New CSN project - customizing rugs!

Obviously I haven't been sewing much lately; school and health problems have taken over my time. However, I will be done with school in June and will be moving into a beautiful apartment then - and of course I already know what I want to do to decorate. I like cruising the CSN website for ideas - whether creative office desks for my boyfriend, and rugs!

I really like using rugs to make a space interesting, and I've been wanting a zebra rug for my entryway. However, I'm having trouble finding one I like, so I'm thinking about getting a zebra rug fron CSN and using paint or dye to personalize it! And, of course, teaching you all how to do it as well :)

What do you think? Has anyone else ever customized a rug?

Here are some of the ones I'm looking at!

I really don't like all the stuff going on in this rug, so I'd probably try to make the whole border black.

Same with this - I like the zebra print itself, but the pink would obviously have to go!

Giveaway from Jerusha Hawkins - French Film Purse!

[Unrelated to this post news: Guess who just had her gallbladder removed? That's right, that means I've lost 2 organs in less than a year. Gaggg....]

Jerusha from Jerusha Design emailed me a while ago wondering if I'd like to giveaway one of her creations, and I jumped at the chance! She makes some super interesting and creative purses out of old film, and will be giving away one featuring an eiffel tower to one of my readers!

(I had to have a black and white picture of this purse - the combination of film and paris just screamed old theatre to me. You can scroll down to see a color picture at the bottom!)

Here is what Jerusha has to say about herself:

Hello! my name is Jerusha Hawkins. I am a full time wife and full time mother of one beautiful 18 month old girl named Nazarie. When i was 16 i got my first job at a movie theater in my town and i fell in LOVE with cinema. Everything about it! It was an amazing first job. Well, when we would have old film they would just THROW IT AWAY!! And i remember thinking what a waste it was because to me it had some real beauty to it. I started taking the film home and for a little while it just sat under my bed. Finally i really decided i wanted to put it to use I started by making a film purse it took forever and and wasn't anything too special. Over the years, im now 23, i have come up with a design that I love and really excited about and i hope you are excited about it too!

Here are some other examples of her awesome work:

And here is another picture of the giveaway prize! You can also see more of her work in her etsy shop.

Also, a quick note: I LOVE hosting giveaways for other new bloggers. If you're interested in me hosting a giveaway to you, send me an email with your ideas!

Now, how to enter:

1) Follow my blog if you don't already

2) Follow Jerusha's blog (use the link at the top)

3) Leave a comment with your name and a way to contact you

Also, for one extra entry, visit Jerusha's etsy shop and leave a comment with your favorite item!

12 Days of Christmas ~ Eight Maids a Milking

...in these adorable milkmaid aprons!! These beautiful aprons can be worn two ways; a standard apron and a more 'milk maidish' version. To make, see here.

12 Days of Christmas ~ Seven Swans A-Swiming

Still need the perfect gift for a little one? Whip up one of these adorable swan softies! This is so adorable and cute it could just become that baby's "blanky" - you know, the blanket/stuffed animal that they carry around until college (or even throughout. I still sleep with my blanky, shhhh...). Although you may want to use fabric instead of felt for the beak in that case!

Bundt Pan GIVEAWAY!!

Here it is - the bundt pan giveaway!!

I used this pan last night to make an amazing pumpkin cake.. it was the easiest thing ever and delicious. I absolutely LOVE this pan - it worked better than any bundt pan I've ever used!!

From now until Christmas Eve I'll be posting recipes, along with my reviews of them, to be used with a bundt cake pan. I've picked ones that are perfect for the holiday season, so hopefully they'll be good for Christmas baking.

For more info on this pan, check out this post.

The giveaway will end on Christmas day - think of it as my Christmas gift to you :)

Now, for the rules. Read carefully!

You can enter 1, or 2 times.

For 1 entry: Leave a comment and follow my blog! If you don't have a blogger profile for me to find your email address on, leave your address as well.

For 2 entries: Leave a comment, follow the blog, and link back from your blog!

12 Days of Christmas ~ Five and Six!

I got behind yesterday, so today will be a two-fer!

...so no one's wine glasses get mixed up!!

A set of these make great gifts! They're super easy to make, very customizable, and beautiful. If you are super creative, you can even combine them with the next tutorial as well...

Find out how to make these here.

This was a super tough one. Just like hens, what can you really do with geese? Ah... eggs! More specifically, golden eggs. So I guess it should really be 'On the sixth day of Christmas my true love gave to me, six geese a laying golden eggs.."

I made one of these necklaces for my mom for mother's day with birthstones of her kids in it. However, I think the idea of simply gold eggs is also beautiful. I'm not super fond of the nest in the above picture, but the tutorial I found for you (I was going to make one, but thought that maybe there'd be one out there - turns out there are tons!) makes beautiful, more realistic nests, like below:

These would also make amazing gifts - find out how to make them here.

12 Days of Christmas ~ Four Colly Birds

I knew right away what project I'd have to post for this one!! For any crafter who hasn't made some of these bird softies, try them out! They're super easy, fun, cute, and make great gifts. There is a link to the pattern for them here.

12 Days of Christmas ~ Three French Hens

Well, I couldn't think of a good 'hen' project that didn't involve chicken in the form of food, which seems... wrong. So, I decided on something that hens produce - eggs! French eggs, to be precise. I also have an extension on this tutorial that I'll be posting tomorrow, so check back then for something to do with your eggs!

What you need:

- 3 plastic easter eggs, wood, or styrofoam eggs

- Print outs of 3 different types of french writing (I just googled french text and french handwriting and found some jpegs to use, or if you want I can post the ones I have - just leave a comment if you want them!)

- Mod podge

- foam brush

For Tomorrow:

- glass container, like a candy dish, that your eggs will fit in

- ribbon

- florist moss

Step 1: Rip up your french text! Tear the print outs into strips that can be decoupaged onto the eggs.

Step 2: Spread some mod podge on the egg where you want your first strip to go. Put the strip of paper down, and put another layer of mod podge on top! Continue this way, slightly overlapping the different pieces of paper to get a layered look.

Step 3: Do this with each egg until you're finished! Be careful of spreading the mod podge too much; depending on your printer you might have some ink bleeding if you mess with it too much.

And there you have it - three French eggs.

You could put them in a bowl, in a clear container, anywhere you need an extra filler decoration! Any other ideas on what to do with these?

12 Days of Christmas ~ Two Turtle Doves

...in the form of napkin rings!

What you need:

Note that you can get the birds and nest in the floral department at most craft stores - I got mine at Michael's. Sometimes you can even get the birds already in the nest!

- A napkin ring

- A small bird nest- small enough so it doesn't look funny on the napkin ring.

- Two any-color birds, preferably with brown wings

- A hot glue gun

- Bleach

- A couple Q-tips

Step 1: Glue your birds into the nest. I did this first; in retrospect it might have been smarter to do step two first!

Step 2: Now, obviously we don't want orange birds for our turtle doves. In fact, until I actually looked it up I thought they should be white! Then I saw this picture:

I was pretty happy, because I wasn't able to find solid white birds at the craft store and the only ones they had had brown wings made out of pinecone pieces, which would be hard to bleach or paint!

SO, dip your Q-tip into some bleach and dab it along the birds. You should see the color start to fade almost immediately. Keep dabbing and rubbing until all the color has faded (you might need to wait a couple minutes to see the complete results).

This is what they looked like partway through:

Step 4: Grab your napkin rings. I would personally use skinnier, more organic looking ones, but there were all we had in the drawer so I used them.

Now, hot glue the bottom of your bird nest to the napkin ring. Pull your fancy napkins through (once again, I would probably use a more organic cloth for this, but purple damask was all I had on hand!) and voila, two turtle doves and a holiday napkin holder.

Check back tomorrow for 3 French Hens - I'm really excited about this one!

Bundt Pan Specs

I realized after posting last night that I should've given some more info on the cake pan I'll be using for my recipe reviews and giveaway, so here it is!

Part of the reason why I chose this particular pan was because it was inexpensive. I hate it when I see bloggers review things that they have gotten for themselves or for a giveaway that is out of a normal person's price range. Really, who'se going to go buy that after seeing the review? And then you get so excited about something, only to go to the website and find that to get that item you'd have to sell your house/car/kids. So, I wanted to pick something that was reasonable.

How reasonable you ask? $14.99. Not bad, eh?

Here's the rest of the info on this pan:

Nordicware Natural Commercial 2 Piece Angelfood Cake Pan

Made of even heating, rust proof aluminum and galvanized steel wire around the rims for added strength, bakers agree that aluminum is best. A removable bottom for easy cake removal.

Features:

• Constructed of aluminum
• Cooling feet
• Lifetime warranty
• 9.4" x 9.4" x 4.25"

Tell me what you think - do you like this idea? How would you use this pan?