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Crafty Monday #3: Cute Tying Storage Box

Amber — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 19:28:43 +0000

Recycling things is not only good for the environment, but can be great for sharpening up your crafting skills as well! This weeks Craft idea was originally supposed to be last week’s craft, but I had to delay it due to not having the main supply I needed: A box! I finally got my hands on a used postal box and started my craft today.

I’ve been in desperate need for somewhere to store my scrapbook papers, construction paper, and all that neat stuff. This home-made box is perfect for that. There are numerous other things you could make it for: An awesome personalized gift box, art supply holder, Picture box, or you could stuff anything imaginable in there. Boxes can always be extremely useful. Not to mention you are taking something that would ordinarilly end up in the garbage and putting it to good use!

If you read my last Crafty Monday post, I used a different method of explaining the craft than in my first. I’ve put that method to use in this one as well. You can click on the image below to enlarge it.

Materials:
- 1 Box of any size you choose
- Cute & pretty patterned papers that will fit on your box
- Scissors
- Glue, preferrably a glue stick. Paste is too liquidy!
- Ribbon of your choice
- Tape (I used HD clear box tape)
- Hole puncher (optional)

1. Gather your materials. Here I have pictured all of the materials you will need. Not necessarily a step, but I figured I would put it in there anyway!
2. Open one side of your box. Cut on the left and right side of that side of the box, but leave the last side uncut. This creates a flap.
3. Here I have pictured what I mean by a flap. Now, your box will still be open on one side. Take some tape and tape the side of the box shut, minus the part you just cut. You have just created your box’s Skeleton! Now it needs some skin!
4. With a pair of scissors, cut your papers to the sizes needed for your box sides. I decided to use a different pattern of paper per box. Paste them on using your trusty glue stick.
5. Ta-da! Box is all covered. If you want, you can line the inside with paper as well. I left mine un-covered because I like the idea of showing that I made this box out of a plain old mailing box!
6. With your hole puncher, or you can use scissors if your puncher isn’t sharp enough to pierce the cardboard, make two small holes on the front flap of the box.
7. Cut a 12″ (or longer if you prefer) piece of ribbon and poke them through the holes as shown. On the box directly below the two holes you made (I marked the spot on my box with a red dot) create another hole.
8. Cut a 6″ piece of ribbon. Now this part can be tricky. Make a loop in the ribbon and stuff it through the hole, going outward. You’re creating a Vertical loop on the front of your box. Tie a small knot inside the box to keep the ribbon from slipping out.
9. Tie the top ribbon through the loop you just made into a cute little bow. Now here is the part where you can garnish your box. Place stickers, pictures, ribbons, or anything you would like on your box to make it look more decorative and even more original to your own style. Finished! Don’t forget to put all the stuff you want in your box before you tie it!

I figure the instructions I’ve typed out might be a little confusing, so if any help is needed you can contact me and I will see what I can do!

2010 AIDS Walk Houston

Amber — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 15:04:53 +0000

This Sunday is the 2010 AIDS Walk Houston, happening downtown. I wasn’t sure if I was going to do it this year due to my job but it turns out I can. I’ll have to be up by 7AM Sunday (HISS at DST on Saturday night!) to get ready and head downtown to participate! I’m somewhat excited because this will be my first benefit walk I’ll be in. The team I joined as currently raised $500! A good thing is that today is my last day of work for the next 9 days due to Spring Break. I’m definitely excited for that! I’ll also be taking care of my grandmother’s cats from this upcoming Wednesday to April 8th. That means if I decide to stay over at her house for a few days, I will have it all to myself. It’s going to be nice!

I Love Sally Beauty Supply!

Amber — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 21:32:17 +0000

I never really have shopped much at Sally Beauty Supply, and I honestly don’t know why. They have the best products for your hair and the best prices on them as well. Today I went in there and signed up for their beauty club card, which cost me $5, and shopped for a few things. I’ve been needing a big curling iron for a while now, and they had one for $12.99. Since I have the beauty club card now, the price was only $11.99. The coolest part is that it came with a cute little mini straightener! I know I have the best straightener in the world already (I own a Sedu Revolution!) but this mini iron will help me get closer to my scalp and also be easier to straighten my bangs with. Not to mention the adorable pink leopard print design on it!!

Plus, I got this split end treatment made my ION. It’s supposed to work really well, and my ends definitely need some work. The green bottle is some stuff that will help my frizzies go away, but boost my waves & curls, yay!

Oh yeah, and the best thing about this all is I’m getting a $5 gift certificate in the mail soon for signing up for the beauty club, so technically the membership was practically free!

Crafty Monday #3: Delayed until next week

Amber — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 07:44:24 +0000

Over the weekend I didn’t have the time to gather supplies for the Crafty Monday I wanted to do this week, so it’s delayed until next Monday! check back then for a new craft

Crafty Monday #2: DIY Earrings

Amber — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 05:25:06 +0000

Following along the same lines as last week’s Crafty Monday post, I figured I would do a post on making your own earrings! The best part of making your own jewelry is knowing that the pieces you make are 100% original YOU! Not to mention it can be cheaper than buying store-bought jewelry. Making your own earrings is a cinch! Not the most flattering picture of myself (you can click to enlarge it so you can see the earrings better), but the earrings in the picture are what I’m going to blog about today They’re very simple to make and only takes about 10 ~ 15 minutes. I put $25 as the estimated cost because if you do not already own a pair of round-nose pliers and wire cutters, those can run about $8 ~ $12 from a craft or hardware store. The supplies for the earrings are very cheap, though.

Materials:
- round-nose pliers
- wire cutters
- 2 two inch head pins and 2 two inch eye pins
- 2 ear wires
- beads of your choice & 2 shaped beads (ie. pink hearts)
Cost: $25.00

You can follow along with the instructions with the image below. Each number on the image corresponds with the number in the instructions.

1. Grab a head pin and slide your shaped bead onto it. With wire cutters, cut down your wire to 1/2 inch sticking out from the bead.
2. With your round-nose pliers, bend the wire at a 90º angle. Bend the wire into a loop, but make sure you leave a gap so you can slip an eye pin on it. good example of how to do this can be found here.
3. Take an eye pin and slip some beads on it. Depending on how small or large your beads are, you’ll be able to slip 3~5 beads on the eye pin. Hook the shaped bead onto the end of the eye pin and squeeze shut with your pliers.
4. If you notice, there is no loop on one end of the eye pin. This is so you’re able to slip the beads on. You’re going to have to make your own loop on this end. Do the same procedure written in step 2 to do this. make sure you leave a small gap!
5. Slip an ear wire on the loop and close shut.
6. Repeat steps 1~5 for your second earring. Display them proudly! you’ve just made a 100% original piece of art!

Peanut Is Sick

Amber — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 04:37:08 +0000

My female brown fancy rat, Peanut, is sick She developed an upper-respiratory infection over the night somehow. I found her this morning in her cage with her eyes barely open and she was acting very lethargic. I rushed her to the vet. Thankfully my other 3 rats didn’t get this, but it was still a hefty vet bill at $65. She looks terrible but hopefully the Baytril will start to work soon. I feel bad for her. I really hope it clears up soon. I’ve been nursing her throughout the day and she seems to want to lay up behind my neck for the most part, I guess because it’s warm there. She’s still so cold, though. I really hope she makes it through through this

Edit: Peanut has died tonight. Throughout tonight she slowly became worse and worse, and unfortunately she passed away. I only had her for a couple of weeks but I grew to love her not only as a pet, but as a little ratty friend. She was a little over a year old. I regret not having taken a lot of pictures of her. I have a few but they aren’t of the best quality thanks to my crappy blackberry camera. She’s the light brown rat on the left

Crafty Monday: DIY Earrings Holder

Amber — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 18:17:08 +0000

I’ve decided to trash the Crafty Wednesday idea and make it Crafty Monday instead I think it’s more functional this way, because it gives me the weekend to work on a craft and have it ready to show on Monday. Considering this is my first crafty post I’m going to explain the way my posts are going to be. I’m going to explain the craft that I chose to do for this week along with a picture. Then I’m going to list the materials needed, and after that the procedure. Of course I will also credit the website where I found the idea in the first place, unless of course it’s my own

Before I found this idea, all of my earrings were in a slightly crowded, unorganized jewelry box. Every time I wanted to find a pair of earrings to match what I was wearing, I had to dump the box over and shuffle through the masses of different earrings to find the ones I was looking for. What a hassle this was! This craft idea is my ultimate remedy. No longer do I have to dig and dig for my earrings, and not to mention spend extra money for pairs of earrings that I lose!

Materials:
- 1 10” x 13” Picture Frame with metal snaps
- 1 sheet of cross-stitch canvas
Cost: $5.00

I bought my materials from Michael’s Craft Store. The frame was on sale for $4, and the cross-stitch sheet was .65 cents. The funny thing is, it’s the exact same frame that’s used by the original poster of this idea, even though it was posted almost a year ago.

Remove the back of the frame, along with the glass and any papers / fillers that are there as well. If your canvas is too big, you can use regular scissors to re-size it. You want it to fit pretty snug in the frame, but not to the point where it bends.

Lay your canvas into the frame, and secure it with the metal snaps. Flip your frame around and voilà! You are done You can hang this on the wall with a thumb tack, or secure a picture a hanger to the back of the frame.

I found this craft idea from Teresa Franco’s Blog. So since this is my first crafty monday, I am well prepared for some direct constructive criticism. How have I done for my first post like this? Is the format of my post okay? Did I explain everything clearly? All comments are appreciated!

Crafts and Stuff

Amber — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 14:17:34 +0000

New theme. Well, basically it’s my previous theme with a more “Spring-y” feel to it. A new look to my site has been way overdue. I still plan on changing the side navigation tabs to better match the layout, but for right now I’m pooped. I really like how it came out, though. The tulips look a bit funny, but I don’t plan on changing them so there’s no use in me complaining.

Today I researched ways to get organized, and I found a lot of very cute craft ideas. this has inspired me to do one of those weekly crafty posts..A Crafty Wednesday I just hope I stick to it. If I miss a week I guess I could make up for it by doing two crafts the next week. I plan on making the craft along with taking pictures, and leaving a link to where I spotted it. I think this is going to be fun so even though it’s Sunday, I figure I’ll start early on what I’m going to make this week. I don’t want to give it away, but it has to do with a picture frame. I promise that in no way gives away what it is! I figure you could still try to guess, though As soon as 9AM comes, I’m off to the craft store!

Well, Well, Well

Amber — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 04:51:42 +0000

Look what we have here. I’m actually blogging. It’s been over three months since this has happened. I am so ashamed of myself! Honestly I do have some few reputable excuses for this happening. I have been a bit on the busy (and lazy) side for the longest. My new job that I started on January 4th has taken up most of my time recently. It’s a very nice job, actually. I make $13 an hour tutoring at a local high school. I get about 3 hours in a day so that’s a good $40 a day. My paychecks are usually around $400 every 2 weeks so it’s a pretty good payout! Not to mention the job is the easiest thing I’ve ever been apart of. I like it a lot! It’s a shame that I won’t be here but for a couple more months. If anyone who comes here reads Andy’s blog, which I doubt because he is always complaining about not having any visitors, then you would know that he has a house now! I plan on moving back in with him some time between mid-April to early May. He lives in Spokane, Washington, which is a beautiful city, and not to mention a pretty cheap place to live. It’s going to cost around $1400 to hire a local moving company to take care of everything. If my grandmother becomes a millionaire (I’ll talk about this in my next blog post) then she said she would buy me a newer car once I move to Washington. I’m so excited!

Andy has slowly been getting furniture and appliances for the house. Today he received his new stove. It’s actually pretty nice. I’m so used to using a gas stove though, and his is electric. I’m sure it won’t be hard for me to adjust. It seems like an electric stove is a lot easier to clean than a gas stove anyway. He already has a bed with a box spring and bed frame, a few bookcases, a dresser, and a kitchen table. He is still lacking a couch, though. I’m interested in seeing what kind of couch he’s going to get. I hope it’s not ugly!

I went on a 7 day cruise from January 24th to the 31st with my dad and step-mom. The itinerary included Montego Bay in Jamaica, Grand Cayman in the Cayman Islands, and Cozumel in Mexico. I have a butt-load of pictures I need to upload to my Flickr account still **Refer to the beginning of my post as to why I haven’t done this yet either! I’ll have them up eventually. So there is what has been happening in my life recently, and what will be happening soon. Let’s hope all goes to plan!

Since I have the Spare Time

Amber — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 12:59:51 +0000

Considering right now I don’t have a job, even though I’m frantically looking for one, I need to make use of the spare time that I have. I need to update my Wordpress, first of all. Secondly, I need to design a new layout. Helllooo Amber, It’s not summer anymore! I did actually fix a few errors around my site this morning. My host switched companies and the new one used PHP5, so I had to alter a few of my includes so they would work properly. Thank God I managed to figure out what to do myself This is just a quick update, though. I’ve lost pretty much all of my visitors that used to frequent my site (Probably because of my lack of blogging, I’m assuming) but hopefully once I get back into updating more often, everyone will come back to visit me more often