DIY Cupcake Stand for under $4

Last weekend was my son's first birthday, and although I wanted to go all-out for him, I also had a limited budget with Christmas coming up soon. Because of this I knew I needed to get creative when it came to the decorations and serving dishes. I went to my local thrift store looking for inspiration and came across this strange looking thing-a-ma-doodle:

Anyone know what it is? I think it may have been used to hold salt/pepper and oil bottles? Maybe? Who knows. In any case, I thought it would work great for the base of a cupcake stand. Y'know, aside from the fact that it was insanely lopsided. But hubby made quick work of that and filed down one of the feet to make it level.

Next I took three stove burner covers I bought at the dollar store and spray painted both sides of the rims dark grey.

Then I cut some scrapbook paper to fit inside the burner covers. I didn't glue them down at all so that I can use the stand again for other parties and color-coordinate the paper for any event.

I glued the burner covers to the thing-a-ma-doodle (yep, I'm just going to keep calling it that) with some trusty E-6000 glue and used some canned food to keep everything in place while the glue dried.

Ta-da! I think it turned out so great and these little fishy cupcakes looked so cute on it.

I love cute cupcake and cake stands, don't you? I think somehow food tastes better when you serve it in a pretty way.

Tutorial: Ribbon Ball

My little Ollie will be one year old in less than two weeks, and I decided to make most of his gifts - partly to save money, and mostly because I can make him things he'll love just as much as store-bought toys.

This week's project: a soft, squishy ribbon ball. I've seen these in boutique stores selling for WAY too much money and decided I'd make him one myself. Here are the instructions in case you'd like to make one for a little munchkin in your life!

Materials Needed:
Ribbon Ball Pattern (you can download and print it HERE)
Felt (you can do one solid color or make it multicolored)
Grosgrain Ribbon
Sharp Fabric Scissors
Chalk

Instructions:
1. Cut out ribbon ball pattern shape and trace on felt six times.

2. Cut out all your felt shapes.

3. Cut out 18 pieces of grosgrain ribbon, approximately 4 inches long. Lay your pieces out the way you'd like them on the ball. Place three pieces of ribbon between each felt piece the way you'd like them arranged.

4. Place the first two pieces of felt on top of each other, right sides together. Take the first piece of ribbon, fold in half, and place between the two felt pieces with the cut edges sticking out about half an inch. Repeat for the other two pieces of ribbon.

5. Pin piece together and sew 1/4" from the edge.

6. Trim the raw ribbon edges down a bit and cut small snips up the edge you just sewed, being careful not to cut the seam. This will allow the fabric to form a nicer ball when you turn it right-side-out.

7. Repeat Steps 4-6 with third piece of felt. Now you've got something like this. Kinda looks like a funny hat, eh?

8. Now you'll need to repeat the steps 4-6 with remaining three pieces of felt, leaving a 3-4" gap open between two pieces for turning later.

9. Now you've got two halves of the ball. Place these two halves right sides together and pin all the way around, inserting your remaining ribbon pieces and pinning in place. Sew all the way around the ball. Make small snips up the edges you just sewed, being careful not to cut the seam.

10. Turn ball inside out and stuff with fiberfill. I didn't have enough so I ended up using some felt scraps and batting scraps as well. You can even use scrap fabric, old clothing, or even plastic bags if you want the ball to be crinkly.

11. Once fully stuffed, hand-stitch the opening shut.

DONE! I can't wait to give this to the wee one for his birthday. I may have to make a couple more in varying sizes for him to play with. If you make this, let me know how it turns out!

Shoe Makeover

I don't know about you, but I think Pinterest is about the coolest thing on the interwebs right now. I love seeing what other people create and getting inspired to make things I would never have thought of before.

Example: My sister pinned these shoes last week. Not sure what the source is, but aren't they beautiful?

As soon as I saw them I thought, "I could do this myself!" I rifled through my closet, sewing boxes, and craft closet and came downstairs with a pair of dark red pumps, some black stretch lace I had from an old shirt, white glue, a foam brush, clothes pins, and brown craft paper.

I laid the craft paper over my kitchen table to protect it, then mixed the white glue 50/50 with water to make homemade mod podge.

I cut two pieces of lace that would cover the shoes completely. Starting at the tip of the shoe, I applied a thick layer of mod podge, laid the lace on top, then applied more mod podge. I worked like this all the way around the shoe, not worrying too much about the edges yet. I didn't worry about getting any mod podge on the sole or heel because I knew I could clean it later with water. I used masking tape in an attempt to keep the lace in place, but it didn't work so well. I think pins would have worked better.

When I got to the heel, I used my fabric scissors to trim the lace around the back, creating a seam that I overlapped slightly. Because it's lace the overlapping fabric looked fine and the seam wasn't noticeable.

I let this first coat of mod podge dry overnight. The next day I used fabric scissors to roughly trim closer to the edges of the shoe. I then applied a second coat of mod podge, paying special attention to any place there could be more friction (the heel and along the sole).

I used clothes pins to hold any lace in place that wouldn't cooperate. In retrospect I wish I would have put a piece of waxed paper between the clothes pins and lace because when the glue dried the clothes pins stuck and it was hard to remove them without removing the lace pieces.

Once the shoes were completely dry I went over them again with the exacto knife, cutting along the seams and carefully pulling off all the excess lace. I used a bit more mod podge to touch up any areas that still weren't completely adhered to the shoe.

The last thing I did was take some cotton swabs and water and clean the mod podge off the heel and sole of the shoes.

What do you think? They turned out so much better than I thought they would!

Obviously these aren't shoes to wear in inclement weather, and putting a couple coats of some kind of clear sealer would be a good idea.

I think they look great! My husband calls them my vampire shoes, so I may have to wear them on Thursday when I go see the midnight premier of Breaking Dawn!

Tutorial: Yellow Angry Bird Mask

 My son is like most other four-year-olds: he hates eating dinner, he asks the funniest questions imaginable, and he LOVES Angry Birds. Last night I thought I'd break out my sewing machine and some felt and make him a yellow Angry Bird mask. He was so excited this morning when he saw it and spent most of the morning running around with it on.

I thought I'd post a tutorial on how you can make one of these yourself!

*A few notes before we get started:
- I used white thread throughout the project except where noted otherwise.
- You can shrink or enlarge the pattern on a copier to make the mask bigger or smaller.
- The key to going over the curved pieces: go SLOWLY. You'll be much happier with the results if you take your time.


Materials needed:
- Mask pattern (download it HERE)
- Felt (red, black, yellow, gold, and white)

- 3/8" elastic (I used about 14" of elastic; your measurement may vary depending on the size of your munchkin's noggin)
- Sewing machine
- Fabric glue
- Fabric scissors

Instructions:
Cut out all pattern pieces.

Fold beak in half along "fold" line. Sew along fold, as close to the edge as possible.

Once sewn, it should look something like this:

Place beak along one body piece, right sides together, and sew along curve, manipulating the fabric as needed to sew all the way across the top of the beak.

It should look like this now:

Now sew the chest pieces to the lower curves of the body, only sewing along the top and leaving the bottom open.

Position eye pieces, pin, and sew them to the body with black thread, as close to the edge as possible.

Turn over and cut out eye holes, being careful not to cut along the seam you just made.

Now lay both body pieces on top of each other, wrong sides together.

Pin elastic between the two body pieces.

Also pin the hair between the two pieces.

Sew all along body, going over the elastic and hair sections several times to strengthen the seam.

Now it should look something like this:

Sew along eyes, as close to the black pieces as possible.

Turn over and cut out eye holes, careful not to cut across the seam you just made.

Last step! Using fabric glue, attach eyebrows to the mask and let dry completely.

And VOILA! Your mask is done! Pretty simple, and if your kiddo is anything like mine, they'll love it!