diy

DIY Planner: Fabric Fauxdori Cover {video}

In The Studio

www.ScrapsOfLife.com

As I said in my Helmar post, I’m in full-on planner mode these days, and in addition to reformatting my Creative Days planner for 2016, I’m changing binding styles, too!

Inspired by the Midori Traveler’s Notebook as shown in Kiala Givehand’s video on the topic, I’ve joined the many Faux-dori’s out there by making my own cord-bound planner cover!  And since the first one went so well, figuring it out as I went, I decided to make another and video it so anyone who wanted to make a similar fabric planner cover could follow along!

(Direct link for the feed readers: Fabric Fauxdori Planner Cover)

Some of the Fauxdori makers have their own shorthand (like JenDori and FoxyDori), so maybe this is a ScrappyDori? Hey, a girl can try.

I’ve been using my pink cover and my new 2016 planner prototype for a little over a week, now, and I have to say I’m really happy with the changes I’ve made so far! I want to give it another week or so before I decide on the final changes for the 2016 Creative Days planner and put those out at the beginning of October.

What I Used:

  • 16″x9″ Fusible Fleece (1 piece*)
  • 17″x10″ (ish) Fabric (2 pieces*)
  • 1/4″ eyelets (6)
  • Silkies Necklace Cords (2)
  • Foldover Elastic (~12″)
  • 2″ Charm

*To fit an A5 or US Letter folded in half-sized planner or notebook.

Along with the usual sewing bits: scissors, sewing machine, iron, etc.

You know, I’m more inclined to iron for craft projects than I ever feel compelled to on laundry days!

And even though the video is almost an hour, it’s only that long because I wanted to take you guys through the different decisions I made and how I got here–it took less than an hour of actual working time to make this planner cover and it’s mostly straight seams (I rounded the corners, but that’s a personal preference thing).

Resources:

Midori Traveler’s Notebook
Kiala Givehand’s Book-in-a-Day Traveler’s Notebook Tutorial

JenDori aka ChickSparrow Journals
FoxyDori Etsy Shop (currently on hiatus)

Stretch Magic Silkies Necklace Cords (affiliate link)
Jewelry Fundamentals Thick Elastic Cord (affiliate link)
2.5mm Crimp Tubes (affiliate link)
Fold Over Elastic (affiliate link)
Blue Moon Beads Shortcuts Connectors

If you give this project a go, I’d love to see how yours turns out!

“Roughing It” on Gingerbread Lane

The Gingerbread Diaries

It started out as a joke, that we were going to “camp out” at the new house. Turned out to be a more accurate description that we expected. After all, we had lights, water, Internet access, and all that important stuff, right?

Mostly.

The first Friday night we spent up there (2 weeks ago), I dragged a car-load of gear with me: an air mattress, compressor, linens, pillows, a folding table and chairs, bath towels, and even the shower curtain from the hall bath in our current rental. If I could have reached it, I would have brought my camping cot, too, to serve as a makeshift sofa, but Todd had already brought the big ladder up to Thomasville. Furnishings might have been sparse, but we had more than the average hotel room in other respects, so it all evens out.

Wine but no wine glasses--obviously I didn't think that one through 100%

Wine but no wine glasses–obviously I didn’t think that one through 100%

Before we ate supper (Burgundy Beef in the slow cooker, that I’d also brought up from home) we headed off to Lowe’s to pick up lightbulbs, a thermocouple for the hot water heater (the pilot wasn’t wanting to light, and that’s the most common fix for it), a new toilet seat (no amount of bleach was getting the old one clean), new door knobs/locks, and other odds and ends.

We discovered a few things, that evening:

  • There’s a small leak in the downstairs bath, coming from the roof–we know it’s not a plumbing issue as the water was still turned off. At least this will be addressed when the contractor gets started.
  • Speaking of water, there’s a busted pipe under the water heater/laundry room area (more on that in a bit).
  • All of the downstairs faucets exist in some sort of leaking state.
  • The plaster and lathe walls, thanks to the metal mesh that provides their structure, impede wifi signal–between the router in the living room (temporary location) and the dining room (across the hall and one room back) the signal went from fabulous to almost nonexistent; we’ll work on that!

The burst pipe was, of course, the most pressing issue and not something we could easily remedy at 9pm, in the drizzly rain. So we went from “roughing it” to near-primitive camping pretty quick! Thankfully we’d picked up a 5-gallon bucket at Lowe’s, and that (filled before we shut off the water to the house) allowed us to manually refill the tank of the commode, so at least there was that. Everything else we used bottled water for (I’d brought up a case, figuring it’d be a good idea and I didn’t know how city water was up there.)

Those finials at the ends of the pin--swoon!

Those finials at the ends of the pin–swoon!

It wasn’t all bad, though! We found out most of the downstairs doors have these awesome hinges on them, which will look amazing once I get the paint, etc. off the metal. Plus the weather was nice and cool, even if drizzly, so the 5K walk we participated in on Saturday morning was relatively comfortable. The 10K run that went by our house the following weekend would not have been so cozy!

I feel like this picture needs a hazmat warning! Years of build-up *shudder* but it's gone now!

I feel like this picture needs a hazmat warning! Years of build-up *shudder* but it’s gone now!

At any rate, my plans to start cleaning the house were a bit hindered by the lack of hot running water. I managed to get most of the crud off the bannister using bottled water and Magic Erasers before we headed back to Tallahassee.

Weekend #2 started off with far less surprises, at least of the negative kind. The Rose Festival Parade was Friday night so we walked down to the parade route, then decided to scope out the downtown Chinese place (gotta find your basics, right?). Hun Yip won’t be our go-to spot for take-out, turns out, but we’ve got a few more options to check out. We came out of dinner to find the dance party in full swing at the intersection of Jackson and Broad, stayed for the live band and then the fireworks before walking back home. It was all very Stars Hollow and I love that we’ll be able to walk downtown for a dinner out (there are so many lovely restaurants in the area) once we get truly settled in!

(For pictures of the parade, etc., check out this Facebook album.)

Saturday was the day, though! We (read as: Todd) was going to fix the pipe, repair the leaking faucets, and once and for all get the water heater’s pilot light lit! Since there wasn’t much I could do until all of that was done, I decided this was as good a time as any to start making some videos to go along with these posts! I still need to work on my editing skills, etc. but it’s not a bad start.

(Direct link for the feed readers: Gingerbread Diaries 1.1: Bread and Pipes)

I also filmed the faucet repairs but I haven’t had time to edit those, yet. I’ll add them to the YouTube playlist when I do, though. (Note to self: the night before you want to post them is not the best time to take a crash course in a new editing software!)

So glad Todd is handy with this sort of thing! Of course, if he weren't we probably wouldn't have bought the Gingerbread Dollhouse in the first place!

So glad Todd is handy with this sort of thing! Of course, if he weren’t we probably wouldn’t have bought the Gingerbread Dollhouse in the first place!

I didn’t film the hot water heater repair as it was supposed to be a simple fix. Todd described it as a 2, going in, but after an hour declared it more of an 8.5! Basic rule of thumb, everything takes longer than expected, but he eventually got everything put back into place and, yes, the pilot light finally lit! By that point it was creeping into early afternoon and Todd had some errands to run in Tallahassee, so we packed up and headed back to our other home.

We still have some issues to work out with the bathroom faucet (they don’t leak, but they also have next to no water pressure, meanwhile the tub spout flows with no problem), but at least we can leave the water main on and the major leak is fixed. Hopefully this means hot water will be in good supply for next weekends clean-a-thon!

Until next time!

Some Swag and Bottle Service

Wedding Planning

Alas, this post is not about any bachelorette-style shenanigans. No, today I have another diy-decoration update because that seems to be what my life revolves around at this point!

Wall Swags

jwalker_ttb_swagcollage

It’s practically unheard-of for a venue to allow brides to hang anything on the walls, but we have permission to do so for our reception space and to pass that opportunity up would be almost criminal. Granted, the “walls” are actually screens with regularly-spaced pillars, but it’s enough. I look at it like hanging your first piece of artwork or framed photo in your new apartment–it feels more like your own space and less like a rental.

To take advantage of this golden opportunity, I created mesh, ribbon, and grape swags for each of the 8 pillars in the room. They’re not huge, but I’m hoping it will add a slightly more custom feel to the space just by being there.

Deco mesh seems to be having quite the crafting hey-dey but frankly? After making 8 (9 counting the smaller one that I’m using on our program basket) swags out of them I am less than impressed. It’s not very resilient and frays like a–well, like something that falls apart at the least provocation–leaving a trail of plastic strands all over my living room. That said, it does fill space fairly well and is lightweight, which can certainly be important.

I layered brown/coppery and gold deco meshes with some moss green ribbon and tied all of it together with plastic-coated wire. I used the tails of the wire to secure a bunch of faux grapes to the center of the bundle, twisting what was left into a hanging loop at the top of the bunch. Once everything was secured it was just a matter of man-handling the mesh into alternating loops (this being where that lack of resiliency came into play) and spreading out the ribbons.

Once all of that was done, I thought it would be nice to add some length to the arrangement with 3 hanging corks. Into the top of each cork I pushed in (with the help of some pliers) some eye-pins, opening the eye enough to slip a ribbon into. I used 9″, 12″, and 15″ lengths of ribbon, tied it onto the eye and closed it up, knotting a set of 3 together for each swag. It was easiest to loop the ribbon clusters through the wire loop at the top of each swag and tie it off.

I’m wondering now if it wouldn’t have been better to use slightly shorter and darker ribbons. Oh well, a done project is a done project at this point and I’m not going to let ribbon color worry me now!

Cocktail Hour Centerpieces

jwalker_ttb_cocktailcenterpieces

While I finished our dinner decorations a while back, I hasn’t done much in the way of decorations for the high-top tables we’d have for our guests to congregate around at our cocktail hour. They’ll have the standard long, white, tablecloths tied with a chocolate ribbon but I didn’t want the tops completely bare.

Looks like another opportunity to use some of my bottle stash!

I gave each bottle a quick painting of grapes, leaves, and vines using a mixture of gloss enamel and pearlescent glass stain paints (literally mixing 2 or more similar shades of each type to get the best qualities of each). The end result was a mixture of translucent portions and visible, swirly brush strokes that are, admittedly, a bit tough to photograph but look quite nice in person. I’m happy with them at least!

To go around the base of each is a small wreath. I’d purchased a roll of moss-covered grapevine garland when I ordered all those beads to put in the bottles and used 3′ lengths to make wreaths just the right size. Then I draped beaded garland over the wreaths, securing it with some pieces of moss-flocked wire, and added a bow where the ends of the garland meet–partly for pretty, partly for camouflage!

This is also the point where I tone down my ire (a little) for craft stores putting out Christmas decorations when we’re not even close to Halloween, yet, since that’s where I found ivory and maroon garlands.

Two Birds, One Stone Card Box

Wedding Planning

We’re not expecting many gifts brought to our wedding, but I figure cards might be a bit more common so wanted to include something to hold them in and just set it on the same table as our guest “book” set-up and call it a day. From what I can tell, it’s fairly common to include a picture of the couple (another use for that engagement session) on the table with the guest book–and that’s when I worried said table might become a bit cluttered.

Since our guest book is actually a cork cage, I thought a card cage would be a bit much even if they are one of the prettiest options out there. The mailbox idea is cute, but it’s tough not to look at them and see the montage from UP! and that leads to instant waterworks. A suitcase wasn’t right and while the cardbox monsters are absolutely adorable, it was a little more levity than I had in mind.

But something needed to be decided, so I picked up one of those generic patterned paper boxes at the craft store with the intent to paint or otherwise cover it.

I’d used one of these at a shower I threw a few years back and just inserted a skewer to keep the lid propped up. It was functional if nothing else.

However, this was right around the time I was making the mini-books for our centerpieces so I started looking at the box from a different angle and decided if I could fashion a way to keep it open without losing the cards inside when the box was moved, why not do that instead? And if it’s standing up like a book (or a picture frame, ahem), why not put our engagement picture there instead of on it’s own?

‘Why not’ indeed!

I even had some of the envelope liner/mini-book cover paper leftover, enough to cover most of the “cover” of the card-box book and create a mat for our photo on the front.

I love it when a plan comes together.

First things first, I had the gold paint out again and decided to go ahead and paint the narrow sides of the box/book. It probably would have been best to prime it with a layer of gesso, first, so that it wouldn’t take four coats of the metallic gold paint, but it eventually got where the pattern wasn’t showing through so no harm, no foul.

Not that I'd consider trying to color the entire side of the box, but, hey, for edges it works!

Not that I’d consider trying to color the entire side of the box, but, hey, for edges it works!

For the edges where paper coverage was less likely, instead of getting the paint back out I opted to use my metallic sharpies and they worked amazingly well covering up the patter on the edges and dried much quicker, too! I liked the ease of the marker so much that when it came time to create the shim to hold the box open/create a base for the box, I colored over the paper with the bronze marker, too, and it worked wonderfully.

And it was around this time I realized I'd fit the shim to the wrong end of the box--oops! Good thing nothing was permanently adhered, yet.

And it was around this time I realized I’d fit the shim to the wrong end of the box–oops! Good thing nothing was glued down, yet.

By adding a couple of metal washers to the shim, the flap of the box will serve the same purpose: keeping the lid (that’s now the front of the book) in place! In this case enough that I don’t have to permanently adhere the shim to the inside of the box so we can use it to store the cards or other memorabilia after the wedding.

Rather than cut tiny little strips to line the inside edges of the box/book, I used ribbon to cover those areas, mostly it just needs to blend in more than anything, so the darker color of the ribbon works better for that than the patterned paper would have anyway!

jwalker_ttb_damaskpatternedcardbox

Then it was just a matter of cutting the paper to size and adhering it to the box, then using 1″ strips to create a mat around the edge of the cover before attaching our photo. Preferring the look of finished edges, though, I decided to take a bit more ribbon and frame the photo and then dressed it up with some self-adhesive pearls.

jwalker_ttb_portraitcardbox

The final touch was to mat a little “cards” sign on a scrap of the patterned paper then create little legs for it to stand on at the top of the book. I colored the flat portion of the legs to match the gold paint it’d be sitting on, but left the other half white so it would blend in with the paper. Minor details, sure, but it’d be far more noticeable if I’d left them out.

(Okay, probably only noticeable to me, but one less distraction for the bride is never a bad thing, right?)

 

Convertible Corsages

Wedding Planning

When I started thinking about the additional flower-wear for family and special guests, I figured I’d ask Mama Leadfoot’s preference on lapel vs wrist corsages and go from there.

Silly Miss Road Trip for thinking it would be a simple question!

At first she wanted lapel but then she worried about getting too hot over the course of the day and taking off the little jacket that goes with her dress so switched to wanting a wrist corsage after all. Of course, if she’s taking off a jacket, whatever’s on her wrist could still get in the way or prove cumbersome, so what to do?

Convertible corsages it is! This way I get to make everything the same and the wearer can decide how she wants to deal with it, there’s no words exchanged over who gets what or making twice what’s necessary to make sure everyone’s happy.

All it took was adding a little clip to the back of the corsage and sewing a bit of elastic to some ribbon to form bracelets that were neither too stretchy nor too tight. The best combo for me ended up being 6″ of grosgrain ribbon and 4 inches of elastic, but it definitely depends on how much stretch your elastic has as to whether or not that ratio needs to change.

Putting together the wristbands.

Putting together the wristbands.

Sewing the ends of each piece to their match and then rolling the seamed bits into themselves (followed by a few more stitches to secure) ensures all ends are enclosed and your edges are nice and neat.

For the corsages themselves, I went pretty simple with a 2-layer bow and a paper flower with a flat-backed crystal in the center. The bows are made out of 28″ pieces of wired ribbon: 4 loops for the wider, cream ribbon and 5 for the skinnier, chocolate ribbon. While the loops are still flat I secured the centers with a piece of plastic-coated wire and used the ends of that wire to secure the little clip to the back. Fluff out the bow loops and then glue on your center items and the clip will be all-but hidden.

jwalker_ttb_corsageclips

I’ll include a package of corsage pins with the corsages, but the clips can also be used to attach to clothing or straps on their own.

For the gentleman in the family I just went simple with a paper flower and a spray created out of tubes of bronze paper and wire, wrapped with floral tape to secure them and attach groups of five together. A couple of crepe paper leaves and I thought I was done, but the stems looked so unfinished. I tried a couple of different ribbons but they didn’t really look right, until I remembered some hemp yarn I had in my knitting bag.

jwalker_ttb_diycorsage_boutonniere

The residual tackiness of the floral tape actually helped quite a lot to keep the yarn wraps in place, but I found the best way was to start with a slip knot at the base of the stem, tightened to secure, and then wrapping up, enclosing the “tail” as you go. This mean I only had to use a little bit of glue at the top edge to make sure nothing came loose.

I think the real lesson, here, is not to give people options so as not to make more work for yourself. But necessity is the mother of invention and all that, so I think I hit on the best compromise overall.