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Golden Seismograph Easter Eggs

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A couple years ago a friend told me about dyeing eggs with silk ties – an idea she picked up from Martha Stewart Show staff member, Jackie Manzolillo, who picked it up from her Great Aunt Helen, who picked it up from her grandmother. It’s a family tradition. And if there is one thing I can’t resist, it’s a craft project with lineage. Of course I had to try it, and of course the eggs came out great. If you haven’t seen the original video, you should, ‘cause there be some serious granny cuteness going on. And yes, the results are mucho mucho impressive.
Since I like to try a new egg dye technique each year, and that one came out so well, as did my tissue paper eggs from last year as well, I thought; why not cross the two? 
The end result is a swirling dervish of sparkly pastel Easter goodness. This is an easy project that relies on little more than bundling and soaking — both are very kid friendly, especially if you use hard boiled eggs instead of fragile, hollow eggs. Of course, I would avoid eating eggs that have been boiled in garment dye but I wouldn’t think twice about setting them out on the coffee table.


Materials

  • Eggs with their guts blown out (see this video)
  • Silk neckties (can also use scarves or fabric scraps – must be 100% silk)
  • Tissue paper cut into long strips (dark colors work best)
  • Non-metal pot (I used my slow cooker, but you can find ceramic and glass pots at the thrift store – no metal)
  • Vinegar
  • Coffee filters
  • Dental floss or strong white thread/twine
  • Mod Podge
  • Gold Paint Pen 
Again: watch the original video. That way you can skip most of these directions. Or piece it together from the pictures. I love craft tutorials with more pictures than words, don’t you? Brevity is a virtue. I ramble too much but I’m good with sequins – that’s my virtue.
The number of eggs will determine how many neckties you need, but I would estimate 4-6 eggs per tie (I found these ties at the thrift store for 50cents each. Not all neckties have obvious fabric indication tags, but if a tie is 100% silk, there is a decent chance the manufacturer will brag about it with a big ol’ tag). 
Cut the tie apart into pieces large enough to surround each egg, roughly 5″ square or larger.
The dying process is based on a simple bundling technique.
Egg > Tissue Strip > Silk Piece > Coffee Filter > Tied Together with Floss
Use tongs to submerge the egg bundles in hot water (not boiling) with a splash of vinegar. Leave them there to soak. Be sure to use a non-metallic pot, as it will react with the acidity of the vinegar and effect the dye process. I don’t know about you, but I don’t have any non-metallic pots sitting around so I resorted to using my slow cooker with a ceramic insert. The slow cooker also allowed for a clamp-on lid, which was helpful in keeping the eggs wet, even if they insisted on floating (fully submerging eggs in a crowded pot isn’t easy).
You will have to experiment to see how long they stay in there. Some dyes will release in a few minutes, some will take a few hours.
As you can see, the paisley print was a direct transfer in some spots, while the strip of green tissue created reverse-print stripes in other spots. The overall effect is very muted and pretty. And abstract. Which is a nice way of saying no one will notice if you make a mistake. Don’t you love that?
It’s important to coat the outside AND the inside with diluted Mod Podge (we went over this last week). I also added a dash of glitter paint to the mix. Because, you know, I’m tasteful.
Now for the fun! Use the ‘stripe’ created by the tissue paper as a guide on where to use your gold paint pen. I chose to draw staggered vertical stripes along the outer borders of the stripe. I was trying to give the visual impression of “music” but it came out looking more like an “earthquake.” Hence the name of this project, Golden Seismograph Eggs.    
I almost gave them the name Earthquake Eggs but I like the word seismograph. I also like the words mercurial and besmirch. Last week I was on the phone with a guy who used troglodyte in a sentence without even trying. Man, some people are so cool! 
Interested seeing some other folks dye eggs with neckties? Check out Dabbled and Parents Magazine.

Friday Flowers: Tracy’s Daffodils

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Did I mention I am bringing back the Friday Flowers? 

Rewind: the first few months I started blogging I posted a series of paper flower projects every Friday. Then I ran out of room and my friends got tired of me pushing them, so I stopped. Then recently Emma wrote me an email and asked if I would do some more because she had already attempted every one of the projects from the first round of Friday Flowers “…and I could use some more.”

Emma is eleven.

If an eleven-year-old can get it together enough to make paper flowers, so can I.

So here we are, Emma. I’ll be keeping you busy every Friday until you are, well, you are, ummm…. well, old enough to get bored of it. And let’s leave it at that.

Heads up: some of the Friday Flowers will be dimensional flowers, some will be items simply improved with the help of flowers, some will be flowers made by other people….Who knows? All I can tell you is I will plan on publishing a post every Friday. So if you like Flowers, you will know where to get your weekly fix. And you can thank Emma for it.

With that in mind, I asked the folks on Facebook what sort of flowers they wanted to see, and the first person to reply was Tracy, who said “Daffodils.” Actually, Tracy said “Daffodils, Hydrangeas, and Daises” but y’all will have to give me some time to make my way down the list. We will get there eventually, I promise.

So, without further adieu: let’s get started on Tracy’s daffodils.

Materials:

  • Yellow Cupcake Liners (I happened to have two shades of yellow cupcake liners laying around, but any color will work)
  • Plastic Drinking Straws
  • Frog Tape ripped into 10″ pieces (Frog tape is a fairly new product, but you can easily find it in the painting aisle at the hardware store. Runs around $5 a roll, depending on thickness)

Start out by dividing your cupcake liners in two piles: One pile will be the ‘outer flower’, and one will be the ‘inner flower’ (if your daffodils will be two-toned, now is the time to decide). 

Take the cupcake liners you will use for the outer flower, fold into thirds, then snip off the rounded edges, forming a mild V shape in the center. Here, the picture will explain:



Also use your scissors to cut a small slit in the center. The end result will look like a six pointed star with a small hole in the middle.


Now take your ‘inner flower’ cupcake liner and pinch the middle.



Pull the tip of the pinched inner flower through the slit in outer flower.


Now pinch them together. Secure with the first 1″ inch of a 10″ strip of frog tape. Then proceed to use the other 9″ to adhere the flower to the plastic straw, rolling downward as you go.



That’s it. Keep rolling downward…

Now gently pull the inner flower upward, and the outer flower down. That’s it!
Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Have you ever seen a solo daffodil? No. They came by the dozen. Luckily these only take a minute so you can populate a whole field of daffodils!

Did anyone else read the “Real / Not Real” and think of The Hunger Games?

Wow I am a dork. 


Happy weekend 🙂

Friday Flowers: Franken Flowers

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Silk flowers are a controversial subject.

Not since the OJ Simpson verdict has a nation stood so squarely divided.

Some people loathe silk flowers. They write them off as tacky, dusty, dated, and only acceptable in conjunction with gravestones and in funeral parlors. In their minds, silk flowers are best relegated to the dead.

In the other camp, there are those who worship silk flowers for their joyful appearance and economical price tag. Silk flowers last forever and are readily available in dollar stores, craft stores, and most anywhere off-brand toothpaste is sold.

Me?

I like silk flowers. Nay, I love silk flowers.

But I didn’t always feel this way…

I went through a snobbish phase in my early twenties when I disliked anything that was not organic and otherwise wholesome. Man, that was annoying. At one point, while sitting down to lunch to meet my then-boyfriend’s older sister, Juanita, a woman 22 years his senior, with eyebrows like caterpillars and fingers like overcooked hot dogs, I remarked on the restaurant’s decor and their over abundance of silk flowers. With tremendous confidence I declared,  “Aren’t they just so tacky? Who wants to eat food right next to these dusty old things? They probably absorb all the food odors and bathroom grime off everyone who has ever walked through here. Gross. Gross. Gross! Don’t you agree, Juanita?”

Juanita shot me a look that could curdle milk.

I spent the rest of the lunch attempting to make friendly small talk, while Juanita donned her cat eyed reading glasses and buried her nose in her menu. Every once in a while I would see her staring daggers at me, which I wrote off as the leery eye of a concerned older sister. Typical, right?

Six months later, when I was invited to her home to celebrate a family birthday, I discovered that Juanita’s entire home was covered in silk flowers, including, I might add, a rather impressive dining room ceiling bedecked in a carpet of dangling silk wisteria.

Oh crap.

No wonder she gave me the stank eye.

Oh look, here is Juanita now…

Now she is giving you the stank eye. Yield to her power: embrace silk flowers!

As the years have passed, silk flowers have grown on me. But I don’t really see them as a decorative item as much as a supply source. They are so much more fun when you take them apart and use them for other purposes.

I decided to call these Franken Flowers because they are composed like Frankenstein; by taking parts and pieces from multiple places and meshing them together.

Frankenstein is also what I called Juanita when she wasn’t around.

Sorry Juanita.

Materials:

  • A variety of silk flowers
  • Cupcake liners (optional)

Wow. That was complicated.

Start by taking your flowers apart. I have found that silk flowers from the dollar store come apart very easy, while nicer, fancier flowers from decorator stores can sometimes have glue blobs at their base (something to check before buying). Be sure to keep the green plastic stem things holding the flower together, which shall be known as “little green things” hereafter.    

The more flowers you take apart, the more flowers you can put back together. This project would work just as well with two kinds of flowers as, it would ten kinds, but I suggest, whatever you choose, look for contrast in color and a variety of sizes to help each layer stand out.

For this sample, I pulled six individual layers of petals and laid them out in alternating colors. Then starting with the smallest flower, I slipped each layer back onto the little green thing and finished with one of the big green discs. 

I apologize for my lack of technical terms here. I’m hoping the pictures do the talking for me. If someone has a better term for little green thing and big green disc, feel free to chime in here.


End result looks like the flower above. Neato, huh?

I think is pretty darn cool. But, just to pump up the jam, I’m going to go back and add in a couple of cupcake liners for extra oomf. 

The cupcake liners make the flowers seem a little less like Frida Kahlo’s Taco Stand, and a little more like Pippi Longstocking’s Cupcake Truck.

For the record: I like tacos AND cupcakes. Don’t anyone write me emails about that. My diplomacy knows no bounds.

And that’s it! No glue, no mess. For very little money and effort you have a colorful bouquet that will last for years to come. Go ahead, try it out! What do you have to lose? Listen, if you decide you don’t like it, you can always give it Juanita.

Happy weekend 🙂

Cashmere Cat Bed for $3 in Ten Minutes

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Lola is a picky kitty. She likes the finer things in life. Cashmere in particular.
If I’m wearing a cashmere sweater of scarf, it takes her all of ten seconds before she on me like a hair on soap. Something similar happens with sequins.
She knows what she wants. And whatever Lola wants, Lola gets.
So when I found this old cashmere sweater had been eaten up by moths, I decided to give it new life as a bed for Lola. It keeps her super warm and, let’s face it, Lola looks great in red.
Must give credit where it is due: I saw a similar pet beds for sale at a flea market last summer, but their construction was a bit different and the sleeves were much fuller, making the sides taller and not appropriate for all cats. Which brings me to….
Rambling cat lady side note: Not all cats like beds, and not all cat beds are the same. While most cats like to have their own special ‘nest’ for napping, some cats feel trapped or unsafe when sleeping in a confined space, like in a bed with four high sides. This is sort of like how some people can only sleep with their socks off (for the record, anti-sock people are just plain weird, but we love them anyway)… So if your kitty is anti-bed, try offering them a bed with low sides, or three sides, and see if they like it. Cat beds are great, because not only do they help kitty feel comfortable, they help keep shedding cat hair in one place. Win-Win!
Materials:
  • Old cashmere sweater. Any sweater will work, but most cats will avoid acrylic on account of the static electricity. However, I have heard from people with small dogs who love snuffling on sturdy acrylic sweaters. Use your discretion.
  • Cotton quilt batting.
  • Needle and thread.
  • Glove warmers (optional).
 
1. Stuff the arms with cotton batting (see note above about cat beds with high walls)
2. Tuck the cuffs into each other so you get a sense of how large the bed should be.
3. Fold the corners of the sweater in to create a rounded off bed bottom
4. Stitch the neck and the bottom of the bed closed.
Now tuck the cuffs back together again and stitch them to the perimeter of the sweater (which is now the bottom rim of the bed). This part gets tricky to demonstrate here but it’s actually very easy to do, especially if you use some safety pins to hold the sweater in place while you stitch. I should note, I just use big loopy stitches with my needle–nothing fancy or hidden (Lola has distinguished taste, but not that distinguished).
Tip for folks with mature pets : Lola has some issues with arthritis, so during the cold months I create a hot spot by tucking a glove warmer in where the two cuffs overlap. It doesn’t warm up the whole bed, but it’s provides a nice hot spot for her to warm up any achy joints, sort of like a hot water bottle.
The fur in the photo above shows you just how much Lola likes her hot spot. It is already well worn!
Sweet dreams 🙂

Valentine Garland from Plastic Grocery Bags

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Despite the fact that I own eleventy thousand reusable grocery totes, I always end up with a pile of plastic bags.
Crunchy, flimsy, entirely eco-un-friendly plastic bags.
What to do?
Hey, I know, here, let’s make a festive garland. It will look like those nifty crayon hearts but more gruff and tumble. Let’s make some hearts with rock n’roll soul!
Materials

  • Plastic bags
  • Parchment paper
  • Tin foil
  • Iron (and a flat surface or ironing board

The amount of bags will depend on how thick you want your hearts. I started with 20ish (later  divided into stacks of 3). First, cut of the handles and trim off the bottoms –the end result will look like a big flopsy tube. Important: turn them inside out so the print faces inward and away from your iron or you will end up with a big ink mess.

Cover your surface with aluminum foil then sandwich three plastic bags between two sheets of
parchment paper.
Get your iron hot and go to town! Keep your iron moving around for about 15 seconds then lift up the parchment to see what you find. It could be melted to bits with tiny, lace-like holes; it could be thick and solid—results vary widely depending on the grade of plastic bag.
Give it a minute to cool before you peel it away from the parchment. The end result will feel like a big plasticy potato chip.
*Note: I use the hottest setting on my iron because I like to get it good and melted. If you want flakey biscuit looking hearts, use the lower settings and check more frequently.
Cut out your hearts. Lots of them. It’s the same as cutting paper and it’s easy. Read: Get a kiddo to do it for you. I think they look pretty nifty as is, but if you want to string them into garland, read on!
Sewing the hearts by machine is super easy –just lay down a strip of tissue paper and stitch a solid line, randomly inserting a heart every few inches (the tissue paper will prevent the machine from snagging between the hearts).

Tear away the tissue paper from the hearts. I find this part oddly cathartic.

If the tissue paper snags when you tear it away, try tightening the stitches.
I chose to tie my garlands on to an old tension rod and hang them in the window, but I think, after Valentines, I might try restringing them onto a lampshade or something. Or maybe cut them up further and string them into a necklace. Something funky.

Random: throw some tinsel bits in between the bags before you iron. The end result looks like confetti. Or spaghetti. Or something…

This is one of those projects that was a snap to make but difficult to photograph. My camera skills struggle to capture the light coming through each one of the hearts, each more red and luminous than the last. Winter mornings can be a real downer–these hearts are a welcome sight.

Candyland. Sorta.

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As I child, I told myself that if I ever lived in wooden house, come Christmastime, I would decorate it as a gingerbread house, bucket sized gumdrops and all. There would be a motorized train in the driveway and I would hire college students to dress as gingerbread men to dance on the lawn each night. Neighborhood children would come to affectionately refer to our home as “The Candy House” for years and years, long after the holidays were over.
Reality check: WTF was that all about?
Decorating the outside of a house is hard. Ladders are dangerous. Lights are expensive. And what parent is going to let their kids play with drunken college kids dressed as creepy gingerbread men?
Still. I couldn’t kill the dream. I had to try. This is my first attempt at Candyland:
Props to all y’all who go whole hog decorating the outside of your homes for Christmas. I had no idea how much effort was involved. Now I know! 
Well, seeing as this was my first time decorating the outside of a full sized home, I set myself some parameters to keep me on track:
  • It had to look good in the daytime, not just when the lights are on at night.
  • It had to be something that could grow a little ever year.
  • All materials had to be inexpensive/widely available/crap I already owned.
  • No scary ladder climbing.
The end result is a far cry from my childhood visions of grandeur, but as a first attempt, I am very happy! It was easy to do, and didn’t take a lot of time or money. 
The candy lights are my favorite. I may string those up in my studio after the holidays. And they were crazy easy to make too— you have got to see the original tutorial from Brittany Jepsen on featured on Oh Happy Day last week. It’s pretty much amazing!
Side Note 1: Per the original tutorial, I couldn’t find corsage boxes for less than $2.00 a piece, so I substituted by stapling together a pair of clear plastic bowls. Now I realize I also could have used plastic bottles with the ends removed, or clear plastic take-out containers. Oh well, next year!
Side Note 2: With bulbs this tiny, I’m not worried about overheating, however, some kinds of cellophane will degas toxic fumes when exposed to heat for extended periods of time. I used no-heat LED lights just to be safe, especially since these may be used indoors in the off-season.You decide for yourself 🙂
Merry Christmas!

Gift Wrap Challenge: Cardboard Tube Tuffets

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I’m not buying any wrapping paper this year. Stop by every Monday until New Years for an easy gift wrap idea featuring everyday items. 

Between stocking stuffers and Chanukah gifts, it seems like everyone I know is always hunting for easy ways to gift wrap little things. I thought it might be fun to address the problem with one of my favorite materials –coffee filters, and something everyone has around the house –cardboard tubes. 

This is a fun, munchkin-freindly project that does not require special skills to come out looking fancy schmancy. No tape. No glue. No mess. You like it already.


The coffee filters are starchy enough to stay in place without the sticker, but a good Santa sticker never hurt anyone. Plus, it will keep away any pre-holiday gift peepers.

Not that I have any experience with gift peeping.

Confession: One time my cousin John left town a week before Christmas and had to deliver my gift wrapped up in a bike chain and a combo lock just to keep me away. The plan was to prevent pre-Christmas peeping by waiting to deliver the lock combo via phone on Christmas morning (clearly, John knows me a little too well).

Another Confession: Shortly after he left I used a screw driver to scrape away some of the paper between the chain links to see what was inside. Sorry, John 🙁

No coffee filters around the house? Use tissue paper.

Gifts too big for 2″ tubes? Use larger tubes from paper towels, or, *gasp*, wrapping paper.


Dear Person Who Found My Site by Googling “Grateful Dead groundhog tuffet” on November 17:
I have no idea what you are looking for, but I feel compelled to meet you half way. Here is a batch of Grateful Dead style tie-dye tuffets.  Pretend the groundhog is on the inside.

Happy Holidays!

 
 

Jive Turkey: Kid’s Art Turned into a Seriously Cool Thanksgiving Centerpiece

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Do you have a lot of leftover kid’s art hanging around the house?

Because I sure do.

I don’t even have any kids and my place is littered with gobs of their paintings, drawings and doodles.

People just give it to me. Everywhere. They know I love it, and more importantly, they don’t have the heart to throw out their children’s art work. They would rather give it to me, their token hoarding friend.

Nice.

With all the munchkin art on my mind and in my house, I decided to do a new version of the old classic Hand Turkey, but, instead of tracing my hand on a single plate and filling in the fingers with color, I decided to cut out lots of hands and cobble them together into one monster turkey masterpiece. The end result is a cross between my previous post Cher and Ruffled Chicken, and a Turkey Table Topper from Disney’s Family Fun Magazine.  The end result is seriously impressive, and even better — the process to make it could not be easier!

Best part? Total cost on this: Zero Dollars.  That’s right folks, you own all this stuff already. No kid’s art laying around, use scraps from some other project.  Or food wrappers. Or cereal boxes. Or make some….

Create the foundation by stapling paper plates to the shoe box. Click here to see a handy diagram for the folks at Family Fun. Their pictures explain it better than I ever will. 
Note: Any sort of paper based kids art will work with this project, but I suggest using thicker pieces if possible (think construction paper or heavier). Paper plate doodles are excellent. If you have lots of light-weight paper, I suggest decoupaging wrapping paper onto the back to stiffen things up. Everything with a white back will need a quick smear of paint — I like watercolor, but you use whatever you have on hand (no pun intended).
Technically, you can skip the glazing and the curling, especially if you are working with impatient munchkins, but I think they add a special touch. Plus, the Mod Podge will strengthen and protect each hand, turning this from a one-time craft into a lifelong family keepsake. Something you can keep out on the coffee table every November. Because that’s just what your livingroom needs — a giant, sparkling turkey.  
Oh hush. I know you want it.
The final product came out far more impressive than I imagined. Initially I thought I would make this as a gift for my friends, the parents who gave me much of the art I used along the way…but now I see the end result, this turkey is not going anywhere. This one is a keeper! 

Liberace Pumpkins

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My love of Liberace is no secret.

I mean, let’s face it: the man knew how to dress.

I always try to weave some Liberace flair into my holiday decorations, but this year with all the stores vamping up the jingle factor so early in the season, well, I can’t help weaving Liberace into Halloween too. He is everywhere. G-d as my witness, one day I’ll get myself a Liberace costume! In the meantime, a few glitter encrusted pumpkins and a round of Moon River will hold me over until Christmas.

Bonus: Lola gets to feed her sequin obsession

Zombie Lanterns, Hayo!

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Know what I love? Kittens. Sunshine. Chocolate Ice cream. Zombies.

Yes indeed, zombies and zombie heads are rad in general, but these crafty-as-a-beaver Zombie Lanterns are the best. And so easy to make. Just get a rubber mask of your favorite deposed political leader, spray paint their face, strap it over a pumpkin, and BLAMO you are ready to go.

If I really had my act together, I would have made ten of these and strung them from the porch rafters come Halloween night. Trick-or-treaters love scary swinging zombie heads. Love them.

Say, why not take this to next level? Swap the electric candle for a low/no heat LED light bulb and keep it on display all year round.  Nothing keeps the home fires burning like Richard Nixon’s zombie head on your night stand. Nothing.

Don’t like zombies? OK, what’s wrong with you? Oh, I get it. Well, a Yoda lantern might look awesome too.  


Anyone else need a mask or last minute costume supplies? Click HERE to receive a discount on your order from HalloweenCostumes.com.