Paint Chips

And now for something completely different...if you follow the Craft and DIY boards on Pinterest you have seen suggested uses for paint chips, yes, paint chips; from large works of wall art to card-making embellishments.  I've tried both and I thought I'd share with you a few of the cards I've made. 
 Before Christmas I was looking for ideas for cards and found examples of folks using paint chips to make Christmas trees, so I tried my hand at it:

Not terribly original, but I'll play around with the idea when the holidays roll around again.

Then I saw a card on Pinterest that looked fairly simple to duplicate.  Here's my version:

Rather than cut circles out of cardstock though, I decided to try paint chips. Now I need to stop and tell you that as a part of my card-making activities I've found that I keep many many left-over scraps of paper.  Ask anyone who does paper crafts.  It is just a given that you will have paper scraps and that you will find yourself saving ever smaller and smaller such scraps.  So when I saw that there was part of the paint chip left over I figured why not use it.

There are lots of very small paper punch shapes that can be cut from small paper scraps or in this case left-over paint chips!  And what might you use those shapes for?

I hope I've given you some ideas for using paint chips in your own craft activities and I hope you'll share your ideas with me too. Thanks for stopping by.

DIY Pillows

Now many folks have made decorative pillows at one time of another, I suspect.  I know I have, especially back when I was cross stitching.  Last year I saw a great idea for creating inexpensive pillows by using lined placemats.  All you had to do is rip out one of the side seams and insert the batting, then sew the seam back up.  I couldn't find any such placemats last year, but I did come across these Christmas hand towels marked down to a couple of bucks:

These towels were not lined, but all I had to do was fold in half (right sides together of course) and sew up the seams leaving enough open to turn the fabric and insert the stuffing.  Voila:

Cute, huh?  Now this year I've been more intentional about looking for placemats and I finally found some that are square in shape, have a Christmas theme and cost less than $4 each:

             

So pillows will definitely be on my gift-giving list this Christmas! :)  Next I'll show you some past projects I've made and given as gifts.  Thanks for stopping by.



Why I started this Blog

I have always enjoyed creating things but I'm no artist.  So to satisfy my creative streak I have taken up at one time or another: sewing, crocheting, knitting, smocking, cross stitch, web design, photography, card-making, etc.  A few years ago I decided to be intentional about finding projects that I could make and then give as gifts at Christmas and birthdays. I even did web searches for "homemade gifts that don't look homemade."  I'm quite proud of most of these DIY gifts, though the ideas were not original to me. 

That is the beauty of the Internet.  There are SO many websites that feature arts and crafts projects you can do yourself; many of those blogs and sites offer step-by-step instructions and even video tutorials. And now we have Pinterest that help us find those sites.

I'm going to use this space to showcase some of my DIY gifts and projects.  I'd like to think that they might be an inspiration to you as well.