Make a Mosaic Bean Pendant

Hi everyone!

How was your weekend?   We had a pretty quiet Sunday, but our Saturday was full of fun activity.  I attended a bridal shower while hubby and Toddler Chuck visited family.  (I'll post up photos from the bridal shower later on this week.) I thought I'd start off the week with this crapty (and slightly crappy?) pendant that I made.

I think mosaics are lovely.  There's something quite special (and dare I say, possibly mathematical?) about laying pieces of varying shapes and/or colors together so that they fit a space and create a desired image or pattern.

Wanting to make a wearable mosaic of my own, I used some household materials to create this mosaic bean pendant:


Yeah.  I know what you're thinking.  Girl, that's a lot of look.  And my reply? Girl, I know.  But really, what does one wear with beans anyway?

Erm.... I'm not sure if I like the result, but I did have fun making it.  And who knows?  If you ever find yourself trapped at home with a couple of bored children, then perhaps you could whip these up for fun.

Materials:
- dried beans
- cereal box cardboard <--crap!
- craft paint
- paint brushes
- Tacky glue (I used Aleene's)
- String
- Felt
- Scissors

It's Friday!

Hope you have a wonderful weekend.

Making Styrofoam stamps

Hello there!

I'm on a crapting roll, so I figured I'd upload two posts today.

As you can see, I'm still working on my greeting card designs for the upcoming craft show.  Here's my newest attempt at crapting stamps:

These are the materials that I used:
- Scissors
- Craft knife
- Pencil
- Tacky glue
- Cardboard
- Styrofoam (I used one that originally held ground beef-- I know... gross when you think about it, but I promise I washed it really well)

To make these crapty beauties, I used a pencil to sketch out my designs onto the Styrofoam.  Then, I used my scissors and craft knife to cut out the different pieces.  Then, I used tacky glue to attach them to pieces of cardboard.  Once the Styrofoam was stuck on tight, I trimmed the cardboard so that it was slightly bigger than my stamp.

Instead of making a sponge ink pad, this time I used a paintbrush and painted a thin layer of craft paint onto each stamp before each use.   Here are my results:

Look!  My lettering came out the right way.  Hooray!

These stamps were fun to crapt... and I feel like I'm moving in the right direction... but I definitely have a ways to go if I want to make cards that are good enough to sell.

So currently I'm going back to the drawing board and channeling the mantra of Chuck's favorite book character:  "I think I can, I think I can, I think I can..."

Making potato stamps

Remember when I shared with you that my one word for this year was going to be  "try"?  Do you remember me saying that I would push myself to try new things... even when they seemed a bit frightening?

Well, guess what? *Gulp*  I've definitely been trying some new things out. .. and this post describes one of those things.

(You're probably wondering, "What?  Making potato stamps frightens you?  Girl, you gotta get out more...")

Oh no, no, no.  Let me back up.  A couple of months ago my aunt and I signed up to sell crafts at a craft fair.  *Gulp*  To any seasoned crafter, this would be no big deal.  You craft a bunch of stuff and then you sell it.  No biggie, right?

Ha!  It's a biggie because first you have to make a whole bunch of inventory...and second you gotta make sure your inventory is good enough to sell.

I signed up to sell greeting cards.  After reading Elisabeth Harden's kid's book on printing, I think I'm going to try stamping original designs onto my cards.  So I've been playing around with printing.   Here's my first attempt at making stamps out of potatoes:

I took a medium sized potato, cut it in half, and then carved out the design for two stamps.    My potato was super wet when I carved it, so I placed the potatoes (cut side down) on a piece of paper towel to dry them out before using them..  I made a makeshift ink pad by pouring a bit of craft paint onto a flat sponge and rubbing my finger over the sponge to help the paint soak in.  Then, I protected our dining room table by covering it with an old towel (since I didn't have any newspaper.)

All this took place while Baby Chuck napped.  When he awoke, he had a new  activity to try out.

The potatoes worked out as kid stamps... but I don't think they are good enough to decorate my cards.

Oh yeah, here are three big things I learned in the process:  (1)  Unless you're Leonardo DaVinci, you should write your word stamps backwards. No one wants to read mirror image writing.  (2)  Always put a smock on Chuck.  (Craft paint comes out in the wash, right?) (3)  I need to ditch the sponge ink pad and possibly get a craft roller... hmm...

Oh well.  That's what happens when you try new things.  Now... onto our next printing adventure!  (Hopefully I'll figure out something before the big craft show... eekers!)