and she could even wear this without an undershirt because it's not too revealing and I think it would look cool and cute for a fun summer shirt! But that is just my personal opinion.

 

Anyone have any extra tips for Nikki?!

Let us know below!

Happy Wednesday Pinstrosipeeps!

I'm off to work on a special post we have for tomorrow! It's a joint post! I don't think we have done that before so stay tuned!!

 



No-Sew Pet Bed

Schools out. Check!

Back from vacation. Check!

Summer is here. Check!

 

You know what this means?!

I'M BACK!!!!

 

And it is good to be back.

Today I was going through emails and this one just totally made me chuckle, for those of us who are cat people ( I am animal people, I love them ALL) this will ring especially true. I just had to share.

 

The Original

http://www.frugal-freebies.com/2012/09/frugal-pet-tip-no-sew-pet-bed.html

 

No-sew pet bed. If my hedgehog would use it I would be ALL over that. However she is a diva and would just stick her nose up at me (literally).

Well Mary Beth tried this out for her feisty feline....and this is how it turned out, check it out!

The Pinstrosity

 

Why is it that you lovingly make things/buy things for your pet and they refuse to follow through with a proper thank you and use it. Because they know we will still love them that's why.

 

Here is what Mary Beth had to say about it, and I thought this was a funny story so enjoy!

 

"Way back in February, we added Ikea's Hemnes 5-drawer chest to our bedroom for additional storage.  It's a little over 4' tall, and Weasley likes to climb on top of it, stretch out and sleep.

 

Let me preface this next part with the fact that I've been watching a significant amount of My Cat from Hell on Animal Planet lately.  If you haven't seen it, it's like the dog whisperer for cats.  This tatto-ed, convertible-driving, guitar-carrying guy named Jackson Galaxy (Yes, Jackson Galaxy.  I can't make this up.) visits people with problem cats, and after weeks of therapy, the problem cats become beloved family pets.  90% of the time, the cat's bad behavior seems to boil down to the fact that the cat feels confined and limited, and giving it more space to play and explore turns things around completely.    There was this one episode in particular where a couple had their cat confined to one room and it would hide and scratch and bite and pee all over everything, but when they let it out into the rest of the house and built a series of steps so it could roam around on high shelves, all their problems were solved.

 

Obviously, in the wake of viewing that episode, I decided that the best way to stop Weasley from annoying the crap out of us every morning by batting incessantly at the blinds was to make it nice and cozy for him to sleep up high on top of the chest of drawers.

 

Now, I'm looking extra silly because that link clearly provides easy-to-follow directions for making one of these correctly.  You'll just have to believe me when I say I could only find a picture (not directions) when I decided to undertake this project a few weeks ago.

 

Directions or not, it seemed pretty simple.  I found tons of ideas for making no-sew fleece blankets on Pinterest using two pieces of fleece, so I figured I'd just do that and stuff batting between the two layers before finishing off the final side...

So, back to my pet bed.  What went wrong?

1. My method was easy and successful enough, but obviously, I didn't size this correctly.  My intention was to make a pillow that was the same size as the chest of drawers, so I started by laying my material on the top of the chest and cutting a rectangle of the same size.  What I didn't realize is that I should have added 3-4" on each side for the fringe, which wouldn't add dimension to the pillow once it was stuffed.  The result?  Instead of a cat bed specially made to fit  on top of the chest of drawers, I wound up with something more like a mini throw pillow.  But even if I'd made it the correct dimensions, this still would have been a failure, which brings me to point #2 . . .
2. Cats are butt holes.  They do what they want.  And obviously Weasley does not want to sleep on top of the cozy, snuggly cat bed I made especially for him.

Witness Weasley precariously positioning himself so close to the edge of the chest that two of his legs are falling off just so he doesn't have to touch the offensive cat bed."

 

 

Did I mention how much I laughed when she said cats are butt holes? Probably too much, but I have had lots of cats and that just fit too purrrfectly. ;)

 

This just goes to show, if you make it, they may or may not come depending on their mood that day/hour.

Happy Wednesday Pinstrosipeeps!!!

 

Also if you missed Marquette's Mix It Up Monday I think you will thoroughly enjoy it. It's a big and little announcement for one the Pinstrositeers! Check it out!!

 

 

 

 

 



Dandeflames

Em's with our friend Camille for her graduation vacation (we're so proud of her!). The poor things have to go to Disneyland and the beach. I know...I'm sure they wish they could have stayed here in the wind and dust, but they aren't as lucky as us. Oh well. ;) I wish I could post every day this week, but life has dictated otherwise, so I'm going to just hit Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. We'll get back to normal soon we hope. 

Today's Pinstrosity is a quick one (the clutch went out on the car, so we need to go take care of that before work). It's another in the saga of "Don't trust all the captions you see on Pinterest." Behold:

The Original Pin:

http://pinterest.com/pin/207517495302754944/

The caption under the pin reads "Dandelion on fire. Bucket list for this summer... It burns all different colors! :) so neatttt." So Jesse decided to give it a go. 

The Pinstrosity:

"There were no general directions to follow, just light a dandelion on fire...so we did that and it burned super fast and just looked like any normal plant on fire, orange flames..so that pin is not true and dandelions do not burn in different colors."

So what did I do? I turned to Google and typed in "dandelion on fire" to see other people's results. 

The Extra Proof:

http://letoilenicoisedaphne.deviantart.com/art/dandelion-on-fire-211157791

http://favim.com/image/428127/

http://www.deviantart.com/morelikethis/334803823?view_mode=2

http://www.flickr.com/photos/26359084@N08/2556120263/

So....dandelions don't produce rainbow fire as they burn. But, they do produce fire when they burn and you know how we love fire (responsibly, of course). Only this time of year we don't hardly want to even look at a matchbox in fear that it will combust and set the countryside aflame. We had some rain yesterday (the first in a LONG time)...but not nearly enough. Maybe the whole town should get together and wash our cars. That should do it, right?