Day 218 placemat's to keep you entertained at dinner

I have been collecting old magazine's from op shops and trash and treasure sales for some time now. I compile them in my paper box for various projects, and whenever I get these out I spend half the time reading the articles instead of crafting because they are SO entertaining! 

So when it came to covering these old placemats I wanted to preserve the ad's in full so that you can be entertained everytime you use them.

I had to share some of the priceless articles with you! (they are too good to keep to myself!)

"exclusive-elvis is dating again!"

and

"the TRUTH about the men who share jackie O's bed"

 "the bible is true" 

"prince philip-is he the WORLD'S unhappiest husband?" and

"star swan nude to ESCAPE husband"

 can you imagine this on the front of "who weekly?"

 Elvis dating again!!!

 WHAT A DUDE!

 burns off ugly fat?? 

oh good I wouldn't want it to burn off any of my good looking fat!

 check out the male corset! (didnt kyle sanderlands wear something like this under his wedding suit?) I think that was in a recent "Who weekly" (ha! and they are already divorced!)

 okay back to the craft

 I cut out the best full page ad's to cover this set of "Australiana placemats"

 I wish we still wore wigs! how much fun! and only $6.99 each bargin!

love the names "london shag" "freedom wig" "afro american"

"gypsy love"

 all glued and ready for varnish

craft out

craftastic creatures

xxoo

Day 217-upcycle dress

Today has been one gloomy ol rainy day... I have spent the day indoors trying to get a head start on a few different craft projects for the week, but no matter what I started on,,, I struggled to finish....

just one of those days.

But now I am sitting with a glass of wine and full of chinese take-away hmmmm yummmm!

Tonight's craft is similar to my t-shirt upcycle but this time with an old dress

I had some good times in this summer dress, but now its time for a new life

 snip snippety snip

 wooden beads (i swear I have been lugging these around for the last eight years! finally putting them to use, I have about another 4 jars of them too!)

 Walah! upcycled scarf-lace

 testing

 geez looking serious tonight!

 or as a belt??

craft out

xxoo

Day 216 paper brooch

Tonight I have continued with the paper jewellery theme, creating some paper brooches

some old wrapping paper

fold over approx 1cm, keep folding until you have used the whole page

(you can also use newspaper or junk mail)

 create a tight pinwheel

 I have held it in place with a piece of wire to stop it from springing open

then paint the whole thing with a layer of PVA glue (let this dry and repeat, you may want to do a few layers)

 drying

once dried add brooch backs to complete your pinwheel brooches

craft out

xxoo

Day 215-paper jewels continued

Tonight I have continued with the paper jewellery experimentation.
I wound up some junk mail last night and then applied the PVA glue and left it to dry...

some of the paper swirls

 I attached an earring clip to the swirl

 I think it looks quite cool! love the red and the newsprint

craft out

xxoo

July wrap up

I am 4 days late on the monthly wrap up! see july's journey below....
I had a few projects which spanned over a couple of days this month, I think this month I need to pull my crafty socks up! cheers xxoo

Day 214-Paper bracelet

Tonight's craft project starts a few years ago now... in fact 3 and a half years ago.
Andee and I had been travelling around europe for six weeks and we were at our last destination in Athens Greece.

andee and I in greece

It was a super hot day and we were wandering the streets looking for somewhere cool to stop for lunch. Although it seemed we had missed lunch and most places were closed for siesta. Down one of the meandering back alley's we stumbled across this artist studio/shop filled with giant canvas paintings and a large collection of jewellery made from paper, I was in heaven... and yes I tried on all the pieces!

me wandering thru the alleyways in athens

I ended up just buying one bracelet (see pic below) and returned home to Australia inspired to learn how he made these amazing recyclable, wearable pieces of art

it took me quite some time to work out all the elements

this is the pattern piece i ended up with

 it works well to make one cardboard template to ensure all your paper beads end up the same size

 ive used an old map book for this one, you will also need wooden skewers and PVA glue

 you roll your piece of paper very carefully and tightly onto the wooden skewer and then paint the whole paper bead with PVA glue (ensuring not to get glue on the stick-because you want to be able to get your paper bead off the stick the next day)

 after you have enough and they are dried you need a very long piece of strong elastic to wind your sticks together (2 pieces of elastic need to go thru the same stick in opposite directions)

 to create your own paper bracelet.

These take ALOT of fiddling around to get your technique correct.

I am keen to try out some new paper based creations in the following weeks!!

Craft out peoples

xxoo

Day 213-more wallpaper paste

Tonight my doily ball lamp is finally dry!! But a few of the overlap bits have lifted, so another batch of wallpaper glue is called for...

see it is lifting off

he he he!

 the doilies have shrunk as it dried, pushing the balloon out the top

me getting messy... again

then with the left over glue I have dipped another doily in the glue 

and wrapped it over

a glass lamp shade

so another few nights next to the heater...

Craft out

xxoo

Day 212-Guest blogger Mondays welcomes Aunty Jude!

This week's guest blogger is my beautiful Aunty Judy! Below is her DIY project...

Hi, my name is Judy and I am Bron's Aunty living on Mt Tamborine in 
the Gold Coast hinterland. We have lived in this house for 8 years 
and I have wanted to change the look of the kitchen for that whole 
time, so I decided to start with the windows which frame a fantastic 
view to the coast. The venetian blinds were never used so I really 
just wanted to "dress" the windows. I guess this is more a DIY home 
reno that craft but it was fun and pretty easy!

Before....

Firstly we measured the width of the window frames and headed out to 

purchase rods, fittings and to decide on the fabric.

My original idea was to just do a simple "swag" draped around the rod 

but as with some of Bron's craft projects sometimes turns out 

differently!

I decided I would need double the width of the window in material to 

get enough for the draping and found a soft cotton in a 140cm width.

I had wisely invited my Mum (Bron's Grandma) and her sewing machine 

down for the weekend, thinking two heads would be better than one!

My Grandma Norms gets crafty!

Once we returned home my other half kindly attached the rods to the window 

frames and G'ma and I got into the project.

Basically we were making a tube of fabric to drape around the rod.

We cut the fabric according to the window widths and realised we 

could get 2 lots of 80cm width thereby giving us 4 times the width of 

the window frames.

sew each side of the tube of fabric, 

 leaving a decent size gap to pull thru

 the right way when finished

I then decided to taper the ends, so turned it back inside out and 

measured a 90 degree angle at each end,cut and sewed again and pulled 

back through.

This must have been where the original idea went out the window as no 

photo's were taken of the "swag" which just did not look right and I 

think the reason being that the rods were too narrow, that look 

really needs a solid wooden rod to look good.

Returning to the drawing board we unpicked a small opening at the 

top of each "taper" wide enough for the rod to fit through and tried that...

Hmm, not too bad but needed finishing touches, so we cut scraps of 

leftover material and sewed some ties

They did not have to be neat just functional and a little bit rustic

And Voila!

You can view our home on Homeforexchange.com (ID 39416), we are 

looking for an exchange in January 2012 to attend Bron's wedding in 

Melbourne.

Craft out folks

xxoo