DIY Baking Soda and Cornstarch Ornaments

Hello! I haven’t fallen off of the face of the earth, I have just been so busy with holiday activities! Also, my Milo has been a sick little boy for the past 5 days…a little goodbye gift from his last day of preschool, I guess.

Anyway, I wanted to update and let everyone know that I am going to be absent for a little while longer, but I am coming back after the holidays with a new look for Me + Three {and counting…}! I’m really excited for all of the upcoming changes and anxious to see how I manage to stay on top of it all while adding a new baby to the mix.

I will leave you with a one more Christmas DIY project that I completed yesterday. I am not sure if these have another name besides “baking soda and cornstarch ornaments”, so that is what I’m calling them.  These are probably my favorite DIY ornaments because I can be totally lazy and leave them as they are, white and sparkly, or I can paint and decorate them how I want!

Baking Soda & Cornstarch Ornaments

Makes roughly ten 3″ cookie cutter ornaments

1 cup baking soda

1/2 cup cornstarch

2/3 cup of water

Combine all ingredients in a sauce pan and place over medium heat. Stir constantly until mixture forms a ball of dough. Transfer dough to a bowl to cool enough to handle. When dough has cooled, knead until dough is nice and smooth. Roll out to desired thickness of ornaments (I did about 1/4″). Cut out shapes with cookie cutters, use a drinking straw to make holes (for the string) at the top of the shape, then allow them to dry overnight so they can harden. Make sure they are drying on a flat surface and if they begin to curl up, just flip them over to flatten them out again.

Mine took about 12 hours to harden enough for me to paint them. I picked up some Martha Stewart patterning tape along with some of her metallic paint in yellow gold to make the stripes. And you can decorate them however you like! These are definitely going to be an every year DIY ornament project for my tree!

And here’s the {mostly} finished tree! I seriously need a tree topper, but with Christmas being in a week, I don’t think we’re going to have one this year.

Alright, I’ll see you all in a few weeks! Have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

DIY Easy Christmas Stocking {DIY Christmas}

Welcome back to Me + Three’s DIY Christmas! Sorry I skipped last week. I had made this stocking the day before I was planning to post it, but it totally didn’t work out the way I wanted it to, so I took a little more time, tweaked the pattern, added and subtracted a few steps and finally got what I had been going for!

Alright, so first of all, you can use any stocking pattern that you have. I drew up one of my own just because I didn’t feel like spending the money on one and I couldn’t find one that I liked on the internet. So, if you’d like to use mine, then you are more than welcome! Oh, and don’t mind the duplicated 4th page. It’s extra.

Christmas Stocking Pattern

Make sure that if you are using fabric that has a right side and a wrong side, that you flip the stocking pattern over to make the opposite side. I used some of the fabric leftover from my couch covers along with some pretty burlap interlaced with gold.  Also, if you are using burlap for the accent pieces, make sure your stocking fabric is heavy enough or just double up with a liner if it’s a super thin fabric. 

Materials:

stocking fabric and accent fabric (You could probably get 4 stockings out of 2 yards of fabric. You only need half a yard or less for the accent pieces).

Pellon 805 Wonder Under Fusible Web

Embellishments

Twine for stocking hanger and embellishments

Sewing and cutting tools (sewing machine, matching thread, scissors, pins, etc…)

So your first step is going to be to cut out the pieces. Don’t forget to use the toe and heel pieces to cut out the wonder under pieces.

Next you’re going to follow the steps on the wonder under and fuse it to the back of the accent fabric.

If you don’t have the directions then you simply put the rough side of the wonder under and the wrong side of the accent fabric together and press with a hot iron for about 8-10 seconds, or until it’s fused to the fabric. Next, damped a dish cloth or towel, peel the other side off of the wonder under, place on top of the stocking where it is to be fused to the fabric, cover with the damp towel and press with the iron for 10-15 seconds or until fused to fabric.

Then it’s time to do a decorative stitch over the edges of the burlap toe and heel. You only need to do the stitch on the inside sides of the burlap because the other two sides will be hidden in the seam.  I switched my stitch to zigzag, set the length at 0, and stitched over twice.

Place the edge of the burlap right in line with the needle.

Next, cut 3 strips of your accent fabric that are about 2 inches wide, and the length of the top of the stocking (about 8 inches).   Lay one strip a the top of the stocking and sew, using about 1/4″ seam allowance (if you are sewing an embellishment on, like I did, then try to sew it on now. For mine, I just cut a 4″ piece of twine, threaded two cute snowflakes onto it and sewed it with the strip, then when I hemmed the top, I reinforced it by sewing it into the hem). Flip the strip up and measure about an inch from where you sewed the first strip. Sew your second strip there and repeat for third strip.

Now that the front of the stocking is finished, hem the top of the stocking. For the back of the stocking, cut a 4 inch piece of twine, loop together, and sew into the hem at the corner (this is the stocking hanger), about a half an inch into the stocking piece (the side that the heel is on). I did about 1/4″ hem on both pieces.

Now you’re ready to sew the 2 pieces together. Simply lay the right sides together, pin, and sew, using a 1/4″ seam allowance (right in line with the edge of the presser foot).

Turn right side out, trim any random threads, press the stocking, and enjoy your handy work!

I know I normally do a weekly dinner menu on Monday’s but I’m only cooking tonight and tomorrow night for my family, so I’m going to skip this week and take some time to be extra crafty!! Have a wonderful Monday and don’t forget to check out the other posts from my DIY Christmas series!

DIY Rag Ball Bulbs

DIY Cinnamon Garland

DIY Burlap Ruffle Pillow {tutorial}

I’ve been spending a lot of time with my sewing machine this weekend. I’ve been meaning to finish this burlap ruffle pillow for sometime now, and finally got around to it! I also managed to make a set of curtains for the back window and a door curtain for the back door. We are now completely covered at night! Back to the pillow…I thought I’d share some instructions on how to do the burlap ruffles on the front of the pillow case.

This is a fairly easy project to do as long as you know the basics of sewing a zippered pillow case. If not, I am including a few good reference posts on that subject below.

Alright, so here’s the cast of characters. Ignore the piping that I tried to “X” out. I decided not to use the piping with the burlap ruffles.

1. Pillow form (this one is 12″ x 12″)

2. Front and back panel cut from fabric of your choice at 13″ x 13″.

3. 4″ burlap ribbon (found at Michaels)

4. 8″ – 10″ zipper for closure

The first thing I did was pin the burlap ribbon to the pillow like this:

I didn’t cut the burlap into specifically long segments because I wasn’t sure how much I needed for each strip, so I just kept the ribbon connected while I pinned the ruffles then cut it off at the end of the pillow case. I measured 1.5″ between each burlap strip. I measured about 2″ between each little ruffle crease (the creases were made simply by folding over about .5″ of burlap and pinning).

Then I sewed the ruffled strip at the very top, making sure to backtack over each ruffle fold to reinforce.

The next step is really much neater if you own a serger, but if not, you can simply clip the edges to make them neat and even for sewing the pillow case.

Now you have the front of your pillow case and you can sew it up as if it were just a plain ol’ panel of fabric! Pretty darn easy, right?

Here are those pillow case tutorials that I promised:

Zippered Pillow Cover

Zippered Throw Pillows

Have a wonderful Friday!!

DIY Fall Wreath {Giveaway Winner Announced!}

It’s winning day!!! I’m really excited that my first giveaway is coming to a close! I used random.org to select the person, so it was completely, um, well, random. The lucky winner of 3 crocheted washcloths is…

Sarah Rowe!!

**Winner! You have 48 hours to claim your prize! Simply contact me through my contact page located in the upper righthand corner**

For everyone else: Don’t go anywhere! I have another giveaway coming up from one of my favorite Etsy shops!

Back to normal blogging activity…

I’ve been itching to get some fall decorations up even though it’s still in the 100’s here in Yuma. I have been searching Pinterest for the perfect wreath for my front door and finally came up with a design, which is a mixture of a few that I’ve seen.

My Fall wreath Pin-spiration:

Top This Top That’s Easy Burlap Wreath – This is the tutorial my mother-in-law and I used last year for our Christmas wreaths.

724 South House’s Easy Burlap Wreath – I really liked her idea for the monogram. {Definitely check her blog out if you’re a new wife facing the daunting task of turning your husband’s college bachelor pad into a beautiful home. She’s doing a good job!}

I really like the idea of making one burlap wreath and just switching the embellishments when the seasons change. I might do a different color monogram {I’m thinking ivory or gold} for a winter wreath since those are my Christmas colors.

Above, you can find my cast of characters for this project. I included the door hanger because I almost forgot this thing! I would have been very disappointed to have spent all day making a wreath and then not have been able to hang it up! Also, you don’t have to use chalkboard paint, but I thought that would give me a really flat finish for the “W”, which is what I wanted. So, I just followed Top This Top That’s tutorial for the burlap wreath, then I secured the “W” with some thread. I’m sure there was an easier way to do this {please let me know of one!}, but I couldn’t think of anything right off the bat.

I’m also doing a table runner, thinking of doing a valance for my kitchen window, and on the hunt for organic pumpkins so I can get to canning for the holiday season!

What fall projects are in the works for you?

– See more at: http://christianmommyblogger.com/fellowship-fridays-55/#sthash.xkTIEpUI.dpuf