Glider chair revamp

Another project I ( well we... My mother helped) took on, was recovering the glider chair. I purchased fabric online at fabric.com. I found it in the clearance section and ordered 3 yards, for a total of $20.94! This covered the chair and the ottoman and we even have a bit leftover. There are tutorials all over the net on how to do it, but we basically traced all the actual cushions for a pattern.

We then simply placed the new pieces over the old, rather than ripping the whole thing apart. The only spot this posed a problem was the arms because they needed to clip back on the chair and placing the fabric overtop made the, a bit shorter. They took a bit of fiddling to get them back together.

On the ottoman, we made a cover almost like a fitted sheet for a bed. It can be removed and washed if need be. Also, we didn't need to rip it apart and use the staple gun.

It looks like a whole new chair now that it's done! And for less than $25.

 

 

Owl mobile

While putting together the new nursery I wanted to reuse as much as possible from little dude's nursery. I hated the idea of throwing anything out, but I also wanted something "new" for our new little guy. Always seems unfair that the second child (like myself) gets so many hand-me-downs. When I was going through all the baby stuff I found the old crib mobile and wanted to spruce it up.

Before, it looked something like this...

I really did not like it. I looked on etsy for some inspiration and really fell in love with all the felt mobiles. And honestly, they looked simple, but were so expensive... So as usual I decided I could do it myself. I went and purchased felt sheets (really cheap at dollar store or even michaels with a coupon) and embroidery thread. Otherwise, I just used old buttons, pillow stuffing and scrap fabric. For tools, I needed sewing scissors, embroidery needles and a hot glue gun.

I made a paper pattern for my owls. I had one for the main body, one for the stomach and one for the eyes. I used them as a template for each owl. I used felt for everything but the stomach circle, there I just used scrap fabric. After all the pieces were cut out I glued the stomach and eyes to the main body. I then added the detail to the back, the buttons and embroidery. I then stitched the front and back of the owl together, leaving about a 1 cm opening for the stuffing. Using a pencil to push the stuffing in tight and then finished sewing it closed. I then did the same for the stars and moon. I used the embroidery thread to hang it all from the mobile. I also took a long peice of scrap fabric to cover the long plastic bit. Just sewed the two edges together, flipped it inside out and slipped it on.

I love the way it turned out. It is however missing the moon now... Not strong enough for a 3 year old to hang off of...

 

Cloth diapers?! A Gdiaper review.

Not something I'd ever thought I'd consider. Definitely not something I did with my first little guy. Becoming a mom for the first time is so overwhelming. The information overload in unbelievable. All these products, parenting techniques, advice.... I learned what I could with number 1, but focused on the essentials, which was time consuming enough. Picking a Carseat for example; sounds simple, but there is so much to think about and five million options; and not with simple differences like, which colour do I like best, but type, weight range of the seat, handle options, weight of the seat itself, expiry date lengths (seriously Carseats expire)... I didn't have time to get into anything but the essentials...
Anyways, this time around, with much more time on my hands not learning boring stuff like the difference between powder and liquid formulas, I was able to explore some more interesting alternative options. In a prenatal class I took someone mentioned a product called gdiapers, a hybrid cloth diaper. They have a disposable and a reusesble option. This sounded right up my alley, I could do cloth without committing completely.

Let me explain for those, like me, who are completely confused about this whole concept. These diapers are considered pocket diapers. They have a soft outer shell, called the gpants, a snap in plastic part- the pocket and the insert. The insert, is stuffed into the pocket. Gdiapers sells cloth inserts, which are washed and reused, as well as disposable ones, which can be thrown away or flushed.

They can be purchased online at www.gdiapers.ca, or in Canada at London drugs. If you're not picky on colour you can buy 6 diapers for about 85$.I bought one pack of cloth inserts and then made the rest. Here is a tutorial you can use. Their cloth inserts are really expensive,but doing them yourself is so quick, easy and really cheap! I also purchased a few extra plastic inserts because they tend to get dirty. 6 gpants is more than enough because they done need to be washed each time. The plastic liners and the inserts are what get dirty.
I thought I would use disposables while I was out but I don't find I need to. I purchased a wetbag at a Canadian online retailer called snugglebugz. It's a fabric bag with a plastic liner and you can simply throw all the dirty inserts into it and when it's time to wash, just dump it all in the washing machine and wash the bag right with it. It holds the smells quite well and they come in fun patterns. There are a few reasons I find its working better than I thought. One- exclusively breasted baby poop is water soluble, no rinsing required, just throw it in the wash. Two- babies have a lot of laundry anyways, as a result of poop explosions, puking, ect... So throwing an extra load of diapers in at night really isn't a hardship. Three- I let myself use regular disposable diapers at night, this means that baby doesn't need to be changed as often and less chance of having leaks at night. Lastly, cost! I love that we are barely spending any money on diapers. And when we are done we can actually resell them all... Oh and we are heling to save the environment...
Overall, I love using these cloth diapers. We are pretty much doing exclusively cloth during the day and disposables at night. I find them extremely user friendly (even hubby is one board) and are easy on the wallet as long as you buy the value pack of gpants to begin with.
If you have any questions about your gdiapers, drop me a line :) I'm not an expert yet, but I'm working on it!

Stamped Napkins

For the Bridal Shower I co-hosted recently, I really wanted to add some personal touches and what better way than with personalized napkins? I wasn't prepared to pay a fortune for someone else to print them, so I researched ways to do them myself and settled on stamping them.

I purchased a large pack of light pink napkins from Ikea and dark purple stamping ink from Michaels. I bought permanent ink because it's fast drying. While at Michaels, I found a "Bridal Shower" stamp in the clearance bin for a couple of dollars. After that I decided to search for a big "K" stamp. I looked everywhere but couldn't find one the right size.

So, I decided to make a potato stamp. I remembered doing this as a kid and thought it would work well. I cut the potato in half, and then cut out my letter. You could draw on your design or even use a cookie cutter to get a perfect design. Mine was simple so I freehanded it. Just remember, if you are doing letters, you need to cut them out backwards.

I took one napkin and used it for practice. Once I knew how much ink and how much pressure I needed, I stamped each napkin. I used to permanent ink so I was able to pile them on top of each other right away. This easy (and cheap!) project took me less than an hour in total. Great addition to your next party.

Summer Centerpeices

For my little Dude's birthday I wanted to make some centerpeices for the tables outside. My initial thought was simple vases with spring flowers. But, I thought maybe something a bit more kid friendly was in order. Little Dude had gotten a tiny pinwheel from my inlaws (who live overseas) in their last care package and he loves it. They look simple enough to make, so I googled a few ideas. It turns out, it is pretty much as easy as I had thought.

I have a ton of scrapbooking paper with pretty designs that I have had for years, so I decided that this would be a perfect use for it. Other than that I used chopsticks (save the wooden ones you get when you order chinese food) and a thumb tack. I used the directions here.... Well, actually, it was the day before Little Dude's party, so Hubby put them together for me!

One they were together, I took the jars that I had made (check them out here), filled them with a bit of sand from the sandbox and stuck the pinwheels in. Any jar would work though, or even a bucket from the sandbox or a glass.

They were a cute addition to the party, and everyone had fun playing with them afterwards.

Tell everyone I'm TWO!

Little Dude is going to be 2 on Sunday! I can hardly believe it. I wanted him to have a special shirt for his birthday, but I also wanted him to be able to wear it again. Most shirts say "It's my birthday," "Birthday Boy," and that type of thing...not what I was looking for. Therefore, I decided to make him one myself.

I bought a plain white shirt from Old Navy for a few dollars (its the baby sale - 30% off everything!!) and took a scrap peice of fabric from my mom's quilting box. You could use just about anything though. An old dress shirt, skirt or some other peice of clothing that you will never wear again. Anything with a large enough space to cut out your number (or letter depending on your project). I printed off a letter in Antique Olive Compact font, approximately size 500 as a template. Lastly, you need some fusible webbing. Fusible webbing is great stuff. It is basically a plastic fiber sheet to attach two fabrics together using an iron.

I cut the peice of fabric and fusible webbing large enough to accomodate the number I had printed. Try not to let the fusible webbing hang over the sides of the fabric or you might end up melting it to your ironning board. You pull off one side of the plastic and iron it to the backside of your fabric. While it is cooling, cut out your number template. I drew my template on the fabric before I cut it, but you could also just pin it on or freehand it. Make sure you draw it on the fabric side rather than the side with the fusible webbing, otherwise you'll get a backwards number. Cut the fabric number out. Pull off the paper from the fusible webbing and place it on the t-shirt. Then simply iron it on. Let it cool and voila!

I sewed a little border on with the sewing machine, but it didn't really need it. Here is how the back looks!

The front looked a bit boring so I decided to put a little two on the front pocket. I followed the same steps. I love the way it looks and can't wait for Little Dude to wear it on his birthday. I showed him...he seemed quite indifferent about it, I'm sure he loves it deep down.



Birthday Season

Not only is my little dude turning TWO, everyone else in my family seems to have birthdays around this time of year.

I needed a few birthday cards today, so I had to find things around my house. I recently purchased some Washi Tape online. Its Japanese masking tape with cute patterns on it. The shop has a ton of different ones and ships pretty much anywhere in the world. I originally bought it for a picture journal for my summer adventures (...but thats another blog...).

Basically I just ripped pieces and taped them on a plain peice of paper and used a sharpie to write the words. I cut out the paper and taped it glued it on heavier paper. They were super quick, easy and cheap!! No more $5 greeting cards for me! I think that they turned out pretty well!

Happy Birthday Everyone, Everywhere!!!\

Summer Sun Jars

Summer is coming and I'm ready to be outside. I saw these mason jar solar lights on etsy almost a year ago and have wanted to try making it myself. I read on different blogs about tinting the jars with a product called Mod Podge. I have been waiting to try this out and finally found the time. This is the right time, not only because I wrote my last exam of the semester this afternoon(!!!), but the solar garden lights were on sale at Canadian Tire for a dollar each. I found outdoor Mod Podge at Michaels and I already had a bunch of jars that I have been saving.

The first method I tried was The Hand me Down House blog. It was really easy, added food colour and painted it on. The solar lights I found the light part just screwed off. It had the light sticking out the bottom, so Hubby drilled a little hole and I just set them inside.

I added a bit of texture and they look really nice. Unfortunately, Canadian weather came, it snowed a day or so later after this. I am not sure why, but the colour came off a bunch. I don't if it was not completley dry or if it doesn't withstand our weather well.

With a little more garden research I found another method here This included pouring it inside and baking it in the oven on very low for a bit. I didn't let mine drip out and got a bit of a puddle on the bottom. I think it looks pretty cool though.



The darkest one just had thicker Mod Podge. I think this will work, being protected from our crazy weather. I didn't have 3 identical jars, so I just randomly picked a few from the cupboard. I think it looks better this way.

It glows Blue!! I have them sitting outside on my table as a centerpeice now, but they would look cool randomly around your garden or as a path to your house in the front!

Overall, I recycled the jars (FREE), bought garden lights for $1 each on sale and bought a jar of Mod Podge ($7) and used about a third. They were also super easy and quick.

Can't wait to do more summer crafts!!!

Inspired By Buttons

At Christmas time my family draws names. I have 5 siblings and 3 of us are now married, so buying presents for everyone would be a big expense. Or in my case, everyone would probably get handmade gift certificates for 1 free hug. The thing is I love finding the perfect present for everyone or choosing a theme and collecting a bunch of little stuff. This year I drew my little sis and my husband drew my big sis. So, in essence, I got both of my sisters. They are very different, but they both bought property recently. So, I was scouring etsy for the perfect idea. I narrowed it down to some sort of household item pretty quickly and then I found these pillows...

Etsy: withLovebyApril

I thought they were so cute, but expensive. We have a 50$ budget and with that I would only be able to get them one each. Therefore, I decided to make them myself. It should be easy... I mean how hard could it be to sew a few buttons on a pillow?! I bought a few plain pillow covers from Ikea for like $9 and the actual cushions for about $6 each. I looked other places, but I couldn't find ones with strong enough covers that could hold all of the buttons, so I splurged at Ikea. Anyways, my younger sister got 2 and older got 3. (No, I am not playing favourites, my younger sister got another little present too!)

I bought buttons from ebay. I looked at button lots and bought a few lots of blues and teals. Most were vintage but I bought one lot of new ones that I liked the colours of. I bought about 250 buttons and spent probably $12. And I did use all the buttons.

On a side note... I love the way buttons look. I have no idea why, but they totally inspire me.

For my first pillow I took a pencil and drew on the letter. This wasn't the greatest idea because erasing it turned out to be pretty difficult. For the next ones I just put dots on to show me the corner of the letters. That was much more successful and easy to follow. I then sewed on every button individually, using embroidary thread. It took a bit of practice but got much easier as I went along. My little sister got an A and a Star. My older sister got a L, a heart and a N. I can not sew by hand and it took me a long time. I worked on it for weeks...every evening sewing a few on. I do have really bad eyesight, so threading the needle was a pain.

Here are how mine turned out....

Overall I spent for each pillow
$9 - for cover
$4 - for cushion
$2.5 - for buttons (on average)
$15.5 per pillow!!

It was much cheaper.... but, if I consider what my time is worth... not too sure.

Overall, I think they are pretty cool, and it came from the heart and a few weeks before Christmas my great-grandma passed away (she was 101!!). I asked my mom for a few buttons from some of her clothes. So, I sewed a few on each of the pillows for my sisters. You can see them on the corners of the pillow with the star. Now they have even a bit more meaning for everyone.

Thinking Back - Baby's First Birthday!

My little dude's 2nd birthday is coming up and it has me reflecting on his first. I was quite (overly?) ambitious for little dudes first birthday. But, it is a big event. It means we managed to keep him alive for an entire year and we are still somewhat sane.

I had been wanting to try making a fondant cake since cake shows started appearing all over TV. My little dude's first birthday seemed like the perfect event. As he was a cow for his first Halloween, I decided to carry that theme through and do a barnyard theme for his first birthday. I had also had a book for a long time showing me how to make cute little animals that I really wanted to try out. I searched the internet for inspiration and found quite a few ideas. I showed Hubby, who said I should do whatever I like, but he wasn't interested in helping me.

I went to look at buying fondant and found that it was ridiculously expensive to purchase ready made. So, I thought I could make my own. A search on the internet brought up marshmallow fondant and many reviews said it tasted great. I then had to decide what type of cake and buttercream to make. I tried to figure out what went with marshmallows and I obviously landed on chocolate and graham cracker... a s'mores cake! For the graham cracker cake I started with a vanilla box cake (I know, I know, I'm a terrible person) and added a few ingrediants. I found a  recipe for chocolate buttercream, which turned out to be really simple and tasted like heaven.

I started assembling the cakes the day before. Getting the buttercream on smooth was not as easy as Cake Boss made it look like. I struggled for a bit, until Hubby came to check out the progress. He gave me suggestions and promotly took over. He is a perfectionist and made it look perfect. We did the fondant together. I had made it at my mom's the day before, because she has a bix mixer and making the fondant would have been almost impossible without it. The only thing I should have done differently was mix the main colour into the fondant with the mixer, because doing it by hand was A LOT of work!

I shaped the little animals and built the barn out of Rice Crispie treats, while Hubby covered the cake and made the fence. It was much more work than anticpated and took us into the early morning. After a few hours of sleep we got up for the big day. It looked nice, but I had seen on Cake Boss that they always steam their cakes to make them look shiny. We don't have a steamer sitting around, so Hubby suggested we use the iron... It seemed like a risky idea to me. I was terrified that we would either melt the cake. In the end he did it anyways and it looked awesome.

Here is the finished product... What do you think?

Of course, for a first birthday you also need a smash cake. I am too cheep to buy a small cake pan, so I bought a little metal bowl from the dollar store, greased it really well and made a tiny version of the cake in it. I covered it with fondant and gave it a cow pattern. It was really quick.

I really enjoyed the process. Hubby says he is never doing it again...

That was last years project and we are quickly approaching Little Dude's second birthday. It happens to fall on mother's day and I have a ton of ideas up my sleeve!

What came first the crafty or the cheap?

What can first the chicken or the egg? - this is another one of those questions...

Am I crafty and therefore doing it myself saves me money, or do I save money because I think I can do everything just as well without spending a ton of money? I am an idea person, I always see things, often online, sometimes shopping, or at a friends house, and I'm pretty sure that I can reproduce it. My parents instilled a bit too much "you can do whatever you set your mind to" in me. Etsy is the worst for me. I see things and decide I can make it just as well myself, so I can not possibly justify spending so much money on it... It does generally comes out slightly cheaper, but has taken 10 times as much time as I guessed. My hourly wage ends up being like 10 cents. Not very often do I do something that I think wow that was easy... Anyways, it doesn't really matter what came first.. Truth is "My name is Sara and I am a cheapy crafter."