Super Easy Decoupage Frame

I am trying to add some cute things into my kitchen.  When I was going through my monster file box, I came across a $1 wooden frame Shauna and I picked up at Michael's a while back.  It got buried and forgotten.  Well, as soon as I found it I grabbed a piece of scrapbook paper and went to town!
Here it is before, with my supplies: 

I painted the frame's back and sides with acrylic craft paint.  I mixed some blue and green to get the color I wanted.  When that was dry, I laid the frame upside down on the scrapbook paper and traced around it.  Then I cut out the paper and used Mod Podge to adhere it to the frame.  I then took a sanding block and sanded the edges so none of the paper was hanging over the edges of the frame.  To give it a little more "oomph", I took a blue ink pad and inked the edges of the frame.  I love distressing, whether it is with ink, paint, sanding, etc.
Here it is, all ready for a cute picture:

Shower Curtain Love

I know I keep saying this, but this is one of my FAVORITE projects EVER!  :)  Here is a picture of my kids bathroom before with just a dollar store shower curtain liner:
Blah.

Blech.

Enough already with the blah-blah bathroom!!

This. has. to. end.  I looked to the internet for some ideas and was inspired by these:
From Make it and Love it and Show & Tell (two of my favorite blog reads)

A trip to a fabric store or two produced this inspiration:

I started by measuring the shower curtain liner (a new, sturdier one).  I cut my main fabric (the yellow and white) into 2 panels the length of the new curtain, plus a few inches for seam allowance.  Then sewed the 2 panels together.  It was wider than I needed, so I cut the sides to be the width of the liner plus a couple inches for seam allowance.  I then hemmed the curtain on the bottom and sides.
Next, the ruffles.  Love me some ruffles!  I wanted the black and white fabric to be the longest ruffle.  I laid it out to determine how long I wanted it.

I made the width of the ruffle almost twice as wide as the curtain so I could gather it.  I made sure the ruffle was a little longer than I wanted (for the seam allowance), and hemmed it.  Then, I did the same for the top ruffle.

Here is how I gathered the ruffles.  Now, I have the cheapest machine out there.  I am borrowing my sister in law's machine, which is the most basic machine from Wally World.  All it can do is straight and zig zag stitches.  But, I am so grateful to have it!  First, set the stitch length to the longest length.

Sew two lines of stitching about 1/8" apart along the top of the fabric to be gathered.  Then, pull both bottom threads and slide the fabric along the threads creating a gather.  That's all there is to it!  I always do two rows of stitching to gather, because I have tried doing only one and had the thread break on me.  More than once.  I was NOT a happy camper when that happened.

After I gathered each ruffle, I pinned it along the top of the curtain and sewed it on.  And here is where I am wishing I took more pictures.  Sorry!!  OK, I will try to explain as best I can.  To cover up the top of the curtain and create a place for the hanging rings to go through, I made a strip of the yellow and white fabric.  I made it the width of the curtain, and about 5 inches long.  I wanted it to be 2 inches on the front and fold over to be 2 inches on the back, plus seam allowance gave me 5 inches.  I sewed it on like a quilt binding.  For the front, I put the right sides together and sewed it on.  I folded it over to the back, folded up the bottom and hand sewed it.
Clear as mud?  Well...almost done!!
I decided that making button holes would be the best way to hang the curtain from the rings.  This machine doesn't have a button hole stitch, so I just made them myself.  Begin by doing the widest, closest zig zag at the top of where you want the buttonhole.  Then, on the left side, switch to a much smaller zig zag and zig zag down to where you want the bottom of the buttonhole to be.  When you get to the bottom, switch back to the widest zig zag and sew several stitches. To make the right side, switch back to the smaller stitch, and zig zag back up to the top of the buttonhole by holding the reverse button.
Sometimes, I did a good job:

 Sometimes, it didn't come out as good:

It will still work, and not be seen so I was ok with it. :)
I used my seam ripper to slit the center of the buttonhole open.  Insert rings and hang.
Voila!!  Done!   And that is how the cutest shower curtain I've ever had was born.

Sweet ruffles, how I love you!

 The whole bathroom looks new now!

And we all lived happily ever after.  :)

Message Board

We are in the process of decorating the big girl's room.  (we are always in the process of decorating something, right?)  With the bright purple, we thought black and white would be a good accent.  There are touches of other bright colors in there as well, in the pillows and some accessories.  With wall space to fill and pictures and other paper "things" to be displayed, naturally a message board was necessary.  With our budget of very little, we got creative!
This is what I dug up to transform:

A map picture that has seen better days.  It was the perfect size, nice and big.  And the map was glued onto foam core, also perfect.  First things first, I took the map out of the frame and spray painted the frame black.  (already had the paint)  Then I cut a square of some mid-weight batting and cut it a little smaller than the board so that it wouldn't be in the way when I put it back into the frame.  I sprayed some adhesive on the board and stuck the batting onto it so it wouldn't be moving around.  Then I took some cute graphic black and white fabric (already had) and cut it bigger than my map board. I spread the fabric out on the floor and centered the board on it, batting side down.  I then wrapped the fabric onto the board, using duct tape to adhere.

 I took some ribbon (I had to buy the ribbon) and criss-crossed it onto the board, also adhering on the back with duct tape.  Almost done!  The board was ready to go back into the frame.  I took some cute buttons (also had to buy, so went with cheap-yet-cute ones) and sewed them onto the board where the ribbons crossed each other.  I just sewed through the foam core-it was easy!  The needle went right through.  Someone clipped their flower hair clip on and it was cute, so I left it.  Voila!  Awesome message board, for very little money!  Perfect.

Kid's Room Artwork

I have a small stash of things I pick up at Goodwill here and there.  Mostly chunky picture frames, and a few other home decor items to rotate around.  When I made this project, my three little kids shared a room and their walls needed some artwork.
It started with this picture $2 from Goodwill:

I removed the back (it had a dust cover so I ripped it off), and took out the picture.  I decided to use the back of the picture to glue my project onto because it was a nice sturdy cardboard. 

I got out a nicely sized set of alphabet stamps, a couple pieces of scrapbook paper (I LOVE stripes), some white paper and some ink pads that went well with the stripes.

After taping off the glass, I took my free paint from Glidden that I got a while back (True Turquoise) and painted the frame.  No sanding or any prep, just painted it with two coats.

Then I got the stamps out.  In a very calculated mathematical way, I began stamping. 

hahaha  OK, what I actually did was just stamped as many letters as I could across the paper.  I got 10 letters across, so figured if I did 10 more across the bottom that would leave 6 for the middle.  So that's what I did!  For the striped paper, I had to piece two papers together to get the size I needed.  That's one reason I chose the stripes, because you can't see the piecing. I also matted the white paper onto a dark teal cardstock.  (also pieced together)  I distressed the frame a bit and voila!

Here it is all finished!  I think it came out so cute, and you can't beat 2 bucks!!!