Pretty Little Bracelets

I just started making these pretty bracelets last week and I am totally loving them!  My first attempt was quite interesting..  I almost poked an eye out with the wire and thought I was going to have blisters from holding the wire so tight.   But, after a few trial runs, its not as scary!

What you'll need to make these bracelets:

• 20 gage artistic wire.  (You'll need to cut it into strips of about 4 feet for each bracelet).
• A cup or glass (to wrap the wire around)
• Large stone beads with a hole through the middle
• Jewelry pliers or crimper

It takes patience, wire wrapping skills and a little elbow grease.  However, your finished product is just darling!

P.S.  Happy July yall!

Wave your wands with joy and laughter!

I wasn't one of those kids that grew up playing with sparklers and fireworks.  

The thought of Brad and I walking through people holding and waving firey sticks towards our faces and my potentially highly flammable dress and hair, terrified me.  I knew that I didn't want to do sparklers for our exit after the reception.  I also didn't want to do bubbles...   So, I found this super cute idea on Pinterest.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/80823236/50-single-ribbon-wedding-wands

You can buy these on Etsy.  

http://www.pinterest.com/pin/112941903129488746/

But, why not make them?    

I went to Hobby Lobby and bought a package of 100, 12 inch wooden skewers. (They are located in the party section).

http://shop.hobbylobby.com/products/bamboo-skewers-3mm-412783/

They are $1.99 for 100 and I used the 40% off coupon on my phone.  

I also bought some different size and width ribbon in my wedding colors - Mint, Coral, and Navy.  I cut strands of ribbon in approximately 17 inch strips.   I used up the spools of ribbon pretty quickly.  So, I looked through the different ribbon I had in my stash at home.  I added different shades of mint, coral, blue and white.   

Directions:

• Cut the ribbon into desired length.  (I did approx. 17 inches).
• Using scissors, cut off the sharp tip at the the end of each skewer.  
• Using a small piece of scotch tape, tape the end of the ribbon onto the skewer.  (I did this just to make sure it was attached very well in case someone got carried away with ribbon dancing). 
• Using a hot glue gun, put a small strip of glue along the edge that you taped to the skewer. 
• Roll the ribbon around the skewer and put another strip of glue to secure it.

Here's a picture of when I was about 1/2 way finished with the wands:

(Terrible cell phone picture!)

I bought a blue vase to put the wands in, to put on the table.   I also made a sign to put in front of the vase:

Just glitter it!

Brad and I went to Michael's last weekend and I came across a large bottle of gold glitter.  I immediately thought..  "Ohhh... What can I glitter??"  Without having any real ideas at the moment, I decided to go ahead and get it anyway.  It was only $3.99 and I had a 50% off coupon.

I couldn't find the glitter on Michael's website.  But, it was similar to this on the Hobby Lobby site:

http://shop.hobbylobby.com/products/4-ounce-gold-glitter-jar-429308/

Yep, that's just plain ol' gold glitter.

That night, I was still wanting to be crafty with my new terribly messy little product that I just bought.  I'll try to omit the fact that I dropped the bottle....  However, it was still in the Michaels' bag.  Thank goodness!  I didn't have to vacuum up this fabulous pixie dust all over the living room for the rest of my life.   Well, I had an empty beer bottle in the kitchen that I had rinsed out and was going to paint it like the other bottles and jars from my previous post...

But, I decided to  try something different, and glitter it!  I simply got the jar of Mod Podge that we've had, a paint brush and the gold glitter.  Since the Michael's bag was somewhat filled with glitter already, I painted the Mod Podge on the outside of the bottle, and rolled the bottle around in the glitter inside the plastic Michael's bag.  It was practically mess free that way!  I was super excited with the results!

I'm excited to see how this looks with a pretty fresh white hydrangea sticking out the top!

UPDATE:  

I experimented this weekend with more glitter and wine bottles.   I'm just tickled with how these turned out!

I just painted the bottles with Acrylic paint  in "Key West" and "White" Acrylic paint.  

Waited on that to dry COMPLETELY.  (Or, the glitter will stick to the wet paint).  

Then, Mod Podged the top portion of the bottle and sprinkled gold glitter on it.  

It's super easy and just precious!

An old frame and some craftiness

Last weekend, my mom and I went to yard sales in our area.  We didn't hit the jackpot at any of them, but we did stop by my grandparent's old house.  They still own the house and it has kind of been a catch all for different stuff in our family.  We met my aunt and uncle there Saturday morning to see what they had in there that might be wedding worthy or new house worthy.

While looking around at the piles of STUFF, I came across some vintage dishes, table clothes, and the frame to an old mirror.   When I saw the old frame, my creativity started flowing... I wanted to do something with it... What could I do?.....   I need wedding programs for the wedding!  So, I could turn it into a chalkboard and then use it in the house later on the pantry door!

I hate that I didn't take any before pictures of the frame, but I guess I was too excited to go ahead and get the project going!  It was kind of a beige/brown color to start with.

I went to Lowe's and found the Valspar chalkboard paint.

Then, I was trying to decide what color I wanted to paint it and if I wanted to spray paint it or brush it on.  Personally, I'm a huge fan of brush painting and not so much with spray paint.  So, I came across the little samples of paint and fell in love with this pale minty color.

It was $2 and some change and it was way more than enough for what I needed.  

I still have plenty left for other crafty projects.

Here is a picture of the board that I also found at Lowes.  They were nice enough to go ahead and cut it the right size for the frame too!

It was a huge board and I had to buy the entire piece, but you never know when you might need some extra board. I think it was $16ish for the board.

Here is the frame after I painted it: 

I finally finished it last night!   Here is the finished product:  

The stand was also in the house and my aunt is letting me use it.

Here is the stand that I have it sitting on:

Approximate total cost for this project:

$27

Happy Birthday Mom!

My mom was diagnosed with stage 3 colon cancer only a few days after her birthday last year.   After surgery, an infection, and 6 months of many various reactions to chemotherapy, she is cancer free!!  :)  

Follow her blog at: http://imasemicolon.blogspot.com/

I wanted her birthday to be special this year.  So, we decided to throw a Cruise themed birthday party.  

My first purchase for planning the party was this, $11.99 back drop that I found on Target.com:

 http://www.target.com/p/cruise-ship-deck-backdrop-30/-/A-10882467#prodSlot=medium_1_4&term=cruise

I was shocked at how big it was for only $11.99!  I was definitely pleased with this purchase.  We had the party in our garage, so we used it to cover up some of the garagey-ness of the location. 

 

I found this idea on Pinterest and thought it was too cute! 

 http://www.pinterest.com/pin/112941903129857699/

Here's my version of it.  Let me just say, it is much harder to thread anything through a Life Saver than one would think.  I only did 12 of these the day of.  This is a project you would want to start sooner than a couple of hours before the party.  

Here are the tables decorated.  I used some of the jutte and white wine bottles that I have been working on for the wedding.  It gave me a good idea of how the tables are going to look in October!

Here is our fruit table:

I LOVED this watermelon "charcoal grill" that mom made.  She cut he watermelon in half.  Then, scooped out all of the melon and put blackberries inside.  The "grill's" legs are carrot sticks.  Then, she stuck skewers inside the watermelon and made ca-bob fruit sticks to put on top.

She also made this carrot and green pepper "palm tree."  It was hard to keep it standing up inside the coleslaw.  We would have to be more creative on getting it to stand up if we made this for another dish.

Pallet Time!

It's been a few days since I've posted.  So, I thought I would show you the pallet signs I worked on last weekend.  My dad gets a lot of pallets at his work, so it works out really well for me and my craftiness.  :)

Our venue is out in the country and my first thought of using pallets was to use them as direction markers on the road.  So, I've made several generic "wedding" pallet signs.  

To make these pallet signs, I stripped the boards off of a pallet.  
Used a saw to cut smaller squares to nail onto the back of the pallets to hold them together and support them.  
Once the 2 boards were nailed together and sturdy.  I printed out large letters, in one of our "wedding fonts" (Edwardian Script) to spell out WEDDING.  
I cut each letter out and traced it with pencil onto the pallet boards.  
Then, I used navy blue acrylic paint and painted in the area where I had traced the letters.   (My years of graphic design and typography did come in handy after all!)

Here is what it looked like when I started with the paint:

Here is what the finished road marker pallet sign looks like:

I also saw this on Pinterest for the dessert or cake table: 

http://www.pinterest.com/pin/400538960579634294/

I tweaked it a little and created this:

I did the same thing I did with the "Wedding" sign here, but changed it to vertical and nailed more boards together.  I used Copperplate and Edwardian Script for the fonts.

Happy Palleting!

Thank you Pinterest

To add to the wedding stress...  We are building a house.   

The land is very close to where I grew up and it will be nice to be that close to my family.   The day after we purchased the land, my fiance and I decided to walk around the entire property.  At the back of the property, near a creek, we came across a ton of stuff that the previous owners had thrown out over the years...  An old lamp, jars, bottles, old lawn mower parts, etc.  So, we decided to salvage some of it.  Brad and I spent time that afternoon getting as many glass jars and bottles together that we could and we were going to come back later and pick them up.  

A few days later, a good friend of mine and I decided to be adventurous and go back to get the bottles while Brad was working. As we're hiking through the woods and talking, I noticed that Katie stopped and was staring at me while I was talking... I thought maybe she was just very interested in what I was saying, until I took another step and realized that I was standing on this:

SNAKE!!

Well, I'm still alive to write this blog... So, I didn't get bit!   But, it made for an even more interesting adventure! After our wildlife experience, we continued on our journey for the bottles.  

I couldn't help thinking, "How awesome would it be if these old bottles and mayonnaise jars are actually worth something!?!  Then, we can pay for our land AND house AND have an awesome wedding with the money from our new wonderful treasures!!"  So, I took a picture and sent  them to an Uncle who collects old glass.   

Yeh... I couldn't be that lucky.  His reply was "They aren't worth anything, but have fun using them to decorate!"....  :-(

That got me thinking... Hey!  This stuff will work perfect with my Southern themed wedding!  Some of the bottles were very stained from being out in the elements for years.  So, I looked to Pinterest for some inspiration.  I cleaned the bottles up the best I could with a tooth brush and some dish detergent.  Then, I found some mint acrylic paint that I had with my craft supplies.  I also painted some wine bottles with acrylic paint and got some jutte to wrap around some of the bottles.  I've also thought about using some burlap and pearl ribbon to wrap around some of the mason jars.

These "wonderful, priceless treasures" that I thought I had found, ended up being a fun craft and will be great centerpieces for the wedding!  

And the planning begins...

Once we FINALLY set a date and booked the venue, I jumped head first into planning.  I knew the colors that I wanted to incorporate and I knew somewhat of a theme... 

Pinterest

But, we had even tossed back and forth the idea of eloping and having a lovely ceremony on the beach somewhere with just he and I present.  The Keys maybe... Turks and Caicos... No friends... No wedding party... Just us.

I also had already purchased my lovely ivory Maggie Sottero dream dress, which probably wouldn't fit so well inside ANY travel luggage anyway.  Besides, I got the dress to wear with my great grandmother's pearl necklace that was passed down to me.  I had to wear it in front of the whole family then... So, what's any good southern girl to do?

START PLANNING ASAP!

The next weekend after setting the date (10.25.14) and the venue, I went to Hobby Lobby (LOVE that store!) to start getting ideas.  (Never mind my 500+ pins on my Pinterest board).   After being inspired by Blake Shelton's cotton boutonniere, I decided to incorporate cotton and go with a very Southern themed wedding.

   

Pinterest

Within the first couple of weeks of planning (in February 2014), we had already booked and decided on:

• The Catering - BBQ
• The cakes - My mom and other family members
• Photographer - Coworker who does photography
• Music - A local radio DJ
• Wedding Favors
• Thank you cards
• Rental company

I also found this AMAZING wedding planner/check list.  I HIGHLY recommend it  to anyone who is planning a wedding!

http://www.russellandhazel.com/PDF/WeddingTemplate.pdf

My plan was to get as much stuff out of the way as early as I can, to avoid stress....

Boy was I wrong...

I think I'm only prolonged my stress and anxiety!

E & B

Brad and I met in 2004.  However, we didn't start dating until 2009, during my last semester of college.  We got engaged the day before Thanksgiving in 2012.  During  the past 5 years, we have been through A LOT together...  Family issues, health issues, grad school, job opportunities, job losses, and some financial hardships.  Throughout all of it, we've stuck together and (tried to... haha) remain supportive of one another during everything.  I'm proud to call him my fiance' and I can honestly say I've gained a best friend and an awesome soon-to-be husband out of our relationship.