¿Cómo se llama?

Before we left the States, a friend of mine casually mentioned that she and her friends were painting the inside of her car, and naturally, my ears perked up when I heard the word "painting." Intrigued, I asked her a little more about it, and then demanded to know why I had not been invited to paint inside her car, at which point I was formally invited.

A few days later, Bethany showed up with her car, five bottles of craft paint (red, blue, turquoise, white, and glow in the dark), a few Sharpies, and a paintbrush, and told me to have at it... I chose one of the door panels, and about an hour later, there was this...

Bethany likes llamas. She wants me to bring her one home from Spain, although I'm not quite sure if they're even indigenous to Spain, and I'm quite sure one wouldn't fit in the overhead compartment even if they were. So this may have to do...

Painting inside a car was certainly a first for me, and I had never really attempted painting with such a limited palette before, but I kinda like the quirky way it turned out... and Bethany's a little quirky herself, so it suited her.

I think she was happy with it!

{Art} Wooden Tile Jewelry DIY

Does it annoy you when you ask someone for a recipe, only to be told that it's "a secret," and if they told you, they'd "have to kill you"?

Yeah, me too. If you've got a good thing going, why not share it?

I feel the same about art and craft techniques. Because each person brings his or her own unique style to the table, it doesn't really matter if they're using the same technique as I am, because it's still going to be different. That's the beauty of art....

One of my lovely readers (Hi, Stella!) recently contacted me and asked if I would give her the scoop on how I make the necklaces, pins, and magnets featuring my artwork that I carry in my Etsy Shop. Since she's not the first to request this info, I thought I'd share a little tutorial here for all of my readers. Please just be sure to use images to which YOU own the copyright - don't use someone else's artwork or photography to make your pendant... It's illegal, and it's tacky. Be original (and legal)!

Okay, so let's get started!

Supplies You Will Need:

• Small wooden tiles - round, rectangular, square: choose the shape and size that will suit your image best.
• Sand paper - if you're buying pre-cut tiles, they are usually smooth enough to use without sanding. However, if you wind up cutting your tiles to size from small craft boards (available at craft stores - I've used basswood strips from Hobby Lobby before), you'll need to give them a good sanding.
• Fine grade steel wool - if any of the clear layers get "bubbles" in them, let them dry, and then use this to lightly sand the bubbles out. Add another clear coat on top to bring back the shine.
• 2 flat paint brushes (Designate one for the black paint and one for the clear coat. It's best to get a new brush for the clear coat, and only use it for clear coats. If there is any paint dried in the brush, it will flake out into your clear coat and cause you a lot of frustrations!)
• Black acrylic paint or whatever color you want the back and sides of the tiles to be. I use black for most of mine, but I've also used dark brown.
• Mod Podge - "Hard Coat" is my favorite, but any should work since you're covering it with...
• Some type of super thick, crystal clear varnish or epoxy for the top coat. I use "Triple Thick" by DecoArt. Some people use a product called "Liquid Glass." Whatever you use, make sure it's safe for jewelry/wearing on skin.
• High quality printed images featuring your original work sized to fit your tiles. (Please be aware that copyright laws DO apply here - don't use someone else's work for your project without permission - including mine. :o) Thanks!) I make my own prints with my Canon Pro9000 printer on Epsom Ultra Premium Presentation Paper (Matte). I do my editing and resizing in Photoshop. You can use artwork or photographs - Moms/Grandmas LOVE when you make these featuring photos of their kids/grand kids!
• Sharp scissors, a paper cutter, or punches to cut out images (punches are especially handy for round images - they give you a perfect circle, which is very difficult to hand cut with scissors).
• Jewelry glue
• Metal bails, chains or supplies to make your own cords, glue-on pin backs, magnets, etc., depending on what you're going to be making.

OK, the first order of business is to size your images to fit your tiles. Print them, let the ink dry, then cut them out carefully. Make sure that they fit on the tiles exactly, without overlapping the edges.

Paint your (smoothly sanded) tiles with black acrylic paint, and let them dry.

After the paint is thoroughly dry, use the Mod Podge to decoupage the images onto the tops of the tiles. Paint a layer directly onto the wood, then immediately place the paper on top and add a coat on top of the paper. Be sure to take some of the Mod Podge down the sides of the tile. Let this dry thoroughly, then coat the back and sides (again on the sides) with Mod Podge, so that the entire tile has been coated once, with the layers overlapping on the sides. Let this dry.

At this point, I usually add a little initial "signature" on the back of the tile with gold acrylic ink, but it's not necessary.

Now is a good time to give the image side a quick little rub down with the steel wool. This smooths out any brush marks and/or bubbles and creates a smooth surface for your top coat.

Next, you're going to coat the back and sides of the tile with the clear top coat (Triple Thick). Let this dry thoroughly. Flip the tile over, then add a coat of the Triple Thick to the top (image side) of the tile, and allow it to overlap the first coat a bit on the sides. Let it dry.

If any bubbles have formed over the image, use the steel wool again to smooth them out.

Repeat the clear top coat at least once more, making sure to let each side dry completely before flipping the tile. Be sure to cover the sides of the tile as well as the top and bottom. Add as many coats as you like, depending on how "thick" you want it to look. I usually do 2 coats.

Once the final clear coat has dried, you can turn your tile into something! I make a lot of necklaces, so I use jewelry glue (kind of like super glue) to adhere metal bails onto the backs of the tiles, then I make satin cords with clasps to serve as the necklace part. I also have turned tiles into pretty magnets or brooches by gluing round magnets or pin backs onto the backs of the tiles.

You can get creative here and try all sorts of things: pins, magnets, necklaces, bracelets, hair clips, ornaments, push pins, etc.

After I glue the findings onto the wooden tile, I usually do a "touch up coat" of the Triple Thick to finish it off. Sometimes the jewelry glue creates a cloudy haze around the metal finding, and adding another layer of the Triple Thick in that area will get rid of that and make it look shiny and polished all over.

The clear coat needs to cure for a few days before you do much with it - I usually suspend the necklaces by the cords to let the air circulate around the pendants. You just don't want to let them be touching anything until the top coat cures and hardens, or it can leave dents in the clear coat or get stuck to something. 

 

My studio always looks pretty crazy when it's "jewelry-making time"! I use dowel rods, yard sticks, and curtain rods wedged under heavy items on my shelves to create hanging space for curing large batches of jewelry. Be sure to leave a little space between each tile. I usually let them hang up for at least 3-4 days before packaging or wearing them.

 

Well, that's it! I hope I've covered everything clearly here and that you've found this helpful. If you decide to try making one of these yourself, I'd love to see photos of your finished project! Feel free to ask if you have any questions - you can use the comment form below, or e-mail me.

 

Happy Crafting!

 

Linking up on Friday at:

 

{Art} Wedding Pretties and How to Make a Doily Lantern

Last weekend my friend Keri and I had the honor of doing most of the decorating for the wedding of some dear friends. I thought I'd share some of the prettiness with you here today...

To save money, we decided to do our own flower arrangements. The only thing we purchased were the roses - everything else was gathered from around our yards and nearby fields.

Welcome to the "flower sweat shop."

 

The day before the wedding, we went out early to pick the Queen Anne's Lace, ivy, and other greenery we used in the arrangements. It was a beautiful morning, and there were spider webs covered with dew all over the field: amazing!

Thankfully, there was still plenty of Queen Anne's Lace blooming, although we did have to relocate a few little visitors...

Anyway, back to the wedding.... Keri made the arrangements for the wedding party: the boutonnieres, corsages, and these gorgeous bouquets for the bride and bridesmaids...

And I did the arrangements for the pews, the altar, and the candlesticks...

 

For the reception, the bride had requested a piñata! How fun is that? We couldn't find a "wedding" themed piñata anywhere locally, so Keri found this tutorial online and made this fantastic wedding cake piñata herself! She did an amazing job!

 

 

As you can see, it was a big hit at the reception. - {groans} You know I had to, right?

 



My own craft project for the reception was this doily "chandelier," which we strung up with white Christmas lights and a canopy made from fabric normally used to cover tobacco beds (How's that for re-purposing?!?). We got the fabric at a farm supply store, and it's a pretty economical way to do something like this. The closest thing I can compare the fabric to is interfacing used for sewing, but this is MUCH cheaper than interfacing...

Anyway, as you can see, it did a lot to dress up a rather plain, dark room and made it look much more elegant for the reception....

There are already several tutorials online for this, but to be honest, I found it to be WAY more complicated than they made it seem. I thought I'd share what I learned through my own experience with you, and hopefully it will save you from some of the frustrations I faced...

The first order of business was to go doily shopping! I wanted a variety of real, hand-made doilies made from cotton crochet thread (not the polyester, factory-made ones you get in stores), so Keri and I hit up some of our local antique stores. We managed to snag most of these for around $1-2 apiece. I brought them home and washed and ironed them first.

The tutorial I found said you could use one of these "punch" balloons to form the base. I tried this first; however, my balloon wound up leaking half its air the first night, and I had to re-do the whole thing. So use a sturdy beach ball!

On attempt #1, I tried using Elmer's Glue thinned down with a bit of water. This made the cotton doilies so heavy that they kept wanting to fall off of the balloon. I wound up only covering half of it at first, and I planned to do the other side when this had dried.... However, like I said, the balloon leaked, and I had to start over.

These doilies were super thick, and in hindsight, I think the thinner you could find them, the better off you'd be.

Boo! The balloon deflated! You can see the little loser on the right there, after the first night. I had to re-wash all of the doilies to remove the glue, then tried again on the beach ball. This is a 24" beach ball, and in hindsight (once again), I think one of those "clear" plastic beach balls would have worked better than this one (I'll tell you why later).

Okay, let's try this thing again.... The second time around, I did a better job of preparing my work area and gathering my supplies ahead of time, so it made the whole process much less frustrating.

I tied a string to the air vent in the ceiling and added a hook formed from a paper clip to the bottom of it. Then I tied another string to the plug of the beach ball, and tied a loop on the end. This allowed me to easily hang or remove the beach ball from the string whenever I needed to flip it over, rather than having to untie it. It's easier to work on if it's suspended, but there are times when you're going to need to manhandle the thing, so it's nice to be able to quickly take it down.

 

For the "glue" on this one, I wound up using a mixture of several things (several types of Mod Podge, fabric stiffener, and Plaster of Paris). However, as I learned on another project, I think I would have been better off with straight-up Mod Podge (the one marked for use on fabrics). If you use just the Mod Podge, I wouldn't thin it down any.

 

Because I had so much trouble getting the doilies to stick to the bottom of the balloon the night before (the force of gravity won out over the sticking power of the glue solution), I decided ahead of time that I was going to "tie" the doilies together as I placed them on the ball. This would also help hold the whole thing together once it dried and I had removed the beach ball...

 

As I added each doily, I used white crochet thread and a tiny crochet hook to help me anchor the doilies to the ones they overlapped. I simply threaded the string through the two doilies in several spots, and tied a good square knot. Once it was dry, I trimmed all of the ends of the string. This was a pretty tedious and messy process, so I don't have any pictures.... sorry....

Incidentally, another thing I learned was that it's not a great idea to choose doilies that have such loose, spidery looking areas as you see in the doily covering the upper yellow section below. They don't provide enough support once you remove the beach ball. Look for doilies that are lightweight, but have a fairly sturdy structure throughout the entire piece, like the one on the bottom left....

Depending on the type of lighting you intend to use inside the globe, you're going to need to leave an opening  or two in the doilies. I left an opening around the top where the string was attached, and I made it large enough to fit my hand inside. I also left another small opening on the bottom, which would allow you to replace a light bulb if you were using this with a pendant light kit. The openings also made it possible to get the beach ball out when it was dry.

Once I had all of my doilies tied in place, I let it dry overnight, then painted a second coat of my glue mixture over the whole thing. Again, in hindsight, I should have probably added several more coats of just plain Mod Podge and let it dry for a week or so before removing the beach ball, but we were getting ready for the wedding and in a bit of a rush...

Once the glue has dried and the doilies are feeling good and stiff, give it a few extra days to dry thoroughly, and then you can remove the beach ball. If you don't care about it, simply pop a few holes in it with a sharp knife, or if you want to reuse it, open the plug and carefully deflate it.

At this point, I realized that, while my doilies were stiff enough to hold a shape, they were still pretty pliable. If I had had time, I would have blown the ball back up, added a few more coats of Mod Podge, and let it dry longer.... but again, time was working against me. This type of beach ball also proved to get pretty "stuck" to the glue, so I really had to pry the doilies off of the plastic. I think the clear, plastic-y type of beach ball would be better than this opaque, more "rubbery" ball. (I used the clear type for another similar project, and it pulled away much easier... I'll be doing a post on that project later!)

Here it is once I got the beach ball out.... After it hung like this for a while, it started to sink in on itself a little. I wound up reinforcing it with a couple of rings made from a white wire coat hanger to support it during the wedding, and I used white twisty ties to suspend the string of Christmas lights all through the center. It held up enough to use for the wedding, although it became more "balloon" shaped rather than being perfectly round... You can see the difference in the two photos below...

At any rate, it was still beautiful, and it made the perfect centerpiece for our sparkly reception lighting. Now that the event is over, I may put the beach ball back in and add a few more coats of Mod Podge to get the sphere shape back, but we'll see...

I hope you've enjoyed this tutorial! If you decide to try making one yourself, I'd love to see pictures! Thanks for reading!

Linking up today with Jennifer:

Needle Felted Nook Cover Tutorial

Well, after much kicking, screaming, and digging-in-of-the-heels, I have been dragged reluctantly onto the "e-reader" bandwagon.

My husband, a bit of a gadget geek, decided that we needed to get a Nook. He originally planned on getting a Kindle (my parents are huge fans of theirs), but the option of being able to use either the "E-Ink" screen (that looks like reading actual paper) OR the glowlight was the point that led him to choose the Nook Simple Touch. So now I can read in bed at night while he goes to sleep with the lights off, and everyone's happy.

(Disclosure: I'm an Amazon Associate, whatever that means. I've yet to see a check, but here's the link anyway.)

I must admit that, for all my protesting, it's actually pretty nice to have it. While I don't think I'll ever go entirely paperless (I love the smell, feel, and look of real books too much... Plus I'm a little suspicious of the "big brother" factor in having my library stored/managed in an online database that someone else controls....), it is a handy thing to have. The convenience of being able to instantly download and read a book is very nice, and it certainly makes traveling with a small library (as I tend to do) much....lighter. So, I do find myself using it.

Anyway.

Since we'll be taking the thing on trips and such, I decided that getting a protective case for it was in order. I looked at a few online and in stores, but most of the covers I saw were either terribly expensive, or they were designed to hold the reader while you're using it, with a "cover" that opened up like a book cover. To me, that sort of defeated the purpose of having an e-reader (which is super light and easy to hold since you're not straining your hand propping the cover open all the time), so I decided to make my own "sleeve" that I could pop it into when it's not in use. I took some pictures throughout the process, and I thought I'd share a little tutorial on how I made it in case you'd like to make something similar. The size could easily be adjusted to hold a Kindle, laptop, iPad, iPhone, iPod, small camera, or any number of other gadgets. So here you go....

Needle-Felted Nook Cover: A Tutorial

My first order of business was to raid my fabric bin. I found a few pieces of wool fabric that were large enough to do the trick, and I decided to go with this neutral khaki-colored piece. I simply folded it in half, placed the Nook on top of it, and "eyeballed" the approximate size I wanted it to be. In hindsight, I kind of wish I had factored in some extra fabric so that the "flap" section would be a double-thickness of fabric, but oh well... (You'll see why later.) Anyway, I cut out the shape (allowing for seams), and this was what I came up with....

Next, I pulled out my bag of batting scraps and found two fairly thick pieces that would add extra padding to the cover. I cut two rectangles that were slightly smaller than the wool to serve as the front and back padding for the Nook.

Next came the fun part! Always feeling the need to embellish things, I did a little needle felting on the front and back....

(If you're not familiar with the basics of needle felting, you might want to visit my tutorial video series or my simple description of needle felting, before you begin. You'll learn what tools you're going to need, basic safety tips, and a lot about technique.... which I won't go into much in this post.)

Here's how the front turned out, and I'll show you the step-by-step progress on the back.... I love birds!

As you can see below, I needle felted through both the wool AND the batting... this will help hold the batting in place once the thing's assembled. (Please note: you must do your needle felting before sewing up the sides of the pouch - if you try to do it once the pouch is assembled, you'll felt the front and back together, and you won't be able to slide your gadget inside....) Also, it's important to make sure that you're felting on top of something like a piece of thick Styrofoam or one of the special "brush" pads that they sell specifically for needle felting... You don't want to stab yourself or accidentally felt your pouch to a piece of furniture or something! You can see the block of Styrofoam I'm using peeking out in the photo below...

Here's a view of what it should look like on the "wrong side" so far.... Make sure you never do any felting with the two sides folded together, or you'll never get them apart!

And now, I'll show you how I go about felting a design like this.... First, I did a basic sketch with some chalk - you can kind of see it in the photo below, but I'll admit, it doesn't show up well on wool.

If you're not comfortable sketching a shape yourself, or don't feel confident about "free-handing" the design, there are several things you can try. I've seen people use cookie cutters as guides - simply place the cookie cutter shape you like in the correct spot, hold it down firmly, stuff some roving inside the cutter, and begin felting inside the cutter while holding it firmly in place. Push the roving up against all of the sides, and it will create the shape you want.... You could also get a copyright-free image online and transfer it to your fabric before felting.... I don't think I would use one of those "iron on" things though - they leave a "plastic-y" coating that would probably hinder the felting action.

You need to start with the "bottom" layer of color. I started with the bird's body color, which was green... Take a small wisp of your roving, and using your needle, "tack it down" in a few places along the edge of your design. Once you've gotten the basic outline established and locked in place, then you can go to town jabbing it down inside the design. This is where the "staying in the lines" coloring skills you learned in kindergarten will come in handy....

Jab away! Needle felting is a productive (and legal) way to work off some frustrations....

To save some time when felting larger, less-detailed areas, you can get a tool like the one below...

See all the needles inside? A tool like this comes in handy for large, less detailed areas, because it "jabs" the wool with five needles at once. It saves times, but it's certainly not necessary. A single needle will do the same thing and will give you more control over detail... it just takes longer.

After you get your base color down, you can start adding details over it. I decided to use some of this beautiful turquoise blue for the wing color... The same principle applies - guide the roving around the outline of the shape, tacking it down around the border. Once the shape is established, then you can start filling in the center... Incidentally, it's always better to start with too little roving than too much. It's a lot easier to add more than to try to remove some once you've started felting...

Make sure you plan your pattern placement so that they're both "right side up" when the pouch is sewn together.... the bottoms of both images should be towards where the fold of your fabric will be....

Continue adding details, working from back to front... To get small details like the eye, eye ring, and beak, you only need a tiny amount of roving....

Hello, birdie!

Continue adding to your design until you get all the elements in place. Just remember to work from back to front - the largest "base" areas go first, then add the smaller details on top. Be sure to felt each layer thoroughly so that it doesn't get pulled out...

For the mushroom, I started with the white stem, then added the khaki colored base layer for the underside of the top, then the dark brown "gills," then the red layer, then finally the white spots. You can get as detailed as you'd like... you can add shadows and highlights if you want to go all out....

It's starting to take shape....

On a side note, for my friends who believe I'm a total OCD freak, I've included a few pictures of what my house often looks like "mid-project."

Wool roving everywhere...

...and my studio room looks like a bomb went off in Hobby Lobby! Don't worry though... it's all cleaned up now. :o)

OK, so once you get your felting done, you can start assembling the cover... I chose some chipper red gingham to make the lining, then raided my button stash to find the perfect candidate for the closure.

For the lining, I simply created a small pouch with the right sides in. The opening on the top is hemmed, and the sides got zipped through my machine for a simple straight stitch. I also used a zigzag stitch to stitch up the sides of my exterior wool layer. You'll be sewing both pouches "right sides together," but only the outer pouch will be turned right side out. The lining you want to leave facing "in."

(On a side note, you could extend the back side of the lining to serve as a lining for the "flap" part, if you didn't double over the wool when you cut the flap section earlier.)

Before you sew in the lining, it's a good idea to make sure your Nook or other device will slide inside both the lining and the exterior shell...

Once you've tested the pockets for size, simply slide the lining into the pouch, and whip stitch around the top, attaching the lining to the exterior all the way around. (If you used the interior lining to extend up the flap area, you'd need to adjust your sewing to tack that part in...) I used a snazzy red wool yarn to do all of my visible stitching.

I sewed on my button, cut a button hole in the area of the flap that lined up with my button placement, then whipped around the raw edge of the button hole with the yarn. Then for some extra flair (and also to help anchor the batting around the inside edges), I did a blanket stitch around the edges of the pouch and the raw edges of the flap to finish it off....

And there it is - the finished Nook case!

And here's the back.... The birdies make me smile every time I look at it...

Here you can see a closer view of how I attached the lining, and finished off the edge of the flap and button hole.

And - yay! - my Nook fits snugly inside when I'm not using it!

I hope you've enjoyed this little tutorial and that maybe it has inspired you to try your hand at needle felting! This was an example of 2-dimensional needle felting, and it can be applied to just about any fabric item you'd like to use it on... (Hats, gloves, scarves, ... your couch??? I've even seen it done on jeans!).

If you'd like to learn a little more about 3-dimensional needle felting, please check out my tutorial video series on how to make a needle felted Teddy bear!

Thanks for reading!