Halloween Table Runner

Okay, I have to apologize ahead of time for the poor quality of the pictures. I was just trying to get done with the project really quick, and thus was not paying attention to the quality of pictures. Lesson learned. I promise I will do better.

Moving on. This is all part of my Black and Silver Halloween decor, and worked out well, because I needed something to give the table a little spooky holiday cheer. The runner itself did not turn out as spooky as I had imagined, which I will touch on a little more later, but I still like it.

For this project, you will need:

About 1/2 yard of fabric of choice
Tulle (I cut 6 strips off of a 45" wide piece of tulle)
Ribbon (one spool will suffice)
Sewing machine/needle/thread
Scissors

Step 1:
 Cut out 2 equal pieces of fabric, however big you want them. Mine were about 7-8 inches by about 24 inches.

 Step 2:

Put your two pieces one on top of the other, then fold in half, hamburger style...

...then fold in half again so that the top and bottom edges in the picture above meet up (like you would fold up a piece of paper into quarters).

(Please don't mind the crushed goldfish on the ground, we had an incident, and I forgot a few pieces)

Step 3:

This could be a little tricky, but just cut a rounded edge from the ong edge to the opposite side top corner. See picture below.

Unfold them to reveal 2 nice, even squovals! You may need to do a little trimming to even everything out a little, but not much.

Step 4:

Put the right sides together, and sew together, leaving a space to pull it out of, of course.

Step 5:

Notch the edges that are curved to make it easier and lay nicer when you Pull it inside out.

Step 6:

Turn inside out to reveal right sides.Tuck in patch you left unsewn, and sew over top about1/4 inch from edge. Continue sewing around the entire runner.

This one's a little tricky to see, but if you look super close, you can see that this has been sewn all around the edge.

Step 7:

Cut your strips of tulle. Again I was cutting along the 45" wide section of the material, and I cut them about 2-3 inches wide. I used about 6 strips.

Step 8:

Working about an inch from the edge, sew the tulle down by gathering it with your fingers as it travels under the foot of the sewing machine. Your fingers will decided how much gathering is done! Be careful!

Step 9:

Once finished with the tulle border, take your ribbon and do a similar thing as you did with the tulle to gather/pleat it except pleat it less often and make it jagged so it looks irregular. Again, your hands are the ones feeding it through pleated/gathered.

And you're done! Enjoy!

Halloween Branches

These are pretty self explanitory. Just a fun, cheap, and easy idea that I thought would add to my "black" halloween decor. I had to wait until night time to get these branches, because we live in an apartment complex, and I didn't want management to see me cutting down the branches of one of the trees.

Once I cut them, I painted them with black acryllic paint, and lightly brushed them with silver over the top. I'm not sure that I would recommend these to be put away in storage for a year though after Halloween is over. It seems like they would break easily. It may just be something I do every year, unless anyone out there knows how to store branches!


Here they are with my Halloween Pumkins.

And here's a close-up so you can see how I painted them.

Halloween Pumpkins

I got this idea initially from a set of mercury glass pumpkins from Pottery Barn, but as I was executing this idea, I felt more inspired by these glittered pumpkins from Martha Stewart.

I love the feel of these, and I love playing up the blacks and greys around Halloween instead of orange. I feel like you can play up orange in September, then November, but Halloween should be different!

To make these, you will need:

Fake Pumpkin(s) - I got mine from a craft store after Thanksgiving. Can someone give me a one-dolla-holla?!? *okay, I'm done acting 12*...moving on...
Acrylic Paint in Grey and Black - I would go with a light to medium grey
Glitter Glue- also a dollar at the dollar store
Paintbrush
Mod Podge

Optional: Any embellishments - I used wire around mine

Step One:

Take a picture of your pretty fall pumpkins. It's the last time they'll look nice and friendly...their pre-Addams family stage.

Just kidding. Go ahead and lather your pumpkins with grey paint. You'll probably need 2-3 coats.

Step 2:

*PLEASE wait until paint is dry! It makes it so much easier!*

Paint the stems black. Let dry.

Step 3:

Brush Glitter glue over the entire pumpkin, including stems. Let Dry.

Step 4:

Mod-Podge over the top of entire pumpkin to seal in glitter, paint, and to give it a finished look.

Step 5:

Embellish as desired. I wrapped wire around each pumpkin several times, then cut off little pieces of wire and did little "twisty ties" around the wire every so often to give it a barb wire feel.

Sienna's Bow Holder

I made this for Sienna's birthday -- she really needed a place to put all her bows, instead of just letting them wander around one of her drawers. It was made to match the color scheme in her room. I got the idea from my friend Alyssa, the same one who made the amazingly cute invites in my previous post. She makes these for the farmers market, which is what made me want one, and later, want to make one.

What's nice about this, is that it didn't cost me anything. And since Sienna dies over anything that displays "pretty" things, this worked out for everyone.

I just used scrap wood we had lying around, paint I already had, fabric, paper, and embellishments I already had, so just to reiterate -- this costed me nothing.

At the end of each strip, you put a side of velcro on the tip, and the other side about 4-5 inches up the strip, so you can loop it up to hold headbands, as pictured.

I used fabric for the strips but it is easier and quicker to use thick, grossgrain ribbon. I didn't have any on hand that I liked with this particular design, so I just sewed up some strips and stapled them onto the back with a staple gun.

Living Room Afghan Pattern

As promised, here is the pattern for the afghan. It's pretty easy if you know how to crochet. If you don't, and you want to learn how, there's TONS of good videos on You Tube, so go buy some yarn and a hook, and get goin'! Then come back, and use this pattern to make an afghan!
Row 1: ch 122

Row 2: hdc in 3rd st from hook, hdc in every st to end of the row.

Row 3: ch. 1, sc in first st., skip 2 st's, then make 5 dc's in next st, skip 2 st's, sc in next st, repeat until end of the row

Row 4: ch. 3, then do 2 dc in first st. skip 2 st's,  5 dc's in next st, skip 2 st's, sc in next st, skip 2 st's, repeat until last st, then do 3 dc's in last st.

Repeat rows 3 and 4 until it's as long as you want it.

Once it's as long as you want it, finish it off with a row of hdc in each st.

Then, add the scalloped trimming, and you're done!

Living Room Afghan

Oh boy, oh boy, did I forget how much yarn an afghan takes to make! I started out with 4 skeins, (not to mention they were the small, half-sized skeins), and barely got a thick scarf! So after many more trips to the craft store for yarn, I finally finished this baby. I used the shell stitch, which I am rather fond of. I originally wanted to tie tassels to the ends, and then unravel them so they frayed, but with the type of yarn I used, it didn't look quite right, so I finished it off with a scalloped edge. (Surprised?) I tossed it over the arm of the couch, and what do ya know? It's a keeper!

By the way, I plan on posting the pattern to this...I just need to finish writing it out, so expect it sometime next week.

Love,

At Last...an end result!

I am proud to say that Sienna's room is officially done! I'm sure I'll do little extra crafts for it here and there, but as a whole, it is complete! Here's some photos of my end result:

The Bedding that got the ball rolling...

Followed by the diaper stacker and changing pad cover...

Then...it all got put together!

Things accomplished with the room:
-made bedding
-made mosquito net
-made decorative circles on wall
-made changing pad cover
-made diaper stacker
-made valance
-painted scalloped trim on wall
-made canvas photos
-put up decorative accents and pictures
-made shaggy raggy rug


sigh... now onto Breck's big boy room!

Love,

Sienna's Shaggy Raggy Rug (For Reals this time)

This is my 3rd shaggy raggy rug to date, of many more, I'm sure. I enjoy making these, and I think they are just so darn cute! Since my other two rugs I have posted on here are my 1st and 4th posts, I wasn't as good at posting instructions in a clear manner, so I will post a better tutorial now.

What you need:

-7 1/2 yards of fabric (I suggest quilting solids, or light-weight cotton material of any type)

-about 3/4 yard of rug canvas (at most fabric stores, though JoAnn discontinued it)

-scissors

-patience

Step One:

Lay your fabric out and cut strips length-wise that are about 5-6 inches wide.

Step Two:

Once you have a bunch of long strips (all 5-6 inches wide), start cutting those strips along the width, about 3/4 to 1 inch wide. You should have a bunch of tiny strips that are all about 1 inch by 5 inches (approx.).

Step Three:

Cut your rug canvas to size. It should be about 100 squares by 70 squares. If you want a bigger rug, you may need a little more fabric.

Step Four:

Start tying them onto the rug as pictured. A single tie will do, you don't need to double knot or anything. There should be a space in between each tie, and each tie will occupy a hole from two rows. Thus, there will actually be only 50 rows that you are tying, with 35 ties per row.

You can see that each tie occupies two rows of squares. They are staggered with each new row.

Step 5:

Repeat rows, tying the strips into the opposite holes as the previous row, to create a staggered look. This will help it look more filled in.

Repeat this until rug is finished.

For different designs, refer to previous posts about the rugs. For this rug, I made the pink border first, then filled in the brown around it. I used about a yard of pink, and 6 1/2 yards of tan.

Wall Art for Sienna's Room

First off, let me just say, I really love photos printed onto a canvas. Really. I knew I wanted a set of them in Sienna's room, but as most of you know, we are still students so our decorating budget didn't exactly cover printing four 8"x10" photos onto a canvas. It's pretty darn expensive for just one let alone FOUR!!! I had seen a few ideas online about getting pictures printed out, then just mod-podging the picture onto the canvas, and sanding the sides a bit, which I liked, but I still really wanted that "printed on canvas" texture on the picture itself. Then, while looking around online one day, I found out that you can actually print from your computer onto tissue paper! *Brilliant!*

Thus, my idea was born. I would print out four pictures onto tissue paper, then mod-podge it onto the canvases! The tissue is thin enough to where the texture of the canvas comes through, and I was very satisfied with the end results! Are you curious now? You want to try it? Well here's what you do:

What you need:

Canvas (however many you are using, I used 8x10's)

White tissue paper (I only needed one regular sized sheet for four pictures)

Printer *with ink* :)

Regular printer paper

Scissors

Tape

Mod-Podge

Brush

Step1:

Take a piece of printer paper. Place it on a corner of the tissue paper, and cut out around it. It doesn't have to be perfect, but will need to be trimmed up later. Cut the length one inch longer than the length of the printer paper.

Step 2:

Trim up the side of the tissue paper so it's the same width as the width of the printer paper.

Step 3:

Put printer paper in the middle of the tissue paper so there is one half inch overflow on each side. Fold each end over, and tape. I used double sided tape underneath, but regular tape on the edges will work fine too.

Step 4:

Perform a test on your paper in your printer, if you don't know what side it prints on. I drew a star on the side that I was going to put in face-up. I printed out the word "test" to see what side it printed on. It printed on the opposite side of the star, so I knew when I fed the special paper through, I would need to make sure the tissue side was down. If you already know how your printer feeds, ignore everything I just said.

Step 5:

Print off your picture to however big your canvas is, stand there while it prints to make sure it feeds through right.

Step 6:

Separate tissue from printer paper, once ink is completely dry. I just cut along the fold where I folded the tissue paper over.

Step 7:

Mod-podge a layer onto the canvas.

Step 8:

Very carefully, lower the picture onto the canvas, making sure the sides all match up. Then starting with the middle, gently rub the tissue down in a circular motion with your fingers to get it to adhere to the canvas better. Start in the middle and move your way out until the whole picture is glued.

Step 9:

Cut the excess edges as close to the canvas as the scissors will allow you. mod-podge just under then, and gently with your fingers once again, rub the edges down onto the mod-podge. You won't be able to see a definite line (except for where the picture ends and the white begins, but that's normal for the regular photo canvases too).

After that, you are pretty much done, unless you want to embellish them. I put a couple of ribbon embellishments on mine!

*And it totally has the canvas texture on front!*

Here's how I displayed 'em.