Personalized Vase Tutorial

A few months ago I received a facebook message from one of my best girlfriends boyfriend. Josh was letting me know he was going to propose to Bridget on Aug 24th in Portland and that he was also planning a surprise engagement party with her closest friends to follow. He wanted to let my mom and I know in case we could make it. I was so excited for Bridget, I immediately emailed and called my mom and we decided we were not going to miss it for the world!

As Aug 24th was approaching we were thinking about an engagement gift for her. I wanted it to be something special because she is so special to me.

I looked on Pinterest and wedding websites for ideas and decided I was going to make something for her. During my searches I found this vase and was inspired. I was thinking about my options and how I could make it. During my brainstorming I emailed my super-craft-cousin, Tiffany. If you spend a few minutes on her blog you'll understand why I reached out to her for ideas. Between her ideas and mine, I had a plan!

Here is how it went!
I went to Michaels Craft Warehouse (with my coupons of course) and bought a square glass vase and bright/fun scrapbook paper.

I created a word document on my computer with what I wanted the vase to say and planned the vase layout in my mind and printed! Advice, be certain you have the word document set to the paper size (scrapbook paper is larger than printer paper DUH and your margins are set as small as possible). 

I had all my supplies and was ready to start cutting and gluing. 

 I wanted the bottom to be the black and white floral print paper, so I started with that.
I kind of wrapped it like it was wrapping paper, however I cut the excess 

paper away so it wouldn't be thick. 

I used Mog Podge glue. This is a water-proof craft glue. 

Next I used the Mog Podge to glue on the turquoise paper. This was the paper I printed on. 

I was very careful to not get glue on the ink as I was worried it might smear it. 

Then I added a black stripe at the top, and a black stripe over the seam between the floral and the turquoise. I was done gluing the paper to the vase. 

Now the tricky part, how to make it water proof!??

Well, I used wood shellac. I brushed it on in thin coats (2-3 coats) and made sure it was dry

before applying another coat. I think it did the trick. I need to follow up with 

Bridget and ask if it is waterproof!!  

When we arrived in Portland, our first stop was a flower shop to fill the vase! 

We were very happy with how it turned out! 

We were staying at the same hotel as Bridget and Josh so it was to be delivered to their room after left for the part so she had another surprise waiting for her after her exciting night. 

More to come on the proposal and engagement party! 

A few things I learned and would change if making this again (which I am sure I will). 

I would make my word document be a little different, I repeated the same saying, so they would wrap around the vase. However, I didn't adjust their staring point, so all of the Josh & Bridget are lined up. I would also find a smaller vase so there are fewer seams. I have 2 seams in the back of the vase rather than just one because the vase was larger than my paper. 

If you make one and have additional suggestions, let me know! 

New Patio! Bring on SUMMER!

This winter we had a lot of rain and mud, combine that with a 90lbs puppy and you get LOTS of dead grass. We decided we needed to get a sidewalk to Wyatt's kennel (on the other side of our garage). One thing lead to another we needed a new patio all together. 

Below is our OLD patio, with the sprinkle pipes removed, as we were getting ready for the patio guys to come! 

The DURING.... thank goodness for the equipment! 

That was a LOUD day! Sorry neighbors. 

The guys were at our house on a Saturday from 7am-10pm 

doing the removal and prep for the new. 

The following Saturday they came and poured! 

Jordan helped out and ran a wheel-barrow, one and a half trucks of cement later, it was poured. 

I was, of course, a great manager and drink supplier! 

 This weekend we got the grass seed planted around the edges and more of the finish work done. 

We are ready to ENJOY our patio! 

Bring on the summer! 

We also are thankful for our patio set we received as a wedding gift! 

As you can tell, we planned the patio with the furniture in mind :) 

And my flowers are planted and I love the color they add! 

 Last but not least, Wyatt has a sidewalk to his kennel, well it's more for US than Wyatt! 

Needless to say, we LOVE our patio!!!!!!!!!! 

We just need our grass to grow (might be tough with a 90lbs puppy)! 

Wreaths with Mom!

After doing our Pinterest Craft Day (go to Tiffany's Blog and view MANY posts to see all of our projects on "Pinterest Craft Day") mom and I have still had the "crafting itch".

The week of spring break, everyone at work took a day or two off,

so I invited mom over for a day to craft and hang out.

This post on Pinterest had sparked my interest so we selected it to be our project for the day.

Mom brought a role of brown paper she just happened to have.

We bought styrofoam wreaths from Michael's Craft warehouse (with our 40% off coupons of course), I have a circle cutter in my scrapbooking supplies and we were ready to go!

First we figured out what size our circles should be for the size of wreath we purchased.

I think we cut about 5" circles.

See all of the scissors in the above picture with different scalloped finshes? Well we quickly figured out that cutting the edges scalloped was going to TAKE FOREVER (mom was able to cut 5 circles at a time with the circle cutter and I would have had to cut each circle one-by-one with the scallop finish).

As a a result, we decided to try burning the edges!

I was able to burn anywhere from 5-10 circles at a time.

Mom cut, while I burned!

Safety first, I burned on an old cookie tray!

Then we decided we better see what they look like before we got too many done!

Looks good! Keep going!

We used the ends of sponge brushes to wrap the circles around, place the hot glue, and stick to the wreath.

Careful.... if your hot glue gun is too hot, you have to hold it a lot longer than you do if your glue gun is at a medium temperature.

It is a very repetitive and time consuming process, but the end product is worth it!

Since, I have also added butterflies! They look great and they can easily be removed as I simply used Tacky Glue and figured if I want to use this wreath in the winter or another time of year, I can remove the butterflies and either leave the wreath plain or add something else!

I finished mom's wreath for her (we had everything cut, I just had to glue) and brought it to her this weekend when we enjoyed a nice Easter weekend with mom, dad and other family members.

We both LOVE our new wreaths!

Patio Table Transformation

Jordan and I have been talking about "re-doing" a patio table for a while now, well this weekend we did it! We removed the legs and I spray painted them black. Jordan got a piece of plywood from work and he cut it to size and did the sanding.

In the mean time, I bought to 2 stencils and was excited about the "finish work."

We brought it inside once all the sanding was done so I could stencil in comfort. Once the stenciling was done, I painted the edges black and then took it outside and finished it with shellac. I am really excited about our new patio table that is bright, fun and springy! It will also be very functional when we pull the BBQ out of the garage this spring!

Canvas board with stickers

My last project for the day was painting a canvas and using stickers to write things!

I am happy with how it turned out!

This was another Pinterest inspired project!

Wine bottles turned into chalk board vases

Another Pinterest inspired project.... wine bottles painted with chalk board paint!

For the black bottles we used chalk board spray paint, and for the red bottles we made our own chalk board paint! It worked! I think the chalk needs to be used a little though for it to work better. Brand new chalk is a little hard to use. But I am happy with the turn out!

New Necklace...Pinterest inspired

Check out the necklace I made!

I was inspired by Pinterest

Here is my version! I can't wait to wear it.

I had so much fun, a girlfriend and I made them.