Silhouette

We are in the process of moving to Oklahoma!  I'm going through crafting withdrawals!  We are in between houses for 3 weeks, and living temporarily in a small apartment.  I packed up all my crafting items, and can't wait to get settled into our new home!  I have  many ideas to get started on!


This past summer, I purchased a Silhouette cutting machine.  I have only done a few projects using it, but so far every project has been so fun!  I love watching the machine cut and do it's thing!  
I came across made.  There are a TON of tutorials on her site!  One in particular caught my eye, and I knew I wanted to try it...Recycled Grocery Totes!  The picture below are the ones Dana made and used for her tutorial.  Aren't they great?!

In the tutorial, Dana tells you how to melt a number of plastic sacks together to make a strong re-usable tote!  I saved up all my Target shopping bags until I had enough to make my tote.  Once I had enough bags hoarded I got started!  Melting the bags together was kind of fun, I have to admit!  Once I had the bags made, I used my Silhouette to cut the letters and design from some fabric I had laying around.  I think the bag came out great!  It's a bit smaller than my other re-usable grocery bags, but perfect for the quick trips to the store to pick up a few things.  

Where did summer go?

I can't believe summer has come and gone!  The tempertures are dropping, and fall is fast approaching!  I wanted to share a few things I have been busy with over the past few months.  Maybe some of them will inspire you to try something new for you, your kids or your home!

I purchases a vinyl saying from Uppercase Living a few years ago!  If you have a Silhouette cutting machine, you can make your own vinyl signs!  I recently purchased one, and LOVE it!  I got around to putting my vinyl sign on an artist canvas I painted.  I painted a base coat of a mustard yellow, adding a crackle finish and then gave it an antique finish.  I was always coming up with lonely socks, and didn't know what to do with them while hunting down their mates!  I decided to add small clothes pins onto the canvas so I would have a place to clip those lonely guys!  I found the small clothes pins in the stationary aisle at Wal-Mart.  I spray painted them brown then took some sandpaper and roughed them up a bit.  Once I had them spaced out on the canvas to my liking, I glued them down, and ta-da!  A cute sign for my laundry room and a place for those pesky lonely socks!

Free Fronts!

I love surfing the web and viewing other blog pages!  I have learned so much by what others have done, and I am SO very thankful that some have shared their knoweledge!  I am going to try to also share what I have learned! 
Today I came across Kevin and Amanda's blog while trying to figure out how to place a signature after each post in my blog.  It had helpful step-by-step instructions!  I got the signature created, and found some awesome free fronts from their site!  Double score!   The free fonts I downloaded are from their fonts for peas section.   I used one of them for the blog signature I created!  What do you think?!!  ;)
For all my scrappers, they also have free scrapbook fonts!  There are easy to download buttons to click on that will download all of the available free fonts.  Once downloaded, click open file.  The time consuming part is you have to click on each font and "install" it.  It's not hard, but does take some time to go through all of them!  Once installed they are ready for you to use in your program of choice!  Have fun downloading free fonts!  They are super addictive! 

Lil Blue Boo/Dharma Trading Design Challenge

I recently made one of my nephews a cute tee for summer.   Lil Blue Boo's and  Dharma Trading Company have created a design challenge.  Follow the link (design challenge) to see more information about the challenge.  I decided to enter after I made this shirt! Using a Carter's t-shirt, I removed the pocket to make room for the appliquéd tie.  I then screen printed stripes in black and silver ink from Dharma Trading Company onto a ribbed green cotton knit.  Using wonder under, I attached the tie to the shirt, and hemmed around the entire tie.  I think he looks adorable and so dapper in his tie!!

Pre-K Art Project!

I recently had to opportunity to work with my oldest son's pre-k class on an art project for a big fund raiser that benefits his school.  It's all organized by PTO.  It was so much fun!  I used a tutorial from Lil Blue Boo to start the project.  The kids were allowed to paint what ever they wanted to on the large canvas, then I antiqued it, and added the damask print.  I think it turned out great, and is something I would hang on my wall!  Hopefully it will bring big $$$ in the auction!