{Simple Silver Bracelet}

Hey, y'all!  Recently at Through the Eyes of the Mrs., I shared the easiest bracelet tutorial you will ever see.  (Well, there might be an easier bracelet tutorial somewhere, but I doubt it...)  Today I want to share it with y'all.

You only need a few supplies to make this bracelet.

You will need a piece of chain the size of your wrist, a clasp, a jump ring and a silver tube bead.  Are you beginning to see what I mean by easy?

Thread the chain through the tube bead and attach the clasp to one end and the jump ring to the other. That's it.  Seriously.

Besides tying a string to your wrist, bracelet making can't get much easier than this!

I think this bracelet would look great paired with other bracelets, but it also looks great by itself.  If you like this tutorial, check out my Silver & Suede Bracelet tutorial.  It's pretty easy too.  ;)

{My Karing Card for April}

Hey, y'all!  I was part of the Karing Card Club in March.  (I blogged about it {HERE}.)  It was fun, so I decided to sign up again in April.  When you sign up for the club, you're paired with another person.  You send each other a card--handmade or store bought--that goes along with the month's theme.

I had to have surgery at the end of April, so I wasn't my usual super-crafty self when creating my card.  Also, I was on pain meds and a little groggy, so I didn't even remember to take pictures of the card until it was already sealed in the envelope.  To top it all off, I sent the card a little late.  Yeah, not my proudest blogger moment.  But the focal point of my card was this image--a photograph I took at my Aunt's house at Easter.

The theme for April was "Happiness," so I edited the picture with PicMonkey and added the phrase to it.  I put the picture on a blue background and added some washi tape and a flourish scrapbook embellishment.  It wasn't the best card I have ever made, but considering the circumstances around my making it, I don't think I did too terribly bad.  I sent the card to my Kare Club partner, Nikki from Flairy Tales.  (She has the cutest party blog, and she has lots of cool free printables!)  In return, she sent me the most gorgeous card ever, along with a banner!

She was so thoughtful in making the card because she used my blog colors and even added my blog logo to the banner.

The note she wrote inside was so very sweet!  She read on my blog that glitter makes me happy, so she added little glitter dots on the inside of the card.

I am seriously in love with this card and banner!  I can't thank Nikki enough for taking the time to make something so perfect for me!  If you want to participate in next month's Karing Card Club, you can sign up {HERE} by May 17th.  May's theme is friendship.  Everyone could use a new friend, right?  :)

{The Wreath That's Technically Not a Wreath}

Hey, y'all!  Last week I got tired of having a snowflake wreath on my front door.  I mean, it's springtime now...even thought it hasn't felt like it the past few days.  So, anyway, I saw {THIS} door hanging at Second Chance to Dream, and I knew that I just had to make my own version of it.

I started with a frame from Michaels and a wooden letter that I ended up using as a template.

I painted the wreath with Martha Stewart's Pink Flamingo.

That color just sounds perfect for warmer weather, doesn't it?  Then I used my wooden letter as a template to make a cardboard letter.

I know from experience that if you use a heavy embellishment on a wreath on one side and don't balance it with something, your wreath will hang crooked.  I thought a cardboard letter might remedy this problem.

After I traced the letter, I cut it out.  Then I painted it with metallic gold paint.

And since everything is better with glitter, I mixed some extra fine glitter and Mod Podge.  I brushed a few coats of the mixture on the letter.

I brushed gold paint on three tiny clothespins because I wanted them to hold my pennant banner, which I made next.

I cut pennant shapes out of coordinating fabric and ribbon.  I hot glued a piece of trim on the top of the pennants to create my banner.  I added some rhinestones and ric-rac to my letter and hot glued all the embellishments on the wreath.

I used a Command Adhesive hook to attach the wreath to the door.

I love all the fun colors on the wreath, and, of course, I love the glitter and sparkle.

If my bright green door didn't show enough of my personality, now I have this wreath.  How do you show your personality on the outside of your house?

{DIY Photo Pendant}

Hey, y'all!  Mother's Day is just around the corner, and I have the BEST, super-easy-to-make gift idea for you!

Every mom loves pictures of her little ones, right?  And almost every mom likes jewelry, right?  Well, I have combined the two into a perfect Mother's Day gift!  I made this one for my awesome sister-in-law, and she LOVES it!  To start with, you need a blank photo pendant tray.

I purchased mine from Hobby Lobby, but they're sold many, many places.  And, of course, you need a photo to fit in the pendant.  I chose a cute one of my nieces because, let's face it, all that cuteness deserves to be on a necklace!  :)  I edited the pic in PicMonkey, and then I sized it to fit my pendant in Word.  It's really easy to do.

Open a Word document.  Click Insert, Photo, and then Picture from File.  Choose your picture.

Click on the pic and then click on the Format Picture tool bar.  You will see a space for height and width like in the screen shot above.  Input your measurements, and then just print.  I learned that printing on photo paper is best so that your picture is vibrant.  (I have been buying photo paper from my local Dollar Tree, so check there before buying expensive photo paper.)  Cut out your picture and make sure that it fits in your pendant tray.  If it doesn't, carefully trim it until it does.  Then coat with Mod Podge.

I coated the front and the back of the picture with Mod Podge to make sure the image didn't get messed up when I attached it to the pendant tray, which is the next step.

Coat the pendant tray with Mod Podge and adhere the picture to it.  Smooth it down carefully to make sure there aren't any bubbles.

After all the Mod Podge is dry, cover your photo with a layer of Mod Podge Dimensional Magic.  This is the step that makes your pendant look REALLY professional.  (I was just tempted to type "profesh" because I've been watching too much Rachel Zoe.)  I always start squirting my DM on a scrap sheet of paper because if there are bubbles, they usually come out first, and you don't want bubbles in your DM.    If you do happen to get a few bubbles, you can try to pop them with a straight pin.  It's hard to do, though.  Let the pendant dry UNDISTURBED for the required amount of time stated on the bottle.  Then all that's left is attaching a chain.

Since I pretty much already had the supplies on hand besides the pendant tray, I literally spent less than five dollars on this awesome gift!

Isn't that the wonderful thing about handmade gifts?  You can give beautiful, personalized gifts that you don't have to sell a kidney to afford.  

And, of course, I can think of other occasions to gift this besides Mother's Day.  How about a new mom gift or a mother of the bride gift or even a gift to memorialize a loved one who passed away?  No matter the occasion, whoever you give this to is sure to be your new best friend.  :)

{Cheerful Embellished Mini Tote}

Hey, y'all!   I have a cute, inexpensive project to share with you today that I recently shared on The Hair Bow Company's Blog.

To create one of these miniature cuties all you need is a mini tote bag and some embellishments.

I chose ribbon, ric-rac (not pictured), and a shabby rose from The Hair Bow Company to use for my embellishments.

The mini tote I used came in a pack of four from the craft store for $2.99.  (Depending on the craft store, you could get an online coupon, and they would be even cheaper!)  I started by cutting a piece of ribbon a little larger than my bag.

I then folded over the ends of the ribbon and hand stitched them.  (This could be a completely no-sew project if you use fabric glue, though.  I'm an impatient crafter, and I didn't have any at the moment.)

Then I cut a piece of ric-rac to layer on top of the ribbon.

I also selected a pretty shabby rose in a coordinating color.  I used fabric glue (Yeah, I bought some.) to glue the ric-rac to the middle of the ribbon and folded the ends under the ribbon.  Then I glued the ribbon to the bag.  The finishing touch was gluing the flower to the ribbon.

This is such an easy, inexpensive project. 

I think these would be great as party favors, gift bags, or even bridesmaids' gifts.  Or use the same steps for a large tote bag to create a purse or travel bag.  There are so many possibilities!  What would you use your mini tote for?

{My "Meh" Bowl Makeover}

Hey, y'all!  Today I have a post to share with you that I actually started to just write off as a craft "meh."  That's Pitter and Glink speak for a not-so-amazingly-cute project.  I am a bit of a perfectionist, and I only want the best projects on my blog or at least only projects that I love.  At the same time, I never want y'all to think I'm perfect because I'm nowhere near perfect.  So after talking to some other bloggers, I decided to go ahead and post it since I put in all the work anyway.  So here goes...

Several weeks ago I found the cutest little white ceramic bowl in the thrift store.

As you can see, it was only fifty cents.  I knew that I could use some paint to make it something spectacular...well, at least I thought I could.  So I started by painting the inside of the bowl pink and then hand painting a ikat-like design.

When I finished, I just wasn't digging it.  Since I didn't heat set the paint, I was able to wash the paint off the bowl.  So the tutorial that follows is attempt number two, which I started by painting the inside of the bowl blue using Martha Stewart's pearl paint.

I did two coats of paint, and then I decided I would do a sort of tribal design in the bowl using a sponge and more Martha paint.

I cut some different size squares and a triangle out of a kitchen sponge and used them to create my design.

At this point in the process, I should have heat set the paint in the oven using the same directions as I used with my Dollar Store Stenciled Mugs.  There's one problem, though: I was not in love with the final piece, and I'm still not.

It's not hideous, but I think it could be better.  I almost like my first attempt better than the second one.  What would you do?  Would you move on to attempt number three, or would you leave the bowl as is?

Maybe I'm just being hard on myself and the bowl is cute and I should go ahead and heat set the paint.  It's definitely never going to be a feature piece in a room or anything because it's very tiny.  Nonetheless, I just don't love it, and I really want to.  Help me out, creative ladies!  :)