Button Wine Charms

I had a grown-up party this past weekend. Had food, wine and games, even. Well, since most of my guests are wine drinkers, I knew I needed a way for them to easily ascertain whose glass was whose.

Enter wine charms.

I knew I didn't want to spend a fortune on these little baubles, but I wanted them to be fun and somewhat whimsical.

From Pinterest I'd seen some ideas using hoop earrings as "templates" – so I decided to buy some of those (Michaels) and then use something I had already at the house...I had leftover buttons from my homemade burlap wreath project, so I just used those.

They were quick and simple to make, and I had no idea how big of a deal it would be for my guests to choose WHICH button wine charm they wanted for their glasses...who knew it'd be a little game in and of itself?

Fun, cheap and easy wine charms – I guess I need to have people over again just so we can break them out for another go-round :)

Rustic DIY Flower Vases

After completing my DIY burlap wreath I had a lot of leftover burlap, twine and white pillow case fabric. What to do with it all?

On Pinterest I'd seen some really cute centerpiece ideas – most notably, those using soup cans for vases. I'd already cleaned up and been using three such cans on my table for flowers, but they seemed a bit plain (I'd done nothing with the soup cans).

I'd originally thought to tie raffia around them, but then they still seemed a touch boring.

Well, since I had this leftover burlap and pillow case fabric, why not add that to my little soup can vases? So I did – and I'm quite pleased with the results!

For the first soup can, I covered it entirely with the burlap, but for the remaining two I trimmed the burlap to fit in the center of two of the soup cans. I like both methods but I think I like the vases where I can still see the soup can.

After attaching the burlap with the glue gun I cut some of the pillow case fabric to apply in the middle for some contrast. Then it was time to tie on some twine to complete the look.

And there you have it – cute little DIY rustic flower vases for a fun centerpiece.

DIY Burlap Wreath

I've never been a "wreath" person. That is to say, if it's not the Christmas season, I don't have any wreaths hanging in my house. Until now.

On one of my favorite dog-walk routes, I pass by the cutest little brick house. I can tell someone new moved in recently, because the décor has improved and there's always a wreath hanging on the front door. It recently changed from a Christmas-y reddish wreath to a gold-ish, spring-looking wreath.

The idea occurred to me: just because it's not Christmas didn't mean I couldn't hang a wreath on OUR front door...but what kind? So I started looking up ideas online – and figured I'd make my own wreath. For some reason or other I've decided I'm in love with burlap, so I went to Michaels and bought all the requisite materials for my first-ever DIY burlap wreath:

• grapevine wreath
• burlap
• super glue
• buttons
• twine
• wooden letter

I knew I wanted to make my own flowers to put on the wreath, and that if I only used burlap the color scheme would be a tad bland. So I headed over to the neighbors' house to ask if Jane had any leftover white fabric...lo and behold, she did – she'd just finished up her own project and had two leftover white pillow cases, which she gave to me.

Upon learning that I didn't have a glue gun of my own, she loaned me hers...which proved invaluable in the making of my burlap wreath. While I had started out using super glue to make my burlap flowers, the glue gun was easier*.

The pillow case fabric went perfectly with the burlap – a tad rustic, a tad rough and white to break up the brown color palette. I didn't end up using all the flowers I made, but settled on one flower pattern for the wreath: the oh-so-easy-to-make rosette. Most of the flowers are plain, but for a few I added button centers to shake it up a bit.

After I spent a couple nights making all the flowers, it was time to start figuring out just how I wanted the burlap "covering" to look on my grapevine wreath. I played around with wrapping the burlap for about two minutes before settling on how it should lay. I didn't even glue it in place; just wrapped it around and then tucked the ends into the grapevine wreath. 

Then it was time to arrange all the burlap and fabric flowers. I laid them all out, positioned them, re-positioned them a few times and then glued them down to the burlap with the hot glue gun.

At this point, all that was left was to add the curlicue letter "D" (for Danks :) with some twine. Voilà! A homemade burlap wreath for any season.

The only thing I didn't consider when making this wreath was the tendency of the grapevine wreath to hang a certain way...as you can see, I didn't work with shape of the wreath; the way I positioned the burlap and flowers the wreath has a tendency to want to hang along the pre-existing "oval."

I originally wanted the flowers to lie along the left-hand side of the wreath, but the way it wants to hang they have to lie along the underside for weight distribution.

Oh well, next time. Consider that my "humility bead" aspect of my first DIY burlap wreath!

It was a fun project that led to more...after finishing my homemade wreath I had the "bug" and wanted to make more burlap stuff. With the leftover burlap and pillow case fabric I ended up making some cute, rustic DIY flower vases. And covering a cheap, store-bought candle. And wondering how hard it would be to make burlap curtains...

But that's for another day :)




*Note: I'd never used a glue gun before. I had read a lot of other DIY'er accounts of how you burn your fingers while using this tool...after a few minutes of using it I thought, "what's the big deal?" And then 45 minutes later, when that sucker was SUPER-hot, I got it. I think the most painful was when I got a big ol' dab of molten lava-hot glue on my fingernail. YOUCH.

DIY Green Onions

Oh, how I love my Pinterest. Okay, so technically I don't love Pinterest; I love the people ON it who find and Pin the most fun things ever. Sure, the fun things are out there on the "www" for anyone to find, but since these cool people have Pinned these neat ideas on Pinterest and I found them there, to Pinterest – well, its loyal users, technically – the credit goes.

Here's another Pinterest-inspired idea that I've come to know and love for no other reason than I'm a lover of Pinterest: regrowing green onions.

It seems like a no-brainer to reuse scallions you buy at the grocery store, but if not for my love of Pinterest I'd not have seen the post about regrowing green onions on your window sill from Homemade Serenity.

After seeing that, the next time I made tacos and needed green onions (I love, LOVE green onions on my tacos), I carefully saved the last inch or so of the root area of my scallion bunch and threw them into glass shot glasses on the west-facing window sill...lo and behold, I could literally see the new growth of my green onions the next day!


'Twas brillig. I was hooked...of course, there are a few caveats when re-purposing your green onion roots, such as:

1. Don't put too much water in the glass; you want enough to cover the roots but not the green part (if any resides) of the scallions.
2. Change the water and wash the "slime" off the green onion roots every 2-3 days.
3. Even if you're not in need of green onions that day, clip the ends if they're getting "old"  – this will allow for new, fresh growth.
4. Be sure to put your scallion roots in a sunny window – sun is essential!

Of course, if you were so inclined, you could just grow your own green onions – from seed or plant – in pots with soil, but this way if you're not a winter plant keeper (as I'm not) then you don't have to worry about keeping the potted scallions alive in winter :)

Happy DIY growing...and Pinning!


PS: Here are the same green onions 2 weeks later: 




As you can see, they grow quite quickly. I took these images right before I washed the scallions' roots and gave them fresh water – which, again, has to be done every few days.

Re-growing green onions you purchase at the grocery store is easy, economical and also adds a splash of color to your home.




All you need is a bunch of green onions, a glass and a sunny window sill to have your own, private "garden" that will continue yielding fresh scallions as long as you keep pruning them.









*Photography by Sarah B. Danks*

Lazy Susan as Spice Organizer in Small Kitchen Cabinet

Lately I've been on a kick to ensure everything in the house is organized. Everything sitting out is in its place; I've purged storage areas and re-organized everything in them; I've even cleaned closets and hung my clothes by color.

It was only a matter of time before I started on the kitchen cabinets. I've never really cared what the insides of cabinets looked like; after all, I'm really the only one who ever sees them. Well, enter Pinterest and all the cool people on it and their great ideas for organizing everything.

While originally the idea came from Martha Stewart, I ran across it as a Pin from this Pinner. It's not a big deal, but I thought it was a pretty neat idea – and easy to implement, too: using a lazy susan in a cabinet to organize spices. I don't have a lot of counter space – or cabinet space, for that matter – so having a cute spice rack sitting out on the counter was out of the question.

All my spices reside in one small cabinet and unless they were often-used (ergo in the front and easily reachable), they were hard to get to or see. This organizational tactic was the perfect solution for me – especially since I don't have a lot of space to work with:

And, the only things I needed to fulfill this little Pinterest project were a lazy susan (I got mine for a great price at The Container Store) and time. Oh, and the will to clean out that cabinet :)

It wasn't horrendous, but it wasn't great, either. Frankly, I'd really like to be able to fit two lazy susans in there, but it just won't happen. It's still not perfect, but it's a lot better organized than it was!

Now all I have to do is organize all the rest of the cabinets...




*Photos by Sarah B. Danks*

Shag Pillow Hack

{By Christine}

I found this great shag pillow on Pinterest. Ahhh Pinterest. So many creative ideas, so little time to make them, because I have spent all of my time pinning.

I did manage to get to this project at least. That’s something, right?

The tutorial is from one of my favorite blogs, V and Co. Vanessa has great ideas!

What I especially liked about this project was that I didn’t have to buy any fabric! Instead of purchasing cotton and jersey as Vanessa did, I used old t-shirts, the ones my girls have outgrown or that have little holes in them, for the shag, and an old pillowcase for the body of the pillow.

One t-shirt is not enough fabric to cover this entire pillow with shag. I ended up using four, all in different shades of pink. Pinkish? I like the pillow even more with several colors. An added bonus!

Begin by cutting the tops and side seams off of the t-shirts.

Then cut 11/2 inch x 4 inch strips from the t-shirt fabric.

From the pillowcase cut through both layers of fabric to get two 11x15 inch rectangles. 

Mark guidelines every ¾ inch on one of the pillow rectangles.

Following guidelines, begin to sew t-shirt strips onto top layer only of pillow. Be sure to leave ¼ inch at the top and bottom of each row to allow space for the seam of your pillow!

 Because I was using four different colors, I had to determine ahead of time how many strips of each color I was going to add per row. My math was not very good. I ran out of one color and had too much of another. Oh well. I’m the only one who would notice. Hopefully if you decide to make this pillow and use several colors you will have better luck with your math.

Continue to add t-shirt strips until you have each row filled, about 15 strips per row.

As you add the strips, bunch them, roll them, and twist them, to give your shag pillow a less uniformed, shaggier look. This will be good!

Once all of the t-shirt strips are sewn onto the pillow top, pin the top, shaggy layer, to the bottom layer of the pillow, right sides facing.

Sew around the pillow leaving a 5 inch opening on one side. Be careful that you do not sew any of the strips into the seam of the pillow.

Turn the pillow right side out and stuff with fluff. I just like to say stuff with fluff.

Hand stitch the pillow closed.

Voila! A fabulous, fun shag pillow! 

A shag pillow that was confiscated by my youngest daughter!

That, my friends is my first Pintrest hack! It shall not be the last! (maniacal  laugh, maniacal laugh!) Sorry! I got a little caught up in craziness of actually completing a craft I pinned on Pinterest.

~ Christine


*All photography – minus V& Co image – by Christine Van Tassel*

Bookshelf Organization Inspired by Pinterest

Hi, my name is Sarah and I'm obsessed with Pinterest. (<chorus> Hi, Sarah!)

I've seen some super-cool ideas on Pinterest and I want to replicate them in my own home (a cool corner hutch unit, picture frame collage ideas and framing a bathroom mirror, to name just a few), but I have to say I'd already done the bookshelf organization thing.



That's right. BEFORE Pinterest. Well, before I knew what Pinterest was, anyway.

Okay, I'll admit that SINCE seeing some neat organizational ideas for bookshelves on Pinterest I might've rearranged some things. Just a bit.






And I realize this "bookshelf" holds less books than it does paraphernalia – most notably my collection of antique cameras. But still.














*Photos by Sarah B. Danks*