Twine wrapped sea Glass Bottles

 

 

 

 I love to re purpose anything I can get my hands on. I loved the shape of these bottles and knew I wanted to do something decorative with them so I gathered some supplies.

I first grabbed some modge podge and food coloring to stain the glass. Careful, this can get messy. I recommend wearing gloves if you have anywhere to go the next day.

First you will want to mix some modge podge and food coloring.

 

 

 I am doing one bottle teal and another blue just so you can see there is not much difference.

 

 

You want to do very thin coats of this mixture.

 This is one layer on each bottle with about 20 of dry time on the right one.

 

 Two layers on the right one.

 Three layers on both and you want to make sure your final layer is up and down. More on why later. The left one is the blue and the right is the teal.

Wrap up your paint surface and the plate with the dye to prevent it from getting on anything and toss it in the trash.

I painted two of them in a purple and did not do the final layer up and down so you can see why it has to be up and down for the final. The blue has now had a half hour to dry after its final layer.

Leave them to dry overnight.

 

These are the two blue ones again the left is the regular blue and the right is the teal. Not much difference.

 

This is how the purple two dried. With streaks all the way down the bottom. If you forget to go up and down you can sand the dye off and paint them again.

 

For the second half of the craft I gathered my supplies.

The blue bottles, glue gun and hot glue, scissors, and some twine that I got from the dollar tree. This twine is a dollar for three rolls and can be used for anything. I did not even use half of one of the rolls for both bottles.

 

You want to wrap the twine around the bottle once at the point that you want it to go the highest. Put a drop of glue and use the scissors to push where the strings meet into the glue. Careful it is hot.

 

 

 Continue wrapping the bottle and then pushing the twine up until it is close together.

 

As you get closer to the bottom it is going to be harder to wrap.

 

When you get to the bottom you will need to hot glue the last two layers of twine to the bottle by using scissors to push the twine into the glue.

You then want to do one more layer on the bottom of the bottle.

 

 The bottle will then have a layer of twine that it is resting on for the bottom.

 Make sure it is glued down good.

 

 

Push the cut off end into the glue with the scissors, then let the glue dry. 

 

 

You will be left with a very cute bottle to use as a vase for a fake flower, might get messy with water in it, or just a bottle for decoration.

It should be able to sit perfectly flat even though there is twine on the bottom.

 

Again the left is the blue and the right is the teal. This photo makes it easier to tell the difference than in real life.  You could always wrap the bottles with yarn or anything else you wish or just leave them dyed.

This craft took less than a hour of my time for painting two bottles and wrapping two bottles.

What color would you have picked for your bottles?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DIY cute and cheap storage boxes

 

I have been doing my best to organize our apartment. However, I was not willing to spend to much money to do so. Which is why I decided to make my own storage boxes. 

 

 

I have a pretty good supply of boxes from our trips to Costco lately. You can also find boxes behind most grocery stores. I ran to target and grabbed some cute contact paper. 

 

Contact paper is used to line the inside of shelves. It is almost like wall paper. 

 

You can get a big roll for $5 at target.They also sell contact paper at dollar tree but do not have much of a selection. Home depot and Lowe's also have good supplies of contact paper. 

 

First I had to wrap my box and make sure I had enough to reach all the way around before I cut the section I planned to use. 

You want it to hang over on the top and bottom. Unpeal the backing from the wrap in small sections and smooth one section out before continuing to pull off the back and apply more. This will save the contact paper from wrinkling. If you can get a extra set of hands use them but they are not necessary.

Wrap the bottom of the box like you would a present.

 

Cut the top over hang at all four corners down to the box. Then fold the corners in.

Be sure to pull tight and smooth it out as you go.

 

 

When you are done you have a much prettier box to store things in. Come back next week to see what I used these boxes for and what else I used the contact paper to spruce up.

What do you need to organize?

Favorite part of my apartment

If you look at pinterests home section you are bound to come across a photo wall at some point. They keep becoming more and more popular. However when it comes to putting one up in your own home it can be quite a challange to make it not only look right but incorperate everything you want into it.
I had been looking at photo walls for a very long time. One thing I noticed, none of them had shelves, none of them had candles, and none of them were anything close to what I was looking for.



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I did not want to have a bunch of the same sized frames on a wall. While it deffinitly makes it easy for the wall to flow I wanted shelves and collage frames and as many pictures as I could get up because this was going to be the only place in our apartment I was putting pictures up on the wall. It had to be just right and having everything the same size just was not going to work.




I then decided that the best way to make the things I wanted to be up on the wall work together was to play with them untill I was happy with how they looked. This took several days of adjusting. I layed them out on the floor until I was happy with how they looked. One trick that I found to make everything come together  the best was to be sure that each picture frame atleast lined up with one other frame. This gave the wall a flow. It made everything seem to fit together when it should not be able to work together.

Once I figured this part out it came time to put it up on the wall. You need to figure out where on the wall you want the photos to go. Do you want them to be over top of something or in the middle of the wall or off to a side of the wall. I put ours up right over our couch.

Now comes the fun part. You can look all over the internet to find ways to put these things up. You could measure the distance to where the nail goes. You do this with tape and a ruler. Or you can use paper cute to the shape of the picture frames.

How ever you decide to do it do not use the tooth paste method. It was way to messy.

What is your favorite part of your house?



Mason jar soap dispenser

I came across a post on Pinterest that I just loved and had to have. Who wouldn't love a mason jar soap dispenser in their kitchen?




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It is no wonder I was instantly in love. However, paying $17.00 for one, not so thrilling. So whats a girl to do? Well Make my own of course!

I headed on over to hobby lobby and got a mason Jar during a week when they are 50% off. Which, just in case you didn't know, half the store is on sale one week and the other half the next. So if something you want isn't on sale wait a week.

The next step is the only difficult part. Figure out how to get a hole in the lid of the jar. I tried getting a screw driver and hitting it through with a hammer, which did work sort of but did not make a big enough hole. So I had my fiance drill one for me then used the screw driver to stretch it until it was big enough. The hole does not have to be a perfect circle. It just has to be big enough for the soap dispenser to fit through and small enough for the top of the dispenser to cover it.

I found my soap dispenser at target. It was on clearance for a dollar and I just tossed the bottom part in the trash since it was cracked. You can use the top of any soap dispenser for this. Even one from Bath and Body works. you will need to slide the bottom part through the lid and check to see if it is the right length then trip away any excess till it fits.

Then you want to turn it upside down on the jar. You are going to need a hot glue gun or some super glue for this part. Glue the bottom of the lid to the dispenser. You want to make sure you put enough glue to make it stay put but not enough to be messy. This part will be inside the jar so it will not effect the look of the soap dispenser.

You will want to leave it upside down to dry. Once it is dry you should not be able to separate the lid and the dispenser. As you can see I really layered the glue on there just to be sure that it would stay. The first time I glued it was not enough to keep it from separating so make sure you check and add more if needed.

Now you can flip it over, screw the top back on and be done. If you want it to be tinted a color you can mix some food coloring and modge podge and paint the jar on the outside. You could also do a solid paint on the outside if you do not want to see in. I loved how it looked clear since I was leaving it i the kitchen but if I make one for monkey mans bathroom I will tint it blue to match.

The last step, you need to pick a soap. I love bath and body works kitchen lemon soap. The smell just makes me think clean. Plus my dish soap is also yellow and I wanted them to match.

Total cost: $4.00 including soap.
Total Time: 30 minutes

Isn't it cute filled up? What kind of soap would you choose?
 Where would you put yours or who would you give it to?

Make a masculine lamp girly

We have these two lamps that used to be in my fiances room before we moved in together. They are by no means ugly but I still didn't like them. So I decided to make them Mrs. and Mr. lamps. I went to Joann's fabrics and got some ruffled ribbon. Then I started taking hot glue and wrapping it around the top. When I got back to the same spot I cut it. Then I continued doing this all the way to the bottom of the shade. So while my fiance hates what I did to his lamp it is definitely growing on me. I think I might add a few fabric flowers to it and maybe even some silk buttons to the back.

Is there anything in you house that you wish was more feminine? Is there anything of your husband or boyfriends you would change to suit you better?

What the Wick

I use candles a lot in our apartment. I seem to always have at least one burning at all times while I am home. I happened to come across some candles at bath and body works and they have now become my two favorites. Whoever would have thought that lemon and mint would go so nice together? It makes my kitchen smell lovely.

I also came across three little candles that I liked at Michaels earlier in the year when all their candles were 50% off. However with these three I have had the same problem. When they get about half way burned through the wick falls out of its little metal holder and comes out of the wax. 

So what was I to do? I could not very well just throw out three candles. So I thought I would show you all how I have managed to get all three burning again. 

First, you need to get the wax out of the candle. I use my fiancé’s screw driver together the wax out by scraping it from around the sides. 

 

Then I took a candle plate and dumped all the wax out onto it so that I would still have it.

 

 I took the metal part that holds the wick and pulled it out of the glass. You are going to need to get all the wax out of the inside part where the wick should be. The best way to do this is to peel the hot glue from the bottom of it and then stick a toothpick through it.

  

 

Then I got some twine and cut a piece about two inches long. I used jute twine that came three rolls together at the dollar tree.

  I pulled the twine through the middle of the wick holder. Then I tied a knot in the bottom of the twine a cut off extra below the knot. Then you are going to get the hot glue and restick the entire thing to the bottom of the candle jar.

 

 

Once that dries you want to start restuffing the candle jar with wax. 

Once all the wax is back in the jar you will need to heat it up in the microwave. Put it in for a minute at a time and check it until the wax is partially melted. Yes I realize you are putting metal in the microwave so you are going to want to stay close to the microwave. Or if you are not as laid back stupid as me you can heat the wax in a glass container and poor it the jar as it melts.

Then you are going to push the non melted wax into the melted wax. This will make it melt as well. 

Once most of the wax is melted use the screw driver or a toothpick to make sure the wick is still stuck to the bottom. Once most of the wax is watery you can stick the entire candle into the freezer to harden.

 Once it is hard (should be about a half hour) you can remove it from the freezer. It is now good as new. What are some of your favorite candles?