Cheap Posters/Prints

These two gigantic photo prints cost me a whopping $3.00 each. If you take your photos to Staples on a jumpdrive, they can print you engineering prints. I found this tip through Pinterest here: Link The creative lady who had the tip used wood to carve out a frame for her huge photo, but I'm unsure of what I will use yet. They turned out really well especially given the price!

I also had a poster made for my classroom. I took a picture from our honeymoon and used Picasa to add words.

This is a really bad picture of the poster, but it will look great in my room!

DIY Wedding Shadowbox

My friend Emily got married in September and her mother surprised her with a gorgeous wedding shadowbox for Christmas which was  done by a professional. When I saw it, I fell madly in love with it, but knew that it was out of my price range. Even though it was worth the money ( the woman who made it meticulously hand painted each and every petal of Emily's bouquet then put it all back together), we were completely broke after our wedding, so I decided to try and make my own version. I'm thrilled with the outcome and the price ($36.00).

Time: 1 hour

Supplies:

Shadowbox (I bought mine at Hobby Lobby with a 40 % off coupon)
Dried bouquet and boutineer
Other wedding tokens
Pins
Tape

Steps:
1. When you get home from your wedding, (or have someone do this step for you) hang your flowers upside down in a dark room or closet. In hindsight, it may have been better to take it apart and hang each flower individually (but taking an hour to do this might not go over too well with your new husband...;)

2. After you get back from your honeymoon and the flowers are completely dried out, you will need to deconstruct the bouquet. You will need to do this because your bouquet is probably too fat to fit in the shadowbox.

3. Put the bouquet back together by stacking the roses. What I mean by this is, don't make your bouquet round---make it flat on the back and stacked in the front (opposite of the "Baby Got Back" song...ha) You may think the flowers will be too delicate to do this, but mine were very sturdy, and this worked perfectly.

4. Pin the bouquet to the board. Then, as you can see from the picture above, you will need to remove any unsightly petals (this is where the professional earns her pay because all the petals would be painted the exact color of your original flowers if this were done by a professional).

5. Pin or tape the rest of your items on the board. Replace frame and you are finished!

I wanted to use our original vows, so as you see, my husband did some editing to his as he went along haha. I like to think this adds charm :)

I love the rustic look that my flowers took on ; they match perfectly since we had such a lovely rustic wedding

Western Shirt turns Summer Sundress

This thrift store western shirt has turned into one of my favorite sundresses! It was super easy to make too!

Time: 30 minutes or so depending on sewing skills

Supplies:
A man's shirt (this one was a 2X) It's pretty short on me, so watch the length as well.
Sewing supplies
A dress to go by

Steps:

1. Find a dress that fits well

2. Lay the fitted dress over the big shirt and, using a fabric marker, draw the outline of your fitted dress. Be sure to give yourself about an inch for the seam

3. Cut through the front and back of shirt along the lines of the outline.

4. Turn the shirt inside-out and sew back together

5. Do something with the sleeves. I decided to quarter mine.

Just Married Umbrella

Ok, this project isn't upcycled, but it was the best 19.75 I've spent for something new in a long while  :)

We are back from our honeymoon (lots of wedding posts and pictures to come....an AMAZING day), and this umbrella is still being used simply because it makes me giddy every time I use it. First of all, we just happened to be visiting Savannah, GA and Hilton Head, SC the same time Beryl  decided to drop in. We were surprisingly blessed with mostly clear weather though...so clear in fact, that we almost didn't get to use our Just Married umbrella that I made and adore! Beryl did give a us one evening of showers however, so Aaron was a great sport and a perfect gentleman and carried our umbrella for us. We had a ball with it! Everyone on the streets would get a big smile on his or her face when they passed us, and a lot of people wanted to take pictures for us and give us their congratulations  :)

Supplies:

1 Clear Bubble Umbrella (I got mine from Amazon)

White duct tape

Directions:

Cut tape in blocks then cut in half length wise

Form letters on umbrella

I thought that the duct tape wouldn't stay very long on the umbrella, but even after multiple uses, it's still holding strong. I debated whether paint would work better since it took a while to form the letters, but I'm glad that I went with the tape since I can take it off (if I ever have the heart to) and use the umbrella for regular use.

 I got this idea from this picture on Pinterest

Self-Portrait for barn dance invitation

Option 1 

Rustic barn and wonderful sunlight 

Option 2

Flower Favors

This idea sprang from my garden marker idea. I thought it would be cute and inexpensive to make seed flags as our wedding favors.

Time: 30 minutes for 30 flags

Supplies:

Seed packets
Skewers
Hot glue

Steps:
1. Make sure all seeds have fallen to the top of the packet
2. Fold the bottom of the packet and spread hot glue down the fold

3. Put the skewer in glue, and then you are finished :)

They could also be used as "Cheering" flags and seed tosses

Hippie Skirt

This skirt would have taken anyone with even semi-good sewing skills about 30 minutes to do. Me....more like 3 hours. However, my hard work was not in vain because I adore this skirt! I started taking pictures of the process, but then gave up after I did a whole row of stitches through the front and BACK of the skirt at one point. This is to be expected because as you can tell from this blog, my sewing adventures are few and far between. I'm really wanting to take classes this summer so that I can actually learn to sew. I telling you all of this because I want to encourage those of you who are afraid of a sewing machine to give it a shot! Even an idiot-sewer like me can make this skirt!

Supplies:
 Elastic (I found mine at a thrift store for 25 cents...BAM!)
Fabric (Mine was on sale at Hancock fabrics for $2 a yard.) The original width of the fabric was a perfect fit around my bottom, and I needed about a yard for the length.

Steps:
1. Wrap elastic around your waste and cut to fit
2. Sew fabric to elastic (You will have over-hanging fabric if your waist is smaller than your hips)
3. Wrap fabric around you and pin (I was able to do alone, but I'm pretty flexible ha)
4. Pin out slit if you want one
5. Hem all sides

As you can see, I messed up with the placement of the elastic because I wanted the seam to be in line with the slit.  I had planed to put a flower or something there to cover it up. Since that didn't work out, I just wear a long shirt with it to cover the elastic.

I teach high schoolers and got TONS of compliments on my skirt Monday. Lots of girls asked me where I had gotten it, and it made my heart swell when I told them that I had made it. :) It's teenage-girl approved, so in my mind, that means something!