Beaded Wrap Bracelet Tutorial

This is an easy beginning jewelry project for all ages. We just taught it to 6-8 year olds in our Jewelry & Fashion Art class. It's perfect because you can make it as long or short as you want to, and it can be worn as either a necklace or bracelet because of the clasp.


1. Thread two crimping beads on to flexible jewelry wire

2. Thread your clasp on after the crimping beads

3. Push short end of wire back through the crimping beads to form a loop and shorten

4. Use needle pliers to crimp beads and secure loop/clasp

5. Bead away! With this wire you don't need a needle and thread. For this example I just used seed beads but you could use whatever you want. Work with a pattern, or be completely random in your bead selection!

6. Once finished, thread two more crimping beads onto the end

7. Attach other end of clasp in the same way as you did in the beginning, be sure to keep your loop as short as possible

8. Crimp beads

9. Snip wire, and thread any remaining back through the beads

Wear, and enjoy!

Haven't entered my contest yet? Enter HERE to win 200 CUSTOM POSTCARDS. I'll also throw in a little extra handmade something to the winners as well! WHAT ARE YO WAITING FOR? Head over and enter! Good Luck!

Simple Sunflower Card Tutorial

I picked up a sweet clear sunflower stamp in the dollar bin at JoAnn Fabrics last week (have I ever mentioned how much I LOVE those dollar bins?! Yikes!) and it was the perfect inspiration for a quick little card. You could use this same basic template and techniques with any color scheme or stamp you wish. (Click on photo grid to view larger, or simply hop over HERE)


1. Fold a piece of 12x12 cardstock in half, crease with bone folder
2. Divide into three even rectangles. Cut with craft knife or paper cutter to create three cards.
3. Take clear stamp on stamping block and saturate with ink
4. Stamp over front of card, allowing some flowers to go off the page. Set aside.
5. Re-ink stamp, then wipe off center of sunflower with a baby wipe or similar.
6. Color the center of the stamp with washable brown marker
7. Stamp on white paper, then cut around shape with scissors.
8. Make two more sunflowers in the same way.
9. Cut a strip of brown cardstock and place in center of card. Place sunflowers on top.
10. Glue in place. Finished! : )

PS) Have you entered my contest yet?! Come on people - FREE STUFF! Just click HERE.

1st Birthday Party Cupcakes

Here are the cupcakes we made for a first birthday (airplane themed) party this weekend!

200 Custom Postcards Printing Giveaway from UPrinting.com

Happy Friday to all! What better way to salute everybody's favorite day of the week and kick of the weekend right than with a CONTEST?

I've teamed up with the wonderful folks over at UPrinting to offer a super easy and fun giveaway:

2 PRIZE WINNERS WILL RECEIVE 200 Custom Postcards

(choose your size: 4x6, 4.25x6, 5x7"); 14pt gloss or matte, 13 pt uncoated. Full Color on both sides (4/4) Shipping must be paid by Winner.

Offer Valid for UNITED STATES SHIPPING ONLY.

To enter, all you have to do is leave me a comment and let me know how you would use these custom postcards if you win! You can personalize your custom postcards for invitations, thank you cards, announcements, holiday greetings, etc. The possibilities are endless!

UPrinting also offers custom greeting cards!

I know that for Heather and I, who are dabbling in a new cupcake business, these postcards would be an excellent marketing tool for us! And what about those of you that have Etsy shops? What a great tool for you! Oh, and don't forget those of you that have birthday parties and events coming up for which you might need thank you notes!

You have two weeks to enter this contest! I'll announce the winners on Friday August 28th!

All you have to do to enter is leave me a comment... good luck!

Cake Class Part 1

In an effort to make our cupcakes *that much better* Heather and I enrolled in a Wilton Cake Decorating Class at our local Hobby Lobby. It's four, two-hour classes. Last week was the first class but I had a prior engagement, so Heather represented both of us. It was essentially just talking about materials and supplies so I didn't miss much.

For yesterday's class (class two of four) we had to bring a frosted, decorated cake plus three 1 cup batches of different consistency frosting's with us, ready to work with in class.

Let's be clear. Heather and I bake cupcakes from scratch all the time - but baking and assembling a layered cake? Boy, that's a whole other story.

If we were smart, we would have baked on Monday and frosted on Tuesday...

We're not smart... : )

I won't go into too much of the disastrous cake baking and frosting that took place ALL DAY yesterday but the highlights included: collapsed cakes, underdone cakes, wobbly cakes, and way too thick frosting.

Yikes!

We eventually ended up with two blue cakes. Sort of. As you can see, my cake was incredibly lopsided, and because I'd sandwiched the wrong halves together and we made a really crumbly cake, there were cake crumbs mixed in with the frosting all over the place.

Sigh...

I almost had a temper tantrum and boycotted us going to class. Seriously! I'm a bit of a perfectionist and was NOT happy with our results...

Anyhoo, lucky for us Heather is much more level headed and we made to class we all of our supplies, and our cakes in one piece.

Class was SUCH FUN!

We worked primarily with gels and star tips, although we did some writing stuff as well.

And we got to decorate our cake using a transfer design technique.

Here we are with our finished products!

If you ignore the actual cake on concentrate on the decoration - it's really pretty sweet looking!

And the best part? The instructor said we can bring cupcakes next week! PHEW! : )