Filed under Updates

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!

  Filed under Animals, Death, Health
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

  Filed under Arts & Crafts, Crafty Monday, DIY
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!