Holiday DIY: Metallic Leaf and Wine Cork Wreath

I've been collecting wine corks for a couple of years now and have amassed quite a collection just sitting there waiting for a project. So, after seeing the photo below from the Soho Grand that Emily of Cupcakes and Cashmere recently bloged about (thanks for sharing!), I decided it was time to make my own festive cork wreath.

I loved the metallic painted corks but I wanted my own twist.  I turned to my craft supplies and came upon a pack of gold Dresden leaves that I had purchased years ago at Tinsel Trading in NYC. (LOVE that shop!) If I learned anything from crafting, it's that you never know when you'll use a supply so if you truly love something, buy it!

What do you think? I love how it turned out, now if I can only decide where to hang it!

Here's a little step-by-step in case you'd like to make your own!


Step 1: Gather your supplies: recycled wine corks (you could always fill in with store bought corks from the craft store), hot glue gun, glue sticks, flat wood wreath form, gold Dresden leaves.

Step 1: Begin to hot glue each cork to your wreath form. I decided to use a flat wooden wreath form (found at Michaels) instead of Styrofoam. I find the flat shape works better with the rounded corks.  

Step 2: Continue to glue corks until the wreath is covered. If you have gaps, don't worry, you'll cover them up next! 

Step 3: After your first layer is finished, fill in any large gaps with more cork. You could do an entire second layer or just fill in as I have here. Fun tip...to personalize my wreath, most of the corks on the top layer are from local Long Island wines--they are my favorite. 

Step 4: Add embellishments. I loved the idea of using these gold leaves to embellish, but you could use anything really...faux grapes, painted leaves, or just leave your wreath as is. It is up to you!



Step 5: Hang. To hang, you can use a ribbon or attach a picture hanging clasp on the back.

Hope you enjoyed this little project. What are you crafting today?

Show Me Your Jewels!

I love jewelry. I love wearing it and I love displaying it even more! I was recently introduced to the From Me, To You photography blog on Tumblr and was instantly smitten with this photo.

Not only is the jewelry collection awesome, but so is the carved metal tray its resting upon. I use a small wall mirror at home as a tray for my jewelry but this photo has me thinking of creating a more dynamic display.

Here are a few ideas....

I created this look while working at Quick & Simple. We were very inspired by a Blueprint story that talked about using pretty bowls to organize your jewelry inside a drawer. It is like a little surprise just for you each time you open your drawer. TIP: Line your drawer in pretty paper and use candle wax to affix the bowls to the drawer to they don't move around. 

I really liked this pretty idea from Martha Stewart Living. They used a flea-market frame to create a hanging display. Here, they cut a piece of Homasote, covered it in luxurious velvet and placed it inside the frame. Pin hooks are used to hang the jewelry. Stunning!

Finally, this photo from Declare Magazine also caught my eye...a gaggle of beaded necklaces hanging well, on a hanger. Very clever and definitely an eye-catching display!

So how about you? What creative ways do you display your jewelry?

Project: Spring Napkins

Easter is a week away and I'll be hosting my hubby's family. I've been preparing a bit, decorating here and there but felt I was missing something. Then today I found these sweet DIY Spring Napkins over on The Purl Bee.

It seems that if you can sew, you can make these napkins. I have so many scraps of fabric and lots of ric rac ribbon...I am so tempted to give this project a try!

And if I do, you can be sure the photos will be here :)

Then, I of course went on a little hunt for napkin rings to go with them...aren't these from Crate and Barrel just a perfect match:

They remind me of a project we did at one of the magazines I worked at. My amazingly creative pal simply popped the heads off of faux flowers similar to these and glue them onto wide pieces of sturdy grosgrain ribbon. A simple project and more cost effective too...although at $2.95 each these from Crate and Barrel are a steal.

I love decorating tables, its one of my favorite things to do. How about you...how are you decorating for Easter?

Bedroom Makeover, Part I: A Grey Romance

We've decided to repaint our bedroom. I'd like it to have a more modern, romantic vibe with a little drama. Kinda like me :)

I fell in love with and scooped up these pillows (in black) from HomeGoods, which are now serving as the inspiration for the entire new look of the bedroom.

They're the Popple ZigZag pillows from Thro., LTD. It's hard to see but trust me they are shiny, luxurious and gorgeous with a silk back. They're over on Overstock.com right now for a good price if you're interested.

I loved they are in grey, purple, black, silver--all of my favorite colors. Right now the browns, peanut butter and robin's egg blue we have in the bedroom just isn't doing it for me.

So we spent our morning pouring over grey paint samples and have narrowed it down. Right now, my choice is Manhattan Mist from Behr. A blue-toned grey that will cool things up and still embrace warmth. Sounds, nice, right?

We'll be priming and painting over the next few days so I'll be sure to take photos and post the before and afters. For now, it's on to shopping for bedding!

Halloween Tips and Tricks

Halloween is just a few weeks away! I know I'm excited, how about you?

I wanted to share some of the new Halloween articles I recently produced, including the "True Blood" Party for Celebrations.com.

And have you checked out AOL Home's newest site: Holidash.com yet? I was proud to contribute this DIY Haunted House story. My friend is one of the editors and she is doing a great job!

Oh, I also recently put together this small, sparkly display in my home. What do you think?

I propped up two glittery skulls from the dollar store on a pair of purple zebra-print candle holders I already owned. I added faux plastic skeleton hands that I also found at the dollar store. To finish, I covered my lampshade with faux spiderweb and a plastic spider or two. Kinda fun I think.

Don't get me wrong, I love to decorate but when you're busy writing about it all day long, sometimes it's nice to find cheap, quick and easy ideas for your own home!

What do you think?

Glitter Crafts

Sunday afternoon was all about crafting outside in the beautiful fall-like weather. Inspired by my recent Wendy Addison / Tinsel Trading post, I decided to play with glitter!

First up...glittered letters. I have a set of chipboard letters leftover from an old project. I'm not a fan of the leafy green print as you can see in this "before" shot.

I decided to see what would happen if I decked a letter out in Martha Stewart's gold glitter. I love how it turned out!

I used Design Master Spray Adhesive Glue for Glitter, an aerosol spray that I find to be easy to work with. First, I gave the letter a light coat of the glue and then covered it in the glitter.

Tip: To prevent a huge mess, be sure to wear rubber gloves and work in an empty cardboard box.

I let it dry for about 10 minutes, shook off any excess and then applied a second coat of glue and glitter to fill in any missed spots. After drying another 10 minutes, I gave it a final spray of glitter glue, just to seal it, which worked great. Just be sure to let these types of projects sit for a few hours to really settle.

My plan is to spell out the word "LOVE" and glue magnets onto the back of each so I can display them on my fridge.

Next up, peat pots. I picked up a set of 20 pots for $.79 at Michael's recently. A good friend of mine used these to create the cutest little Halloween treat holders a few years back and I've wanted to try it myself ever since.

Following the same steps as the glittered letter, I covered the pots in the glue and then the gold glitter (and one in copper-colored glass glitter). Here they all are drying together in the sun. See how they glisten!

I want to use the pots as decoration for my Thanksgiving table, maybe fill each with a bit of tissue paper and a few Hershey Kisses. I know, I'm way ahead of myself but the holidays will be here soon!

Next up, I want to glue a variety of these Dresden Thanksgiving die cuts to the center of each. Then, I'm on the hunt for a unique way to make a handle for these little pots. I've seen it done with pipe cleaners, but I'd rather give mine a more grown up handle. Any ideas??

I'll post more pics as I finish up these projects. See how a little quiet, creative playtime can yield exciting new projects?

DIY: Paper Butterfly Napkin Rings

I recently found a pretty bohemian-inspired butterfly-patterned paper at the craft store and decided to transform it into napkin rings. How can you beat spending 40 cents on a sheet of paper that will yield about 8-10 napkin rings?

Aren't these super-cute? It might be hard to tell but the butterfly on top is a pop-up, it looks like it's floating. So fun! Want to learn how to make them? Here's a simple step-by-step guide for you:Here's what you'll need:

• One 12 x 12 sheet of patterned scrapbook paper. (Mine is Winsome 12 x 12 Ambrosia by Basic Grey)
• pinking shears
• small paper scissors
• mini glue dots
• scraps of white cardstock

Step 1:Use pinking shears follow the paper's pattern and cut several 12"L strips of paper. To figure out the width, follow the width of your pattern, mine was about 1"W.Step 2: Each strip can be cut in half, to about 6", that should be long enough to wrap around any rolled napkin. Set them aside.Step 3: Reserve a strip for your "floating butterflies" and use the small paper scissors to cut a bunch out.Step 4: Measure and cut a strip of white cardstock about 3/8"W x 1 3/4"L. Fold the paper accordian style (see below).

Step 5: Add a mini-glue dot to the back of your cut-out butterfly shape and place it on top of one end of the folded paper.Step 6: Use another mini-glue dot to attach the other end of your accordian-folded paper to the center of your napkin ring strip.Step 7: Roll the napkin ring around a rolled napkin and use another mini-glue dot to seal the ends.That's it! Simple, right? Have fun and send me a photo if you make them!

DIY: From Junk to Gems

A bit of shameless self promotion here, but I'm excited that my latest column for LI Pulse Magazine is out! For August, it was all about cool DIY projects made from, well junk!

Photo via lipulse.com

One of the talented staffers at the magazine, scoured junk yards and other surprising sources for cool stuff that she re-invented into functional home accessories. Check out the bookends she made, above, using old license plates! To find out how to make them and other projects, click here.

Speaking of junk, it is flea market/yard sale/antique show season! End-of-summer and fall are perfect times to get out there for the best tag sale goodies. Sometimes, it's great to just find a cool antique that just needs a little cleaning but when you're on the hunt this year...keep your eye out for less-than-perfect objects or "misfits" no one else seems to be buying. Put your thinking caps...you may be able to re-purpose it into a fab new project!

To help you locate a tag or yard sale where you live, check out this cool new site called yardsaletreasuremap.com. I read about over at Daily Candy today. Just plug in your address and it will give you the locations of yard sales in your area! Brilliant!

Happy Junking!

Monogram Chic

Photo via impressrubberstamps.com

When crafting, I love using initials, especially when making gift wrapping or gift tags. I usually dress-up plain paper gift bags using fun letter stickers or rubber stamps.

That's why I flipped for this cute monogram card idea from Impress Rubber Stamps. They used a script initial stamp inside a flourishy-frame to dress up a plain notecard that had been stamped with a very cool woodgrain pattern.

I really loved how this card turned out, so chic! I may have to add the Script Initials Rubber Stamp set from Impress Rubber Stamps Set to my collection. It is pricey at $75, BUT you get 26 stamps, that normally cost $5 each.

How about you? Do you like to rubber stamp? How do you dress up plain cards and tags?