Hello World,

I went to a wedding this last weekend, and gifts were not expected.  I never show up empty handed to parties or events, so I whipped up a simple sign.

Right near my house, the city is tearing down an old grain silo.  They have three huge bins sitting in front of it which are labeled “free wood.” My boyfriend was so kind as to rummage through the bins to find some nice salvaged wood. He grabbed me about five pieces of wood, and the one I used below seemed the most fitting. It had an old screw in the center, as well as 5 other pre-drilled holes.

The wood was an average color, but I wanted a beachy look, so I whitewashed it myself. I chose to whitewash instead of just paint so that the wood grain would still be visible (similar to a stain). Check out how to do it too, below:

1.  Gather your supplies: a chunk of wood, some water, white acrylic paint (or any other color), and a paintbrush.

2.  Make sure your wood is nice and clean, sand the edges, dust off any remaining sawdust.

3.  Mix 70% water with 30% paint.  I made too much, so I placed it in a covered container to save it for later.  (Helpful hint: If you ever pour too much paint or don’t want to wash your brushes/rollers you can place them in plastic bags and put them in the fridge.  The paint won’t harden. 🙂  )

4.  Mix the water and paint until you are satisfied.

5.  Paint the whitewash mixture onto your board.  Make sure to get the sides of the wood as well, for a finished look.  Let dry between coats. I did 2 coats.

6.  Let dry completely, then personalize it.  I hand-painted their names on it.

I used the painting technique here for the lettering.  I used a scribe brush, but I feel the bristles were too long and at times difficult to control.  Next time I will use a different detail brush, so that my letters are all perfectly consistent in size.

I tied a piece of hemp yarn through each pre-drilled hole, and double-knotted the bows.  Next, I braided three pieces of hemp-yarn together, looped it through the bows, and tied knots at both ends to keep it from coming undone.

Then, I painted one side of each close-pin, and clamped them to the braid-so pictures could be hung.  For the top hanging string, I looped more hemp yarn through the pre-drilled holes and tied them together in the center.

Remember Mark Montano from TLC? Well, now he has some great, easy DIY tutorials on youtube!  I had a friend over and we tore apart a bunch of my magazines to make some party balls.  (I have mine hanging up even without a party. lol)

Check out the video below!

I tried to find magazine pages that were similar in color.

Hot glue every other notch on alternating pages.  I didn’t listen to this at first, and the ball was not a ball at all.

Leftover scraps from cutting out the notches. Save for homemade confetti?

Mine is the orange one, and the blue one is my friend’s. I need to make more of these.

Hello World!  I had a crafting day with a friend of mine, and we tried to make our own glasses out of old bottles.  A link to the tutorial: HERE. I couldn’t get it to work for me. We tried three times, with different materials.  I think I’ll try again later, after reading the comments on her blog post.

Here are some pictures of the yarn on fire. (Which was pretty awesome to play with.)

This was the second attempt, so we increased the amount of yarn, in hopes that it would get hotter with more area to burn.

As a last resort, I tried a cotton fabric instead of yarn. The flames were so hot and huge with fabric! (I know the edges are not straight) But at this point I really just wanted the bottle to break.

I think it might not have worked for me because:

A. My bottles were too thick.

B. Wrong type of yarn.

C. Nail polish remover too weak.

D. Other

If anyone tries this technique out and is successful, please let me know!  Any trial and error advice would be greatly appreciated. I have so many bottles that are destined to be glasses someday.