Thanks.

Thanksgiving is nearly here! I love this time of year. I am thankful for a fantastic family, a pretty snazzy boyfriend, an enjoyable job, and a class that I like. I'm also thankful for days off! I started today off with a run outside gazing at the autumn leaves (before you think: wow, she's dedicated. Know that this may have been a one time thing), just took some pumpkin bread out of the oven from this new recipe, and am trying not to be too jealous of my roommates who get to go be with family for the weekend while I work through the weekend. 

As the weather gets cooler, I seem to get craftier. Remember these cute magnets I made with cork? I seem to have an abundance of cork afterwards. So I whipped up an inspiration corkboard! Here's how I did it.

Started off with a cork tile - dollar store. or Kristen's house. I have so many, it's sad -, some paint of choice - I chose metallic silver - and a paintbrush and tape. 

Tape off your design and paint your design! I chose chevron. Cause it's SO in right now. 

I glued mine to a second cork tile for thickness, attached it to my wall with 3-m poster strips, and added a little inspiration. Paint samples for fall wardrobe inspiration, and memories from summer that I want to keep in mind. Easy as pie! Or pumpkin bread.

Where does this thanksgiving weekend bring you?

Enjoy!

What a Card {No. 2}

You've probably heard, but on Tuesday, there is a certain holiday called Valentine's Day! I actually really like this day, though some people get bitter about it, I think it's fun no matter what your relationship status. 

I spent the day finishing off my valentines that I've been making for some friends. I won't take credit for all the incredibly cheesy (but cute) sayings I used, but I don't remember where I found them all. I had such fun making these! What do you give out on Valentine's Day?

Enjoy!

What a card.

I've had few chances to be crafty the past couple weeks! One thing that keeps me creative is making cards now and then. I'm not a hard core card maker, but It's so wonderful to have a stack of cards ready to give out the second you think of it. Especially with Valentines Day coming up, and it's always nice to give out cards to your loved ones around this time. I'm making some pretty cards for that occasion, I'll post them next week!

Here's some of my favourite things to do with cards:

1. Film (pictured) - If you find any old rolls, don't through them out! Keep them, cut off a strip, round the corners if you like, and embellish a card!

2. Sewing - I have no idea what kind of damage running paper through a sewing machine does, but it looks really pretty! I love doing a wide zig-zag pattern when stitching on paper.

3. Paper folding - I found some Origami paper and kept folding triangles until it looked neat! 

Here's a neat one I found, Valentine's themed. 

                                                                     Source: smg.photobucket.com via Carrissa on Pinterest

What are your favourite card making tricks?

Enjoy!

DIY Wednesday.

A new feature perhaps? DIY Wednesday?

I love the look of this! I think I'll try it soon. 

                                                                      Source: witandwhistle.com via Kristen on Pinterest

...when I have time. These past few days I've hardly had a moment to sit! Memorizing lines for a drama production coming up, getting all the syllabi for the coming semester, starting regular classes, and starting teaching again. My goodness, I just want to craft!

What's a project you want to attempt? 

Enjoy!

Craft Withdrawl

It's a real disease. Craft Withdrawl symptoms include:

-inability to enjoy every day mundane tasks

-extreme longings to compose something from scratch, particularly one that looks beautiful

-craving to complete a project, to gain that crafty satisfaction

These, as well as others symptoms, are normal with Craft Withdrawl. If you, or any loved ones you know are experiencing these symptoms, a suggested remedy is to spend a day with your mom, not worrying about the outside non-crafty world, and sew a beautiful, useful project (i.e. a laptop sleeve!)

3 layers of healing for the top of the sleeve...

3 layers for the bottom.

a patchwork fold-over to complete the remedy for my withdrawl.

Amidst the healing process...

and...Cured!

my laptop will be safe, and I am cured of my Craft Withdrawl!

If you are looking for a similar remedy, check out the full tutorial (CA - Crafters Anonymous, also known as Sew, Mama, Sew) here. Here's the PDF version as well.

Enjoy!

Bringing Summer Back

The strangest summer occurred. There was wind, there was rain, there was blizzards every week...well not quite, but they would have fit in just fine too. It was a cold and rainy summer though, and now, in October, summer finally decides to pay a visit! Thankfully, I live on the sunny side of the street/dorm, so I get to enjoy all the benefits of my good friend Mr. Sun. I even considered singing the song for him to come shine down on me a little more.

So, with this sun, the flowers outside that haven't frozen already still flourish! And i wanted to bring the joy of those beautiful flowers inside. And so i I did just that. I am quite happy with the result. So beautiful! The buds even bloom just sitting there in the vase.

And the vase you ask? It was a burst of creativity I had probably two years ago, but never had the spray paint to follow through with it. I just taped off some sections in a mosaic pattern on a blue glass bottle and took my can of spray paint to it, and it turned out well! Very simple, and very pretty I think.

I enjoy a second, more adequate, summer!

Enjoy!

I hereby declare myself a bloggist.

Yes, I do realize that a bloggist is more commonly referred to as a blogger, but really, who wants to follow normal trends?

I have really enjoyed blogging this entire summer, and as this summer comes to an end, (Happy Sepetember!) I really hope to continue this fantastic habit I seem to have acquired, blogging for the better good of creative minds!

I heard about the new Stats feature on Blogger (under dashboard) and have been enjoying it thoroughly! It's quite satisfying knowing more than one person reads my blog! I blog for the personal enjoyment of it, but it's kind of fun knowing readers do exist! Thank you readers! You are appreciated!

So, in celebration of my love of being a bloggist, I will share a few of my favourite things. You can see more of my favourite on the list to the right.

Jenni's Blog- beautiful photos, words and inspiration from my sister. She's an avid blogger as well.

Craftster- here's a whole community of crafters. I haven't been here lately, but it's a back up sometimes when i'm out of ideas. I'll admit, sometimes it just makes me feel good about myself if I see a project I could do better and succeed.

ReadyMade Blog- As you may have noticed, I have mentioned ReadyMade before, one of my favourite magazines. Here is the blog on the ReadyMade site that I actually only started reading today. I enjoyed how it's often very cleverly written, as well as has fun things!

What Anna Loves - more pretty inspirational things!

Aesthetic Outburst- I love how she shares her photos!

Hope this gave you some crafty inspiration for your day! I'm working on some strawberry plant tins today, will be posted soon! I also had found some neat apothecary style jars during my MCC trip, and recovered one of the lids with the same fabric as my lamp yesterday. I'm not sure what to use them for yet. Jordon suggested loose tea, my dad suggested candy. And other ideas?

Here's to bloggists everywhere!

Enjoy!

Skirts..Skirt..Skirk..Shirk..Shirking my skirt?

Yes. It's true. I have been abandoning my skirt. Skirts actually. There are two in the process. I love them both dearly but have come into some difficulty making both. As I am far, far from skilled at sewing, I haven't overcome these obstacles.

But! Nevertheless (favourite long word of the week) I will share the progress of my two skirts so far. Both very close to being done, both not wearable. Ah well, the trials of being more ambitious than skilled.

It's hard to tell what this one is, but that top part is the waist band, then i have two pleats.

Apparently I didn't measure right, and ran out of fabric. So, i just added a triangle. It looks good in the end, it really does.

My beautiful belt loops. I love this fabric! (You may remember it from my 'Off the Loom' post)

Skirt Numero Two:

Started out with two mens XL dress shirts from MCC, cut off the sleeves, and split them.

Sewed them all together...

I have hemmed this now, no pictures of that yet, and it is turning out a little 50's waitress, so I'm thinking I may have to take it apart and make the sleeves a little narrower. Too much work!

For a different look at the skirt out of shirts, click here. I actually found this idea on Threadbanger, but some of the channels stopped, so I could no longer find it:(

Here's another idea for Men's dress shirts that is pretty neat! A very cute dress if I could ever master that sewing machine.

I also found a whole post about men's shirts re-do projects on Threadbanger! Click here to see skirts, bags, dresses and more!

Enjoy!

Fun Ideas, Not Enough Ambition.

Lately, I've had lots of really great crafty ideas, but not nearly enough ambition. Though I am nearly finished my first skirt! (will be posted soon. Preview: It's grey, vintage, and i probably will even wear it!) I spent the majority of the week working on it. I have come across a lot of really fun ideas for more projects, but I'm not sure I'll actually get around to them. I'll share them, perhaps someone else can attempt the things I am too un-motivated to do!

I got a new issue of my favourite magazine, ReadyMade, today. What a joy it is to receive a magazine postmarked with your name, all full of crafty ideas! I literally sat there for an hour, drinking chai tea with cinnamon dolce syrup, just browsing through those glossy, filled-with-crafty-joy pages. One of the neatest things I found was a planter made out of light-switch and outlet covers!

See this neat project here.

Or if you're looking for something a little more on the cool side (pun very intended), and just love puzzling situations, why not create a puzzle with jello, ice or popsicles? Yes, someone came up with the idea of making tetris-shaped ice cube trays on this DIY site. It caught my eye. Or should i say my mind. And who doesn't love Tetris? (or is that just me?)

See the fun in ice cube trays here.

I'm also really into necklace making. (previous posts may slightly hint at this truth) I found a necklace I LOVE! It would embody the very existence of myself! well, maybe not. But it does portray something I really enjoy -Tea! I'm thinking if I can find some teapot charms, I may be able to attempt this necklace myself, when i acquire the ambition of course.

See the original here. (called 'tea time long necklace'. about half way down the page, but there are some pretty neat other jewelry pieces as well)

Perhaps I will discover the secret source of ambition sometime soon!

Enjoy!

Reality TV, Inspiring my life. (not really)

I love clothes. I really love creating outfits. So during this week of relaxing, I've been enjoying a reality show called Project Runway. Now I may not be in, but i'm definitely not out of a fashion sense completely. In argument to Heidi Klum's statement, "You're either in, or you're out", I think I may be right in the middle. The judges on this oh-so-intriguing fashion designing competition often say that fit is so important. If the contestants outfits don't fit perfectly on the models, this often causes elimination.

If you know me in the least, you'll know I am a 'deal finder' (self proclaimed title). I rarely buy anything full price. Why do so? When it will always go on sale eventually. Sales are my dominated section of a store, I will search relentlessly for the best, the most pretty, and the least expensive pieces. A shirt for $5? Yes please! 2 shirts for $5? Even better! Because of this, I often succumb to settling for the wrong size, saying, "Oh, it fits alright. I will still wear it.", since sale sections don't always have the largest selection.

Project Runway may change my point of view on this. No, I won't let a show dictate my life, but maybe grabbing every sale item I can find isn't the best way to approach shopping adventures. I've improved over the years, but often I am still drawn in by that bright red sticker on the normally bland white tag. Perhaps I can be a little more particular in how I shop. Especially being a poor student this next year, this concept may serve me well.

Anyway, here's a collage made on Polyvore made of well-tailored items, all very chic and 'fashion-forward' as my good friend Heidi Klum might put it.

tailored by kristenb featuring Marni dresses

A Crafting Hunt -Part One

Tomorrow, I am going to conquer my city.

Garage Saling is my adventure of choice. I have recently been introduced to Threadbanger, (by one of three very crafty sisters) a very creative site that has tons of really great D.I.Y. ideas! Some of it is quite out there, but most of it is very much my style! Currently, I haven't attempted any of the projects I have seen on there, but tomorrow...tomorrow I will begin!

I have researched for many hours into the night, and i found 12 different garage sales to visit tomorrow. I wrote them down in my favorite little blue notebook that i recently purchased from a beautiful paper store, Paper-Ya. Check it out, it has some pretty amazing little paper products! I very much enjoyed my visit there!

And so, tomorrow...tomorrow I will commence on this journey. The goal: find a lamp to start on this really neat skyline lampshade, or at least use the same technique to create a lamp of my own.

Here's what I'll leave you with for tonight. The idea. The inspiration behind this entire adventure. I hope my adventure is fruitful! but of course, I will post what comes of it..because this, this is only Part One!

Enjoy!

The Love of Every Young Girl

So, when I was younger, i distinctly remember playing with many of my mother's paper dolls from when she was a girl. We played with all 27 sets of these, then we moved on to creating our own. I'm pretty sure the joy of the actual creating of the paper dolls was way more entertaining than playing with them. Later on, my youngest sister and I had a stage where we would cut literally nearly everything out of the Sears catalogues and use it all for playing paper dolls. We used all the Sears furniture for our paper dolls' houses, all the kitchen appliances on imaginary counters in our paper dolls' houses. We cut out outfits for all those Sears models, which meant they didn't really fit most of the time (I suppose they could have all done the same pose, but I guess Sears gets points for variety). Paper Dolls were an extremely large part of my childhood.

And what girl doesn't love paper dolls? I found some vintage paper dolls online, a definite reminder of playing with my mom's paper dolls. I don't think they'd have the same wear and tear as a set handed down from mom, but they could be fun just the same.

Apparently, Paper dolls are on a lot of people's minds. Little girls, designers, and even musicians sometimes think about paper dolls apparently!

And yes, I still love the idea of paper dolls! Today, as i saw magazines lying around the house, I decided to create a modern version of paper dolls. The idea seemed to be a lot better than the finished project, but it was fun just the same. It was inspired by the new, improved banner on the blog! (did you see it? So exciting!) I still have yet to perfect that project as well, but such are the trials of being a perfectionist and a crafter with tons of time. Ah, life is hard.

And so, the modern paper doll!

An outfit perfect for that evening party you were planning on attending.

Add a bag and flats instead to make it daytime shopping wear!

Oh you want to go that cute little market by the sea?

Or perhaps a cruise around the bay in that yacht over there?

There really is an outfit for everyone in your own, personal, imaginary closet of magazines!

Enjoy!

A Creatively Inpsiring Event

Picnics. Creative? I think so. Who doesn't love to create a picnic? My summer started off with a picnic near home, then an adventure 16 hours away for the summer. I think I will have lots of creative inspiration this summer, with no job yet and lots and lots of time sitting in a new home-a beautiful one! and with a sister who loves to create!

Here's a creative look at my favourite picnic.

Cheese! this would be the German Edam. We had five different kinds on this picnic.

yes those are then nicest Toms in the world!

It's just sparkling apple juice. But still just as classy.

Am I creatively inspired by picnics? yes!

Enjoy!