Loving these colors and variety of designs. This is about 1/4 of the stash of buttons I brought back from my recent trip to K-town.
Where do you find cool, vintage buttons?
Smiles!
Megan
Cupcake Inspired Art January 4, 2011
I wanted to make my Aunt something special this Christmas, something cute and creative and fun, but what can you possibly make for a lady that bakes and decorates amazingly beautiful treats such as these?
Or these?
Well, a Cupcake inspired memory box of course!!
She is also a HUGE Nebraska Cornhuskers fan so just had to use a Red and White color scheme.
I knew I wanted to do something around her mad baking and decorating skills so I browsed the baking aisle at hobby lobby for some inspiration and out popped these fun white doilies, the perfect place setting for a cupcake, right?
And what person doesn’t love those big silver sugar sprinkles?
More cupcakes on the inside of the box too, featuring a special message. I used an image transfer technique to take an old love letter and incorporate it into this design.
Vintage buttons of all styles made for fun decorations.
And sealed with a bow. Now she has a special place to keep all of her sweet memories.
Smiles!
Megan
Repurposed Cabinet Doors December 31, 2010
I’ve been following Gail’s Blog, My Repurposed Life, for about a month now and it is one awesome blog full of tons of creative inspiration especially for repurposing furniture. Seriously, an old door repurposed into a toddler bed? HOW COOL! Gail says that her favorite thing to do DIY wise is to repurpose every day items that are headed for the garbage/landfill.
Some of you know I like to do the same thing, take this old window I purchased at Tiede’s (my favorite junk store) for about $7.
After a coat of paint and adding some wreaths and ribbon, it looks perfect on my bedroom wall!
Or this old thing, I think it’s half of an old wood screen door. Whatever it is, I thought it was cool and it was only $4 at Tiede’s so I painted it white and then painted some red flower shapes on the screens. Also looks perfect on my bedroom wall! And I know you CAN NOT purchase wall art that large for only $4!!!
Or this cute little shutter I purchased at the Habitat for Humanity ReStore for like $3 I think. Painted it black and now it’s super cute wall art in my kitchen.
Okay, I think you get my point!!
I had purchased these incredibly inexpensive cabinet doors at the ReStore about a year ago knowing there would be something cool to do with them but not knowing what exactly that would be! Then Gail inspired me! These made the PERFECT Christmas gifts for my Mom and my sister and I can’t wait to make more. I wanted to do a step-by-step post but got so into creating these I forgot to take photos!! So here is one step and the final products!
Gail taught me this little trick – always check out the OOPS section at Lowes! I picked up this mistint for $0.50 and it worked perfect. After sanding the cabinets and taping off the inside, I painted the “frame” with some old laytex paint I had from painting my kitchen. It took a few coats. I let it dry, then sanded the edges and such to create a weathered and worn look. Then I painted on the stain and let it dry for a few seconds then wiped it off.
It worked well because it warmed up the bright yellow paint while darkening the sanded areas to really accentuate that weathered and worn look. After this I took off the blue tape and painted the inside with chalkboard paint. Okay, there’s the one step, now on to the fun stuff!
I gave this one to my Mom. She has a very huge creative space that has tons of fun wall art and repurposed furniture. She sews amazing quilts and fun little pillows so I wanted to add a tad of that sewing inspiration idea into this piece, even making a holder for the chalk at the end of each ribbon tail! I’m loving my sewing machine.
I had some fun with rick rack, some ribbon I had around, as well as vintage buttons. My Mom was really surprised and loves it so that was the best part of giving her this gift!
This is the one I gave to my little sister Kate (minus the photos, those are mine, I just wanted you to be able to see how this would be used). I seriously LOVE giving gifts to my sister because she gets so excited even at 25 years old and her reactions are priceless!! I used the same process for this chalkboard wall art but decorated it so she could hang photos.
I had some really big old wooden buttons that I painted black, then hot-glued to mini clothes pins. Those got painted as well. I added some color with the red vintage buttons and then hot glued it to the edge of the cabinet door. Pretty easy, very cute! That is my beautiful sister and myself in the photo on the left and us with our Aunt (our Martha Stewart) and Uncle in the photo of the right.
Kate absolutely loved this and I chose colors that are perfect for her living room. Thanks to Gail at My Repurposed Life for the inspiration for these fun Christmas Gifts!
Did you get a DIY or handmade gift this year? I would love to hear about it.
Smiles,
Megan
Baubles & Bows One Thousand Times Better December 8, 2010
Now, I thought my Baubles & Bows were pretty impressive but check out these GORGEOUS and inexpensive gift toppers I just read about over on Design Sponge. Love this!
Baubles and Bows November 30, 2010
I broke out my old bow tying skills from my days at Flowerama and put them to work on some fun Christmas wrapping. They were too cute, I had to share.
Are you jealous. . . it’s November 30th and I have 80% of my holiday shopping complete and presents already wrapped! I just love this time of year so much, I get a little obsessed with getting Christmas things done before anything else!
Isn’t that pillow so cute? My amazingly creative mother makes them!
I’m in love with that striped ribbon.
So I incorporated it into the gift tag and added a little red button for some texture and interest.
I’m reusing these gift tags from last year. I got them from my friends Lynn and Karla (who has the cutest winter hats available on her blog right now!) – little poker chips covered with pretty paper and attached to a mini-clothespin, how cute!!
I’m also reusing this idea that was a hit last year, I just used old christmas baubles I didn’t want on my tree anymore. They add a little sparkle, elegance and holiday fun to the silver wrapping. Just string a ribbon through the tops and tie together tightly. Easy as that!
I would love to see your unique holiday wrapping ideas this year, share a link!
Smiles,
Megan
Trendy Elephants For Baby June 2, 2010
I just knew my friend Cindi would come up with something so adorable for her new baby’s nursery, she has an amazing eye for design and color, must come from her mad graphic design skills at a local ad agency. When little Aaron came into her and her husband Warren’s life it was a wonderful miracle and I knew they would have so many memories they just had to have somewhere to keep them!
Seriously SO CUTE!! Note the elephant on the changing table, elephant mobile, elephant quilt and what are those circles on the walls? I HAVE to find out.
Her creative pals at the ad agency threw a very cute shower complete with the elephant theme!
I fell in love with the elephants and wanted to incorporate them into the memory box so I used white Prisma Color to draw them all over the box.
And continued with the green, brown and white color theme. What a beautiful photo Cindi took of little Aaron all wrapped up. And I was able to use a lot of fun buttons found in various antique/junk stores.
Here are a few shots of the inside cover and inside of the box. You will probably notice a few themes – rick rack, fuzzy white poofy ball things and the fun little letters.
With inspiration from my friends Karla and Lynn, I’m starting to have a little fun with the wrapping by incorporating elements from the memory box into the entire gift package. Karla actually made the striped clip I used to clip the card to the bag.
She took a mini paper clip and glued an old poker chip to it then covered the poker chip with fun paper! How creative!
I hope to visit little Aaron again soon and spend some time with the new Mom and Dad! And I hope that between all the golfing, concert going, gardening and traveling I’ve been doing I can spend some more time blogging. Speaking of traveling, have you ever heard of a rose rock? It is the state rock of Oklahoma where I just spent a great weekend with Brian and his family.
I’m so grateful for this precious and intricate little souvenir from my trip to Oklahoma. Thanks Di-Ann!
Smiles,
Megan
Many Memories to Celebrate May 8, 2010
Last weekend I had a chance to head home to Kearney to do some celebrating with my family. It’s a big year for our family, both of my parents turned 60 this year AND they both retired and are looking forward to new adventures. My Dad retired in November from a career in school administration and my Mom completes a 36 year career teaching 4th grade for most of that time in two different school districts. AMAZING, I can’t imagine working somewhere for more than 5 years let alone spending 19 years at the same school!
Here’s my Mom (hopefully she doesn’t scold me for posting this.) starting her career as a student teacher in 1972.
Here is my Dad receiving at graduation from Kearney State College in 1972.
I’m so incredibly proud of both of them and wanted to do something special for them. So my sister Kate (this is a picture of her below with Ted from the car dealership in Kearney, she bought her first car this weekend too! Congrats Kate), put our creative minds together and decided to work on a little something special for our folks.
My sister is a wonderful writer, in fact, she blogs for the store she works for, Material Girl, check it out here. And as you all know, I am a little obsessed with creating memory boxes. But lucky for us, neither of our parents have one yet! So we decided I would create the memory box and Kate would write a special tear-jerker note to include in the memory box design. Here’s what we developed for my Mom.
A colorful, teacher and classroom inspired memory box! My Mom and I have similar handwriting and being that the little kiddos have called her Mrs. O’Dea for the last 36 or so years I wanted to make sure to include that detail.
My Mom always had the best bulletin boards and it was something she prided herself on so I wanted to incorporate that in to this design. I went on a hunt around Omaha (thanks for taking me Brian!) to find old rulers. I cut them up to frame a little piece of cork board and decorated with colorful buttons and a great photo!
When I was little I always remember my Mom writing notes or decorating her bulletin boards with lettering that had little dots on the corners like above. So I knew I wanted to incorporate that and here you can see it on the front of the envelope that holds the note my sister wrote for Mom. The envelope fits into photo corners so it is easy to remove.
This memory box for my Dad was a little more difficult to create being that a career in school administration doesn’t translate quite as colorful and light-hearted as a career in teaching! So I thought to myself, what do I remember about my Dad going to work everyday? He wore a lot of ties and was very business like so I spent a lot of time at our local thrift stores scavenging for ties (actually, they aren’t that hard to come by!).
I felt like a bow just wouldn’t look good with the design of this box so I decided to create a sort of clasp using 2 buttons and some black elastic. Turned out good!
I purchased the letters used on the inside cover at the market at Silver Bella (yes, I’ve been saving them since November to use just for this memory box!). The Irish Blessing is pasted on the front of the envelope that holds the note from my sister and again is secured with photo corners so it can be easily removed.
He already had a pile of notes, cards and memories ready to put in his memory box! So cute.
I loved working on this project with my sister and creating these for our parents but most of all I loved seeing their faces as they opened their gift. So special. What other special gift ideas do you have to celebrate retirements? I would love to hear from you!
Smiles,
Megan
Keeping Memories for Baby Girl April 6, 2010
In a previous post I shared the start of a project – a memory box for a baby girl. This was so fun because my friend Jami is giving this as a gift to a good friend of hers who recently welcomed baby Emri into the world. Because Emri has such an adorable nursery, Jami thought it would be fun to match the memory box design to the nursery so Mom can display it. Of course I was all for this as well, what artist doesn’t want their creation to be center of attention!
On the left is a photo of the wall mural in baby Emri’s nursery, a whimsical tree with sage green leaves and highlights of pink flowers. On the right is all the components I planned to use in the box, pink buttons, ribbon with a pattern similar to that of the wall mural and various colors and textures of paper.
I’m really pleased with how the different textures, tones, colors and styles came together in this whimsical yet trendy memory box for baby Emri. The papers, ribbon and letters were found at some of my favorite art supply stores including Hollanders, Hobby Lobby and Dick Blick. Of course the buttons come from all of my various junk store or antique store adventures in either Omaha, Overton or Weston, MO.
I really like using these letters because they add a child like playfulness to the memory box. The photo corners are another new item I’ve been using recently as opposed to building an actual frame out of chipboard and slipping a photo in it. This is a much more user friendly solution and leaves more room for for fun details like layering different papers and more buttons!
I have a really great HP Desk Jet printer that came with my Mac that I purchased back in 2002! I can run so many different thickness and textures of paper through this printer, it is an awesome resource and I hope it never ever dies on me!
This is kind of an awkward angle but you can see how I incorporated all of the elements from the front of the memory box on the inside of the box.
As all artists experience, sometimes mistakes can be happy ones! This strip of green paper with the letters spelling out Emri was a last minute addition because the paper crinkled really awkward when the glue dried and I didn’t like how it looked. This was a creative solution to fixing that issue as it really enhanced the design of the interior of the memory box, making it more personal and interesting to look at.
I’m so happy that baby Emri will have something so fun and whimsical as a keepsake full of many memories to visit over and over again the rest of her life! I’m curious, how do you keep the many memories made by your babies?
Smiles,
Megan
Special Gift to Keep Wedding Memories March 6, 2010
My friend Nikki who lives in Minnesota sent me an envelope full of memories from her sister’s recent wedding. Everything from shower invitations and photos of the couple to bachelorette party keepsakes and the gorgeous wedding invite itself. Having all of these items made this memory box even more special it allowed me to create the entire piece and add elements I normally wouldn’t get to. This was such a fun project that really took me to another level with my creations. Thanks Nikki!!
I purchased the chipboard for the box, book cloth and papers from my favorite paper store – Hollander’s. The ribbon is from one of Hobby Lobby’s fabulous 50% off sales!! And the buttons are from my favorite junk store – Tiede’s – in Overton, NE.
I really like this style of box – a basic hinged lid box. It allows to do some fun stuff with clasps or ribbons to securely close the box.
And a fun little surprise when you open the box – a beautiful photo of the happy couple!
Here you can see several bundles of keepsakes secured with a bow and accented with some beautiful but artificial greenery! Similar to that on their invitation you see on the front of the box. This is a great little keepsake for Nikki’s sister. Thanks for a fun project Nikki!
And up next. . . another memory box but this time for a baby girl. My good friend Jami is giving this to special friends who recently had a baby girl. On the left is a photo from the nursery that Jami sent me before hand so I’m matching the colors and style.
Can’t wait to share this new creation with you!!
Smiles,
Megan
Keeping Memories for Baby Boys January 24, 2010
My good friend Jaci was going to a baby shower today and asked me if I would design a custom baby themed memory box as her gift, she wanted to give something unique. The gift was for a baby boy and she provided his name, birth date and birth weight. . . all important info that mother’s remember!
This was the first memory box I’ve made for a baby gift and it was so fun! I chose the color theme of chocolate brown and a baby blue. I had the white textured paper recently purchased at the local Dick Blick. I had the rick rack and very cute little buttons from a trip to Tiede’s in Overton and the brown canvas, blue Canson paper, letters, ribbon and fuzzy puffy balls were all purchased at Hobby Lobby. They are starting to feature some really great detail patterns and color patterns in their ribbons.
I love this color scheme, so much it’s also the color scheme of my living room along with a few other bright colors! The top of the box features fixed photo corners which hold a 4×6 photo.
This is the customized detail – baby’s name, birth date and birth weight.
This is the inside of the box cover with a few little cute button details.
The final creation is something very sweet to hold many very sweet memories. Thanks Jaci, it was a fun project and I now have so many ideas going through my head!
Smiles!
Megan
