iPod Sleeve from Sample scraps

My friend works for design firm and they were tossing out sample books of leather and fabric. She of course let me dig through it before it was tossed out. I got so many great little scraps. Perfect for little accents to my projects. 

While digging through the scraps I found two "leather" scraps I loved. So I decided to make myself an iPod case. 

I took one little strip and folded it in half. I stitched it up the sides to form a pocket. Then I took a small strip of a different color and hot glued it to the back and put velcro on the other side. I could have sewed it..... but I'm lazy. :)

Easy Wine charms

Last friday I went to game night with my mom and her friends. And of course there was wine, and of course it was St. Patties themed, so naturally I had to make wine charms. These were super simple and it cost me WAY less than $1 for all of them. 

I had a bag of little "foamies" shamrocks in 2 different color greens. All I did was sandwich hemp chord (you can use ribbon or string, whatever works) between two sharmrocks with hot glue. Then I wrote our names on them.

Done. Yay. Easy.

You could easily switch this to any holiday or theme. You could also put a rubber band in between them so you could wrap them around a can or bottle or cup. 

What to do with a Half Dead bouquet of flowers

My boyfriend is a super nice guy and brings me "random-I-love-you" flowers (yes, I'm bragging).  And I like to bask in the love for as long as possible. But I hate when half of the flowers die, and the other half are still alive. 

Do you just throw them all out?

Do you keep them in the vase?

Do you take out the dead ones and have a sparse vase of flowers?

I have a solution!  

I saw this vase from urban outfitters and I loved it:

But it was $24 and the reviews said that you can't take the beakers out and wash them. That sounds gross to me. But I was obsessed with the idea, so I just bought a test tube stand set online for $6.

When the big flowers died I took out all the ones that were still alive and trimmed them down and put them in my "test tube vase". It spreads them out and makes the last little bit of flowers I have left look "purposeful and cute" rather than "sparse and leftover". 

Check it out!

I think it looks great on my shelves in the living room. 

Much better than a half dead bouquet!

Ps. This is my 100th post! Isn't that like a milestone or something?

"Silhouette-free" Jar labels!

I've seen everyone's cute chalkboard labels for their pantry jars and now I wanted some. But I do not have money nor a silhouette *tear*. So I made them for Free-ish (that's like free but using things on hand :P)

I got the taller two jars as hand me downs from my mom and the shorter two jars were from a thrift store for $1.50 each. 

You will need: Chalkboard vinyl, scissors or an exact-o knife, a pattern of the shape you want (I got mine by Googling "borders"). 

I used chalkboard vinyl on a frame for valentines day and I had a LOT left over. The whole roll was about $5 at Michael's.

 Cut out a piece of the vinyl that its big enough for your shape

 Dab a gluestick on the back of the image and sick it to the back of the vinyl. This will keep it from moving around while you are trying to cut the little details.

 Use scissors or a knife to cut out the shape. I forgot a picture for this one but I'm sure you can figure it out.

 Then just stick them on your jars. I used this chalk marker ($2.50) to write on the labels. If you mess up, it wipes off with water.

 When I change out my coffee blend I can write whats in there so they don't get mixed.

 I think they turned out great! No silhouette needed! I am crafter, hear me roar!

While I have your attention check out the fruit bowl I got a garage sale for 50 cents!

Total cost for everything [but the kitchen sink ;) ] in this photo $4

I'll be linking up, so check out my links page!

PREVIEW: Throw Pillows and New Sofa

I got this really great sofa on craigslist for FREE. Yea, thats right, be jealous. ;) 

If you go to my FACEBOOK page you can see a sneak peak of the "before" couch. (Then you can "like" me and then I will be really happy)

But it needs just a little fix up. 

Working on that currently.

But I've already got some ideas for my pillows. 

1. I will be copying  creating a pillow inspired by this pillow from World Market:

I will probably change the colors to match what I've got going on a little better.

2. Then with the coffee bean bags that I got from my boyfriends work (thats right, authentic :P) I will be making pillows similar to these from pottery barn:

I am so excited!! yaaaaaay! <--that's how excited I am, I'm showing my dorky side.