Easy Kid’s Name Sign

August 7, 2010

I promised myself I would post more often and try to catch up with all the stuff I’ve been doing…but I don’t have to explain to all of you guys how hard that is with a toddler around! This past week has been extra busy because we hosted our friends’ son for what we ended up calling “Camp Atlanta.” He stayed with us for a week, and Evan and I took him to all our favorite places and at least one new one…Atlanta peeps check out the Tellus Museum. Both Evan (19 months) and Landon (7 years) had a complete blast playing with all the hands-on exhibits and it was clearly the favorite favorite of all the things we did. We will definitely head back there on a regular basis.

Here’s a fun and really easy craft project to personalize your kid’s room.  This is a great idea for a homemade birthday or Christmas present and depending on what materials you already have, can be quite inexpensive.  I wish I had more pictures because I’ve done quite a few of these now, but here is the latest one.  I made this one for Maya, Evan’s special baby friend.  She is two months older than him and it has been so fun watching Evan and Maya grow up together.  Her parents are planning a hot air balloon theme for her room.  So I made this for her.  It was supposed to be a first birthday present but became a celebrating becoming a big sister present….congratulations Maya on your new baby sister!  Here is a picture of her name sign….see below if you want to make one yourself.

Materials Needed (all available at just about any craft store or online)

  • unfinished wooden plaque with metal hangers on the back (buy these separately if needed)
  • unfinished wooden letters
  • tacky glue used for gluing wood (that’s what I used…hot glue would be good too)
  • acrylic paint in various colors and brushes
  • unfinished wooden accents (optional, I didn’t add any to this particular one, but you can get all sorts of cute shapes…I’m making a train sign for Evan)

Steps for putting it all together:

  1. Decide placement for all your parts by putting them together before you glue anything.  For all my signs, I put the letters for the name to one side and left a blank area for the picture or accents.  Depending on the length of your name, and spacing of the letters you will have more or less room for your pictures/accents.
  2. Roughly sketch out your design on paper the same size as your sign for reference purposes.  Keep it simple!  For this theme, I needed pictures of hot air balloons to help me draw.  I just googled “hot air balloon” on google images and got plenty of help.  I’ve also found that googling your theme with the words “cartoon” or “art” will help you find simplified images or ideas if you find it too intimidating to turn a photograph of the real thing into a simple image for your sign.
  3. Before gluing, paint the base of your sign, your letters and any accents separately.  If you try to glue first and then paint, it will be much more difficult and you could end up with brush-stroke lines around the letters.  If you are mixing up your own colors, make sure you have enough to cover the areas you want before you start painting.  It is very hard to recreate the exact same color if you don’t have enough.  Let paint dry.
  4. Place the letters and accents on the sign where you want them and then picking them up one at a time, add glue and stick them on.  Let glue dry.  (Note:  for this step, make sure everything is placed correctly so that the hangers on the back of the sign are on the top edge of the sign…I learned this the hard way, accidentally making this sign “upside down” so that it was necessary to remove the hangers on the back and replace them in the correct spot.
  5. Very lightly sketch your theme image (if you are painting it) in pencil on your sign if you need a reference for painting.  In my experience, it is hard to erase pencil lines on acrylic so it is useful to have a bit of extra base color to cover mistakes, if you make any, or you can just paint over them with a little bit of an accent color.
  6. Paint your image, let dry and you are done!

Here’s a close-up of the theme image for this sign…I’m horrible at painting people, so I chose bunny rabbits as my balloon riders!  How do you like it?

By Jess | Posted in Arts and Crafts | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments (0)

Returning to blog with Tie-dye baby stuff!

July 24, 2010

Oh, I’ve been gone from here for a loooooonnng time.  No excuses really, except that we finally sold our town-home and moved.  That mixed things up a bit, but we’ve been fairly settled for a while and I now have a room in our new home to myself (at least for awhile until our family expands).  I guess I just haven’t done much in the way of crafting until just recently, hence the absence on this blog.  I have a LOT to blog about now…but I’ll start with TIE-DYEING BABY STUFF!  Sweet!  In the near future, I hope to write about making a pillow case for Evan, bean bags for toddler games, a name sign for some friends’ toddler, a tooth pillow for my nephew and a restaurant high chair cover for a friend’s baby shower.  Woo hoo for having dedicated crafting space!  I need to get busy!  I also have one more subject to write about that applies to the topics on this blog…my latest obsession….CLOTH DIAPERING!!  Stay tuned for those adventures too! ;)

Before I get started though, I just wanted to update you on my colored pencil dog prints on Etsy.  Well that didn’t really go anywhere.  I didn’t sell any, for whatever reason.  When nothing happened, and I wasn’t sure what to do next, I had made a decision to start this online program to learn about the business side of art.  It sounded really good in theory, but after I received the first installment of the program, I was instantly overwhelmed with everything it takes to truly be successful at selling artwork.  But it was a good experience because it helped me come to the conclusion that now is just not the time for me to start this.  It would literally take up all my free time, which I decided I did not want to spend doing what needed to be done to sell art.  I would rather keep my house clean, spend time making things for my friends and family, plan activities for Evan…etc. etc.  In other words, I’d rather focus on being a mommy!  It also helped that Mike saw impending meltdown happening and reassured me that I didn’t need to do this right now.  So no more lingering anxieties, guilt or pressure over what I thought I should or should not be doing to support my family.  I can now pour my whole heart into doing exactly what I want and need to be doing right now…and that is being Evan’s mom (and Mike’s wife no less ;) ).  Does that make sense?  I wish it could’ve been simpler and easier, but it wasn’t… c’est la vie :) .  I don’t know how WAHMs do it.  Maybe once we are done having kids and they are all starting school on a more regular basis, I can reevaluate the situation.  Anyway, I gave it a shot, however small…and for that I have no regrets.  I’m also very grateful that I have the luxury to be a full-time SAHM and that I don’t need to make extra money (though it would be NICE! :) )  Oh well.  Boo.

Ok, now the fun stuff.  Recently my friend Jo had a baby shower and I got the idea to do a tie-dye station from the book Crafty Mama, which in case you want to do it, tells you everything you need to make amazingly sweet and unique baby stuff for the honored guest.  I was REALLY excited to do this, but extremely nervous at how it would go over with the guests.  But it turned out really fun and not as messy as you would think (worrying about fancy shower outfits mainly).  Jo ended up with more than 20 cool little outfits, hats and bibs for her little girl, due in October.  I can’t wait to see her wearing them!  Jo’s mom-n-law had the great idea of putting a white sheet over the table where people were dyeing to catch drips…she plans on taking the dyed sheet and cutting animals shapes out of it to make a blanket for Jo’s baby!! What a fantastic idea!  It also kept things less messy by soaking up extra dye.  The sheet was beautiful when it was all over, I can’t wait to see what Mom-n-law comes up with!

Here’s one of the items that was created (scroll to the end for more!):

Elena made this fantastic blue and purple spiral onesie

The short and dirty version to spark your interest in the process is the following.

1.  Soak your 100% cotton (prewashed and dried) baby items (hats, bibs, burpcloths, diapers, blankets, t-shirts, onesies…whatever you can think of) in a solution of washing soda (sodium carbonate) and water for about 20-30 minutes.  My tip for this part is that instead of buying the washing soda with your dye (at the art store), buy it at a pool supply or aquarium store where it is MUCH MUCH cheaper…same stuff used to buffer pool or aquarium water but for cheap.  I actually got mine for free b/c being a former marine biologist has some perks! ;)

2.  Wring items out, fold and tie with rubber bands and then dye with Procion MX cold water reactive dye (very important to use this kind of dye).  The book I mentioned has several techniques you can use, although I found better methods for the traditional rainbow spiral on the internet…the book tells you to do one part weirdly, not sure how it would turn out if you did it the authors way.  I did it the traditional way, and it came out great.  Loads and loads of great videos on youtube for different things you can try.

3.  Wrap dyed and tied item in plastic wrap (though next time I will reuse plastic grocery bags which can then be recyled) and keep for 24 hours.  My tip for this part is that you send items home with their makers so they can enjoy the fun of the finishing (seeing their designs) and save you from a lot of extra work.  I learned this the hard way…you’d think 27 baby items wouldn’t take that long to finish….boy was I wrong!!  Though it was so exciting to get to see all the cool designs everyone came up with.

4.  Rinse under cold running water until water runs clear, then untie and continue rinsing.  I found that if I set the item aside to rinse something else and then came back to it, I could rinse even more out.  It was quite a process.  After the items are rinsed as much as possible, you can run them through a cold wash with detergent and tumble dry.  I made a mistake at this part and thankfully was able to recover from it.  I rinsed all the items and then put them in the dryer (without a wash)…to my HORROR dye transfered from item to item in the dryer until all the white in every item was pink and basically they looked ruined.  Here’s where the type of dye we used saved me.  Because the dye is only reactive at a certain point in the process, I was able to rinse all the items again and then wash them so that, to my amazement, all the white came out bright white and all the colors came out perfect.  You will be really glad you bought Procion MX cold water reactive dye and not RIT or any other cheapy tie-dye.  It’s not that expensive anyway…the tiny jars make a surprising amount of dye.  We got 10 colors and that was plenty for a tie-dye party with enough leftover for another party.

Here’s how some of the stuff turned out!  I hope my friends don’t mind me showing off their stuff!  It’s great, the world needs to see it! :)

Great sunburst pattern by Susan.

Stacey did this one...really neat effect, not sure how she did it!

I made this one for Jo's baby...not exactly as imagined but that's the way tie-dye goes...surprises galore!

Evan sporting his new home-made hippie apparel :)

By Jess | Posted in Arts and Crafts, Special Occasions | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Comments (0)

Craft Project: Reversible Christmas Stocking

January 1, 2010

Happy New Year 2010!

I decided to start the year off right by celebrating with some of my own personal traditions for New Year’s Day, one of which, is writing!  For many years, I have taken some time to reflect on the past year and jot down my hopes for the future.  I am so happy (and relieved) that I finally achieved my goal of getting some of my creations up for sale with a storefront on the internet and starting this business blog to go with it.  It took me six years of resolving to get this started to finally have it happen! For this coming year, I’m simply hoping to move forward…  Wish me luck!

I hope you were able to celebrate this day with your own traditions!  May 2010 be a great year and decade for all of you!

Now here’s the craft project I’m FINALLY catching up on… better late than never, but here it is:

A reversible Christmas stocking.  This is the first thing I’ve made with my own pattern.  I searched and searched for a good one, but couldn’t find one as simple as the one my own mom made for me.  So what did I do?  I took construction paper and traced around my own stocking, added some room for seams and voila!  I tried to improve on my stocking, remembering how I never had enough room for stuff in the foot, but ended up with pretty much the same sized one, maybe even a little narrower.  Oh well.  Evan will complain about Santa not being able to cram as much stuff into his stocking too.  The project took me a lot longer than I expected also, but was worth it in the end.  I need a LOT more practice in applique (putting on letters or decorations) so I won’t be making personalized stockings for sale next year unless I do.  I could definitely make some plain ones though.  Next time, I will make a pattern with a slightly bigger foot.

So if you want to make your own, here’s the jist of the steps I took (keeping in mind that this project requires a basic knowledge of machine sewing):

1.  Find a stocking you like and create a pattern by taping pieces of construction paper together to make a piece big enough to trace a wide margin around the edges of the stocking.  No margin around the top.

2.  Using your pattern, cut out four pieces of fabric, two each of coordinating prints or colors.

3.  If you want to personalize it like I did, cut out letters for your name, one in each of the selected prints.

4. Iron all four stocking pieces and zigzag the edges to prevent unraveling.

5.  Applique the letters to the front side of your stocking (if you want a reversible one, you will have two front sides).  I appliqued my letters by first ironing in Stitch Witchery tape to hold them in place, and then zigzag-ing the edges with a very short, tight stitch.  This was very difficult and time consuming, but I learned a lot.  Hoping to master this skill in the future with more practice, and perhaps lessons!

5.  After ironing again, and with right sides together in the first print, stitch the sides.  Do the same for the other print/color so you essentially have two stockings, one in each color/print.  I used as small a seam allowance as possible.

6.  Turn right sides out and place your “two” stockings together, one inside the other.  If you have two personalized stockings, you have to do this so that the finished stocking is truly reversible and the name shows on the outside both ways.  My brain was addled during this process and I almost ruined my stocking, so be careful with this step!

7.  Zigzag around the top of the stockings so they are stitched together.

8.  Finish the edge with bias tape in a coordinating color.

9.  Use bias tape to make a loop to hang your stocking and you’re finished!!

By Jess | Posted in Arts and Crafts, Seasonal Decorating | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Comments off