Valentine’s Eraser Jewelry

When we saw these cute Valentine’s Day erasers at Target, we knew just what to do with them! They are perfect for fun and functional jewelry! And the craft is super easy too, and super inexpensive.  Basically, here’s all you need:

Supplies:

1. Cute erasers.

2.  Crafter’s Pick Glue, The Ultimate (or other strong child-safe glue)

3. Findings (Ring blanks, pin backs, eye pins, jump ring)

4. Wire clippers for cutting eye pins (scissors often work well too.)

5. Ribbon for necklace.

Directions for rings and pins:

1. Lay erasers on a flat surface.

2. Add a large dot of glue to the back of each one.

3. Pin back or ring blank on dot of glue.

4. Allow several hours to dry.

Directions for necklaces: 

1. Cut an eyepin so that about 1/4 inch of wire extends from loop.

2. Poke into top of eraser.

3. Add a tiny dot of glue at the top if desired.

4. Add a jump ring through the eye pin.

5. String ribbon through jump ring.

See the finished products below! We feel sure you could do this same project with hot glue, but it tends to pull off of surfaces, so we don’t know how durable they would be.

 

 

 

 

This post is also linked to Toys in the Dryer, but their icon kept popping up on top of my photos every time I tried to upload it!  So to see more Valentine’s crafts, visit them at http://www.toysinthedryer.com/.

Felt Bracelets

 

Materials:

1. Felt. (We used felt placemats that we found at Dollar General for $1.00 because it was heavy and stiff enough for bracelets.)

2. Embroidery Floss. (A great source of this is yard sales! You can pick it up for almost nothing because a lot of people start projects they never finish!)

3. Needle

4. Scissors

5. Beads, Sequins, Buttons, felt cut outs

6. Fabric Glue

7. Velcro

Directions

1. Cut a strip of felt the right length to go around your wrist.

2. Add felt shapes with glue, or use embroidery floss to stitch on beads, sequins, or a pattern.

3. Add velcro using fabric glue.

Ta-da!

 

Happy Monster Pins

We started making monster pins using a recycled pin method we found in Recycled Crafts. But this method was a bit complicated for kids. So we ended up trying a few other things. Here are the directions for the much easier to make Glamourous Monster pins above.

 

Materials

Used button pins

Polly Pocket Shoes

Wiggle Eyes

Fake Fur

Hot Glue

Large Sequins

Trim (lace, sequins, ribbon, shapes)

Rubber cording (you can use rubber necklace cord. We cut up broken headphone cords for the legs above.)

Felt

Directions

1. Cut a square of fake fur.

2. Glue to button pin.

3. Cut a crescent from the bottom of a large sequin.

4. Glue to pin as monster’s mouth.

5. Glue on wiggly eye.

6. Cut rubber cording for legs.

7. Add dot of glue to bottom of cording and stick into small shoe. Repeat.

8. Glue legs to back side bottom edge of fake fur.

9. Cut a small piece of felt and place it over glue and legs to secure.

10. Glue on trim like ribbon for decoration.

Tip: If you run out of button pins, you can use a piece of stiff felt for back and glue on pinback.

 

Other ways to make Monster Pins:

These Pins were made by covering large recycled button pins with Modge Podge, placing fabric over button, then coating with Modge Podge again. Details were glued on when Modge Podge was drying. Hot Glue had to be used to secure buttons with heavy felt (like Cookie Monster). These were harder to make, but we still had fun making them.

This monster was made using the modge podge method.This pin was made by coiling a pipe cleaner and gluing it to a button pin.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


<a href="http://tipjunkie.com/" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.tipjunkie.com/images/TipMeTuesdayButton1.png" alt="Tip Junkie handmade projects" border="0"/></a>

Scrabble Rings

These rings are super easy to make with a few simple supplies!

Supplies Needed:

Ring Blanks (We ordered ours from e-bay.)

Scrabble Tiles (We picked up a game at a yard sale for a dollar.)

Ecoglue (Readily available online or at Wal-mart.)

Sharpies

Clear Fingernail Polish                        

Directions:

1. Make a design on a scrabble tile with a sharpie.

2. After a few minutes, coat the design with clear nail polish. (Clear with glitter also works!)

3. Allow polish to dry. Add a second coat if needed or if you’d like the surface shinier.

4. Lay tile on flat surface with decorated side down. 

5. Add a dab of ecoglue and apply ring blank. 

(We use ecoglue because it is strong and water-based.  Because these rings are made from wood products with water-based glue, you should take them off before washing your hands!)

Hippie Vest

I decided to be a hippie for Halloween this year but I couldn’t find a vest with fringe.  My mom and I made this one out of a fleece throw.  They were two for six dollars and there was enough fabric in one to make two vests.  Now we have an extra throw to play around with too.

Materials:

Fleece fabric

Iron on transfers

Needle and thread

Scissors

 

Directions

1. Fold fleece in half and lay on flat surface.

2. Lay a vest that fits you (or a tee-shirt with the arms tucked in) on top of the fleece with shoulders at the fold of the vest.

3. Trace around neck arms and sides of garment with a piece of chalk. We did not trace around the bottom because we wanted to leave it long for fringe.

4. Cut out neck of garment.

5. Cut out sleeves and down the sides.  Do not cut shoulders.

6. Cut a straight line down front of garment, leaving the back uncut.

7. Stitch from bottom of armhole to where you would like the fringe to begin on both sides.

7. Lay fabric on flat surface with front and back aligned.

8. Cut strips through both layers of fabric from bottom to where you would like the fringe to stop.

9. Create a V neckline in front by alligning front panels and cutting diagonally through both layers from top of neck downward.

10. If desired, apply iron-on transfers to the back.

11. Decorate front with pins!

 

 

back view

                                   

Eight-legged Hat

This bear's big head made him the perfect model for our creepy hat!

 

Materials:

 

1. 8 wiggly eyes.
2. Felt.
3. Fabric Glue.
4. Black knit cap. (We found this one at Target for a buck fifty!)
5. Scissors.

 

Directions:

 

1. Using fabric glue, secure wiggly eyes to black cap.
2. Cut eight legs from felt.
3. Glue legs around the edge of cap, as pictured below.
4. Add black widow detail in red felt to back of hat if desired.

Place legs on hat as pictured with a dot of glue on the bottom of each one. This way they will flop over and bounce when you walk instead of just hanging.

 

Add a red hour glass on back, if desired. Hmm... this one might be a tad big....

Duct Tape Belt!

C goes to a school where there is a uniform policy, but the students can wear any kind of belt they want.  This gave us the idea to make a belt out of duct tape.  C loves it and it looks cool as part of a uniform!

A

Note: Duct tape comes in all kinds of cool patterns these days.  We chose one with a tie-dye design. 

A

Materials:

1. duct tape 
2. old belt buckle
3. piece of satin ribbon (1 ½” worked well.)
4. scissors

 

Directions:

1. Measure waist and cut a piece of duct tape that is about a 15” longer than waist.
2. Place tape on flat surface with sticky side up.
3. Cut a piece of ribbon the same length as tape.
4. Place ribbon right in the center of the tape.  (It is helpful to have one person hold down one end of the tape and the ribbon while the other person carefully places the ribbon in a straight line down the tape.
5. Carefully fold edges of tape over ribbon.  Fold one edge at a time. If you use 1 ½ inch ribbon the tape should meet in the center of the ribbon.  The end result will be a thick tape strip with the ribbon encased inside.
6. Slide belt buckles over one end of the tape strip. 
7. Fold tape down over buckles.
8. Cut second piece of tape about 3 inches long.
9. Wrap around the end of the folded tape strip to secure the buckle.
10. Try on belt.
11. If it is too long, trim off excess.

 

Look in the mirror.  You look pretty cool, right?