How to make a tablet case

Recently I have been so very busy with school that I haven't had the time to blog, but I have still been adding content online for College Avenue. I recently did a very informative and helpful how to on making a tablet case from a composition notebook and some spare plastic, check it out :)

How To: Make a Place mat Purse

Hello Lovelies! Today is such a beautiful day here in Fort Collins! Gosh, following that horrible cold wind yesterday it is such a blessing!

I wanted to highlight that I wrote another fun How To for College Avenue and you should all check it out!

I found two different fun tutorials on how to make a place mat purse and wanted to share it with both my wonderful college fans and all of you of course!

I had lots of fun making this purse! It cost less than $3. The place mat was $1 at The Dollar Tree, the button was $0.25 at the army surplus store (who knew?!), the thread was from a kit at the dollar store and the elastic was an old hair band!

You can find the my tutorial on College Avenue for a very simple version of the purse. I might try making another one with pockets, but I will be sure to follow up with a new post on how I did it ;)

I found these other two very helpful tutorials on Happy Together and Lil Blue Boo, which give lots of options for the tutorial.

I got a new sewing machine! I love it soooo much! It is a Singer Simple and it is so lovely, I haven't been able to get off of it since I got it! Love love love!

Enjoy your weekend! I hope it is as gorgeous where ever you are as it is here!

How To: Make a Shaped Bullten Board

Hello lovelies! Oh how I have missed you. I have been busy with school and enjoying down time with Mark and my new magazine subscriptions to Glamour and Lucky.

I wanted to share a How To I had published for College Avenue Magazine, it is fun and easy, and oh so super cute! I got the idea from the Happy Together Blog.

This is how mine turned out:

Hope you have fun making yours for your desk area!

Have a Happy Tuesday!

Giving old Frames a New Appeal

So, I was surfing Pinterest and ended up on Craftgawker (another pin board inspired website designed for crafters) and saw a photo of some frames that were covered in maps. Well, that reminded me of a super fun craft that my sister did in her first couple of years of college with a girlfriend of hers. So, I decided to take some dollar store frames that I have from my dorm room last year and wanted to spruce up and did this craft with them. 

The craft is to take the frames and use glue to decorate them with magazine clippings. Which is so super fun, and something that is right down my alley! So, here is a little tutorial on how to do it.

{ What you need }

1. magazine clippings 2. old, smooth frames 3. Paint Brush 4. Glue

 Clip out all of your magazine pictures. Then you will apply glue to the back of them with your paint brush, edge to edge, make sure the whole back of the clipping is covered in glue.

 Now you will press the clipping around the frame where you want it.

 Repeat these steps until the frame is covered and add a couple of extras if you prefer ( I added a ribbon made into a bow and a little sparkly jewel.

Do it to as many frames as you like and create a little collage of them on your wall. It is fun and so easy.

Happy Crafting!

Put a little sparkle in your life

With the biggest holidays of the year behind us, everyone has a little more time for themselves. Well, with all that leftover holiday gear and cheer, why not use some of that glitter from making snow globes and sparkling ornaments? Well, here are a few fun ways to use glitter to spruce up your wardrobe or decorate the house.

{ glitter candle holders }

 Try this tutorial from Ruche's Homemade Holiday guide to make these adorable glitter candle holders. Who says glitter is just for one time of the year? Plus, if you are having a romantic Valentine's Day at home, this is a fabulous center piece that is romantic and less cliche than candle sticks.

{ glitter shoes }

 Check out this fabulous tutorial from A Beautiful Mess on how to make your own glittery shoes. Instead of going out and buying super expensive glitter pumps that are out of your budget (let's face it, even knock-offs are expensive these days), you can pull those shoes out of your closet that are outdated and spruce them up a bit. This would be another fabulous Valentine's Day option ;)

{glitter shoe repair }

This is a similar tutorial from Wobisobi, but only covers the back heel of your favorite pumps that have taken a hard hit in the winter weather. It spruces them up and makes them look brand new and ready to wear all over again!

I hope your holidays were wonderful!

Project of the Week

Hello readers! I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday and is still enjoying time with family and friends! This week I wanted to show you what I am working on with my knitting projects. It is a beautiful stitch and I just had to share it.

{ The Herringbone Stitch Cowl }

[Purlbee]

The cowl is so beautiful and full, it will be so warm. They used an alpaca yarn from Purlbee, but I am using a store bought beautiful ivory yarn from Super Soft. 

{ Great Tutorial }

This tutorial is so fabulous to learn the herringbone stitch, because the stitch is a little difficult and photos just don't explain it the way a video does. 

I am so excited about it and it is already so beautiful! I hope you are having fun doing your projects during your breaks!

Down to the Wire: Gift Ideas that take less than 30 Minutes

Here are some fabulous last minute gifts to really get the "wow" factor of homemade. Check out yesterday's post as well: What to Wear for your holiday parties.

Christmas is not just around the corner, its on the same block. That does not always mean that you have finished your shopping, that's why all of the stores are open 24 hours in preparation for shopper's last minute freak outs. Well, even if it is hard to do homemade gifts at the last minute, here are some great gifts or stocking stuffers that will have the wow factor of being homemade without the extensive amount of time and effort.

{1. Fashionista}

[Wrap Scarf] Have even just a little skill on the sewing machine? Well, this is a simple, no pattern required, project. It will take less than 30 minutes to put together and will put a smile on your fashionista family member's face. 

[cotton&curls]

[The Bangle] Have an old sweater that needs re-purposing? All this takes is 10 minutes, a dollar store bangle and sewing or gluing on the sweater. 

[ravelry]

{2. The Barista}

For a less than 10 minute stocking stuffers for the barista in the family, you can easily put together this hot chocolate favor or this tea taster sampler.

[Hot chocolate favor] using a ziploc bag, a ribbon, hot cocoa mix, a candy cane, marshmallows and chocolate chips. 

[Constant Baker]

[Tea Sampler] Sew together two pieces of fabric and wrap up with a ribbon with several flavors of tea from the cabinet (for friends) or pick up a few great flavors at the store.

[Life, Gluten Free]

{3. The Seamstress}

Then there are those people, like you, who always are on some fabulous project. Well, there are gifts for us too. 

[ Sewing Kit ] Take 30 minutes to put this together for your friends who always is going on about her new sewing project. It will really show her/him that you care and know them for them.

[sew she sews]

[ Knitting Needles Carrying Case ] Or take 30 minutes to put this together for your knitting friend, I know I would love one of these for my new found passion!

[sew she sews]

 Even if it isn't perfectly finished, you will still give your heart to your loved ones, because that is what Christmas should be about. Love, cherish and enjoy your time spent with family and friends this holiday. It is so much more worth it.

Happy holidays!

Decorating with your VS Pink Dogs

Everyone enjoys getting their free Pink dog when they buy something from Victoria's Secret, but when they start piling up, what do you do with all of them? Well, after mine sat in my closet for a little while just taking up space, I decided to make better use of them.

I was reorganizing my closet to suit all of my new craft bins and wanted to use them as a decoration.

 

I hung my dogs up using safety pins and picture hangers.

I stuck the safety pin through the fabric on the backside of my dog in the center of the body.

Marked the wall where I wanted to hang them, then hammered my picture hangers in.

And this is how they turned out! They look adorable and say hello every time I pen up my closet door! I only have one more final this afternoon and then my semester is over! Then I will have more time to devote to crafting and, of course, blogging!

Happy Thursday!



**Not affiliated with Victoria's Secret.

Learning new things...

Hello lovelies! I sure hope you are staying warm, because it is freezing here! I have been learning lots of new things, primarily knitting. My friend Kristen from the Gingersnap Society blog gave me private lessons on how to do a simple knit and I have been discovering lots of new patterns!

This is the product that I ended up with on my first try, and though it has some flaws, I am pretty proud of it! It is just a simple knit, but it is so fun and relaxing to put it together.

Since I wasn't sure whether I wanted to pick up knitting or not, I didn't want to commit by buying needles until I was sure it was something I wanted to do, which it was! So, I knit my ear warmer with mechanical pencils, and I wanted to list a few other common household items you could knit with!

1. mechanical pencils
2. pens
3. skewers
4. fingers (there are tons of tutorials on how to finger knit!)
5. chopsticks (preferably smooth ones, not ones that will catch on the yarn)
6. flat head screw drivers

I hope you try it and love it as much as I do!

Happy Tuesday!

Making Thank yous a little more personal

Hello lovelies! I hope you all had a happy thanksgiving weekend and stuffed full of turkey! I was busy making pillows with my mother-in-law for my mother and writing my application for EIC of College Avenue. Well, since I needed some fabulous letters of recommendation, I also need to send back fabulous thank you letters to my mentors! I decided to make them a little more personal by making them!

Just used scrapbook paper and a glue gun! And it always gives a fabulous little personal flare to show my care ;)

Happy Monday!

Origami Star Ornament

I found a tutorial on how to make gorgeous stars out of the art of folding paper, unfortunately I had to follow the pictures, because the whole tutorial was in Russian! So I am bringing it to you in English ;)

All you need is paper!

 First fold your square piece of paper in half.

 Now fold the top two corners in towards the center to line up with the half fold.

 Fold both sides upwards to line up with the half folds.

 Make cross folds by folding the top triangle to each side, lining up with the outer edge.

 Now fold the upper triangle in towards the center, and fold the bottom triangle to its back.

Repeat these five steps with each piece of paper you intend to put in the star (for best results give it a even amount of points.

 When putting the star together slide the smaller triangle into the other's larger triangle, behind the folds.

Do this all of the way around and it should look like this. Then pull them in until they all meet in the middle.

You can add a string to hang it up!

Enjoy!

A new craft organizer

So today was such a fun and wonderful girls day with Katie and Kristen! We went to Once Again Thrift, Plato's Closet and Charming Charlies. I only bought a few things at Once Again Thrift, but Charming Charlies was such a neat store of accessories!

I found this adorable little wine box and had to have it (even though it wasn't for sale... ) so I talked to the owner and got it for $2.59 (for some reason she doesn't like even numbers... ) and I brought it home and made it into  wonderful craft box!

 What I did was make solid sides for it with cardboard that I covered with some fabric I had laying around.

 I measured out the sides and cut them to fit, which was very easy to do with just a pair of scissors and a marker.

 Then I measured out my fabric to cover the cardboard, glued it with a hot glue gun, and then glued the pieces in to finish. It is perfect!

I also found some cute Christmas lights for less than $5 all together! There were a few other items I picked up that you will be seeing posts about in the near future!

Happy Monday!

DIY Paper Wreath

Hello lovelies! Hope everyone is having a fantastic weekend! This morning I decided to be crafty again and made a paper wreath, I found the idea in Ruche's Homemade Holiday Lookbook. I wanted to do it because I have this book I have cut up and just love its vintage pages! So here is DIY number three with the same little old book ;)

What You will need:

• pages of a book
• glue (I used a hot glue gun)
• piece of thin, rectangular-shaped cardboard (from a cereal box works!)

First you cut a circle out of the center of your card board and set aside.

Then begin to roll your pages from corner to corner, making a cone shape.

Then fold the small side backwards and glue the open flap (seen above) to the side of the cone to keep the shape.

Place the fold through the hole in the cardboard and glue in place. Repeat these steps until the wreath fills the entire center and looks full!

And violà! You have made an adorable paper wreath for your decor!

Enjoy!

DIY: Flag Banner

Hello lovelies! I was feeling crafty again today and since I wasn't all bogged down with homework, I decided to make a little flag banner to brighten up our dull, ity-bity, airplane bathroom (as we like to call it).

This is what you will need:

• scrapbook paper
• hot glue gun
• X-acto knife or scissors
• yarn
• markers (optional)
• vintage book pages (optional)

 First you draw out your flags on the back of your scrapbook paper and cut them apart.

 Then you fold the top of the flags over about 3/4 of an inch.

 Then line out your flags to decide what pattern you want.

 Hot glue the backs of the folded part of the flag to the bottom, creating a space where you can pull the yarn through.

Customize them as you like with your markers and vintage paper and string them up! I recommend using a crochet hook to pull the yarn through!

I loved it so much I put it up by our stairs as well!

Enjoy!

DIY: Pinwheel Art

Hello wonderful friends! I made something adorable that I have seen in several places on the net and had to try out!

 It is super easy and this is all you need:

• pages of paper (I used ripped out pages of an old book)
• a glue gun
• thin card board (like a cereal box) or scrapbooking paper
• yarn

Fold each page back and forth (hot dog style) from one end to the other, each fold roughly 1/2 inch wide.

Now glue your pages together, end to end and fold them into a circle.

Glue the scrapbook paper over the center on each side. I used some cute ones for the front! Glue the yarn to the back and hang it up!

Have fun!