Faux Birch Branches

Posted on December 11, 2013 by jewelsathome

They say, there’s a fine line between genius and insanity… I think I got a deeper understanding of this when I took on this faux birch branch project.

I saw these a year or two ago in a department store, and I’m not sure what possessed me, but I decided to make them for our house. It’s the kind of fantastic paper creation you might see at Anthropologie, which always has the best art in their store displays… It makes me want to buy a cute sweater… Now! But I digress.

I’m working on creating outdoorsy and white-themed Christmas decorations this year, like these felt poinsettia ornaments and homemade clay ornaments. I had several large cardboard tubes left over from buying fabric, and I got inspired to transform them into a little homemade forest. I have to say that I was super-excited when I started, and by the end, I was going blind from visions of decoupaged tissue paper, but I think it was worth it in the end.

Materials:

Cardboard tubes. The “trunks” are made from large tubes for rolling fabric. The “branches” are smaller tubes, including toilet paper and paper towel rolls.
Brown paper
White tissue paper
Mod Podge or glue for decoupage
Embroidery floss in black and gray
Patience

To get started, created the shapes of the trees. I used brown paper and Mod Podge to join some long tubes together, so that the lengths would vary. I also used the same technique to add branches to some of the trunks (pictured below).

Next, I started creating the look of birch bark, inspired by instructions on making fake birch bark over at Kitsch Designs. The first step is to cut the tissue paper into strips – I made a variety ranging from about two to four inches wide. Then, paint some Mod Podge on the cardboard and wrap strips of tissue paper around the tube (pictured below). I overlapped the paper in places and left gaps in other places, to give a textured look to the branches.

It looks cool when you tear the wet paper and get a rough edge like this!

Keep adding layers of paper, overlapping them, so the “bark” is textured and natural-looking (right two pictures below). I estimate I used a total of about 4 layers. On the top one or two layers, add some short strips of embroidery floss (left picture below). I cut this into different lengths and also separated some into strands, so there was a lot of variety. The floss stuck well to the paper using the Mod Podge.

I “planted” the finished birch branches in a pot wrapped in fabric in our font hall. I think it would look great with the addition of some greenery and/or ornaments, so I’ll fiddle with that a bit more, but so far, I’m excited with these wintery additions to our foyer.

After the hours that went into this project, I’ll be keeping these faux birch branches around. I haven’t decided if I’ll keep them long for next Christmas or maybe cut them short to display in the fireplace. Let me know what you think!

“Jewels”

Felt Poinsettia Ornaments

Posted on December 10, 2013 by jewelsathome

I grew up in Canada, so Christmas was associated with cool temperatures, bare branches, and as often as not, snow on the ground. Even my kids, who grew up in California, ask for snow at Christmas. So, I decided to create a snowy Christmas for us at home.

I pared down my decorations to focus on the white and silver. I also made several new projects in a white and woodsy theme. So far, I’ve finished a sleek new gray and white Christmas tree skirt, and I also made some new pillow covers in white and gray with outdoorsy appliques of reindeer, polar bears, and trees.

Since I kept our colorful ornaments packed up for this year, I needed to add some more decorations to our tree. The kids helped me make these sweet clay ornaments, and I am adding these white felt poinsettia ornaments to fill in the branches.

I looked at lots of pictures of real and felt flowers, and I read a lot of tutorials, trying to find felt poinsettias that would have a natural look. My final project was a combination of the felt poinsettia pin by Cheryl at her Tidy Mom blog, Kate’s felt poinsettia’s at her Centsational Girl blog, and my own innovation, as I wanted to make the flowers a bit more natural-looking and just right for my tree!

The thing I liked best about Cheryl’s flowers was how she cut the petals. It’s much faster and easier than using a template, and it allows you to make each petal a little bit unique. I used different dimensions, which I’ll list below, and I also cut my petals with a bit of a wave on the edge, to give them more dimension.

I washed and dried my felt before using it, to make it a bit thicker. To cut the petals, first cut rectangles of felt in the specified dimensions, and then trim them to look like petals. It’s very quick to cut the rectangles, if you cut the felt into strips first (left side of the picture below) and then cut the strips into rectangles (middle of the picture below). I was also able to trim the petals three at a time, so it was all much easier than I expected!

Each flower is constructed the same way, and I’ll give the exact measurements for my two sizes below.

The basic parts of the felt poinsettia are

a round circle base (top left picture below)
a layer of large petals (top right and bottom left pictures below)
a layer of small petals (bottom right picture below)

DIY felt poinsettia Christmas decorations to use as ornaments, gift toppers, or around the house | Jewels at Home

Start with a round base, add a layer of large petals, and top with a layer of smaller petals.

To finish the flower, I sewed all the layers together while sewing on some pearl beads to decorate the center of the poinsettia. I then used hot glue to attache the flower to a metal alligator clip.

Finish the flower by sewing the layers together while sewing on some beads for the center.

The pictures above are of the larger poinsettias. The finished size is approximately 6.5″ in diameter. The large flower uses:

2″ diameter base circle
8 large petals of 3.5″ x 2″
5 small petals of 2.5″ x 1.5″
7 beads
metal alligator clip

I also made smaller poinsettias, with a finished size of approximately 4.75″. The small flower uses:

1.5″ diameter base circle
6 large petals of 2.5″x1.5″
5 small petals of 1.75″ x 1″
5 beads
metal alligator clip

Here are the large and small flowers side by side.

And here are the new poinsettias on our tree!

Hooray for a project that was even more easy and fun than I had expected! If I get enough of these for the tree, they may start showing up elsewhere in our house! Or that may be crazy-talk!

“Jewels”

Christmas Pillows in Simple White and Gray

Posted on December 9, 2013 by jewelsathome

I’m not even going to try to hide that I’m crazy about Christmas. I love the warm festive atmosphere, the carols, the time with family.

Over the years, I mostly had the same decorations up each year. Last year, I tried a new color scheme of red, turquoise, and silver. This year, I want to do as much as I can in simple gray and white. I started with our new modern tree skirt, since that is a focal point.

Next, I wanted to make some cute Christmas throw pillows. The idea behind the pillows is simple. It’s all the different designs and fabrics that make them fun! The instructions for the basic pillow cover can be found in the post on our living room pillows. The instructions for making the appliqués can be found in this post from the onesie-decorating baby shower. Since I put some work into all these new pillows, I chose designs that would last beyond Christmas and through the winter.

Here are some of the decorations I put on my new winter pillow covers!

Reindeer pillows:

Polar bear pillows:

A snowy forest of trees on this pillows:

And here is our living room with the new pillows. There’s more I’d love to do, but I like how it’s coming together so far.

I’m also planning to make a throw blanket and some pillows out of a sweater. It could be a fiasco or an amazing project. If it’s the latter, you’ll see it here!

Are you feeling our snowy white Christmas theme?!

“Jewels”

Homemade Clay Ornaments with the Kids

Posted on December 3, 2013 by jewelsathome

I love decorating for Christmas, and this year, I wanted to create a white and outdoorsy theme. I love our collection of ornaments from over the years, but just for a change, I only put up the white ones this year, leaving our tree a little sparse.

Thanks to the kids for doing a quick and fun project with me to make some new decorations for our Christmas tree!

I used this DAS Air Hardening Modeling Clay, and it worked fine, but the dried ornaments are quite fragile, so I’m going to try the next round with this AMACO Cloud Clay. The kids have used it at school, and it seems to be more durable, though it doesn’t look like the shapes come out as cleanly. We’ll let you know!

This project was quick and simple – all you need is some clay, a rolling pin and cookie cutters, and some beads and/or rubber stamps for embellishing the ornaments. Oh yes, and some string for hanging the ornaments. I used embroidery floss.

All the kids were able to do the project pretty much on their own. I did help the younger ones with rolling the clay flat, but even little J did the cookie cutters and beads on his own!

Here are the boys at work:

And here are the ornaments we made:

Homemade clay Christmas ornaments to make with the kids. These are simple and beautiful! Jewels at Home

These are the ornaments I made. I used beads and rubber stamps to decorate the clay.

L made the three wise men.. actually, I believe he called them an “army of snowmen”…

Little J made these stars himself! I had to take them away from him as soon as they were done, as he wanted to roll them back into a ball like play dough.

These are K’s ornaments. I like how he tried a lot of different designs.

The tree looks much better now, but I’m hoping to make a few more ornaments to fill it out.

“Jewels”

Modern Gray and White Christmas Tree Skirt

Posted on December 2, 2013 by jewelsathome

For many years, I decorated for the holidays with the same traditional red and green Christmas color scheme. There’s nothing wrong with that, of course – traditions become traditions for good reason! But after more than a decade of the same style, I decided it would be fun to change up our Christmas look. Last year, I edited and updated our decorations for a red, turquoise, and silver Christmas. And this year, I’m in love with a simple gray and white Christmas color scheme. It makes me feel like I’m getting back to the tranquil snowy outdoors – even if I am in California!

Like last year, when I reinvented many of our decorations with silver paint and ribbons, I wanted to work with a lot of things I had, while adding a few new items. I’ve also been trying to keep my fabric and craft stash in check, so I pulled out all the gray and white fabrics I could find around the house and started to sew!

First up was a new Christmas tree skirt. I sewed our original tree skirt 18 years ago, when I was more fond of a cute and country look, and I took this year’s skirt in a complete different direction, making something very sleek and calming. I started with a grey faux suede upholstery fabric sitting in a corner. I had bought it to upholster our dining room chairs, and then I decided to make them more whimsical with a printed fabric.

Materials:

Grey faux suede fabric, 60″x60″
White cotton fabric to make a wide bias binding (I forgot to measure, but I estimate I used a little over a yard of 42″ wide cotton)
Narrower white bias binding

Instructions:

Cut a 60″ diameter circle from the main fabric
Cut a 6″ diameter hole from the center
Cut a straight line from the perimeter to the center

Tutorial for a simple gray and white Christmas tree skirt | Jewels at Home

The basic shape for the Christmas tree skirt.

Make 5″ wide bias binding from the trim fabric
Iron the binding in half to a make 2.5″ wide strip

Sew the binding to the two straight edges that makes the opening of the skirt, sewing on the back side of the main fabric with the raw edges lined up
Wrap the binding around to the front. Pin and sew to the front of the skirt
Add the binding to the outer edge of the skirt the same way, stretching the edges of the bias binding as you go.
Use the narrower binding to finish the inside circle

Sew the doubled bias binding to the underside of the skirt. Then, wrap the binding around to the front and sew in place.

That’s all! Here’s our new Christmas skirt!

Modern gray and white Christmas tree skirt.

I’ve got a few more white Christmas ideas coming up, and you can start your holiday shopping over at Zulily:

“Jewels”

DIY Decorated Notebooks

Posted on November 23, 2013 by jewelsathome

This project is part of my effort to spruce up my office and get more organized. I don’t know how organized it will make me, but these little notebooks sure are cute! The other project that I did was to cover plain file folders with scrapbook paper, and these look adorable also.

It seems like most workplaces generate a lot of scrap paper. From my first job out of college to my office today, I’ve usually been the one to collect the extra paper for reuse. At my first job, teaching at a small high school, I used the extra paper other teachers left in my cubby to shred for handmade paper, something I’d love to do more of again. These days, scrap paper from the office is the raw material for my three prolific little artists, as well as my own notes.

Even though we’re reusing old paper, it doesn’t have to look sloppy. I decided to make these notebooks to corral all of those loose papers. They’re great, because they can be decorated to create infinite customized looks, and it’s easy to add and remove pages.

Materials:

cardboard – I used old boxes and the heavy cardboard backing from calendars or pads of paper
fabric and Heat’n Bond Ultra Hold
OR scrapbook paper and Clear Contact Paper
0.5 inch binder rings or 1 inch binder rings
paper for pages. Ours are all scrap paper from the office.

Instructions:
Paper-covered notebooks

for each notebook, cut two pieces cardboard to 8.5″x11″
cut paper for the front and back to 8.5″ x 11″. I mixed scrapbook papers to make interesting designs
glue the paper onto the cardboard with a gluestick
Wrap the cover in Clear Contact Paper. As an optional step to make the inside of the cover more finished, I added white contact paper to the inside of the covers.
Punch holes on the left side
Use binder rings to hold the paper in place

Cute DIY covered notebooks. Jewels at Home

Wrap the notebook cover in clear contact paper to protect it.

Make your own customized DIY notebooks | Jewels at Home

As an optional step, I added white contact paper to finish the inside of the covers.

I rounded the edges of some of the covers to make the design more interesting. For these, cut small wedges to fold the contact paper neatly.

Fabric-covered notebooks

for each notebook, cut two pieces cardboard to 8.5″x11″
cut fabric rectangles about 12″x15″ for the front and back covers
Fuse Heat’n Bond Ultra Hold to the back side of the fabric, and then iron on to the cardboard
After cutting the corners, wrap and fuse the fabric to the inside of the covers.
As an optional step to make the inside of the cover more finished, I added coordinating paper to the inside of the covers.
Punch holes on the left side
Use binder rings to hold the paper in place

Make your own fabric-covered DIY notebooks | Jewels at Home

Adding coordinating fabric to the inside of the covers gives a more finished look.

Here are the notebooks I made for myself. I can’t wait to whip one out during a meeting!

Make your own customized DIY notebooks covered in scrapbook paper or fabric. A beautiful way to organize loose papers | Jewels at Home

It’s fun look to make the back and front of your notebook from different papers that work well together. I love this one!

These notebooks have rounded corners for added detail.

And here are the notebooks I made for the boys. They each chose their own covers – Superman for little J, art pencils for my budding artist L, and navy for big boy K. I wasn’t sure if the note books would catch on, but so far, the boys really seem to like keeping all their drawings organized in these! Yay!

The kids each chose the covers for their new notebooks.

L is really into art right now, which is so fun for me. I looped an elastic through the middle ring of his notebook, so he can keep his portfolio together. He has been bringing it to school every day!

Here’s what L is working on in his notebook. I love it!

More of L’s sketches, all neatly contained in his new notebook.

Yay for these little notebooks. They would make great gifts, too!

Some holiday projects coming up next!

“Jewels”

Customized File Folders

Posted on November 23, 2013 by jewelsathome

As I was making the scrapbook paper and fabric-covered notebooks recently, I was inspired to spruce up some plain file folders at the same time.

My office at work is getting a bit overwhelming, and having something pretty – like these sweet patterns – to look at always cheers me up.

It all started with this lovely patterned file folder that I bought a few years ago.

I found papers in my stash that coordinated with these folders, and I cut and glued them onto plain manila file folders to transform them into these eye-catching beauties!

Beautify your office. Use scrapbook paper to turn plain file folders into works of art | Jewels at Home

I really like how all the folders work together. Now, to clear the rest of the office!

I also made a folder for L, who has a lot of artwork to organize, though he now favors his DIY scrapbook paper-covered notebook .

I also covered all the folders in Clear Contact Paper to make them last longer. An easy project, and they look great. Can’t beat that!

“Jewels”

Dip-Painted Wooden Kitchen Utensils

Posted on November 17, 2013 by jewelsathome

I’m sure you’ve noticed that dip painting is very popular these days. I’m not sure that I like the look on everything, but some of those dip-painting projects do look really great. For holiday gifts this year, I decided to make some fun dip-painted kitchen utensils. I’m going to add some recipe cards hand-written by the kids to make special gifts to give their teachers.

And a while back, I used a reverse dip-painted look when I repainted a mid-century nightstand for the boys’ room.

To make your own painted utensils, you’ll need:

Wooden or bamboo utensils. These Oceanstar Bamboo Cooking Utensils worked very well, with their flat finish and a broad handle to show off the paint.
Paint – I used leftover house paint from a variety of projects
Polyurethane to protect the painted finish
Paint brush and sandpaper for touch-ups

With three kids, there are a lot of teachers in our lives, so I set up a dip painting center in our backyard.

I dipped the handles of the utensils in a variety of paint leftover from other projects. For some, I partially dipped in a second color. Finally, I added two coats of clear polyurethane. Between coats, I laid the utensils with the painted edge hanging off of the work table. The cardboard under the table caught any drips. I did use a brush and sandpaper to touch up occasionally, but for the most part, the paint went on quite smoothly and easily.

One small modification that I would recommend is to not paint too far up on the handle. The way I did it would be fine for stirring things in a pan, but hubby, who cooks a lot more than I do, pointed out that the painted handles would be harder to use when stirring a big pot of soup or stew.

DIY dip-painted wooden kitchen utensils | Jewels at Home

I started with one color of paint on the handles of the utensils.

For some of the utensils, I added a second color of paint. So many options!

Dip-painted wooden kitchen utensils | Jewels at Home

These are the utensils from our kitchen. Hubby pointed out that it would be better to have painted just the very tips of the handles, so the paint doesn’t get into big pots of soup, etc.. I guess I owe him some new utensils for Christmas.

You can mix and match colors and patterns to make great-looking sets to give as gifts.

To make our gifts more personalized, I asked each boy to pick a favorite recipe and write it out by hand. I’m going to copy the recipes and tie them to the handle of the utensils with ribbon. I love all the variations, and I hope each of our teachers will find a choice that’s perfect for her or him.

Teachers’ gifts. Dip-painted wooden utensils with your child’s favorite recipes on cards.

I’m looking forward to sharing our gifts with the wonderful teachers in our lives, and I’m also glad these wooden utensils will be a lot lighter to carry around school than last year’s pancake and hot chocolate mixes in glass jars!

“Jewels”

Seeing Silver for the Holidays

Posted on November 16, 2013 by jewelsathome

I love decorating for Christmas and the winter holidays. There’s something about all that sparkle and warmth at the darkest time of the year that just lifts my spirits. I have a lot of traditional red and green decorations with a more natural feel, because our last house was an old Craftsman, and that theme fit it well, but in recent years, I decided to shift towards bright and silver! I set out to do this while reusing as much as possible. You can see how it turned out in last year’s 2012 Christmas house tour, and in this post, I’ll give details on how to add silver and shine to your holidays without breaking the bank.

I bought very few new decorations, but I used a few simple elements to transform things we already had:

Silver spray paint. Rustoleum metallic spray paint in “chrome,” and Krylon “bright silver” which I already had.
Silver craft paint. I used this to touch up some decorations and ornaments we had and add some sparkle.
Silver ribbon – Michael’s had an array of ribbons at 60% off when I was there, and I had some in my craft closet as well.
Silver bells – also on sale at Michael’s

Paint it!

I’ve had these “PEACE” and “JOY stocking holders for many years now. They were a lovely antique bronze finish that got refreshed with a spray primer and a few coats of Rustoleum chrome paint. It has a very bright and reflective finish that looks like real metal.

Tips on adding the glow of silver to Christmas decorations you already have. {Jewels at Home}

I painted these stocking hangers with metallic paint for a shiny new look.

I also painted these mercury glass look-alike ornaments in silver.

Two easy steps to get a faux mercury glass look on your old ornaments.

And finally, I painted some pine cones with the Krylon bright silver paint and used the on their own, as vase filler, and on wreaths.

Spray some pinecones in silver paint to brighten up your holiday decor.

Wrap it in ribbon!

I had three wreaths in traditional greens and reds. This pomegranate and magnolia wreath from Restoration Hardware got a new look with some simple silver ribbon wound around it and used for hanging.

For my oversized wreath with pinecones and berries, some silver bells and ribbon gave a whole new look.

My third wreath was this plain wreath that wore a burgundy velvet bow for more than a decade, and now it’s ready for the next decade with new ribbon and pinecones painted in silver.

;

I did splurge (as much as one does at Target) on this silver beauty for our front door. It sets the silvery tone right when you enter our house!

And here’s what some more silver ribbon and bells did for this tabletop tree:

Wishing you a bright and merry holiday season!

“Jewels”

Superman and Batman Costumes

Posted on November 12, 2013 by jewelsathome

Here’s a quick summary of the recent Superhero-related posts:

Our preschooler is really into Superman. I mean really. As in, he walks up to random kids at the playground and says, “Hey, boy! I’m Superman!” which should be clear from the fact that he’s almost always wearing a Superman shirt. Sometimes, one of our homemade capes also. It’s actually very sweet to see the reactions he gets from strangers big and small.

So, it was pretty obvious what he was going to be for Halloween, and his brother completed the theme as Batman. These costumes served double duty at J’s superhero birthday.

When I was little, my mom always made our costumes, and she usually made them out of things that we could wear again. Even in this age of readily – available store-bought costumes, I’m used to doing things this way.

Superman

blue pajama set or shirt and pants
red fabric for cape and logo
yellow fabric for logo
Heat’n Bond Lite Iron-on Adhesive
Velcro for the cape closure
optional: black puffy paint

I actually made this Superman costume back when our oldest was three, so it has seen a lot of use, and it’s still going strong. It’s made from a set of plain blue pajamas, and I added the Superman logo and made a cape. This year, I added a yellow belt, too. The pajamas have gotten lots of wear, outside of Halloween, but they’re ready for saving the world a few more times.

To make the Superman logo, I used red fabric, yellow fabric, and some Heat’n Bond Lite Iron-on Adhesive.

I started by sketching a superman “S” onto the paper backing of the Heat ‘n Bond. Remember to do it backwards! If you don’t want to draw freehand, you can print out the logo and trace it onto the Heat ‘n Bond, using a lightbox or a window.

I then ironed the pattern onto the red fabric, and cut it out. (see below). I ironed the red “S” onto the yellow fabric, added Heat’n Bond, and ironed it onto the shirt. Finally, I finished the raw edges with stitching. on one version, I also outlined the design with some black puffy paint.

This is the finished Superman costume:

I also made extra shirts in a few colors to give us some variety, since J wants to dress like superman pretty much every day. I sewed this logo onto an older shirt, and I like the worn retro look it has.

Homemade Superman and Batman costumes for your little ones | Jewels at Home

Sweet vintage-looking Superman T made from a faded shirt.

The funniest is when he layers his hero shirts, like this day when he wore the Ninjago shirt I made for L’s Ninjago party under his red Superman shirt, so he could make a quick transformation whenever he needed.

He couldn’t decide whether to be Superman or a Ninjago today.

The cape is very simple, with a Velcro closure. I have more details on how to make the cape in this post about the party favors I made for J’s superhero birthday party.

Batman costume

Gray shirt and pants. We already had a shirt with the Batman logo, but you could make one using the same instructions as the Superman costume above.
Black satin fabric for the cape and hood
Black bias binding to finish the bottom of the cape
Velcro for the cape closure
Yellow fabric and Velcro for the belt
Black puffy paint to do the Batman logo on the belt
Heat’n Bond Ultra Hold Iron-On Adhesive-17″X10 Yards
black elastic for the mask

L already had a Batman shirt in gray,so I bought him a pair of matching plain gray sweatpants that he can wear again. I bought some black satin to sew a cape and the hood and mask and used yellow fabric I had to make the belt.

Satin is very slippery, so it was harder to sew than I planned, but with the help of a lot of pins, it turned out alright. I cut the cape using a similar pattern to the other superhero capes, but this one is wider and the bottom edge is scalloped like bat wings. I used bias binding to finish the curves on the bottom.

The first picture below shows the basic shape of the hood. It has a couple of darts (shown with arrows in the second picture) to shape it around the head. The ears are triangles filled with batting, and I hand – sewed them to the outside of the hood. I decided to make the mask separate, so that he could wear the hood more comfortably.

The belt is a simple strap with an oval in front for the bat symbol painted in black puffy paint. The closure at the back has elastic to make it snug and Velcro to fasten the ends. The mask is made with satin fused to felt with Heat’n Bond Ultra Hold Iron-On Adhesive and a black elastic strap.

And here is the finished Batman costume: