Oh Beautiful for Patriotic Pillows!

Hi there!  My name is Sydney, and I wanted to show you some cute patriotic pillows that my Grandma made.

So, according to Grandma, she cut a stencil from card stock using her Cricut.  She then put some spray adhesive on the back of the stencil, applied the stencil to a piece of muslin, then simply spray painted it!

Seriously Grandma?  Spray paint?!

She placed the pillows on her bench, along with some thrifted pillow shams and a thrifted king-size pillow case reworked to make a seat cover.

Now, to be honest, Grandma says that her idea wasn't original.  She actually got the idea from some pillows at JoAnn's.  She added a border of patriotic fabric to hers, though.

Grandma is pretty happy with her pillows.  She had everything in her stash and didn't have to spend an extra dime.  Thanks for stopping by!

By the way, my cousin Malakai thinks these are pretty neat also!

Grandma likes to link to these great parties!

Girls Camp Crafts 2014

Summer is a busy time for most people, and I'm lucky to have a portion of my summer spent at Girl's Camp.  And, I'm even more lucky to spend my time at camp doing crafts!  How great is that to do crafts in the beautiful outdoors amongst beautiful young women?!  So here's the run down of what we did this year.

Magnetic Bulletin Boards

The first day we made these cute magnet boards.  We started with a 9x13 cookie sheet purchased from the dollar store and/or WalMart.  We cut our paper to size and adhered it to the back of the cookie sheet using mod podge.

While we waited for the mod podge to dry, we made these cute magnets.  We had already printed the words onto colored paper and a 1" punch was used to cut them out.  The girls glued the circles to the inside of the bottle caps, then once dry, covered the circle with the epoxy sticker.  Magnets were glued to the back using E-6000 glue.

Once the mod podge was completely dry (using a hair dryer, or letting it sit overnight) the vinyl lettering was added.  The last step was to drill two holes and add the ribbon hanger.  One tip:  The holes are actually easier to drill before they start the project, and a small file is necessary to remove any metal burrs that are left as a result of drilling.  

Follow the links below to see where we bought the supplies:

Bottle Caps

Epoxy Stickers

Magnets

or, you might like these magnets better

as they are smaller and have a lower profile.

Vinyl Lettering

Temple Pendants

Day two had us doing these super easy necklaces.  The original idea can be found on SugarDoodle, along with the information of where to purchase the supplies, and also a file for the images used in the necklaces.  Follow the directions they suggest and give them plenty of time to dry.  We let ours sit overnight.

These images were cut with a 1" punch just like the magnets.  These, however, were covered with a glued on glass bubble, as opposed to an epoxy sticker.  Please note, I was unable to photograph these without getting reflective glare on the glass, so please excuse what looks like strange white patches on the photos...they are only an illusion!

The necklaces were super easy and took all but about 5 minutes to complete.  Our girls have several activities available for them during their free time, crafts being just one of them.  So, this project allowed them to experience some of the other fun things at camp.

Design Your Own Pillowcases

Our last project was basically a free project...nice on the budget!  I had done this activity before with a smaller group of young women.  You can view the original post here.  The pillowcases were donated from a hotel chain.  Before camp, we cut off a portion of the pillowcases and then added back a band of bright fabric.  All of our fabric was donated so these cute pillowcases didn't cost a thing!

The only thing purchased for this project was a few boxes of crayons.  Add to the fact that crayons are super cheap this time of year and this project cost us just a couple of dollars!

All the girls needed to do was decorate their pillowcase however they wanted to.  Once complete, we used an iron to heat set the design.  The girls who have done this project before say the pillowcases wash up just fine.

And that's it!  Another successful year at Girl's Camp....looking forward to the next!

I like to link to these great parties!

Crayon Decorated Pillowcases

I work with the young women of our church and we meet each week and do various activities.  Sometimes we meet for instruction and learning, sometimes we do service, sometimes we do crafts, but always we have fun.  Since it is the new year, the girls wanted to do something to reflect this year's theme "Arise and Shine Forth."  They decided on decorating pillowcases so that when they wake each day, they would be reminded to be examples of all that is good.  

Trying to be a good steward of the yearly budget for these activities, I was able to put together this activity for almost nothing.  Here's how to do it on the cheap:

•Make the pillowcases from sheets and trim them with fabric from your stash.  Did you know that hotels get rid of their sheets (usually for FREE!) on a regular basis?  Over the years I have used many of these sheets for other church activities.  I have turned several into table clothes.  I have dyed some and stenciled others to replicate stone walls (which were used to turn the gym into Bethlehem.)  Some have even been sewn together and had bricks and windows stenciled on them to create the building facades of Nauvoo, Illinois in the 1800's.   Yes, much to the dismay of my husband, I have a few boxes of sheets around the house!

•Instead of buying expensive fabric paints and markers, use regular crayons.  The girls colored their designs with crayons, then we heat set them.  Just put a layer of brown kraft paper under and over the design and use a hot iron.

•Once complete, give the design detail with a black permanent marker.  Try not to let the marker stay too long in one place, as it will bleed, but make your marks light and quick.

2 pillowcases + 1 blouse = 1 cute dress!

Question:  What do you get when you combine two vintage pillow cases with one cute blouse?  Answer:  A super cute, super easy dress!

It was as easy as cutting off the blouse, stitching on the pillowcases, and threading through some elastic.  You can see the tutorial here.  I could have stopped at that point, but the neckline was a little too open for me so I added ruffles to each side using the leftover blouse fabric.  I also decided to make a bright yellow belt with a big fabric flower to top it off.

I was lucky to find some matching shoes at Goodwill for half price!  In fact, the total breakdown is this:

2 pillowcase @ 1.99
1 blouse  @ 2.49
belt supplies @ 4.20
shoes @ 3.50
free bracelet

Total for complete outfit = $12.18...not too bad!

I've always loved the color yellow.  In fact, growing up in the 70's my bedroom was decorated with yellow and orange...so bright and cheery!  Oh the memories...bright orange shag carpet, yellow walls, mushroom lamp, troll doll collection to die for, anything to do with the sun, and the scent of Love's Fresh Lemon Cologne...so yummy!

Linking to these great parties!

Featured on:
Sugar Bee Crafts
Sew Woodsy
Thrifty 101

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