Go Gimp
0Whatever happened to GIMP bracelets? So many things from the 90′s have come back, but not these and I do not get why not! Gimp was so rad. If you have absolutely no idea what I am talking about, let me remind you. Gimp bracelets are strips of coloured plastic that you weave together to make cool designs and turn it into a bracelet or necklace. You can use two, three or even five depending on the design that you want to make.
So I’m bringing it back!! I remember sitting in summer camp, and everyone was making gimp friendship bracelets and it was such a good time. I think I might run to Michaels right after writing this post and grab myself some! Wait… I don’t remember how to gimp?
Ok – with a little bit of research, I found some awesome sites with directions on doing different patterns! Check them out. Some are extremely easy and you could probably teach a three year old it, but then there are some that I honestly believe you need a degree in computer science or something!! Honestly, some are pretty intense but I’m always up for a good challenge.
I’m going to do all three all together in one. It’s going to be one fabulous bracelet! Let me know what you guys decide to do with your gimp! What a perfect way to add some spunk to your fashion, or friendship as well!
Make Your Own Book Ends
0This is probably the easiest do it yourself craft or idea that you have ever heard of. It’s sometimes the simplest of things that you just don’t think of.
Take book ends for a perfect example. All you really need is something heavy and big enough on both ends, right? Now, if you are an interior designer, you may frown on this idea because it is so simple, but at the same time, if you’re creative, you can spice this craft up to your liking.
Yes, I said it. Bricks.
Depending on the interior of the room you are decorating, big red bricks may look absolutely fabulous alone. However, if you want to change it up, you can white paper and wrap the bricks and if this is too plan for you, you can then place designed paper on the white paper. I do suggest wrapping the bricks with paper first because if you want to use wrapping paper and place that directly around the brick, it’ll rip. However, if you first wrap with the white paper, then the wrapping paper, you should be good!
If bricks are just too big, or too heavy for the book shelf that you are trying to make ends for, rocks are a great alternative and still easy enough! Instead of trying to wrap an odd shaped rock, you can paint it!
Once you have those sexy bricks or rocks all done and decorated, place them on your shelf and there you have it!
BADA BOOM BADA BING!
DIY Personalized Mobile
0Whoever said mobiles were just for babies was wrong because I have a fabulously feminine do it yourself craft to share with you guys today! Well I guess it doesn’t have to be feminine as you can make it whatever way you’d like! The best part? You don’t need a project manager degree to complete this craft successfully, as you do with the difficulty of some of these DIY’s you find online. Luckily for us, this DIY idea is extremely easy and inexpensive but there is one thing I must inform you of up front.
It won’t sing a lullaby for you as you fall asleep.
Shoot, eh! I was a little disappointed as well, but I’m sure we can get past it. Okay, so if its easy enough for me – anyone can do it, trust me! Here are the supplies that you will need;
- a strong circle of some sort. I used a 16″ embroidery hoop which you can get at a craft store. The size depends on how big you want your mobile to be!
- 4 thin pieces of wood (not too heavy) from any craft store. Make sure that they are strong enough for what you want to hang. Also make sure that the length matches the diameter of the circle (if not a tad bit longer)
- construction (or stock) paper – your choice of colour
- acrylic paint (to paint the wood) – your choice of colour
- Nylon thread or fishing wire!
- different size of beads – your choice of colour
- a stencil(s) of animal(s), insect(s), shape(s)
- Magazine and Pictures
- glue gun and scissors!
Sounds simple enough, right? Okay, okay… I’ll stop talking now and just get to the project! You will have to excuse my horrible drawings. I am creative and crafty…. definitely not an artist!
- First, you want to set up your hoop. Taking the 4 pieces of wood, place them across the embroidery hoop (the diameter) so it looks like a pie! Using the glue gun, glue the web in their place.
- Paint desired colour.
- Cut 3 15″ pieces of the nylon(or fishing wire) thread. Once the hoop is dry, glue one end of each piece of nylon thread to it. Be sure to place the 3 pieces evenly apart so the mobile hangs straight.
- Taking the 3 loose ends of the nylon thread, pull them up from the hoop and together in the middle and glue together.
- Taking different lengths of nylon thread, decorate with the beads you have selected.
- Now you can take different lengths of nylon and hang them off of the hoop – be sure you only glue them when you are certain that you like their position.
- Cut out magazine clippings, family photos and your stenciled items from your stock paper.
- Add magazine clippings, family pictures, and stencil cuts (from the stock paper)
- Glue everything in place when you are happy with the look!
And tada!! There you have it! Your own personalized mobile!
Personalize With Silhouettes
0Silhouettes are a great way to spruce up your dorm room, or any room for that matter, and add a touch of your 
personality and you can do it yourself! Save money and add some sparkle? Does it get any better then that?
I personally love them – but not of faces. For me, that’s just a tad creepy. I do not want to feel like I have people and faces looking at me all day, all night. No. Thank. You. I feel like a crime scene investigator would show up eventually, to investigate a dead body – which would be mine… murdered from the people on the wall. Okay, apparently my imagination is getting ahead of me again – but seriously… creepy and stalkerish? If my boyfriend put a silhouette of my face on his wall… I’d be scared. Body, I can understand – ’cause my body is BANGING! Just kidding… I can seriously understand a man wanting a female body silhouette but face… I’ll pass… and run for the hills! You have seen all those scary college movies, right?
However, if you’re into being creepy, by all means make a silhouette of someone’s face. Maybe you really love yourself and want your facial silhouette up on your wall… but you will need someone to help you. I personally suggest making sihlouettes of things you love. Of course, if you love basketball…. this probably won’t work and you might as well just cut out a circle and paste that up on your wall. Some great ideas are high heels, animals, a candle burning, guitar, a silhouette of my hair dryer….! You really have to kind of look around your room and see what items there are that have something to offer. A unique perfume bottle…. your hand….!
Okay, once you have your idea down pat, you are going to want to follow these steps.
- Get a light facing straight on whatever you want a silhouette of
- Get funky paper, wrapping paper, coloured construction paper and tape that onto a wall for tracing. (It will be moved from this place – so don’t put too much thought into this)
- Get chalk, white eyeliner or a pencil for the tracing part. I suggest chalk as it easily rubs off
- Put your object or whatever you want to trace in front of the light so the shadow is on your paper that you have taped on your wall
- Carefully trace the outside of the object onto your paper. Be sure not to move the light, object or paper as your tracing will be off
- Cut the silhouette out!
- Place on your wall
Simple, right? Using an item is much easier then tracing someones face…. just a little extra to deter you from putting faces all over your wall. If you want to get creative, you can also colour on some detailing.
Make An Extra Wall
2We all love our privacy, and it especially gets invaded when you have a sibling sharing a bedroom with you – or god forbid, a bad roommate. Been there – done that…. never again! On the bright side, I discovered amazing, innovative ways to maintain your privacy (as much as possible) and get away from the intrusive, obnoxious person that has a bed across the room from me.
Now, if you have a roommate, I am going to assume you live under someone else’s roof – whether it be your parents, your schools dorm or a rental. If you own your own place and hate your roommate, kick them out or tell them to find a different room. HAHA! I mean, it’s your house right? But the chances of you having a horrible, unwanted roommate and it being YOUR house is highly unlikely. Just admit it – you rent your room, or dorm and you really can’t do much about it, now can you? Okay, my apologies – apparently talking about roommates has erupted a bitter 
feeling within myself – go figure.
Alright, as per usual – I’m off topic. If your roommate is that bad, try to avoid him/her at all costs. If you’re taking online courses and your roommate is always there and won’t leave you alone, you can always go to the library or even MacDonalds! Yup, they have WiFi now! Of course, there are going to be times when you don’t want to leave your dorm – or you can’t – or you just want to be able to enjoy the space that you pay for. I mean, in all reality – why the heck shouldn’t you be able to be there, you know?
So… you can create a wall! No, no… not with wood, drywall and all that other stuff you need for an actual wall – but you can improvise with what you can do in your dorm room and create a way to separate yourself/your side of the room – and you don’t even need a construction management degree.
There are two ways for you to create a “wall”. The first way would be to hang a curtain. 
Now, curtains can get a bit pricey, so you can always even use a shower curtain – just make sure it isn’t see through. You can get little hooks that screw into the ceiling to hand from, but if you aren’t allowed to do this type of thing in your rental space, you can tie a strong string, such as fishing line, from one end to the other and have the shower curtain on that.
Another option is to purchase a screen, or a room divider. Of course, if you are a student, the possibilities of your budget allowing this purchase is unlikely. But hey, at least it’s an idea right?
If you’re dreadful roommate hasn’t gotten the hint yet – these options should drill it into their head a bit more that they need to back off! Sorry… again, I’ve been there – done that.
Make A Stylish, Affordable White Board (Dry Erase Board)
2I recently came across this post from one of my favourite blogs about a whiteboard. Yeah, Yeah… what’s the big deal about a White Board right? Well maybe it’s time that yoouuu read the fabulous post that I am talking about because having a white board is a super idea and great for everything!
I want to go out and get a super large white board. Heck, I want to make every wall a giant white board. Hmmm… I wonder if someone has invented that yet? I know you can get chalk board paint for your walls which is a great alternative if you want to spend the time and money painting your dorm room! All the power to you, but like me… your online college courses probably comes with a low budget that doesn’t allow you to spend very much on extras and chalk paint ain’t cheap! Plus, I want a giant white board, not a chalk board. However, when I went shopping for one, I was dumbfounded by the prices of these things! I thought maybe $5-$20 bucks. Wronnnng! Thus, I walked out of the store empty handed and determined to make my own!
After a little bit of research – I was back at the store.
But not for a white board, but to price out the materials I would need to make my own and the price is considerably lower, so that light bulb went off in my head again and I gathered up my materials and headed home to make my own white board (dry erase board). 
Okay, so what you need is a “Showerboard” which you can find at your local department store. What it is, is basically cheap plywood with a waterproof, plastic coating on one side. Yup, you guessed it… that’s your white board!
Now, of course you could go ahead and just nail this into your dorm room wall and get some dry erase markers and you’re set, but if you are eager to make it extremely cute – here are some extras that you can do!
Instead of buying a huge picture frame (not cheap!), and nailing my new white board into my walls, I decided to go back to my love for Duct tape. Not only is it strong enough to hold, but it will act as a cute frame! I used a designed duct tape that matched my room decor and went around the edges and taped that all up on my wall… and it’s fabulously amazing!
For The College Students – Wallet
0Okay, I know this isn’t the best of pictures! Is it obvious that I didn’t take an online college course on photography? That’s besides the point because despite the bad quality pictures, this is such a fabulous idea.
Of course, everyone is familiar with the Duct Tape Wallets. I mean, if you have never heard of them, you must live under a rock because they have seriously been around for years. I was just fooling around the other day and refused to look at instructions on making a wallet and decided to figure it out myself. I am very pleased with the final result! If you are a little skeptical about doing this craft without instructions, you can find them here. I do suggest just winging it and figuring it out as you go. You will feel much more accomplished!!
As you can see, I used the initials J and W. These are my boyfriends initials. He just happened to be sitting beside me and I had a blast of love for him and figured his initials would be the easiest to cut out. Then after I was finished, I thought this would be an absolutely fabulous idea for fraternities and sororities. Of course, if this was to be a frat boy duct tape wallet, I’m sure the colour choice would be a bit different but how cute would it be to have everyone, specifically sorority girls, make their own matching Sorority wallets with their Greek Letters. It’s a great idea and activity to do together as a group and of course, if you aren’t in a sorority, you can always just create one with your initials, or no initials at all!
In my previous post, I was explaining my disgust for Duct Tape made things when there was only grey duct tape. Now there is a whole variety of colours and designs and I thoroughly love everything you can make with just a roll of tape. Plus, it is super inexpensive! What’s better then buying a $5 roll of tape, specific to your liking, and creating something to be personalized just for you. I’m pretty sure it would cost a lot more then 5 bucks if you were to buy a personally designed wallet.
And hey, if you find out that duct tape wallets simply aren’t your forte… you can use the rest of the tape roll on a million gazillion other things!
Update Your Furniture!
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As you guys know, I love finding creative ways to update my things… and well, I obviously love my Duct Tape! I recently bought a zebra print bed set and pillows and decided that my room definitely looked “off” with nothing else matching. I wanted to have other things that are zebra print to bring my room all together. I don’t have the funds, nor do I want to spend money on buying brand new furniture just to match my new bed set and let’s be honest, I could come up with a new idea and want to completely change my room again, next week!
A lot of my furniture is old and used. I surely don’t have a flat screen plasma tv to say the least, so the thought of taping my stuff with Duct tape wasn’t that big of a concern. I swear, all my furniture is from the 60′s and in dieing need of some revamping anyway! However, if you are a student, stuck in a tiny dorm and were lucky enough to have your parents buy you all brand new stuff from Ikea, you should probably rethink the duct taping idea and skip to another post of mine. Your parents might kill you if you Duct tape all the new stuff they just got for you – or they might even kill me for that matter for giving you this idea! Although…. my ideas are pretty awesome though! Maybe I should teach some online college courses about my fabulously creative ways. I don’t mean to toot my own horn or anything – just being honest. 
For now, my blog courses for you will do justice!
Okay, off topic again – surprise, surprise! What I did was the simplest of crafts and furniture upholstery possible! I went and got my Zebra print Duct tape and starting taping my book cases, end tables, computer desk and even my tv! I made sure not to go over board, because I want my room to be chic with a hint of the exotic jungle. I didn’t want it to be tacky and living in the jungle. Trust me, there’s a big difference! Be sure to leave some things the way they were. Some things are just meant not to be touched!
Hey! At least my doggie loves my new bed sheets.
All in sync now…. ‘awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww’
Who Is This For?
1As I stated in my previous post, this blog is for anyone. Honestly – everyone! I mean, who seriously has never done something themselves and went out about bought something or paid for someone to fix it. So like I said, this blog is really, truly for anyone.
I will do DIY crafts for students on a budget because their online college courses take up all their money. Ha! Kidding! It’s worth it kids – trust me. Seriously, though…. I’ll also do posts for the dummy that hit the drive-thru window at MacDonalds and needs to fix his side mirror. Posts to design your room, style, accessories etc. Arts, Crafts, Necessities, Fixes, Fun… everything you could ever imagine. So, I mean – you might as well just subscribe to my blog now, right? Save yourself some time ’cause you know you’ll be addicted and subscribing later.
Okay, a little bit about me – if I haven’t already scared you off. I do look like this cartoon, seriously! I kidd you, not!
I strictly do blogging for a living. I may not make a computer engineer salary or even a teacher’s salary for that matter, but why does it matter. Why should I go to school and learn about becoming a teacher when I already love what I do and teach to all of you! Wow! That rhymes. Did you noticed? Okay, but on a serious note, I am obviously not the type of teacher that I need a degree for. I strictly just sputter things out onto this web page that are in my head. Do you think I need online college courses for that? Maybe! I’m sure there are some out there. Now, as I said, I love what I do. If I was passionate about children – I would go get an early childhood education degree, or whatever it was that I was passionate about. So for the people reading this, I encourage you to go to school! I am most definitely not trying to deter you from that. Just only do so after you have become addicted to my blog so you can tell all your friends! Aside from that… there’s not much more to know about me. I enjoy writing and crafting and I combined the two and VOILA! Here we are. I love all things pretty and pretty is what we shall make this world. Oh, and I’m funny. Have you noticed?
Alright, if you haven’t already noticed, I am extremely random, which I think only benefits me with my new found love of DIY crafts. Makes sense right? I am creative and fun and am excited to share all these crafts, do it yourselfs, and fixes with you.
I will see you all soon. I better! You better be back!
DUCT TAPE LOVERS!
1
My first post is going to be about the wonderful Duct Tape that I love, oh so much! It really only makes sense to do my first “Do It Yourself” post on the absolute essential to most projects. Of course, you didn’t have to attend the top engineering schools to learn how to fix something with Duct Tape, but that is where you are wrong about what this blog is about! Anyone can slab a piece of duct tape on their car to hold it together (ooh so tacky – please don’t) but I am going to focus on the creation of things as opposed to the fixing of things and as I said, duct tape is an essential
I was so against people that made Duct Tape Wallets and Duct Tape clothing and cell phones cases, but now with all the unique and cute designs and colours you can get – I have jumped on the Duck Tape Bandwagon. Oh yeah, I said it! I thought the day would never come.
For example, this very exact desk that I am sitting at writing to you, squeaks and cracks with every movement I make, and the past week or two, I have been on a total temptation to just Duct Tape the heck out of it, using the Leopard Print design. Ha! I know, it sounds silly but this desk is seriously ugly and is about to bust out screws and bolts. Why not make it sturdy and visually appealing, right?
Of course, if I decide to do that (it has been two weeks of just thinking about it) then I will do a huge post on it, and if it was a complete disaster or not – probably. It sounded good in my head, but now that it came out into the real world, it sounds ferociously tacky.
I will stop blabbing now! This is the ultimate blog for all those Do It Yourself crafts, ideas and fixes that you will ever need or desire to do! Whether you are a student taking online college classes and need to fix your desk (sounds familiar), or if you are a elderly driver who recently side swiped your mirror right off…. I will cover it all, but of course – not before I post about my oddly disturbing new obsession of Duct Tape.
Weird… please don’t leave now! I swear, I am sane… kind of?