Curious Country Creations Crafty Life

A few weeks ago I was making TShirts for a group of teenage girls for their summer camp.  I had very little budget and knew it needed to be a do-it-yourself project rather than just order screenprinting.  I looked into making a silk screen or even borrowing a friends Yudu machine to do it, but was worried about the cost for the emulsions and cleaning chemicals and ink.

Then I had a brilliant idea!  (ok, not really, but it sure solved this problem!)  I have a Cricut and software that allows me to cut anything I want.  I used Corel Paintshop Pro software to make my black and white image, being careful to connect all the pieces that I needed to to make it a stencil.  I uploaded it to my Cricut and waited anxiously for it to cut.

I took out some regular acrylic paint and an old shirt and experimented with the first one… it turned out great!  I realized that I needed to change a few things with the image so the insides of letters would stay open, so I edited it, cut it again (just using cardstock for the stencil– it held up with the paint, even after 15 shirts!), and went for it.

The shirt says “We Seek for Treasure” with a big pirate ship and compass on it.  I’m still waiting to get a photo of all 15 girls together from another camera, but you get the idea!

The tricky part of using this method for DIY T-shirt printing is that while you are painting on the stencil you have to hold it very still and dab the paint on rather than brush.  I touched up any areas that needed it and closed in the letters using a toothpick.  Doing this final step made it look like I hadn’t used a stencil at all!

I finished a dozen backpacks with one design, and 15 Tshirts with a slight variation.  It really only took about 5 minutes per design… and the cost?  $3 in paint, sponge brushes I already had on hand.  Here’s a photo of one of the backpacks– just a slightly smaller version with different text.

Meanwhile my husband was about to run the Wasatch Back Ragnar Relay (192 miles!) and needed a costume.  He was going to be running as the Big Bad Wolf.  So, I picked him up some blank shirts at the craft store (on sale!), found a wolf head image and designed his shirt.  I made a stencil and painted it on.  Easy as that!  His shirt says “Big Bad Wolf” then the picture, and below, “I Eat Little Pigs for Breakfast!”

Of course I couldn’t stop there– our kids needed to be the cheerleading squad for their Daddy at the finish line, so I made them each a personalized tee as well.  They turned out adorable!  Each Little Pig is different, and their shirts say “My Daddy Eats Little Pigs for Breakfast!”

Even though it is just acrylic paint on fabric it has actually held up well in the laundry and is comfortable to wear.  If you try this just make sure that you put a layer of cardboard inside the shirt before you paint to prevent bleeding through.

Here’s a family photo– my shirt says “I Love the Big Bad Wolf”  So proud of my man– his team ran 192 miles in 30 hours!!

It may not be totally professional, but being able to make 20 custom shirts for a total cost of $3 (plus the shirts, but I got those on sale) was just what I needed!

My second baby boy recently turned 5 years old. Holy smokes, when did that happen?!?!? He requested a tractor themed birthday party. The fun started with these invitations that I made using my Cricut Expression and Sure Cuts a Lot 2 software (LOVE it– you can upload any black and white picture or font that you want and it will cut it!).

The wheels have brads in the centers so they can really turn. All the party info shows up in the cutouts on the back wheel. My little cowboy thought they were pretty cool!

We planned for a party at the park just across from our front door. Unfortunately the weather didn’t cooperate and it was too windy to put up the yellow and green streamers and balloons that we had all ready, but the kids were so excited just to be there that it really didn’t matter. Everyone got a bandana to get in the cowboy mood, and the birthday boy (and his siblings, cuz that’s how we roll) had cowboy/cowgirl hats.

I made a tractor cake using donuts (mini and regular) for the wheels, Twix for the rails on the trailer, and hard candies for the lights. My favorite are the haystack of cupcakes in the back of the trailer, and the little farm animals made from mini cupcakes.

The kids did galloping races, danced like cowboys, played stick-pull, played a hot potato version of “Moosical” chairs, and (our favorite) ate slop like little piggies. The slop was chocolate pudding with marshmallows mixed in.

Then the sky opened and it started POURING down rain… we quickly moved the party inside and ate cake and ice cream. The final event was a cow pinata. For once we were very happy that our basement is unfinished! (The cow pinata was purchased at a party store– it’s pictured at the top of this post.)

If tractors, cowboys or farms are your little boy’s favorite, I highly recommend throwing a fun party like this!

Alright, I have been showing you bits and pieces of my bathroom makeover as I made them… now it is done so it is time for the great reveal!

Here is the half bathroom before the makeover:

It doesn’t look too bad, but it was boring and didn’t have a finished look.  I started out last week by taking a tiny paintbrush and making all of the corner and ceiling lines and the baseboards perfect.  What a huge difference that made!  I was surprised by how unfinished just taping those walls left them– so now I’m happy that I finally fixed them!

Here is the Makeover:

I had a shelf just sitting unused in my closet since we moved a year ago and I thought it was high time that it got put back up.  The decorations are all re-used, re-painted items that were given to me.  See my previous posts about the Anchor Upcycle, Salt Cedar Vase, and Bird Re-Do project.  The bottles on the shelf I got at a thrift store.  I just filled one with small polished rocks (Dollar Store!) and tied both with twine.

My husband and I bought the painting of the San Fransisco skyline from a street artist when we visited there two years ago.  Can you believe that’s spray paint?

My all time favorite upgrade to the bathroom though was framing the mirror!  Super easy project, didn’t cost much at all, and made such a huge difference in finishing the space!  I went to Home Depot and picked up some molding and Liquid Nails.  Everything else I already had on hand.  My fabulous husband cut the trim to the right size with his Miter Saw (I won wife points last Father’s Day!).  I painted the trim with three coats of black semi-gloss paint, then used sandpaper to distress it.  After that I just sealed it with a coat of glossy mod podge.  I was a little nervous about getting the frame in place but it turned out to be super easy!  We just put some Liquid Nails on the back of each piece of the frame (starting with the bottom), stuck it on the mirror, adjusted it to be level and straight, and held it in place until it was set.  The whole thing took my husband and I less than 10 minutes!!

Total cost of this Bathroom Makeover: $13.  Love it!!

Next change to happen to this bathroom will be a new light fixture, faucet and sink… but that’s for another day!

Linked up to these parties:

Here’s another decoration given to me by my sister that just didn’t quite go with the look I’m trying to create in my bathroom…. so, do I throw it away?  NOPE!  I get out my paint!

Here is the picture of the bird before:

First I painted the head, back and wings black with two coats.  I painted the beak orange.  The rest of the bird I painted cream colored.  When all the paint was dry I covered the orange beak with yellow, and all the black with cream.  When that paint was dry I got out some sandpaper and distressed the wings, tail and head until quite a bit of the black was showing through, and very very lightly sanded the bird’s back.  I also took off most of the yellow on the beak to expose the orange underneath.

I also painted the stand black to match the rest of the bathroom decor.

After that was done I got out my favorite thing ever– Mod Podge (glossy)– and put a nice coat of it over everything.

Here’s the finished look:

What do you think?  I love it now!

My sister had a woman give her a bunch of unwanted beach-themed decorations… which my sister didn’t want either.  So, lucky me!!  Knowing that I am decorating my house in that theme my sister saved the decorations for me.  This is one of the items:

I said “oooh, I really like it!  But I’m going to paint it black!”  In case you can’t tell from the picture, it was a really light aqua color, not white.  I took off the rope (it was just stapled to the back), washed the sticky residue off of the wood, then painted it with three coats of black paint.  I didn’t want it to just be solid boring black though, so I got out some sandpaper and distressed the high spots and the edges.

Then my dilemma…. what to use as a glaze to finish off the distressed parts?  Should I leave them white?  Brown?  Reddish to look like rust?  Hmmmm.  Then in my stash of paints I saw a metallic bronze.  Perfect!  I mixed some of the metallic paint with water, brushed it over the distressed areas, let it sit for about 30 seconds, then dabbed it off with paper towel.  I let that all dry and then covered it all with a coat of Mod Podge because really, everything’s better with Mod Podge!  I put the rope back on, this time securing it with trusty hot glue.

Here’s the finished look– so excited for the new bathroom!

I love the beach.  I love digging my toes into the sand, splashing in the waves, hunting seashells with my kids, chasing seagulls…  I love the sound of the ocean and could listen to waves crashing for hours.  Reality check: I live in land locked Utah.  *sigh*  To make up for lack of proximity to my favorite vacation destination I have been adding some beach-themed decor to my house so I can enjoy it every day.  A girl can dream, right?

I am still working on the paint job in our main floor half bath, so I’ll have to reveal the whole makeover soon, but here is the first element.

I took a simple square glass vase, wrapped some sheer fabric around it and secured it with hot glue.  Then I wrapped twine around it, using a dab of hot glue on the backside of the vase after every wrap to hold it in place, and tied a simple knot to finish it off.

I found these branches and they reminded me so much of the twigs and grasses that grow in the salty ocean air… no wonder, because they are called Salt Cedar!  A couple of bunches (5 to be exact) of those placed in the vase=perfect!

Can’t wait to show you the whole bathroom makeover!

I saw this idea originally on www.modernwivelyhood.blogspot.com and adapted it for what I had on hand…  I made dozens of fleece roses simply by cutting 4 inch circles and then spiral cutting them, and then rolling them up with a little hot glue to keep them secured.  Assembling this was a cinch because I just hot glued the roses onto a wreath form in whatever pattern I wanted.  I had some pearl-headed corsage pins leftover from a wedding, so I pushed some of those into the centers.  I added a ribbon at the top and looky there, a new Valentine’s Day wreath!

I had a styrofoam wreath form already, but I love the twig one shown on modernwivelyhood.  I think if I was going to do this again I would get one of those grapevine wreath forms and have the finished product look a little more country.

Welcome to the Curious Country Creations Crafty Life blog!  A little about me… my name is Angela.  I am a stay at home mom to four adorable and rambunctious kids ages six down to four months.  I love staying home with the kids and doing projects with them.  I really enjoy DIY projects, sewing, decorating my house and making things for my kids and to give as gifts.  I like cooking and play around with cake decorating.  My favorite things to bake are treats… but I have to limit myself because otherwise my waistline would get upset!  I love photography– I take way too many photos of the kids!  I also love photographing the world around me as I see it, so I hope you enjoy what you see on this blog.

I’m married to the love of my life, a super hard working, fun-loving, tall and handsome man.  One of my favorite things about him is that he always has a bunch of ideas bouncing around and works on them until they become a reality.  I guess that’s something we have in common!  I keep a running list of projects and ideas that I have in mind and I love exercising my creativity while doing home improvement projects, decorating, throwing parties and planning events.  The greatest sense of satisfaction to me is if I can put a check mark next to one of the projects on my list…. and then I add a few more ideas to it!

I will be posting a bunch of crafts, holiday decorations, updates to the house and whatever else I work on.  I hope I can inspire anyone who reads this blog to get their crafty on and make something!  I get a lot of my inspiration from other bloggers and websites, so I hope I can do the same for some of you.

Three months ago the associate producer of Extreme Makeover Home Edition contacted us and asked if we would like to be involved in decorating a home for a family in need in Kentucky.  We were thrilled and excited to donate to this cause so we had to quickly shipped (They build the houses in 7 days so it doesn’t give much time) some birch branches, pine cones, curly willow, Bayou Grass, Glittered Birch Branches, Raffia, Acorns to help decorate the Lampe family home.

They built the home and decorated it back in October but it wasn’t until last Sunday that we got to see the results.  The Lampe family was truly in need and we are so happy for them.  It makes us happy to help out a family that has given so much to others.

You can find most of our products on the show as you watch them look at their house.  Our Birch Branches were used to create nests around the girls beds.  The other branches are scattered around the home to decorate corners and walls.  The acorns and pine cones are in the boys rooms on the walls.

We hope to get pictures of our products in the house so stay tuned and good luck and we wish you well Lampe family with your new home.

Curious Country Creations was referenced by the St. Petersburg Times recently and I thought you should be aware of the discussion. This post is about Obama’s new budget plan and how it will affect business owners.

The business they focus on is selling Tumbleweeds on the internet.  It is a funny topic that Curious Country Creations is very good at and has been doing for year.  Tumbleweeds, Dried Wheat, Large Cattails, and other hard to find dried plants and decorations are our business and we like to point out that fact that this paper and other companies see us a leader in the floral decoration market and that we are here to stay.

If you have not already tried our amazing products please do.  We want to provide you with a place to get even the most hard to find products for your craft arrangements and decorations.

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