Crafty Mama

My mama is so crafty! She upscaled this logoed magnet/clip with only some scrapbooking paper, stickers, and ribbon. Now my fridge is decoratively adorned instead of advertising for a company!

Cross Stitch Owl

This simple owl was one of my first cross stitch projects. My mother helped me frame it and I received a blue ribbon at the fair for my uniform stitches.

My Auntie LOVED owls, a symbol of knowledge, and decorated her home with them. I gave my cross stitch owl to her as a gift. She recently passed away and I was given the cross stitch owl back. I love decorating with it and it always reminds me of her.

Polka Dot Challenge

You may remember my friends Jennie and Amanda, 2 Girls in 2 Cities, from their NEON side-by-side challenge in June. Well, their challenge this month was polka dots and I had just completed the perfect refashion for the challenge!

Do any of you remember seeing this unique little number? The beige inspiration tank that I previously owned was actually purchased on a shop trip with Jennie!

Here's how it turned out! I love how light weight this piece is. It is a great transition piece from summer to autumn as it can be easily layered and the colors coordinate with a variety of pieces I already own.

Check out these other beautiful ladies in polka dots! How are you wearing polka dots this season? Are you planning any major refashions soon?

2 Girls in 2 Cities - @2girlsin2cities

Sorority Girl in the Real World - @erinbrownn

Amanda Kathryn  

Thirties' Two Cents - @thirties2cents

Franish - @fhasselhof 

I Get My Crafty from My Mama 

Autumn Wardrobe Update

Today I decided to avoid rush hour traffic and take my new Goodwill rewards card for a spin. I was really pleased with the pieces I purchased!

Miss Bison heels $4.04

Banana Republic sweater $3.86

Mossimo top $3.86

Ann Taylor dress slacks $3.86

Gap dress slacks $3.86

LOFT cords $3.86

My purchases totaled only $27.20 plus tax for six "new" pieces and really freshened up autumn wardrobe. Krista has also been thrifting recently. Below are a few pieces she recently purchased for me! What have recently thrifted?

Express sweater $2.80

Ann Taylor skirt $3.80

Cute hardware detail!

Sew Help Me by Marissa REOPENED!

is now re-opened!

Make a purchase during the next week using coupon code: REOPEN15 and receive 15% off

Guest Blog Post - Inexpensive Wedding Gift Craft

Today's post is an I Get My Crafty From My Mama first, a guest post! Lane is co-blogger of White Picket Fence, a good friend of mine, and an excellent crafter. Here's what she has to say about her recent wedding gift crafting.


Most people shed the habit of folding up computer paper, drawing stick figure pictures, writing poems, and gluing glitter atop homemade cards when they were preteens. I, on the other hand, just stopped doing so about a year ago at 23 — and solely because becoming a “grown up” requires sending thank you cards to everyone from birthday well wishers to potential employers to your garbage men.

What can I say? I’m very thankful to everyone helping me seamlessly appear to be an adult and I like to put my personal touch into everything.

That’s why I was really dissatisfied with myself when my high school friend got married in April (one of the first of my friends to tie the knot!) and I waited last minute to get her a present. I had to buy the bathroom trashcan on her registry both because it was one of the last things and it would be fairly easy and cheap to mail to their house in Seattle.

I was disappointed with my gift despite the fact that she was probably happy that she and her husband had a place to toss used Q-tips.

So I took to Pinterest, even though it not being helpful that instant. And I found this adorable little personalized gift — cute Mr. and Mrs. décor!

As someone who likes to craft homey touches all the time, I thought this would be perfect the next wedding I’d be attending — which, at this age, I was sure would come soon.

Sure enough, my friends Matt and Stephanie invited me to their Florida wedding in September! For a wedding requiring travel, I thought this gift would be great because it’s small and easily packaged to prevent breaking. Plus it’s personalized!

Another element to add to the perfection is that this couple has already owned a house for quite some time — and they probably already have most items that are absolutely necessary. What better to gift them, I thought, than a memento to commemorate their marriage?!

So I ordered this stamp set online — it wasn’t the cheapest set I found, but I really loved the font. It set me back $25 (plus shipping). The additional catch, however, is it requires you to cut out and glue both the rubber and the labels. I didn’t mind both the price and the setup though because I’ll definitely be using it again for future crafts.

After making the stamps for about two hours (only because I was watching HBO at the same time), I went on to making the actual present.

I bought a $10 frame from Wal-Mart that seemed really well made and was very classy looking.

The blog post that originally posted the custom Mr. and Mrs. frame had really precise measurements, but I like to wing it. I skipped the flowers on the frame because it seemed kind of girly. Plus, I made newspaper roses for a frame I made for myself and they wilted after a few months.

So in my project, I stacked my stamps one on top of the other from the top of a sheet of white computer paper to the bottom and put a little tic mark at the bottom of each stamp. I did so on the top of the sheet of paper as well as the right side.

Then I very lightly drew lines connected the left side to the right side.

Because I didn’t want it to look all jumbled, I chose to leave the one stamp’s worth of space blank around each edge. Then I just randomly stamped black letters line by line — being careful not to make any words.

When I got to the parts where I wanted to stamp Mr. & Mrs. Muscat, I made sure to stamp the letters on white paper so there was no residual black ink, then I stamped the red ink in the spots — voila!

After letting the ink dry for about half an hour, I simply erased the pencil lines, put it in the frame and I was done!

Overall, since I’ll be using the stamps and ink, this was a very quick, inexpensive personalized gift — which is what I was going for.

I accidentally let the word “doe” and “by” slip into the frame, but it’s not that big of a deal to me.

That did get me thinking, however, that maybe a little scavenger hunt with words like “love” would be cute for this project if I ever do it again. I also thought maybe putting their wedding date in there at the bottom in red would be cute.

When it came to wrapping, I wasn't sure what was standard, being a wedding newbie and all. Luckily, I’m also an event planner with a little bit of extra silver wrapping paper from an event I did in July. After I used that, I tied it up in a thick, white ribbon.

Overall, I’m pretty happy with this gift — I hope the Muscats are too!

Couch Potato

Now that we're all unpacked I've been busy making our new place feel like home. For my first "home" craft I decided to liven up our main living space by adding colorful pillows to our couch. With the help of Pinterest I found the perfect pattern for envelope pillow form covers here.

Before

I chose coral material that would brighten up and brake up the dark green and the same light green upholstery material that I used to refinish my dining room chairs. Our city apartment is on the smaller side and using the same material adds consistency and flow to the space.

This sewing project was VERY simple and took VERY little time. I highly recommend it, even if you're a beginner seamstress!

After

My Pillow Covers!