Renewed Buffet Server Part 2

Hello again,
  So if you scroll down a little bit, you'll see the buffet server that I bought used and repainted to match my other dining room furniture.  I didn't like that the inside looked unfinished.  Though I know no one really cares about what the inside looks like, I cared.  So I decided to do something about it.  I went out and bought some wrapping paper that I liked and modge podged it to the inside.  Here are pictures of the process.

 Clean the inside the best that you can.  Paint the interior with modge podge and place your pre-cut pieces of wrapping paper over the modge podge.  Try to smooth out the bubbles the best that you can.  Give it about 15 min. to dry and then put another coat of modge podge over top.  I also sprayed it with a sealant I bought at the craft store to make sure it would really stay on there.

Any advice I can give is if you are really concerned with it being perfect, you're going to be there forever.  It took me a couple of hours and mine is nowhere near perfect, but I like how it turned out in the end. 

Happy Birthday Mom!

So I've been pretty bad about updating this with my new projects. I have a few! The first one I'll show you will be the cake I made for my Mom for her 60th birthday.

My mom always says her dream is to be in a rock and roll band, so what better than to make her a guitar shaped cake!

I started off by making an 11x15 inch cake (3 boxes of cake mix), 2 8 inch round cakes (1 box) and a 13x9 inch cake (1 box).  I baked them, let them cook, and then leveled them.

I started with the records because I thought that would be easiest.  I iced the whole thing with black icing (buttercream).  Then I found a website online that let me generate my own record album label.

I printed and laminated it.  Then I cut out the middle part and put it on the cake.  Finally I used a lifting comb (yes, like for your hair) to draw the grooves on the side and the top.

 

Next was the guitar.  I found a coloring picture of an electric guitar online and used that as my model.  I free handed the shape of the guitar onto a piece of wax paper and put it on top of the 11x15 cake.  

I used a kitchen knife to carve the guitar shape out of the cake.  Then I used the remaining pieces to assemble the neck of the guitar.

I did the same thing with the microphone.  I drew a microphone shape on a piece of paper and then I carved it out of the 9x13 cake.

Finally it was time to ice the guitar and the microphone!

I used the black icing to simulate the wire coming out of the microphone to say the words.  There was a lot of leftover cake after carving everything out, so I used the remainder to make cake balls.  That's a blog for another time, but if you want to know what they are google cake balls or cake pops.  They are delicious.  Here's the final product, at the party for my mom.

I also made little purple chocolate guitars and music notes out of a mold and the meltable chocolate I got at the craft store.  It was a great time and everything turned out perfectly!

Laughing Out Loud

Source: coastingonhappy.tumblr.com via IsabelJazmín on Pinterest

I love these things.  They are often very accurate!

Weekend Project #1

After straightening up my apartment I was feeling very crafty.  I worked on 3 different projects today.  I'm waiting for one to finish drying and another one I have to finish tomorrow, so you will have to wait on those pictures.

We had a couple of unfinished bottles of wine leftover from the Super Bowl.  I knew they weren't ever going to get finished so I dumped them out and rinsed them.  This is of course a pinterest inspired craft, however I didn't use anyone's tutorial specifically, I just gave it a go on my own.

What you need:
Wine bottle
yarn or twine
hot glue gun
tacky glue
felt

Step 1:  clean and wash your bottle.  If possible take the labels off - not possible on this bottle!

Step 2: Hot glue your yarn to the bottom of the bottle

Step 3:  start wrapping the yarn around the bottle.  I was gluing the yarn every so often and pulling it very tight.  At first I was using the hot glue gun, but then switched to tacky glue because it was more workable and less visible.

Step 4:  Here's where it gets tricky - when you get to where the bottle gets smaller it gets tough.  You can't pull it tight because the yarn won't stay.  I started using the glue gun here and made very small (very very very small) dots every inch or so in order to hold the yarn in place.  However, it doesn't look very clean.  This part was difficult and I would like to see if other people's tutorials give tips on how to handle this.  Eventually it got skinny enough where I could just hold the yarn in place until I finished the bottle.

Step 5:  Finish off the bottle by wrapping up the lip of the bottle and gluing the end of the yarn in place with the hot glue gun.

As you can see it got a little sloppy where the bottle gets skinnier and I started using the glue gun.  I decided to put on a couple of the felt flowers from this wreath tutorial on the bottle to hide the sloppy part.

To make the felt flowers:
Step 1:  Find a circular object and cut a circle in your felt (the bigger the circle, the bigger the flower)

Step 2:  Cut the circle into a spiral starting from the outside and working your way in.

Step 3:  Starting from the outside, roll the felt until you reach the center.  Hot glue the last bit of felt to the bottom.  Then simply glue the flowers onto the bottle wherever you want.

This is part of my decoration on my sewing table.  Easy and cheap, it's all stuff I already had in the house (except for the brown felt) and it adds a little something to my sewing table to make it look more decorative!  Let me know if you try it out!

Reduce, reuse, recycle!!

I'm totally not one of those "green" people and I'm pretty sure my carbon footprint is rather large.  However I am one of those "frugal" people and I like to save money wherever possible.  I love the idea of recycling furniture.  New furniture is so expensive and people are practically giving away old stuff on cragislist that is perfectly good, but may need a little love.  I really wanted a buffet server or cabinet of some type for our dining room since we just had a lot of stuff laying around and it looked messy.  I had been searching craigslists and goodwills for the exact one that fit my image and I found it at Bill's Bargains in Mt. Holly.  This also happens to be the place I bought my dining room table.  Anyhow, I found this server for $45, bought it, tied it to my car, and brought it home.  To buy one like this new in the store would cost anywhere from $150-$300.

Here's what it looked like before:

It was in decent shape.  You can't tell by the picture, but the top was all scratched up, plus I wanted to paint it black anyway to match my dining room table.  The hardware was pretty nasty too.  So I took all of the hardware off, sanded down the scratches a tad and then primed it with KLZ spray primer

Here it is on my balcony all primed up.

It was fairly easy and went on fairly quickly.  I waited and hour and started to apply the black spray paint that I bought...which I believe was Rustoleum brand?  I didn't like how it was going on, I'm a control freak and I couldn't control the splatters.  Plus it was windy so it wasn't going on very well.  I went back to Home Depot and bought the same brand paint, just the regular kind and went back to work.  I had to apply a few coats and it was tough being that I only had a small space to work on, but here was the result:

I think it turned out pretty good!!  I made some rookie mistakes in regards to brushes and drippage.  When I primed the knobs I left them on top of the server so there are 3 circles that I couldn't really cover up with paint, the look sort of like water ring stains.  I also took off the hardware and tried to clean them with my jewelry cleaner.  It got most of the tarnish off, but I think they add some character to the piece.  I think I'm also going to do something with the interior cabinets like put contact paper or modge podge fabric just to make it look really spiffy.  Anyway, I'm super happy with the outcome and now I can't wait to paint some other kind of furniture :)

~Jami

Go GIANTS!!!

   Last night was Superbowl 2012 - Giants vs. Pats rematch.  I am happy to say that the Giants pulled out a win after an incredibly close and very exciting game.  I'm not even a huge football fan and I enjoyed watching the game.  I made lots of delicious snacks for the game including this cake.

Of course I didn't think to take pictures of the process to post on my blog (I'm still new to this idea) but I will tell you what I did!

First I decided I wanted to make a round cake and decided on my design.  I found a picture online like this one.

I downloaded it to my computer then reversed the image.  This is an important step if you have an image with words or letters.  I shrunk the image down using a copier until it was a size that would fit on my 8 inch cake.

Next I took my shrunken and reversed image put it underneath a piece of wax paper.  I cut the tip off of a disposable decorating bag and put in piping gel.  I then outline the image on the wax paper with the piping gel.

Next I flipped the wax paper over, piping gel down and pressed it onto my already frosted cake so that it left an indentation of the helmet design.

Then I determined the colors I needed (blue, red, gray, and white).  I used the star tip (tip 18) to color in the helmet with the blue and red.  All the while I kept this image up on my iPad so that I could color it correctly.

I used round tips for the mask and the letters and then I used the remaining blue and red for the design on the bottom.  All in all I think it turned out pretty well and it was certainly delicious.  Today my goal is to get materials for my first sewing project on my new sewing machine!  I'm also going to head over to a used furniture store to hopefully buy a buffet that I can renovate for my dining room!  More tutorials to come!!  I promise I'll take more pictures next time :)

Knitting Parties!?

      I really could use some extra cash these days - I mean, who couldn't?  And while I don't particularly want to get a part-time job, my thought was to turn these hobbies of mine into something prosperous.  Home-based parties are always fun, but people get bored with them...same story, different product.  I'd like to see if I could run a "Knitting Party" business.  My friends are always telling me they want to learn how to knit.  How about instead of going to a class that will cost you $30-$40 at one of those chain retail stores, I charge you $10-$15 and come to your home.  That way you can drink wine, eat snacks, and enjoy a nice evening in with your friends.  I think it could work, I just need to find some people to get the ball rolling.
     I posted a message on my facebook asking my friends if anyone would be interested in attending a workshop I put on at my own house.  Then, maybe I can build up from there?  I can also offer a fee-for-product service as well.  I can pretty much make anything I have a pattern for.  Everyone keeps telling me I should do an etsy shop, but I'm just not sure how it all works with taxes and such.  Anyway, I'm open to suggestions about how I can turn my knitting and crocheting passion into a money-maker!!