Missed you guys!!

Hi friends!  I haven't posted in almost 2 years! Life has stepped in and swept me off my feet. Blissful Bird on Etsy has taken off and kept me very busy, but I've missed posting, and crafting, and writing about my DIY adventures. By the way PLEASE go check out my goods if you haven't already. www.etsy.com/shop/blissfulbirddesigns THANKS!

looking forward to catching up on everyone's posts. I will be back in the next few days with a fun little project! Stay tuned.

Have a wicked awesome weekend.

xo
Angie

PS. here's a cool shot of the #moon I got last night

More DIY Canvas Art

I'm addicted to canvas art projects. Between JoAnns, Hobby Lobby, Michaels, etc. you can always find canvas on sale. I love keeping some handy for those rainy days where you get inspired and want to immediately run to your craft room and start working. Yesterday I found some vinyl letters and numbers that I must have bought a long time ago and forgot about. I remembered seeing some really cool projects on Pinterest where they used lettering and paint and created some very simple, yet really fantastic little works of art.

I needed some bedroom art for the new house we just moved into so I decided to do some sweet lyrics from a David Gray love song. I placed the stickers on the canvas in the format I wanted. (I really like this look where all the words are aligned to left)

Once I had my stickers down, I painted over the entire canvas. I opted for a plain, solid gray. But here, you could do swirls of color, or stripes, or chevron, etc.. 

I let it dry and then applied two more coats of paint so no white was showing through and it was a nice, solid color. Once it dried completely, I peeled off the stickers

It left a rough, sort of unfinished looked, but I liked that. I even had a letter where the gray paint smeared a teeny bit into the white, but it gave it a distressed look that I actually prefer. 

And here is the finished product!

Girls Night In - Gettin' Crafty

Girls Night In can be just as fun as Girls Night Out! My friend Emily had a really fun idea to get a group of ladies together and start a monthly craft night. Every month a different girl hosts the party and comes up with the intended project. Every one brings a snack and their drink of choice and of course all of their crafting supplies. (as I'm typing this I have the Beastie Boys song "She crafty" on repeat in my mind)

The inspiration for our first very craft night was coin decorated letters. For this project you will need the following supplies:

• One or more paper mache or wooden letters or numbers
• Pennies, nickels, dimes or any other small objects (shells, glass, gems, beads, buttons, etc)
• Acrylic or spray paint in copper (for pennies), silver (for dimes/nickels), or whatever colors goes with the objects you will be using
• Craft glue
• Spray sealant (optional)
• Paintbrush if you're using acrylic paint

From here, it's pretty self explanatory. One thing several of us did in advance was paint our letters. This way you do not have to worry about the time it takes waiting for your letters to dry before you can begin glueing. 

Here are a few pictures of how the night went:

Notice the wine! Wine is a very important part Craft Night! We also enjoyed some very yummy vegetarian snacks as well :)

 

Of course Mojo was there for inspiration

A few of the finished products:

Emily's "SING" turned out awesome! 

For my "N" I tried layering my letters for a different effect.  However, I decided that I like the single layer of coins much better. Plus, the extra layer of coins make my N want to fall forward with the added weight. 

 "Vince" will be used in Maria's new baby's room :) 

I'd say our very first monthly Craft Night was a success. I really enjoyed making new friends and spending some time with an amazing group of women who encourage each other, laugh together, and CRAFT together. Looking forward to sharing with you what goes down at the next Girls Night In!

Handmade on the Fly!

Have you ever found yourself in need of a gift for someone immediately, but do not have time (or money) to go shopping? Just recently I needed a small gift for someone on the fly, so I turned to my craft room. I found an unused mason jar and some spray paint that my daughter had used a few months back when she made a birdhouse. I googled Mason Jar Crafts, and came up with this super quick and adorable little project. All you need is a jar or can of any kind, some paint, and some glue. 

I thought I was going to use simple Elmers glue, but that was a mess, so I ended up using my glue gun instead. You can try Elmers but I found it didn't dry fast enough and ended up dripping. 

I took a dry erase marker and wrote a word on the jar. I then traced that word with my glue gun. My letters turned out a little bumpy and sometimes if the glue gets stringy.. you'll have to pick the strings off, but it was really no big deal. And the fact that the letters were not perfectly smooth actually looked good to me. 

I then spray painted the entire thing, letting it dry in between coats. One thing you'll want to do after you've finished painting, is spray the jar with a clear water-resistant finish if you have it, or can pick some up quickly. This will keep the paint from getting scratched and also waterproof it in case the jar gets used for a vase. 

And here's the finished product! You have a very simple, cute, handmade gift that can be used in many ways. A vase, utensil holder, makeup brush holder, etc.. 

DIY Art Guitar

My husband plays the guitar, therefore we always have them strewn all over the house. It's inevitable that one is bound to get broken when you have an 8 year old running around like a wild monkey. This would be the victim here:

So after staring at this broken thing for a month, a little light bulb goes off and I decide to decoupage it! I stripped it of the strings and glued the head back on.  I really wanted it to be a music theme. I decided I would print out small squares featuring the album covers of different bands/albums we liked, and cut them out individually. 

Before I started the decoupage process, I gently sanded the surface of the guitar (only where I was going to be glueing)  and wiped off all the remaining dust

Next, I took the individual pictures and laid them out on the guitar to sort of get a basic idea about how I wanted it to look. Then, one by one, I brushed Modge Podge on the back of each tile and glued them to the surface, gently smoothing any bubbles out. I repeated this process over and over until I had the entire face of the guitar covered. 

Once it was dry, I used an all purpose clear acrylic gloss coat to seal the deal and create a water resistant finish. (Obviously, you should do this outside, or in a well ventilated space) 

Once it's dried, here is the finished product:  (I plan to attach a mount to the back so that I can hang it on the wall)

NEW BATHROOM FINISHED! (well almost)

Wow! Ok, it has been a LONG time since I first posted about the bathroom remodel. We had a few hiccups along the way, but as I've heard, that ALWAYS happens when you do a renovation. I'll get straight to it. Here is the finished product: (TA-DA!)

The only things we still need to finish are: installing the glass enclosure (hence the cheesy clear shower curtain liner) and a few pieces of hardware for hanging towels, etc. We painted over the Blue Sail color with Valspar's "Vintage" (I did not enjoy working with this paint. I've used Valspar before and it was fine, but this time around.. something was funky in the mixture) 

It's a simple looking bathroom, nothing spectacular. But I love it! It's fresh, new, & updated. We even brought the shower out a few inches so I could have some more dancing room in there. I must say it's working out pretty great!

That's all for now! Thanks for reading :) 

Angie

Adventures in Remodeling

Hi friends! WOW, it's been a looong time since my last post. 2012 has brought with it some changes. The biggest one is that fact that we are going to be moving! Before we offer our sweet little house up to anyone else, the master bathroom needed some serious TLC. Our house was built in the 60s and it seems this bathroom has been remodeled at least once since then...however, it was time for another go 'round. So here is a before pic

 

Doesn't seem too bad, however, these pictures make it look a lot nicer than an up close and personal perspective would look. (old dingy, disgusting, i-would-never-let-any-one-shower-in-there-ever, tile). 

TODAY was actually demo day! As anyone who has ever remodeled anything knows, Demo day is also known as "find out your spending way more than your budget" day! We are making the shower a little more spacious by bringing it out a few inches, and installing a smaller vanity to allow for more room. So here are a couple of pictures of the demo 

Surprise! Look at that itty bitty light blue tile that was under the white tile. It's kinda cute! That is one fun part of ripping out flooring: discovering what's underneath. The not so fun part is ALL the little things you didn't take into consideration... like the extensive wall repair we'll have to do because that huge mirror was glued on, and the new door frame we'll need because the old vanity was connected to the wall, etc...

It's all good though. I'm so excited and the end result will be an amazing, fresh, up to date bathroom! Yippy!  I'll post the finished product in a few days so stay tuned...

New in 2-0-1-2!

Hi Birdies! Wow, here we are in 2012! That sure did happen fast. Hope you all had a spectacular New Year's Eve.. and remember.. spectacular can mean ringing in the New Year from the comforts of your love seat with a cup of hot cocoa. I myself chose to mix it up this year and head up to the camp site in Middle of Nowhere, GA and ring in the New Year with the howling of coyotes. Now THAT'S a par-tay! (There may or may not have been a tub full of jello shots too...)

I'm excited for 2012 because I've created a new line of jewelry that I'm now offering in my Etsy shop. I've discovered metal stamping and I'm hooked. I'm starting out with a simple line of hand-stamped, aluminum cuffs. They vary from fun sayings, to scripture, to movie lyrics, to all things pop culture.

I'm also doing custom orders too! Names, anniversary dates, etc. I'm excited about the endless possibilities! Pop over to my Etsy shop and take a peek! http://www.etsy.com/shop/BlissfulBirdDesigns?ref=si_shop

My other 2012 goal (aside from getting fit, which is the same resolution I make every year but fail to accomplish) is playing the piano. My husband bought me an awesome keyboard for Christmas and I had an interview with the piano teacher today. So what if I'm 32. I'm going to play that piano and have late night jam sessions with my guitar playing hubby. You're never too old to learn, right? Heck, we may even start a family band. My daughter did get a recorder in her stocking! We're all set :)

Anyhoo, HAPPY NEW YEAR! Good luck with all of your new adventures! TTFN

Christmas Yarn-Wrapped Wreath

I decided to try my hand at one of those adorable yarn wrapped wreaths that have been popping up all over Pinterest and crafting blogs. For Christmas this year, I felt like going back to the good 'ol traditional green and red. Last year, I did my wreath and tree in purple and gold! It was really pretty, but honestly.. it looked like a pimp had decorated my house. (we called it the "pimp tree") This year... I'm getting back to the basics. 

For this project I used:

*a plain green styrofoam wreath (after reading tons of blog posts, I think a plastic wrapped straw wreath would actually work better, the styrofoam ones crumble easily)

*yarn

*felt

*ribbon

*hot glue gun

First, I wrapped the entire wreath with yarn. I started by tying a knot in the yarn, pinning it to the back of the wreath to hold it in place, and then began wrapping:

 

Don't worry about trying to keep it perfect, it will take forever! Just completely wrap the entire wreath 2-3 times or until the wreath is completely concealed with yarn.

Next, I added some felt flowers. You can click here: http://blissfulbirdie.blogspot.com/2011/09/felt-flower-wreath-for-fall.html  for instructions on making felt flowers. They are super easy.

Once I hot glued the felt flowers on, I decided it needed a little something else. So I wrapped the rest of the wreath with red ribbon. Starting by glueing one end to the back of the wreath, wrapping it around, and then glueing the other end to the back as well. Looking back, I should have wrapped the entire wreath with ribbon first, then glued the flowers on. But it still turned out pretty cute, I think. 

That's it! Here is the finished product below. The whole process only took about 2 hours! ENJOY!

                                             

DIY Apothecary Jars

This is an adorable, easy DIY project with endless possibilities. AND it only cost me about $6 to make. Of course, I saw this on Pinterest and had to try it right away! I went to the dollar store and grabbed a few glass candlesticks and various shaped glass jars. (ex. a few medium sized glass candle holders and an actual drinking glass!)  I used E6000 glue and some Ivory matte spray paint

First, I spray painted the glass candlesticks. This is optional and you can do any color you want. (I did a few coats, letting them dry in between each)

Once the paint was dry, I simply used my E6000 glue and coated the rim of the top of the candlestick and set the glass jar on top, aligning it so that is was centered. 

Once the glue is dried. You are done!! You can put anything you want in them. Candy, corks, ribbon, Christmas ornaments. Use them in your bathroom and put your make-up brushes, Q-tips, etc inside. Again, the possibilities are endless. 

HAVE FUN!!!!