 I loveddddd creating this gnome! I reproduced this from another craft site because I thought it was so cute and creative! The supplies can be altered to fit other items but here is what I used for mine! Supplies:
1. Since the block of wood is being pretty much covered up by everything else, you don't need to do anything to it! I started with making the hat. I cut a 10x10 section off the leg of a mans size pair of jeans and then cut it down the center to open it up to be roughly 20x10. I then took multiple tries to form a cone shape by rolling the piece of jean in a diagonal direction, being sure that the bottom opening would fit the width of the wood board.
2. You end up with an oblong piece for the hat. You can either just cut off the piece hanging out of the cone shape, or, like me, fold it up and form it into a "cuff" around the bottom of the hat.
3. Be sure to actually secure these pieces with a bit of hot glue. I added some at the point, under the overlap, and under the cuff as well.
5. Secure one end of the white fabric to the wood board, starting about 4in down from the top. I wrapped it around multiple times so that the beard would look more full and secured it every once in a while with hot glue.
8. The next step is adding all your "junk". I made a feather out of scrap book pages by cutting out a basic shape and "fringing" the sides of it like a feather. I then glued on other do-dads and he was already for a night on the town!
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 This was such a simple craft that I put together to match up with a book discussion. The book was a YA book with a romance theme and there was also something involving keys so that's how this came about but the end product is just so cute in general! We all have old jeans we don't wear or, you can easily pop into a thrift store and grab a pair for cheap! 1. I made a heart template with thick paper because I always have difficulty getting a symmetric heart shape! I pinned it to a square of jeans and cut around it, leaving enough for a seam! I did this for 2 pieces (front and back).
3. Pinning the 2 pieces together, I hand stitched all the way along the outside. When I got to the center of the heart I added a looped piece of yarn that I stitched into the fabric to use for hanging later.
4. I stitched all the way around, leaving a small border that I was hoping to look freyed with time. I left a small opening that would give me enough room to stuff the heart with fluff! (You can use actual fill here or pieces of scrap fabric to use up!). I finished off stitched the heart completely shut.
5. Lastly, I added a strand of yarn with 2 fake skeleton keys dangling from it for an additional shabby chic look!   This project served as a "Take and Make" during COVID. We were given a small amount of clear plastic ornaments and I wanted to use them up right away! I created a really simple ornament with no cost at all since everything was something we already had or donated!
3. I decided to use some glitter vinyl that we had in our drawer. But, I gotta say... it was actual CriCut brand and it was awfulllll to work with! It was so hard to weed and so hard to get off the backing to transfer! I literally lost letters in my transfer but luckily was able to just put them back on by hand!
 One of the last projects I did before changing jobs at the library, was this floral coffee can! I had been saving coffee cans like crazy for not specific purpose other than the fact that I knew I could use them somehow! I had also received a donation of artificial pine branches from an old Christmas tree and had a tonnnnnn to use! It was my goal to use some of these up before I left and I think I barely made a dent even though I had 20 people and each person got 5 branches! Wow! I also used up some random Christmas/winter floral decorations that I found in a box for this because, why not! It really jazzed up the cans! 1. Wrap the can with whatever you would like. I chose yarn because we had a bunch! And it would give it a nice soft look! I added some hot glue at the beginning to make it stick and began wrapping around and around and added glue every so often to make sure it would all stay secure!
5. Lastly, I added a small strand of battery operated fairy lights and a white sparkly snowflake to the front to finish it off!
One of my coworkers decided she was going to get rid of her old piano. No one really wanted it and it wasn't in the "best" shape according to music people so she decided she wanted to take it apart! Mostly just for fun but also to see what she could get from the scrapyard for it, because, why not! Knowing that I love to repurpose things, she asked me if I would want the keys and of course I said yes! I turned it into one of classes at the library and it was a hit! Everything I used we already had stashed at work. Random things that had just been sitting around for a while and you know how much I love using that stuff! First off, I don't know if everyone knows this, but a piano key is actually a lottttt longer than you think it is. The "key" part is what we see when we sit down to play but here's a very long wooden piece attached to the back which is what is utilized to hit the hammers to hit your notes! Cool! But... I just wanted the keys... so... que the husband! (Not that I couldn't have done it myself but sometimes it's just nice to have help!) He sawed off all those long pieces for me which was sooooooo super nice of him ;) I sanded these down a bit more because they got a little sharp (ha) on the ends and then I also cleaned them because boy were they dirty! I chose the keys that I wanted to use for mine and lined them up how I thought they should go.
I used a smaller, about a 6x8, piece of cardboard for the focal point of the craft. I used sheet music to cover this piece of cardboard for something eye-catching. I chose to rip it up into pieces and glue it down, but when I did this a second time, I chose to glue down the sheet music as it is normally. Then, I glued down my keys with hot glue, making sure they would lay nice and even (I had to rip them off at some point because it was crooked, what a mess!).
I was using a matt frame with a cardboard backing to create the frame part of the project. I glued down a piece of scrapbook paper that I liked to go with the whole thing then I mapped out where the backing would need to be glued so that the paper would look straight in the background.
I thought the matt frame looked a bit boring and decided to add a little quote that I found online. I added a piece of cardboard to the back of this to give it some height and then some black paper to form a border around the words. Lastly, I finished it up by adding a sawtooth hanger to the back and it was perfect!
 Helloooo winter craft! This is perfect for this time of year if I may say so myself! I actually did this same craft a few years ago using coffee cans and larger records so it was more life-size and it turned out awesome! When someone donated some 45s I couldn't wait to make a mini one with soup cans instead! Supplies:
To start with, I cut out felt/fabric to fit the coffee can around the sides as well as the top. I trimmed it down so there wouldn't be any overhang and hotglued it all to stay put nice and securely.
Next, I added a chunky piece of ribbon around the base of the soup can and lastly, finished up the whole thing by adding some extra pieces I had lying around such as: pom poms, holly leaves, poinsettias, Christmas buttons, beads, artificial pine pieces, etc.
This craft was very similar to my spooky Halloween post from September but I still thought I'd share because, why not! This craft was to go along with the book "The Witch of Blackbird Pond" for our millennial book discussion where we do a craft to match the book! We had a stash of these cardboard craft boxes and, as usual, I wanted to do something that didn't cost us anything and this is what I came up with! I started by grabbing random scrapbook paper scraps (yes, I keep those!) and began piecing them together with mod podge to create this cool, almost Sally-looking pattern on the bottom half of the box. I kept going until the whole thing was covered, including the bottom. Around the top edge you may have to trim some pieces away so the box can still shut or us a piece of sand paper to smooth out the edges.
Next, I printed out a black and white vintage clipart image of a blackbird and mod podged that to a white chipboard coaster I had from a previous craft. Then I hot-glued this to the center of the lid.
I crumbled up pieces of tissue paper and glued that around the center image. Once dry, I then painted all of the tissue paper black and distressed the white blackbird image by lightly brushing my paintbrush across the coaster (putting a little more pressure around the sides. I ended up doing the same to the scrapbook paper on the bottom of the box, not pictured).
Lastly, I finished up the box by adding fun "things" to the top! I used moss (leftover from our wedding!), old jewelry, buttons, beads, marbles, Halloween pieces, etc. to make a really interesting top! For this program we left the inside of the box blank but you could really do a lot to it!
 Hey there, it's been a while... again... sorry. It's been months since I have posted and, like usual, I seriously don't know how that happened. Social media is hard. Keeping up on writing, photographing, and scheduling posts is a lot of work and working full time while trying to do what I love was not sustainable. So a little life update for you...
I applied, interviewed, and got hired in a brand new position in the library system that I work for. This job is one that will give me so much more time to work on my own art full time and work a job part time but still having the flexibility of picking up extra shifts as a librarian when I want. I'm very thankful to have been given this opportunity and to have a husband who supports my passions and encourages me to strive for them. I'm very excited about what this means for our life, it's going to be such an exciting change and I'm so ready for it! However, I will sadly not get to do art programs anymore for the library. At least not as of yet. I'm not sure if I will continue trying to do innovative craft projects for the blog on my own, as almost all of the crafts I posted were associated with my job but maybe that will change with some time. I would like to do some but I have to have the supplies and time first. For the time being, I will share my last remaining crafts I did within the last few months and maybe I'll be coming back with new fresh projects at some point too! If you have any projects ideas or something you would like to see me try, please let me know! If you haven't noticed already, I particularly love doing projects with recycled/repurposed materials. If anyone is reading this, thank you for reading my randomly posted blogs all this time :)
This whole project started with Halloween first of course, then I wanted to use up supplies I already had (also "of course). A library patron who I have mentioned here before donated these boxes for us to use and I thought this would be a great way to use them up! There are many ways to make this type of box! You can do whatever you’d like using so many different supplies and random pieces and parts you have at home. The below steps are how I made the box above but feel free to use it as a general example for your creative ideas. I really don't know if there's a "point" to this box... but... I don't care... it's pretty! So enjoy, and in the perfect amount of just 13 steps :) Supplies:
1. To start with, I found a cool old postcard online that of course had a Halloween theme! I printed it off and glued it onto the box with Mod Podge (Just use a thin layer of glue and secure corners).
11. Now for the lid! Paint the walls of the inside of the lid black and glue your other scrapbook paper down on the inside as well. I distressed it a little by adding a little paint!  12. Add other embellishments to wherever you would like! 13. Lastly, add your gold paint for the perfect finishing touch by again very very lightly brushing over raised areas! Finish up by adding whatever else you’d like!   Day late and a penny short, eh? Woops! I like to try to have a new craft post every 2 weeks on Monday but completely forgot about scheduling one! So I thought I'd share this craft while it's still fresh in my mind! The first time I did this craft was as a class at The Little Birdie Wine Nest in Parma. We had a full class and it was kind of tricky with all the hot glue guns that needed to be plugged in! This time, I presented the craft as a free Take & Make at the library where I work and I think people liked it! I used a fall ribbon on my mine because well... I love fall! But, you could add any ribbon you want and it would be super cool if you could make it interchangeable for different holidays and seasons as well! Below are the steps that I took to make mine but I'm sure there are other ways to create this cute wreath! Supplies:
1. So I made my own cardboard base that was about 11 inches in diameter and 1 inch in width but, you could go to the craft store and actually purchase a premade wooden form instead. If you use the cardboard (eh em, free) method, then just be careful as it can get a little tricky to cut out!
3. Start with your first cluster and take the center cork and put a line of hot glue on one side to stick the next cork to. When you start to add more it’ll get tricky! Add a line of glue on both the inside cork and the cork you just glued so the next one has something to stick to! *Note: You may have to add extra glue in certain places to secure the corks better!
4. Glue all your flower clusters together and then glue them to your form. You should put A LOT of glue down for each one and you will need to add some in between each one on the previous cluster so it has something to stick to. Add all your clusters until you have a space left like in the photo (this is for your bow).
5. Make your bow however you like in the photo by crisscrossing the pieces and gluing them together. You pinch all the pieces together and secure them in the center with a 5in piece of your ribbon glued together at the back. That’s it! Thanks for crafting with me!
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Rebecca MyersHey there, I'm Becca, or Rebecca, but not Becky, never Becky, unless you're my family from down south! I'm a simply modern librarian by day and an artist by night. My pursuit is for a simple, happy, healthy, and more fulfilling life! I hope I inspire you to get crafty! Archives
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