the student makes- DIY sewing tidy

With the nights closing in, the children back in school and the students lazing around at home I thought I would kick start my mini series!

I ran "The student makes" last year and had so much fun trying to come up with fun projects that could be made with a couple of pounds/dollars. 

As a student I have little spare cash but strongly feel this doesn't stop me trying to create beautiful things. These are therefore projects for everyone, student or not, whether you have cash to splash or just change in your pocket. I'll try and create a bit of a mix too, some decor projects, some paper, some photography. Enjoy! 

So first up, a little sewing board....

I hate having my spools of cotton and bobbins littering my desk. When I am sewing I need to have things to hand so I made this little sewing board that can sit against my desk and tidy my things away. 

Supplies: (I have estimated cost. I had most of these things at home already)

Salvaged wood. Mine was 12 x 8" but work with what you've got: If it's salvaged it's free! 

Acrylic paint sample: £2.00

18 Tacks or small nails: £1.50

Hammer, sand paper, paintbrush, ruler. 

1. Grab your piece of wood and give it a good sand. I made sure the edges were smooth and free of splinters and that it was dirt free. My piece of wood had previously been treated so if you want to give it an aged look now would be the time to stain it. 

2. With your ruler mark where you are going to hammer in the tacks. I placed my nails approx 1.5 inches away from each other. This seems to be the right distance to hold a spool of cotton. 

I marked six nails for each row and did three rows. 

3. Hammer in your nails where you have marked. Try not to hit your finger ( not that I have done this!).  I find it helps to get low so you can see how far you need to hammer the nails in. It doesn't matter if it is a bit wonky! Don't hammer in the nails too far though as you need them to provide a shelf for your cotton. 

4. Turn the wood 90 degrees and write freehand a word of your choice. I chose "sew" and then painted over it in white paint. 

5. Add your cotton reels and stand back to admire your creation! When I moved this to my desk I added bobbins and a pair of scissors to some of the nails too. 

Enjoy! 

DIY gold painted mug

So this feels like a bit of a cheeky DIY because really it is very easy!
I needed some procrastination craft and saw some lovely gold painted porcelain all over pinterest so went to try and make my own.

You will need: 
A plain white mug. I picked mine up from the supermarket for about £2.00
A Gold paint pen or permanent marker. I used a uni paint marker in gold.
A sunny afternoon and some good music.

I decorated my mug outside just because the paint pen is quite smelly!
Really there isn't anything scientific or technical about this. I just drew what I thought would look nice- spots and geometric shapes.

The paint pen works well and gives it a nice shine. It also dried super fast.
I wanted to add some words to my mug so wrote this on one side...

and this on the other...

I also decorated the handle in stripes. So simple but it looks effective. Just experiment and play around.

I dont' really know how safe the mug would be to drink out of so I have used mine to hold flowers.

I guess if you wanted the porcelain to be useable I would bake it in the oven for an hour or so to set the paint. I didn't do this and the paint is waterproof and doesn't chip so success all round!

I think this would make such a fun gift. Flowers look lovely but you could fill it with kitchen utensils and give it as a housewarming gift or fill with sweet treats for children. And who says you have to stick with mugs? Vases, plates and butter dishes could all look sweet with a little bit of paint!

Tutorial- How to make a blog planner

Hi 

Today I want to share a quick make with you. This was inspired by Elise Blaha. On her blog she showed the wonderful calendar she uses to plan her blog posts. I knew that I couldn’t buy something like that in England so had a brain storm and decided to create my own. 

This is a great tool if, like me, you tend to schedule posts. 

You will need: 

Tacks or nails.

An A3 (ish) sized whiteboard. I got mine from Tesco for £3.50. It doesn’t necessarily have to be a whiteboard, but you need a solid base with a frame. A whiteboard also gives you a prepared clean background. 

A tester pot of paint in matt or any paint that will go onto wood well. 

Printed sheets of numbers to thirty one. I used arial in bold with a font size of 200. 

Watered down PVA glue or modge podge

1. Paint the edge of your frame. I chose a zingy blue. I wanted by planner to look very graphic so tried to make my frame a solid colour. I coated it in two layers of paint. Before you paint it is a good idea to tape off the edge of the board. I didn’t bother with this stage as the whiteboard was shiny. Any paint that dried on the board itself could just get scraped off afterwards.

2.I used a computer to print my numbers. You could easily buy them but I found that the cost rocketed up. Instead I chose the longer, but cheaper, option and hand cut them. Don’t bother cutting the inside of the numbers out (like the middle of the eights). If the board is white, they won’t show up. 

3.Arrange your numbers on your board. I decided not to add the days. This meant my planner wasn’t confined to one month. I wasn’t too fussy about how straight the rows and columns were so my numbers are a little squiff but you could easily take more time over this!

4. Grab your watered down PVA and a paint brush.  Glue each number down and then brush the glue over the top to seal it. The glue goes on white but dries clear. 

5. Leave to dry and then hang. Beautiful! 

6. I follow Elise’s tips and use post-its to plan my blog posts. I write the title of the post on the note and stick it to the appropriate date it will be published on. Green are blog posts, pink are events. I know. I know!  

This was a very easy and very cheap make. It could be easily adapted for a more proffesional look, using number stickers instead of printed paper. You could also cut out the days of the week and blue tac them to the top and move them depending on the month. 

Thanks for stopping by

Tutorial- Salt Dough Magnets

Hi

The other day I was stuck for gift ideas. Naturally I turned to pinterest and rediscovered a that preschool essential- salt dough.

It was such a quick and easy project I figured you might want a little tutorial!

1. Salt dough recipe here.

2. Roll your dough out to a few cm thick. It is best at this stage to play around with the dough and do a few experiments.

3. Gather a collection of stamps and inks and have a go with them on a spare bit of dough. It takes a bit of trial and error to get a clean impression and some stamps really do work better than others.

4. When you are feeling confident roll your dough out and cut discs to your required size. A small cookie cutter worked well for me. (remember if they are too big they will be too heavy to be held up by a magnet)

5. Ink up your chosen stamp ( dark colours work best) and press firmly into the dough circle.

6. Keep going with different designs until you are happy. I kept mine simple and just spelt out our family names.

7. There are many methods for drying. I used a combination of air drying and an afternoon on a low temperature in the oven.

8. The discs should be rock hard when they are dry. Remember though if it is too thin it will go brittle and break, too thick and it will take an age to dry.

9. I bought simple magnet tape from hobby craft and stuck that onto the back of each disc.

10. Sand off any rough edges.



Sweet little magnets to decorate your kitchen.

Tutorial Tuesday- how to use a facebook cover photo

Hi

Tutorial Tuesday again. My! How the time flys!

So, I thought I would share a little tutorial about facebook cover photos. (It is maybe foolish to say, but if you don't have facebook, this will be like me talking double dutch. I'm sorry!)

Well, for those of you in the know, there is a new setting on facebook, that of the "Timeline" I ummed and ahhed about this for quite a while it has to be said but eventually conceded at the thought of the possibility of a cover photo!

(The timeline is a new setting, that tracks your post year by year month by month, more like a blog really. It's great advanatge is that you have a profile picture and a cover photo)

The cover photo is lovely- it is a really large picture at the top of the profile- but it is a really awkward shape, I mean, who has a photo that can fit in that, without cutting off a head? So this is what I did..

You can tell I am a blogger right?!
To make a collage photo like this is a whole lot easier than it looks!

First, start with a selection of pictures. I tried to choose ones that reflected different aspects of me; sister, girlfriend, gap student etc.

Next, edit your pictures. I used Pixlr-o-matic to make the polaroid frame like so..

Then I used Rollip to add a vintage filter

Save all your images. Next open Picasa. This is a free google program. Select the pictures you want and then click "make collage" ( You could easily do this on photoshop too)

You will need to change your canvas size. A facebook cover photo is 850 x 315

The next step is the most fun: arrange your edited pictures so that they fill the canvas. They can be on the slant, straight on etc etc.

Save the collage or flatten the photoshop image and save this. Then load up facebook, switch to the daunting prospect of time line and upload your collage as the cover photo. Voila!

I hope this is pretty clear or at least gives you some ideas of the possibility the facebook cover photo has beyond just being one odd shaped picture!

Thanks for stopping by

tic toc..

Happy Monday. Today has been a good day. We travelled to London to watch the 5th day of the cricket at Lords. I have to say I am the very opposite of a cricket fan, however as the boys are and it was a family outing, I decided to come along.

My bag was laden with enough revision to keep me occupied for at least two days and a healthy collection of music. As such, I spent a happy day working and relaxing, punctuated by occassional jumps when the crowd decided to cheer! Yep, that's right I watched about 15 mins of the days play! oh well, it was lovely to have family time together. (I even played kind older sister and every now and again lent my camera. The boys are getting pretty good at photography!)

These last few days I have been busy making a birthday pressie for my best friend. I am praying she isn't reading this. If you are Lorz, please stop NOW..

I got the idea for her present off Design sponge and this wallpaper clock.

I thought it would be great fun to modify the design. I therefore took a trip to hobbycraft and bought a clock movement and background paper.

It was so simple to make. I basically used the templates on Design sponge for the clock face and traced it onto my bacground paper. (I chose a paper that had a nice amount of detail but wasn't too overpowering)

On the blog, the design is for an A3 clock but it worked just as well for A4. I then cut out the pieces of the clock face, stuck them on the paper and got scrapping by printing out elements, cutting pieces of the background paper out and using foam dots to layer them up.

The hardest part was covering the hands of the clock movement and then sticking the whole design to a piece of board and drilling a whole so the clock movement could sit in the middle.

I finished it off by popping it in a slightly distressed frame. I love the end result and will probs make one for my-self.

The best bit was that clock movements cost only £5.00 so apart from time spent it was such a bargain yet looks pretty!If anyone wants step by step instructions, just comment and i can put them in the next post!

Thanks for stopping by

Loves xxxx