Thrifty Finds & Crafty Creations

It’s been a while since I showed any thrifty finds on my blog, but that doesn't mean I haven’t been buying, it just means that if I showed every thrifty find that came home with me, I would be forever taking photos and editing them, and I just don’t get time for that.

I had a bit of spare time on my hands today, so here are a couple of my favourite finds from recent thrifty shopping trips.

Some vintage wooden game peices, which are totally cool and only cost .50c for the bag. I have seen different tutorials for turning these into magnets or pushpins, but I can also see them making cool jewellery.

This little dish, which has the cutest print on the front, and even cuter print on the back.

The other day on Pinterest (are you addicted yet? I am.) I saw a cool picture of a little granny square bracelet, and I thought I just had to have one of those, so last night while watching TV I made one.

It’s awesome, I can’t believe I didn’t make one sooner. Now I will have to make one to go with every outfit.

At the craft group I go to we have a project night once a month, and at the latest one we learnt how to make beaded teaspoons.

These are the two I made. This is actually a really quick and simple project (if you know basic wire working), and they look so cool. This will be a great future gift idea, so I will have to start stocking up on teaspoons.

I have also got my thrifty tin swap package ready to go, but I can’t show you that, because I know the person who is getting it reads my blog, and I want it to be a surprise.

The Great Sunday Bake-Off Adventure

Last weekend we attended a bake-off at a friend’s house. The original idea was for this to be like an old fashioned housewives get together and compare recipes kind of thing,  so I thought it would be good to give a hostess gift.

Spread your Wings Mini Album

I had far too many photos of the album to put them all into one blog post, so I made them into a video. Some of the photos are a bit on the dark side, because the sun kept coming and going. This video was meant to play to the track of Rhiannon by Fleetwood Mac, but apparently that is illegal, so you’ll just have to use your imagination or play this video at the same time.

I also went dressed to theme, kind of. The theme was supposed to be fifties housewife, but I’m much more into the 70’s, so I went dressed as a 70’s housewife (thinking along the lines of kitty from “that 70’s show” only younger). I don’t have a photo of what I was wearing, but it was something like this, only green.

Image via google image search

The baking part was a bit of a disaster. The lesson learnt, don’t make something for the first time the day before you need to take it to an event. The first attempt at cupcakes (white chocolate mud cakes) was a disaster, and we were left with very little ingredients to work with. So I went with a simple, but delicious, chocolate cake recipe for the second lot, and they at least turned out the right shape and texture, but I had no idea how they would taste. I made buttercream icing for the first time as well, and attempted to make it bright purple, but the colouring was a bit difficult with liquid food colouring. On the day it was made the icing tasted very buttery (a child commented to his mum that it was just purple butter), but we bought some home with us afterwards and the next day they were delicious, so in future I will make and ice cupcakes with buttercream icing the day before they are intended to be eaten. The cupcakes were decorated with a few gold edible beads, and I think they actually looked quite cute in the end.

On a totally different topic, the winner of my party favours giveaway was Hera, who’s little girl turned four and got a new baby brother for her birthday, so I threw in a few extra gifts.

**(I Have been trying to upload this post for a week, but I’ve had slow internet so it’s been impossible!)**

Little Princess Turns Four (and a giveaway)

By some weird and unfortunate coincidence, Little princess happened to be sick on her birthday again this year, with almost exactly the same kind of bug as last year. But she still managed to enjoy her little “party” at daycare, before being rushed home with a sick little man, to have a restful day enjoying her gifts.

I made a rainbow cake, which looks really effective for little effort, and the children and teachers were pretty impressed. I didn’t manage to get any photos at the time, but this is what was left. The layers were (from the bottom up) pink, purple, blue, green, yellow and red. It had white frosting with 2 different kinds of rainbow sprinkles on top, and 4 princess crown candles.

After the cake, each child was given a little triangle favour box. I made 34 of them, and these are the ones left over. I figured it’s better to have too many than not enough, you don’t want to have anyone miss out.

Each little box contained a fabric wrist band and stickers. Each of the 34 wrist bands I made were different, 17 for girls and 17 for boys.

****Giveaway Details: I have decided that I have no use for the 13 favour boxes left over, so if you have a birthday party coming up for a 3/4/5 year old boy or girl, with 13 or less invited, this could be your chance to score some free party favours. I will also add some other bits and pieces to them, because I bought other things to add but was told it is not PC to have those things at daycare, so they are just sitting in my craft room taking up space. All you have to do to enter is leave a comment on this post, I would really like to know if your party has a theme, because I am always looking for new party theme ideas.

Here’s what you will get:

13 favour boxes – 6 boys and 7 girls.

each box will contain:

a handmade fabric wrist band, a puffy sticker, a lollipop, a couple of small bouncy balls, a few of those weird shaped rubber bands that kids seem to love right now, and anything else I can think of, because I can’t remember what I bought.

The giveaway will be open for a week, and if there are multiple entries I will get Little Princess to draw a winner on Sunday 19th June.*******

So, remind me next year to start preparing earlier. The downside to being crafty and creative - you are expected to hand-make everything, and each year must be better than the last. I’m glad that’s over so I can get back to doing things I want to do for a while, until the next birthday.

Swaps on the go

I’m a bit late sharing these things, because both of them happened last week, or it could have been the week before, I’m really having trouble keeping track of time lately.

Firstly, I received my lovely cushion from Lynda, as part of the Cushion Swap.

Then I finished my brooch for the Brooch Swap, but I haven’t posted it yet, because I am terribly forgetful, and it has been sitting on my craft table for over a week.

I embellished a little box which contained some piece of jewellery I got years ago. In case you can’t tell from the photo, the brooch is made from a zip. This is not at all what I had planned to make for my swap partner, but we made these at a craft project night I went to a couple of weeks ago, and I thought it would be something different than what I usually make. I make a lot of brooches, mostly for myself but also as gifts, but I had never made a zip brooch before. I have since bought a few more zips so I can do some experimenting with different designs/colours.

That’s all so far, but I hope to hear this week who my partner will be for the Thrifty Tin Swap so I can start planning and shopping for that one.

At the moment I am completely obsessed with a mini album I am making for a friend, as a hostess gift. She is having a “bake-off” at here house in a couple of weeks, so I thought it would be cool to do the old-school thing of giving a hostess gift, and also I just love making mini albums. Hopefully I will be able to show that to you next week.

A few more examples

Here are some more things I have been working on to show ways of using the embellishments I have been creating.

Triangle box, made using this video tutorial (instructions can also be found here). Embellished with a vintage book page & button flower, a little wire & bead spray, and a die cut embellishment from a package I got ages ago and forgot I had. These boxes are so easy to make, and really cute. I'm going to be making 30 or so for favour boxes for little princess’s daycare class.

A little box that originally had chocolates or something in it, covered with scrapbooking paper (My minds eye – best of paisley), embellished with a piece of paper doily, some crochet trim, a flower made by layering a lace flower, a crochet doily and a heart button, with a bead & wire spray, and a little tag from the same package as die cut above.

Another little box, made using this video tutorial. Embellished with another one of those die cut shapes, a vintage book page butterfly, a crochet flower with vintage button centre and a button & wire spray.

A couple of cards, one with a vintage sheet music butterfly, and the other with a vintage sheet music flower. I forgot to ink the edges of these ones before I stuck them on to the cards, so they don't look quite as good, I think.

This week all my spare time will be taken up getting things ready for the birthday next week. I have to make one of these for each of the children in the class, and boxes to put them in. Plus I still have dolls clothes & accessories to make and a rainbow cake to practice run.

Anyone else feel like this year is really going too quickly??