The First Noel (I Made Myself)

I. Love. Christmas!

I know we aren't quite to Thanksgiving yet...but I couldn't wait to get started on more Christmas decorations for my apartment this year.

Yarn crafts + Christmas = magic...so obviously I had to do yarn covered letters. I picked out some sparkly red, green, and white yarn and tag board letters spelling "NOEL."

For the "N" (the hardest letter for me), I tried using small pieces of yarn on the tops and bottoms of the letter to cover the edges. It was a lot more work than the second method I discovered after a little extra hunting online. On the "E" and "L" I wrapped each entire letter up vertically and then went back over each letter horizontally again. (The "O" was as simple as going around and around and around through the middle.)

I used Tacky Glue to secure the end, but I would suggest hot glue or something else that might adhere to yarn more quickly. After holding the ends in place for 10-15 minutes, my glue worked out all right though.

I don't have a tree skirt (and I'll admit my tag board isn't wide enough to stand up by itself the way more boxy cardboard letters would), so I laid them out around my little 3' tree as a psudo-skirt.

And in all it's beautiful majesty...

Who else is excited for Christmas already?

So I'm a Bit of a Flower Child

So I could NOT get this beautiful piece of wall art out of my head after seeing it on Pinterest...







...and I just knew I had to figure out how to make it. From the picture, it was pretty clear I need canvas and scrapbook paper. But what else to do? What was the best way to accomplish my task?

It's Doable gave me the answer with their beautiful tutorial. After a quick trip to the store, where I picked up a 9"x12" canvas, black acrylic paint, sponge brushes, scrapbook paper, and Mod Podge, I was ready to begin.

First, I painted my entire canvas black, including the sides. It took two coats, but each took only about 15-20 minutes to dry.

I spent the wait time between coats cutting out petals. Though my inspiration picture and tutorial used varied colors, I decided on a more monochromatic set of turquoise scrapbooking paper. Each petal is about 1.5" long and varies in width. I cut out a circle from a black patterned paper and began to set out the petals on the canvas around the center spot.

I love the color and the patterns!



Then I went through and painted the back of each and every piece with Mod Podge to glue it down. If the petal hung over the edge just a little, I glued it over. Any longer than the side edge, and the petal got a trim. Once all of the petals were safely secured, I sealed the entire piece with the same matte finish Mod Podge I'd used as glue.

Here's the finished product:

I'm SO happy with how it turned out. I actually bought three canvases, so I'm thinking about doing two more flowers in two different colors to make a set...maybe pink and purple?

What inspiration have you found online? Any DIY projects you're looking forward to?