Friday, May 27, 2011

Fantastic Friday #21

It is Friday, and I am on my way traveling yesterday and today, so I have no features - I will do two features next week.

Let's just get started with our link party!

Rules:
*become a follower of Iron Violet Designs, I like followers - it makes me feel good. But I won't delete your link if you don't.
*link up anything that you have made - sewn, cooked, crafted, etc. family friendly of course.
*must link to a blog post, not your home page, another linky party, etsy shop or giveaway.
*link back to this post so that others can join in on the fun. Grab a button or do a text link either one is fine with me.
*visit a few of the links and leave comments! Everyone needs a little comment love!
Iron Violet Designs


Let's get started:
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Thursday, May 26, 2011

Wire Frame

This month over at Ucreate the challenge is a frame with chicken wire. I was excited because this is something that I have been meaning to do, yet never done. This is what the end result turned out like:
 
I am in one of those 'use what I have and stop buying more stuff' modes, so I did change a few things about how I did this. Which made this project almost free to make! You have got to love that!

I had this frame sitting around because it was just too cute to get rid of. The glass had broken, and the backing was pretty much shot as well. It was perfect for this project.
I was making something for my girl to have in her room to hang those little notes and pictures that she gets and well I guess just anything that she wants on. So, the color had to change . . . pink was it! That way it kind of matches everything else in her room.


After I painted it I glazed it with an antique glaze, but I somehow forgot to take a picture of that step, this is as good as it gets!

It really did bring out the pattern on the frame and make it look awesome - but my photo skills do not do it justice!

Next I grabbed some artistic wire that I got on sale - on a whim that I was going to make some jewelry - who was I kidding! It was perfect for this project. I cut the wire into pieces that were a little bit longer then the opening of my frame. I just eyeballed how far apart I wanted them.

I them proceeded to hot glue them to the back side of my frame. Doesn't this look like a project that is going to turn out well?! Before I glued them onto the opposite side I weaved them through each other to help it hold flat a little bit better. And I just thought that it would work better that way.
 
Despite that jumbled looking mess, this is what it came out like. I did not like the wires being dark, and so I took a paint brush and gave them a slight coat of paint - just to lighten them up a bit.
When that was done I was trying to decide how I wanted to finish this. I knew that a ribbon would be perfect. I almost went out and bought some ribbon, but I decided against that because I have WAY too much already. I found this lime green stuff that gives this frame just a little bit umfp.
Then we hung it up on her wall. I did go out and buy these cute little clothespins for her to use to hang stuff with. And sorry about the difference in light - you can tell I took this last one during the day.
 
 And she just loves it. She even took some of the pictures that my Young Women gave me from graduation.
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Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Monogram Onsies

Remember two weeks ago when I featured these super cute onsies that had whales and flowers on them. I loved that idea so much that I made some myself. My good friend just had twin boys - which puts her at 5 boys! I wanted to give her something that she would love and I thought some monogram onsies would be perfect. Then her other boys could easily tell which baby is which! :)
Now I do not own a Silhouette machine, I wish I did but I have a Cricut and SCAL, so I can do a fair amount of stuff. I went through my fabric stash to find some good fabric to use for this project, and came to the realization that I do not have a lot of 'boy' fabric. I find this odd because I have 4 boys, but maybe it is my love of flowers that helps me in picking out fabric.

Anyway, I was able to find two different fabrics that would work good. I had some onsies that Thing #5 had never wore, and I picked up some heat and bond from Walmart. Which makes this project almost free for me!
I started by cutting my fabric into a 4" square. I chose this size because it would not look too big on the little onsie. I then cut some heat and bond the same size and followed the instructions on the package to attach it to my fabric.
I then cut it with my Cricut. I used a new blade, and it did great. You can kind of see it in the picture. I did end up having to cut a little bit of the top corner of the 'B' but that was because I did not place it on the mat in the right spot.
After I had my letters cut out I followed the rest of the instructions on the package of heat and bond and ironed these letters onto the onsies. And after only 20 short minutes I have 2 super cute onsies to give to my friend!

It rained yesterday afternoon, and it is supposed to rain all day today - not a great way to start summer break, but my kids seem to be enjoying not having anything to do!
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Friday, May 20, 2011

Fantastic Friday #20

I don't know about all of you, but this week has been a little bit crazy! Yesterday was our last day of school, so I have been up to the school just about everyday for one of the kids! And now the chaos reigns supreme at our house! I am in the planning stages of some awesome summer activities for them. I am not sure if I will post as much this summer because I want to spend time with my kids and enjoy them while they are still little - I will try to get a post or two up a week. But I am not sure how my crafting time will be. Ahhh, the joys of summer! Of course we will still have our Fantastic party every Friday!!!!

On to our party! Last weeks party was great, a little small, but I blame blogger for that because it was down half the day. But, there were so many great ideas out there! I did not get a chance to comment on all of them, but I did visit the links! And I had such a hard time choosing one to feature! I cannot believe the stuff that you all have been working on!
I did choose this awesome Art Activity Wall by a Girl in Air. This is just the coolest thing that I have seen! I know my little boys would love to have something like this anywhere in our house! And she give great instructions on how to make this yourself! While you are there, check out everything else that she has made! She has some great ideas!

Grab a button to let everyone know that you were featured!

Iron Violet Designs

Now without further ado it is time for you to share everything Fantastic that you have been working on this week! Share with us your latest and greatest stuff and start linking your FANTASTIC creations up!

Rules:
*become a follower of Iron Violet Designs, I like followers - it makes me feel good. But I won't delete your link if you don't.
*link up anything that you have made - sewn, cooked, crafted, etc. family friendly of course.
*must link to a blog post, not your home page, another linky party, etsy shop or giveaway.
*link back to this post so that others can join in on the fun. Grab a button or do a text link either one is fine with me.
*visit a few of the links and leave comments! Everyone needs a little comment love!
Iron Violet Designs


Let's get started:

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Thursday, May 19, 2011

Bloggers' Quilt Festival

This week I have spent a good deal of time browsing through all of the beautiful quilts that are on display at The Bloggers' Quilt Festival. I just wrote a post on this quilt, but I am going to answer a few questions that they ask about my quilt. You all need to head over there and see over 400 beautiful quilts!
My quilt that I chose to share is my Yo-Yo Flowers quilt. I am in love with this quilt, it could be because it is the latest one that I have finished, or that it is just so beautiful! Last fall when my sister was visiting she was showing me a few free quilt patterns and I just fell in love with the one for this quilt. I scoured my stash and not surprisingly I had the fabric to make this! So I got started. I got everything cut and then sewn together.
 
I took 4 squares of fabric and sewed them together to cut the circles for the yo-yo flowers. I had never seen these flowers before, and after a couple of you Tube videos I had then down. But for some reason I just was not feeling the quilt any more. So it sat for about 6 months.

But then I had this thought about custom dying some rick rack for the stems, and the rest is history. I went from not doing anything on this quilt to finishing it within the month. I tried to quilt it differently than all of my other ones. I did a squiggle next to the stems, and then an all over loop pattern for next to the flowers and then a simple all over pattern on the edges. I was a little bit worried how it would turn out, because I usually just do an all over pattern, but it turned out so nice and I am very happy with how it turned out.

Thanks for stopping by and visiting!
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Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Fresh Squeezed

When this fabric line came out I just loved the bright colors of it! I knew at once that I wanted to make something out of it - I just was not sure what yet.

My local quilt shop made it easy for me to decide - they had a kit with this fabric line and I bought it right away!

But like many things I took my sweet time getting it sewn up. I posted about these squares a while back and they sat like this for a little while - translation over 6 months.

However, lately I am on this cleaning out kick, and it includes a finishing up of projects that have been sitting around. These squares came out and I started sewing them all together. I had them all laid out and half of them sewn together and Thing #5 woke up and that was the end of that. It took me twice as long to do the rest of it. But oh well, that is how it goes in my house.

But I pushed through and got it all sewn together. And I just love how bright and cheerful it is. When I showed it to my sister when she was in town she was a little taken aback by how bright it was. For me thought it is perfect, because most of the quilts I make are from fabric with colors this bold.
We had an overcast day the other day with out rain so I was able to get some great pictures of it. It is a huge quilt! I am not sure how I am going to get it to fit on my frame to quilt it, but I will come up with something.
Doesn't it just make you happy, and make you want to have a cup of fresh squeezed orange juice?
I see many summer picnics, days at the park, and days of lounging around in the yard with this quilt!
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Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Fabric Winner!!!!

The time has come my friends to announce the winner of our Crafty Girls Workshop winner!!

And the winner is . . .

Lindsay @ Diary of a Crafty Lady said...
I'm a follower!

Congrats Lindsay! Contact me and I will get your information from you!
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Drop Cloth Curtains

This is not a new post, I did post this last week, but when blogger was down it some how did not survive. So I am posting it again.

Also check back this afternoon for the winner of my fabric giveaway!

This has been such a long project. It was one of those that you buy the stuff you need then it sits there, and sits there some more, and even a little bit more. Then I saw these curtains where they had been painted, and I changed my plans a little bit. But I finally got them done and they are hanging up. Not that I really need to be blocking the cold out since it is almost summer - but hey they can block out the heat right?! Here they are all done, and really adding to my living room.
Here is what I did:
I gathered my supplies
paint - home depot - a color almost the same as the drop cloth
stencil - hobby lobby
screen printer thing- hobby lobby
squeegee - from my cleaning supplies
Not pictured is the drop cloths.


I laid out two curtains at a time in my basement. I tried to iron them, but I really dislike ironing so I pretty much gave up on that aspect. I am not that picky of a person so I just eyeballed where I was going to place the stencil, and then started to paint. I taped my stencil to the screen printer and applied paint.

I then just squeegeed the paint off and it worked beautifully!

The reason that I chose a color so close to the background was because I wanted it to be subtle, and then when I made mistakes - notice I said when, not if - you would not see them as well. Some of my stencils turned out like this one above and others better and others worse.

Here is one of the panels all painted and laying there to dry.

When I was all done painting, I decided that they were still lacking something and I realized that adding a binding of sorts would be perfect for this. Again I wanted something subtle, so this is what I choose.

I then got to the task of hanging the curtains. I had found the rods on clearance at Target, and I used two of them to make one big one. It was when I was hanging them that I thought to take a before picture.

And then we have the 'after' picture.
And with the living room lights on - because it was dark when I finally got around to taking these pictures - there is the stencil, very subtle and classy. It is just how I wanted it.
 Here they are with the sun shinning in behind them.The stencil really stands out here.

When I was cleaning up I realized that I had created a little stencil work on my basement floor as well. Talk about great drop cloths! Oh well. but now I am wanting to stencil other things . . .
I am off to enjoy my new classy living room!
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Monday, May 16, 2011

Nutter Butter Balls

 When I saw these a few weeks ago at my link party I immediately knew that I was going to make these. It wasn't one of those things where you think 'oh, these would be great.' It was more of 'I am heading to the store to get the ingredients to make these now!'

However, after I had the ingredients it did take me a little while to make them - which is why I am posting about them now!
Here are the simple ingredients:
nutter butters
cream cheese
melting chocolate - I used chocolate chips because my grocery store does not carry melting chocolate and I did not want to run all over town!

Run your nutter butters through your food processor until crumbs. Then add the cream cheese and mix it all together really well. Shape into balls and freeze. Then melt your chocolate and cover the nutter butter balls with it and ENJOY!!

These are seriously to die for, they are so good and oh so bad for you! But I love them! I mean anything with peanut butter and chocolate is seriously a winner in my book!

There is no school here today so I am keeping this short and sweet. Hope you all have a great day!
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Friday, May 13, 2011

Fantastic Friday #19

Yea! Blogger is back up, and my house is clean as well. Conan will be so impressed when he comes home from work today. However, I am missing the post that I did yesterday.  . .

Last week's party was a little bit small, but there were some great ideas linked up. My favorite were these onsies that Oxford impressions made. They are super cute and a great idea for a baby gift. I have a friend who just had twin boys, and I have been trying to decide what to give to her, now I have the perfect gift. She even made some that were flowers, which will work for girls. I am thinking that I might make up a few for both gender to have on hand.

Grab a button to let everyone know that you were featured!

Iron Violet Designs

Now without further ado it is time for you to share everything Fantastic that you have been working on this week! Share with us your latest and greatest stuff and start linking your FANTASTIC creations up!

Rules:
*become a follower of Iron Violet Designs, I like followers - it makes me feel good. But I won't delete your link if you don't.
*link up anything that you have made - sewn, cooked, crafted, etc. family friendly of course.
*must link to a blog post, not your home page, another linky party, etsy shop or giveaway.
*link back to this post so that others can join in on the fun. Grab a button or do a text link either one is fine with me.
*visit a few of the links and leave comments! Everyone needs a little comment love!
Iron Violet Designs


Let's get started:
Pin It! \

Wednesday, May 11, 2011

Yo-Yo Flowers

I did it, I finally found the time to sit down and sew the binding onto this beautiful yo-yo flowers quilt. The weather has been so nice here, I have been working outside in the yard and taking the kids to the park more. But I just sat down and did it! And I just love the way that it turned out!
I am branching out in my quilting skills. On this one I thought that it would look nice if I did just squiggly lines between the stems and them a loop all over pattern around the flowers. Then I just did a regular all over pattern on the borders. You can kind of see it in this photo here - look on the red, that is where it stands out.

 I love the look these flowers give it. I found a bunch of large buttons on clearance at Archivers and they were perfect for this quilt!
 
 Now I can curl up in it today because the weather has changed to cold again! But then I am thinking that with this one it would look great hung on the wall. We will see what really happens with this.
You think after all of these quilts that I have made, I would be a pro at binding. But I still struggle with getting those corners just right. But I am not going to point out to you where I don't like it!

 I love, love, love it! It is so beautiful! And this puts me at 4 quilts finished this year! 2 more to go and I have reached my goal!

Don't forget to go and enter my giveaway for some free fabric here!
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