Twinkle Twinkle Little Jar

Back in March, I had to say goodbye to my sister, brother in-law, and 7 month old nephew as they jetted off to Hawaii for 3 years.  This is an amazing opportunity for my brother in-law, Josh, as it puts him working on a submarine...his dream!  As happy as I am for him, not to mention proud, it absolutely killed me to say goodbye to Jessica and Finnlee (aka Boogie).  I am the kind of person that finds something small and stupid to fixate on when I am upset or stressed out and this mega-move was no exception.  I spent some time researching Hawaii and I found out that they supposedly have no lightning bugs there.  How can you not have lightning bugs?  What do those poor kids do for fun?  I mean, it is a staple of childhood as I know it to capture helpless lightning bugs in a jar and then let them free when mom says its bedtime...unless you are my husband who, as a child, smeared dead lightning bugs on his skin so he could glow too.  So I got completely fixated on the idea of Boogie not having lightning bugs to catch and decided I had to bring them to him.  Well, the decent person buried deep down inside of me said that attempting to ship a jar full of lightning bugs to Hawaii was not only gross but also murder in the first degree.  As usual, I was on Pinterest one day--really its amazing that I still have a job--and I saw this post for glow in the dark jars.  I decided to try it out and I thought the results were awesome.  I love seeing my jars still glowing in the dark corner of my living room known as the craft corner as I am leaving for work in the wee hours of the morning.  I found some awesome neon colored glow in the dark paint online and am impatiently awaiting its arrival so that I can make my jars glow as brightly as the ones in the pictures on Pinterest.  As you can tell by my picture, a not so great camera does not do justice to the glow my jar has!  

Chalkboard Wall Decals

After work on Friday I spent an hour or two browsing my local Michaels and I found an awesomely cheap and versatile material...sheets of chalkboard paper that are ready to be stuck to your wall, fridge, canvas, you name it!  I picked up two packs, each containing three 8.5 x 11" sheets for $1.92 a piece!  As someone who has little to no drawing skills, I decided to pick up some cheap wooden shapes while I was at it to use as stencils for the project I was already seeing in my mind!

These are so easy to make and they are really affordable...especially compared to the cost of purchasing vinyl decals.  These were small because I didn't want to waste all of the paper if I didn't like the concept made into reality.  However, now that I have made them and played around with them, I am definitely going to make larger cutouts that you can draw more on!

Coasters and Trivets

Coaster are incredibly easy, quick, and fun to make.  I spent a few hours of the weekend playing with ceramic tiles, Mod Podge, acrylic paints, scrapbook paper, card stock, and stencils and here is what I came up with:

Top Row Left to Right--Decoupaged and Stenciled, Decoupaged, Decoupaged, Stenciled
Second Row Left to Right--Decoupaged, Decoupaged and Stenciled, Acrylic Paint, Painter's Tape Stripes
Bottom Row--Layered Sponge Paint

I wanted to play with doilies but surprisingly I couldn't find any while I was out on Saturday.  So I played with what I had and could easily find.  All of the coasters had multiple layers of Mod Podge done on top to seal and protect them!  I am pretty sure the guys at Home Depot thought I was smoking something when I got excited that the tiles were on sale for 9 cents a piece!  They had larger 8 x 10 tiles that I decided to make some cute trivets out of them.  The only difference in the process between doing coasters and trivets is the need to use an acrylic spray finish on the trivets.  Mod Podge is NOT heat resistant so you need to finish it off with a coat or two of acrylic.  I can only imagine the mess it would make to put a hot dish on top of Mod Podge.

My Favorite

A Close Second for Favorite

Acrylic easily peels off of ceramic...I brushed a little too hard over the blue shell