I like big buttons and I cannot lie!

I'm going to let you in on my embarrassing little world for a second. After I wrote the title to this post, I continued singing Baby got Back in my head and I swear Sir Mix A Lot must live somewhere inside me. I remembered the whole dang song. Talk about a waste of brain space. Turn around, stick it out, even white boys gotta shout Baby got Back. Focus Kristy!

I'm still laughing at myself... Ok, big buttons. I picked up this bottom half to a cheese dome at the thrift store the other day. I had originally planned to make a cupcake stand with it but it was a little big.



Can you see that price tag? $0.49 and I think it was 50% off of that.


I decided to make a big button to sit on a shelf my craft studio. This was seriously a 15 minute project and 10 minutes of that was drying time.

I used my cordless drill and one of these (not really sure it's technical name)


to drill four holes in the center.


After a light sanding. I gave it a coat of Oil Rubbed Bronze spray paint. It is my go-to favorite! Thanks to our crazy hot days, it was dry in less than 10 minutes.

At first I wasn't going to put threads in it


but then I changed my mind. I do that a lot. I just put 2 strands of twine through the holes and tied it off in the back.


And up close


Which way do you like it better? Threads or no threads?

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Coton Colors Copy Cat

Hey there my pretty readers! I hope you are doing great! In my little world, I got a terrible toothache last week and tried so hard to tough it out. I think my mom got tired of hearing about it and being the baby that I am and avoiding making an appointment at an oral surgeon, she did it for me. I ended up having an abscessed wisdom tooth and had them removed on Wednesday. It really wasn't bad and my recovery was only painfully boring. So today I'm feeling pretty good and was determined to get my DIY in.

I have always loved the Happy Everything collection by Coton Colors Pottery. I would always oooohhh and ahhhh over them in boutiques and gift shops but the price tag would never let me take one home.

Image from Coton Colors Pottery

Isn't it cute? I really do think it is $45.00 cute but I'm loving my $0.75 version. I'll give you the how-to now!

I picked up this wreath/wall hanging thing at the thrift store for $0.75 yesterday. When I saw those scallops, I immediately remembered the Coton Colors piece and had to have it.


After scraping off the remains of what had to have once been a heart or a goose in 1987, it was ready for primer and paint.


Luckily (or not so luckily, however you want to look at it) for me, it's 98 degrees here and spray paint dries in just a sec. Very quicklu, I'm ready to start with the good stuff.


I used a spray paint can lid to lightly trace circles onto my wreath. I just kind of did them randomly letting some of them fall off the edge.



Then I picked my colors (red, pink, green, yellow and blue) and started filling in the circles. It did take 2 coats to get good, full coverage.


While that was drying I came to Photoshop and printed out the word "Welcome" in a cute, chunky font. If you aren't familiar with my redneck version of tracing, let me show you.

Print out your word/shape/whatever and make sure it fits your space.



Then flip it to the back side. Put your paper up to a glass door or window and trace the outline of the image with pretty heavy lead.



Once you have it all done, lay your piece back down and scribble all over the back of it with the pencil. Be careful not to let it move any.



Lift it up and you should have a light outline to follow. You can fill it in with pencil if all your lines didn't connect.


After I had my lines down, I just went over them with a black paint marker. I actually filled them in with paint marker, but you could use black paint if you have a steady hand.


Then I just looped a black satin ribbon around it and hung it up. I think this one is going to find it's new home on my front door for a little while!


So fun and happy-- just like me, unless you were around for the pre-wisdom tooth removal days!





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Stars and Stripes Door Hanger

Let me give this post a disclosure and tell you that if you are an American Flag purist, you probably won't like this project. I debated whether or not to even finish it when I realized that all 50 stars were not going to fit. But since I was covered in paint and my counters were already covered in burlap fuzzies, I kept going anyway.

I started with a piece of burlap folded in half straight off the bolt and cut a rectangle the length that I needed. I used the fold as my bottom.



Then I started painting on my stripes. If you decide to try this at home, make sure to let each of your colors dry before starting the next color. If you were say, the impatient type, your colors might bleed and it might get all yucky for a minute... but I'm not the impatient type so I wouldn't know anything about that. I'm just saying that it could happen!


Once my stripes were dry, I painted the corner that I left open where my stars would go.



Again, let that dry then find a handy handy star cookie cutter in your junk drawer to use as a guide for your stars.


I stamped all my stars with the cookie cutter and used a combination of these brushes and my pinky finger to get them filled in.


Once everything is dry, fold your piece over so that the painted side is face up and position your ribbon to hang it evenly spaced in the center. You could put a little stuffing in it at this point. I didn't, but I wish I had of.


I used hot glue to get my 2 halves together. I'm sure you can sew burlap but I've already got burlap fuzzie all over 1 table and dragging it to another table just didn't sound too appealing to me at the moment.

Once you get done with that, you guessed it, it's ready to hang on your door.


I hope everyone has a Happy 4th of July weekend! Please remember to keep our military and their families in your thoughts and prayers this weekend.

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My Pretty Jewelry

We just recently went to the beach on vacation and El Cheapo strikes again! We went into a few shops that had really cute handmade jewelry. Cute, yes. Worth $55.00, noooo way! Well, I saw this necklace in the gift shop at Tacky Jacks that I really loved. It was a long, colorful, chunky, beaded necklace. The price tag was was even chunkier than the beads. $55.00! Get the heck out of town! But I still kept thinking about that necklace. I had almost convinced myself that I should have just bought it. But on the way home, between getting car sick and counting mile markers, I convince the hubs that we really should stop at Joann's on the way home. I mean, it's right off the interstate and 2nd & Charles which just so happens to be the hubs favorite store is right next door. It sounded like a win-win to me. Then when we got there, there where having a huge $0.50 clearance sale on a ton of their jewelry making supplies. It was a win-win-win! Not really knowing what I was doing or what I needed, I grabbed a few things of beads, some head pins, some earring hooks and some necklace cording.


After a little spill of 4,587,462 beads, I was on my way to making really cute earrings. This little project also landed me a trip to the optometrist. I could barely see to thread my beads. I knew I needed glasses but WHOA! It's like the whole world went from a 6pt. font to a 24pt. font after I got them.

Anywho, back to my beads... I made several pair of earrings and a necklace that turned out really cute.

These could dress up a cute black dress.


This pair would be cute with just about anything.


And of course for all my die-hard Bama fans, we have to give Big Al some love.


Up close of the elephant ones.


And the necklace I made using necklace cording and some wooden beads.


I made it just by threading the beads and knotting it ever so ofter.


These would be a great last minute gift for someone and they really didn't cost much at all to make. If you haven't ever tried jewelry making, give it a try. With a few basic supplies and some pliers you can make some really neat jewelry.

Be sure to check out the link parties where I am sharing this week!

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