A little boy's chalkboard

My godsons birthday is coming up. He is turning four. Last night inspiration struck and I decided that I would make him his very own chalkboard. He has started expressing an interest in drawing (they just look like squiggles at this stage though) but thought this gift would be perfect to help him develop his artistic talent.

This is the finished product

Here are the basic instructions, very plainly put as I'm not feeling 100% today...

Materials:
Piece of wood
Colored background paint (craft paint works better than spray paint) & chalkboard paint
Picture of a car
Contact paper
Craft knife
Paint pen
Chalk

My rough idea from last night when inspiration struck

1) Sand down the edges of the piece of wood. I used an A4 piece of Masonite in landscape.
2) Paint a base-coat or spray with a primer.
3) Wait for base-coat /primer to dry.
4) Paint background color. Mine is blue.
5) While waiting for the paint to dry, print out or draw a picture of a car.
6) Copy/trace the picture onto the back of the contact paper (the paper side) with a piece of carbon paper. The image on the board will be in mirror image to what is copied onto the back of the contact paper so if necessary print out your image in mirror image.
7) Cut out the car design with a craft knife.
8) Place the contact paper with the cut out car onto the wood and cover any exposed areas with scrap paper. Ensure the contact paper sticks firmly to the board to prevent as much chalkboard paint as possible from bleeding through.

9) Using the blackboard/chalkboard paint, paint the silhouette or picture of the car. A few coats may be necessary, especially if you used spray paint.
10) Remove contact paper and scrap paper and allow the paint to dry completely
11) Trace the image of the car with a paint marker to cover up any areas where paint may have bled through or the contact paper removed bits of background paint. This also just produces a clean finish to the car silhouette.

12)  Using your paint pen write "vroom" or any other personal message on the board. Not on the chalk-boarded car as you want to keep that space open for the fun drawing with chalk that this gift will hopefully inspire. I chose "vroom" because my car suddenly looked more like a skew beret than a car to me and I didn't want my 4 year old godson or his parents to ask me what it was supposed to be a picture of.
13) Add detail with a piece of white chalk to the car to ensure there really is no confusion that it is a car. This also just finishes the gift nicely. Yes it is chalk and will come off when he cleans his chalkboard but by then he will know it's a car and will be to busy creating masterpieces to really care.

Funky fridge magnet

I found magnetic paper at my local small town supermarket. I got quite excited and snatched it up. The pack comes with three A4 magnetic paper sheets and so I decided to experiment with one of the sheets and see how easy it would be to make fridge magnets. I found this funky cardboard cut out at my local craft store and bought that. My head was brimming with ideas so I also bought medium sized wooden letters (watch this space for that project). You can't really tell but I decided to be funky with the paint color and spray painted the sign in fluorescent fire orange. A funky color for a funky magnet. This whole process was a trial and error experiment, starting with how best to attach the cardboard sign to the magnetic paper. My deco-podge is finished but I do have clear tokreen glue/paint and so decided to use that. Self adhesive magnetic sheets may have been easier to work with for this particular project. If you wanted to glue your sign straight onto a magnetic strip or sheet that didn't have a paper face then I guess you would need to use some sort of silicone as the magnet doesn't have a porous surface. Seeing as I only have tokreen and decided to use that, I glued my sign to my magnetic sheet. The tokreen paint has glue like properties and hardens the material you paint it onto, making the sign sturdier (by my logic). I think I read once that tokreen takes like 24 hours to dry but I didn't have that kind of patience so as soon as the color turned from white to clear I assumed it was dry, tested it with my finger and proceeded to the cutting stage. This is where I encountered the first of the "speed bumps". 

I cut it out with my scissors as much as I could and then I used my craft knife to do the finer cutting where my scissors couldn't reach. It was easier said than done and didn't exactly make a smooth cut all around but instead of trying to do a perfect job and going grey in the process I decided to do the best I could and then give it a second coat of paint to cover up any of the white paper that showed. Next time I'll therefore leave the painting for last. 

Here you can see some of the white paper peeking through

 Before painting the next coat I used my bamboo skewer (?) (a very long toothpick, pictured above) to add some extra tokreen to the edges of the magnet. This was just to re-stick the bits that pulled loose during the cutting process and to seal the cardboard funky fridge magnet. Once dry I gave the magnet a few more thin coats of the fluorescent fire orange spray paint. When that was dry I stuck it on my fridge and suddenly wondered why I had gone through this whole process If I could have printed it straight from my computer. Duh, the magnetic paper is designed to go through a printer. I could have just printed the word funky, or whatever else I wanted, straight onto the paper and then cut it out and paint it. Why did this only occur to me once I had finished the whole process? No matter, I had fun on this DIY fridge magnet adventure.

Jam tin luminary

I decided to to try my hand at making my own DIY style luminary. I had seen lots of tutorials all over the internet a while back but can't remember the links to them. Based on what I had previously read and could remember, and winging the rest of it, this is how I went about making my luminary...

Needed materials:

Tin can

Sand and water

A freezer

A drill with a small drill bit

Your design
Scrap paper & newspaper
Spray paint
Candle

I found a tin can hidden in the back of my 'junk' cupboard. You can see it's a little rusted. Oh well! I went into the garden and filled it with sand. I didn't try to compact it or anything. I topped it off with water and put it in the freezer. I actually then forgot it was there until late the next afternoon. 

I was feeling lazy and not in the mood to look for a nice yet simple picture so I traced the shape of this small heart onto a piece of paper. As you can see I then generally marked off with red pen where I would drill the holes. This was a little obsolete as i didn't really stick to my planned red rod pattern. I taped the paper to the tin can.

In the tutorials I remember reading most of them used a nail and hammer to hammer holes into the can to form their 'picture'. As mentioned before I was feeling lazy and not in the mood to try and keep the tin steady, hold the nail and then still hammer it; all without accidentally hammering my finger. So i used my drill. I have what i call my baby drill bit, it's a 1.8mm I think. It's meant for wood but I figured what the heck. There weren't exactly tons of holes to drill. It worked! I put the tin outside for the sun to defrost the water and turn the ground kinda sandy so that i could throw it back into my garden and get to the fun painting part.

The next day I tipped the tin over into my garden. The sand came out easily. Then I washed the tin, getting rid of any sand residue and the paper and tape. Once dry, I placed 2 pieces of scrap paper around the insides of the tin and stuffed it with newspaper. Then came the fun spray painting part. I chose red. I know it's a cliche but because I the design was a heart I went traditional with the color. I didn't prime it first but I did need to give it a few coats.

When I drilled the heart I also drilled two holes on the sides of the tin to put a piece of wire or ribbon or something through. I have not decided what that something is yet though but here is the finished (mostly) luminary during the day and then in the evening. For the evening you only need put a candle in the tin, light it and enjoy your masterpiece. To get the full effect of the light shining through the luminary the candle shouldn't be higher than tin. 
Note: When working with power tools it's important to be careful and take the necessary safety and precautionary measures. 

Etched wine glasses

As posted earlier a friend of mine recently got engaged and I wanted to make them a set of personalized wine glasses. Like their love I wanted the glasses to last and so decided to personalize them with etching cream.

I have decided to do it a little differently to the previously posted tester glass. Here is the link to the post of the tester glass http://laurasdiycrafts.blogspot.com/2013/08/glass-etching-attempt-1.html and here is the process I used this time...

Supplies needed:

Wine glasses

Letter stickers spelling out the name you want to etch

Masking tape

Etching cream

Rubber gloves

Paint brush

I decided to go simple and elegant and etch their names on the base of the glass.

Place the stickers on the base. Where you place the stickers is where the glass will remain clear and not etched. Tape off the stem of the glass where you want the etching to end. I also taped off the sides and bottom of the base.

Wearing the rubber gloves apply the etching cream liberally to the glass. Wearing rubber gloves is important as etching cream can cause severe burns, not necessarily immediately visible, if it comes in contact with your skin. Let it sit for about 15 to 30 minutes, or according to manufacturer’s instructions.

Wash the etching cream off with warm water. Remember to wear your rubber gloves for this part too. When the cream is all washed off, peel off the stickers and tape. Wash the glass in the dishwasher or with warm soapy water before using it.

Pallet heart art

I had these pallet pieces left over from another project. I had painted them in blackboard paint and then left them outside. After a few weeks I noticed that the paint was chipping off and that I quite liked the weathered look so I wanted to do something with them that would keep that character.

I had these hardware thingies lying around and thought that they would work well to attached my 3 pallet pieces together. I lay my pallets upside down (I had never painted the bottom) and proceeded to attached the thingies to the pallets. The screws pictured here were to long so I went in search of shorter ones in my tool box. Luckily I found some as I was eager to get the project underway and didn't want to go to the hardware store first.

Some of the edges were quite rough so I sanded them down. I used an 80 grit sandpaper as it was the first piece in my box of sandpaper that I grabbed. Yes I did it by hand.
I then thought that I want to give them more of a weathered look so instead of just gently wiping the sanding dust away I grabbed a hard bristled brush we have lying around in the kitchen and scrubbed them down. I wasn't gentle.
While that was then lying in the sun drying I did the prep work for the painting.

I received this heart decor as a gift and realized that the heart is the perfect size for my pallet coat rack. I traced it onto a clear piece of contact paper and the cut it out with a craft knife. If you're not that lucky to have something like this lying around then you can print something out, in mirror image. Then use a piece of carbon paper to trace the image onto the paper side of the contact paper. Then cut it out.






I placed the contact paper over the pallets. Be sure that the contact paper covers the pallet so as not to get spray paint on the edges where you don't want it. I then just taped down the sides where the contact
paper wasn't sticking to the wood all that well.
Then I went to town with the spray paint. I sprayed about 4 thin coats. Just enough to let the red color stick out but not so much as to cover the weathered 'background'.

Remove contact paper and viola.

Glass etching attempt 1

A friend of mine recently got engaged and I wanted to make them a set of personalized nice wine glasses. Like their love I wanted the glasses to last and so decided to personalize them with etching cream.
I had etching cream left over from eons ago but wasn't sure about the product. It looked lumpy. Solution: try it on a tester glass. Brilliant plan as then I can also see how the pattern would look once finished. Here is the process...

Supplies needed:
An ordinary drinking Glass
A picture or pattern that you want to edge onto the glass
Clear contact paper
Carbon paper
Craft Knife
Etching cream
Rubber gloves
Paint brush

I wanted to use to interlocking hearts and found a simple picture I liked which I printed out. Print it out in mirror image.

Turn your contact paper upside down with the paper side facing up. Place your carbon paper over the contact paper and then your printed out design over it. Trace the design. Just to make it clearer I then went over the traced carbon image with a marker, all the better to see it my dear. I also 'shaded' the areas I wanted cut out, just to avoid oopsies later when cutting it out. The areas that you cut out will be the pattern etched into the glass.

With your craft knife cut out the image. From the image you can see that I have temporarily misplaced my nice craft knife but made do with this utility type one instead.
Pull the paper backing off the contact paper. Stick the contact paper on the glass being sure to smooth out the edges. This is important. Once you see my finished product you'll notice I missed a spot and you don't want to ruin a perfectly good and fun project with flaws. Although  minor flaws just add character.
Wearing the rubber gloves apply the etching cream liberally to the glass. Wearing rubber gloves is important as etching cream can cause severe burns, not necessarily immediately visible, if it comes in contact with your skin. Let it sit for about 15 to 30 minutes, or according to manufacturers instructions.

Wash the etching cream off with warm water. Remember to wear your rubber gloves for this part too. When the cream is all washed off, peel off the contact paper, and viola. Wash the glass in the dishwasher or with warm soapy water before using it.
Here is my finished product. My ancient etching cream still works. It doesn't have an entirely smooth finish though so I think for the gift that I make for my newly engaged friends I'll invest in a new bottle of etching cream. Also you'll notice where I didn't properly smooth over the edges of the contact paper before applying the etching cream.

But now it's off to the store for etching cream I go...