Shopping your Thrift Store, for crafting materials...

Thrift stores are great places to shop for the raw materials to craft great gifts!  This past Christmas season, I took a few trips to my local Goodwill.  There you will find the castoffs from households that can yield great fodder for unique ideas.

If you need a hostess gift, try bejeweling salad servers, or any serving spoon.   Pick up old necklaces, or bags of beads, tarnished but serviceable serving spoons or pieces, some wire from the hardware store.  Begin by polishing the pieces to a nice shine, string some beads through the wire, and begin wrapping the ends, securing larger beads with jewelers glue, to hold in place. You are reviving old and tired and making new and fab!

Search through the piles of household linens, and you can find stashes of placemats and napkins.  Try stitching a placemat into an insulated casserole. My finished version is rolled up and tied with a ribbon, i didn't get a final pic, as I hurried to send it to my Florida family for Christmas.  Here are a few of the steps:

 Simply make a sandwich of the placemat and another fabric, preferably something that is quilted or thicker for insulation.  Here I used a damaged depression era quilt piece. Before you stitch, make a handle out of coordinating fabrics.  I made the handle  about 2 inches wide and the width of the placemat.  I made the strap from the same quilt, and backed with cute polka dot scrap.  Stitch the handle right sides together, leave a small opening, turn right side out.  Pin the handle in the center of the placemat securing the ends with pins.  Stitch all the way around, leaving a small space for you to turn right side out.

here the handle is peeking out in the placemat "sandwich"

Stitching around the outside, leave the end open.  Turning right side out, trim excess fabric and clip corners, stitch some velcro on the end.  My quilt piece had some bias tape already applied to the edge, so no edge finish needed.  You could turn the edge before applying the velcro, here it was simply zigzagged in place.  This placemat was on the smaller side, so my 11x7 casserole fit nicely.  

A few more linen pieces made into a few items.  The biggest piece below came from a cross stitched tablecloth, that was soiled and had holes.  Here it is made into a pillow, the smaller pieces, for sachets, filled with rice, and touched with frangrance oils, and other ends made into guest towels. 

The linen pieces make beautiful sachets..

Here is another use of salvaged linens, made into ornaments.  I found a stash of wooden hoops, and simply glued and trimmed each with ribbons, lace and old buttons.  Great to use fabric roses made from strips or ribbon roses, sometimes you can score ribbon and craft supplies at Goodwill.  These are snapped up pretty quickly though.  Even old doilies, some worn or with stains, can be renewed with the right placment of embellishments.

Crochet panels, probably made to grace sofa backs or used as table runners make great curtains!  Here a long panel was cut in half, then turned over at top to make a casing for the curtain rod.  I didn't even hem, but I did line with an old sheet to keep sun from damaging the fibers.

What will you find when you shop your thrift store?  Give the items new lives as gifts or useful items for your home.  Try "the 4Rs" way of re-creating for a fresh and "green" approach to your world...come visit my blog for more, http://the4RsRamblings.blogspot.com or also peruse my pinterest site, link is on my blog.

Sandy

Book Page Tree

I know Christmas is over but wanted to share a super cute and fun tree that you can use year round too.  Halle did an awesome job on making one.  

Here's her tree and make sure to give her blog a visit for other awesomeness! 

Upcycled Mirror Art

I wanted to share a great artist with you.  Susan does amazing mirror art.  She creates Upcycled Mirror Art that is fun, unique, trendy and environmentally conscious. Her mirrors are made to be distinctive and exclusive in design.  Here's a little bit about her and her work.  Make sure to visit her website for more!

Mosaic Mirrors and More offers handcrafted mosaic mirror designs that are at least 50% recycled mirror, stained glass and/or tile. Due to the nature of the materials there will be slight imperfections. In art books, it is typically defined as “flawed beauty”.

What is Mosaic Art?

Mosaic is the art of creating images with an assemblage of small pieces of colored glass, stone, or other materials. It may be a technique of decorative art, an aspect of interior decoration, or of cultural and spiritual significance as in a cathedral. Small pieces, normally quadratic, of stone or glass of different colors, known as tesserae, are used to create a pattern or picture.

Susan has great pieces for sale, be sure to visit her!

 

Upcycled Book Into A Pumpkin

I shared this pumpkin I made out of an old book on Facebook but forgot to share it here with you too.  It was a lot of fun to make and what a great way to recycle books that are damaged. 

I used an old book that the top was too damaged to read any longer.  The stem is made from sucker sticks and then wrapped in some twine that was on a package I received.  The leaves are cut out with the card stock from a card I received.  

It was a lot of fun but a lot of work!

You can purchase this pumpkin here:
Book Pumpkin

Elizabeth Upcycles Jeans For Genes Day

We received a very nice comment on our blog from a reader.  Her name is Elizabeth and she commented on a post we have about recycled jean coasters.  You can find the post here.  

So Elizabeth entered a challenge at work called Jeans For Genes day.  She made some amazing things with old blue jeans!  The picture is one of the coasters that Elizabeth made.  You have to go have a look at her awesome things she made!  You can read all about it here. 

A Few New Upcycled Things Added To My Etsy Store

I've added some new upcycled things to my Etsy store.  I wanted to share them with you.  

You can see all the photos by visiting my store by clicking THIS LINK.

Thanks! Monica  

All of a sudden I love Lancome

Sometime ago I was reading the papers and came across this picture that I loved and thought would look fantastic on a card. The image is an advertisement for Lancome, being a natural cosmetics girl I would never have come across this picture if I hadn't seen it in the papers. For this card I cut out the image using a craft knife, stuck to a piece of cardstock and printed the sentiment on my computer. I added the bling on the bag and decided to give the card a black background so as to make the image really stand out. This card shows me yet again that inspiration is everywhere and we just have to find it in the mundane things we do.

Upcycled Book Lights

Hi everyone! I know I did a post about some lights I was making using old books and maps. I promised to post the pictures with the light in them. So here you go! 

You can find these lights I make for sale in my Etsy store. Thanks!  Monica

Upcycled Book Light

I spend way too much time on Etsy & Pinterest, I did however get this great idea from one of those places and was excited to try it for myself.  After gluing about 150 of the book page circles and knowing I had another 150 to go, well, let's just say all the excitement had left me.  I did manage to finish it but you know I'm missing one little thing.......the light!  I forgot to purchase it when I bought the lantern.  Since I am so exhausted excited from doing it, I thought I would share it without the light for now.  It measures about 12 inches around and has 300 3.5 inch circles glued on it. 

Dryer Sheet Flowers

Over at Splitcoaststampers, we are recycling dryer sheets into beautiful flowers. You can read all about it and find the tutorial HERE.

I used Cherry Cobbler reinker (I know it looks peach, but I really did use CC!) with some water in a spray bottle, and then sprayed with Pearl Glimmer Mist for my dryer sheet flower. It is more a background for my paper roses.

Click on the photo for a close-up view. The sentiment is Find Happiness by Rubber Stamp Tapestry.
I cut some Bubblegum felt using SNSS's Scallop Border die and added three rows of Penelope Natural Crocheted Lace from Really Reasonable Ribbon. The Crystal Stickles on the flower took a little time to dry, but I love the look! I hope you will give it a try!

Stamps: Find Happiness by Rubber Stamp Tapestry 

Paper: Crumb Cake, Basic Grey DP 

Ink: Rose Red 

Accessories: Bubblegum Felt (Stamp School), Scallop Die (Sweet N Sassy), crocheted lace (Really Reasonable Ribbon), paper roses (Wild Orchid), Crystal Stickles, Blush Peals (Kaiser), dryer sheet, doily Techniques: Dryer Sheet Flower Technique