Do YUDU monograms???

I have really been on a roll lately, I have been trying to get my crafting groove going and so far so good....I posted earlier my Art Display Board (I have actually made two), and I have been fighting my newest crafting appliance..YUDU!! Can I just say, I love my sister and husband for thinking of me on my birthday and presenting me with such a thoughtful gift...but ummm...I abhor this machine...It has been the biggest nightmare ever and I just hope that at some point, I can figure it out!! If anyone has any tips, other than throwing it into the Gulf, please comment...I am at a loss!! Now, back to the successes...The girls are so excited about how their Halloween costumes are coming out, but as usual, they are wavering about what they want to be...let me tell you, my children will be wearing these costumes I have slaved over even if I have to dress them up and duct tape the costumes to their little puny bodies!!! Just a joke...don't call CPS on me...They do this to me every year and every year I swear that I will never make a homemade costume again. But they were so excited about what they wanted to be and I warned them, no last minute changes!!
Anyway,let me get back to the subject at hand..Here is what I tackled yesterday!!

Number 2 has been bugging me to buy her these horrible boots...I'm sorry, I know alot of you love them and think they are adorable, but I see a Fred Flinstone foot...they just are very unattractive...but while I was laying in bed at 3:00 a.m., my mind started to wander and of course it wandered to my boyfriend "Cricut"....and he called to me saying "please use me, please dust off the fuzz balls and USE ME!!" So the next morning I woke up and started brainstorming...I like to put it in writing, just little notes to inspire me...which brought me to the boots...Number two loves them so much and I have seen them with all kinds of things, Hello Kitty, Hannah Montana, plain, fuzzy(looks like dog fur), cheap, expensive and just about any color you could think of...I hated them all. So I thought, how can I make them better and I remembered when I did the Wellies..
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DING, DING, DING!!! Winner winner chicken dinner....I would monogram them!!! Everything looks better with a monogram!! Right? Right? Of course....so here they are and Number 2 has never been more excited about a pair of boots in her life and of course I got major "Mommy Points"...

let me know what you think and please follow me.. I also beg of you, if you know how to make this YUDU easier, leave a comment, or buy some scuba gear, because it will end up in the water at the bottom of the Gulf if I don't figure it out soon!!!

Fridgeless Picassos

It has truly been a week I would like to forget...#2 had some sort of funky illness that lasted 5 days and I literally have been mired down in germs and antibiotics to last a lifetime.....but there was one day of creativity!
After what seems to be an endless amount of school work coming home from the first few weeks of school, there is always the question of what to keep and what to toss. The problem I have is that I have nowhere to display these works of art.What if my kid is a Picasso, Rembrandt or Monet?? Who would discover their talent in the bottom of my Rubbermaid trash can or the dusty office box hidden in my closet? NOBODY!! Another issue is my refrigerator is stainless and as most of you probably know, there is no place to stick cute fridge magnets. What a dillema right?
So while searching my newest obsession "Pinterest", I found the solution...check out this adorable Kids Art Display at A Little of This, a Little of That...So stinking cute. I loved it and thought this is my answer.

Well off to find my supplies and this is what I came up with:

1x8 board (cut in half)
paint (unfortunately don't make the mistake and use enamel paint..it makes a disgusting gooey mess that you will be struggling with for about 2 hours.)
sandpaper(again, gooey, nasty mess when trying to weather)
clips (I used drapery hooks, because I had 6 packs that I have had for about 3 years and never used, plus, I couldn't leave #2 to go to Walmart)
Wood glue (thank goodness hubby is a contractor)
Beer tabs or Soda can tabs (umm...I'll let you guess which one's I used...hey, don't judge!!!)
Screws
Lettering (optional, but you know how I have a love affair with my Cricut)

So here is what I did:

Spray paint your board.

And here is the dreaded Enamel paint...ruh roh!! What can I say I was punch drunk from being in the house so long..

The legendary .09 clips I have had for 3 years!!

The board after being weathered with sandpaper...I also whitewashed it and used a lacquer over the top...I had to do something to make the sticky enamel look better...IT WORKED!

Space your clips...if I make another one, I think I would space them out a little more...

Glue them on with wood glue.... Add some Cricut lettering and this is what you get...
I love it, it is perfect for displaying their art work and fits in great with our decor!! Now, what I didn't take pics of was the way I added hangers....I used the tabs from (ahem) my cans and glued them on with wood glue, then added a screw on top of that and it is perfect for hanging....yay me!!!

This is probably my favorite project ever...not bad for a few hours of creativity in a sea of germs, snot and sweaty feverish hell!!

I'll get you my Pretty...mums that is!!!

OOOOhhhhh....can you feel it...Fall is coming, there is a nip in the air and it just feels like it's time to start decorating. Fall is truly my absolute favorite time of year. It just puts a spring in my step to think about cool evenings, mums, warm fires and holiday decorating. I LOVE IT!!! So, I started preparing this weekend...decorations are down from the attic, thanks to my wonderfullly resistant hubby...and my Halloween door decorations are up and ready to be accented by flowers and other ghoulish decor. Remember the thrift store canvases I puchased a few months ago...They went from this...



To this....




Well...look at them now....






I apologize for the crooked pics, apparently I am still too tired to take pictures, or I'm inadvertently drunk on coffee...either way, I'm sorry for causing anyone a stiff neck from having to turn their heads to view them!! Geez!!!

Have I mentioned how much I love these $2 gems....and of course...I adore my boyfriend...CRICUT!!! I just don't know what I did without him. If you don't own a Cricut, I think I've said this before...run, don't walk and get one!! Best invention ever...I'm not a scrapbooker, but I use it for so many things!!!

I'm off to continue decorating, hopefully I can get my mantel done this week. I may even start outside, mums, mums....bring on the mums!!!

Trash to Treasure...with a little help from SCAL

I have completed my project that I've been working on for about a week. Butterbean and I stopped by a thrift store a week or so ago and found these not so clean but lovely canvases...I especially liked the Fleur de Lis scroll on the top of them.




I asked the sales lady how much they were and she sort of made up a price of $3, then quickly added "a piece"...well, honestly I didn't really want to pay $6 for something I may or may not be able to re-purpose, so I asked her if she would go lower...she told me "NO"!!! So I begrudgingly put them back and low and behold, guess what??? Those not so clean canvases suddenly went down to $2 a piece....YAY ME!!! Anyway, I began to pay for these jewels and call it karma, bad luck or what have you...but I had no cash and the "oh so helpful" sales lady didn't know how to use the credit card machine...Oh well, it wasn't meant to be...Butterbean and I loaded up in the car dejected and somewhat annoyed that my husband was right about me maybe needing cash one day (I never carry cash, it just clutters up my purse), when I look over and see something shining at me like a great big beacon of "buy what you want" joy. I scraped together enough quarters, dimes and nickels to buy my coveted art....
Now that I had them home I sprayed them with the garden hose, because I was a little heebed out about where they may have come from. They dried and I removed the great Fleur de Lis scroll and spray painted it with my favorite crafting item...ORB. Then I painted over the somewhat hokey art work that was currently on the canvas with an acrylic paint. I let it dry and reattached the scroll....wow, I loved it.





But then I was really perplexed as to what to put on these newly re-purposed canvases. It took me about a week to decide that I wanted to monogram them. But what type of monogram would I use? I only have two Cricut cartridges and the letters on them aren't that great. While lamenting I decided that this would be a great time to bite the bullet and download SCAL (Sure Cuts Alot). Per my previous post, I had a coupon code and it was on sale at Craftedge. Boy am I glad I did...this is the result....I have never been so pleased about a purchase in my life. If you have a Cricut...you definitely need SCAL. Right now, open a new tab and buy it. It is the best investment ever.


So what do you think, this is just one, I am probably going to do the other one the same way and hang them on my doors for the summer. I love them and especially for $4.
If you have a suggestion about what to put on the other one let me know...I haven't started it yet and would live everyone's input. Happy Tuesday!!