{Handmade Goodie of the Week} Painted Polka Dot Monogram Pumpkin

What a better way to come back to blogging than with a fun fall tutorial!

Today I'll be sharing with you all how to make this super-cute Painted Polka Dot Monogram Pumpkin.

Try and say that 10 times fast!  

It's no secret I love pumpkins.  Well, it might be for those of you who are new to Scraps and Scribbles.  So now you know.  I love pumpkins.  Which is probably why I love fall so much.  Each year I try to make a pumpkin-type craft to add to our Halloween/Fall decor.  This year, both of my littles are old enough to get in on the action, so I wanted something we could do together.  Little Man was really taken with the craft pumpkins at Michaels and they were half off, so I grabbed one for us to decorate.  I'd really been wanting to make a monogrammed pumpkin, so this was perfect.

To make yours, you'll need:

A craft pumpkin in whatever size/color you'd like
Paint-you'll want a background color, a dot color and an outline color
Brushes
Dotting sponge or pencil with unused eraser
Accent Ribbon

What to do:

I started by drawing a large "D" on my pumpkin.  You can either free-hand this, or use a stencil or if you have a crafty cutting machine, cut out some vinyl to use as a stencil-whatever is your style.

Then, using your background color, fill in your letter.  You might need to do more than one coat.  Allow to dry completely before moving onto the next step.

Once your paint is completely dry, it's time to get dotting!

I used the eraser end of a pencil for my dots, swirling it around to make some a little larger.  You can use whatever method works best for you.  Again, let your paint dry completely before moving on to the next step.

Once your dots are dry, take a fine tip brush and your outline color and outline your monogram.  Now, this step is completely optional, of course, so if you feel your monogram looks awesome without an outline, skip to the next step or call it done.

Once your outline has dried, take a piece of your accent ribbon and tie it in a nice bow around the stem of your pumpkin.

And that's it!  An easy, cute DIY project that's great for Halloween AND fall decor!  I'd love to see your take on this-if you make one, post a pic of your finished project on the Facebook page!

{Blast from the Past} Wooden Firecrackers

It's about that time again, where we start busting out the red, white and blue and all the craftiness those colors inspire.  Here's a flashback to these easy wooden firecrackers that I shared a few years back {in case you missed them or forgot about them.}

These cuties took me only about a half hour to whip up.  And I love them!  

If you want to make your own {and I know you do!}, you'll need:

three pieces of wood: 1 7 inches long, 1 6 inches long and 1 5 inches long and all about 2 inches wide

Red, white and blue paint

Wooden star

Hemp or twine

Hot glue and paint brushes

I started with this block of wood.  It was left over from the posts of our fence.  Pre-cutting, it was about 4 inches wide.  I divided it in half on two sides and drew some lines.  Then, my brother-in-law helped me do the cutting-I don't trust myself with power tools while being pregnant.  Once I had four pieces, I had him cut two shorter-taking one inch off of one and two inches off of the other.

So they looked like this.  Now, my pieces were pretty rough and I wanted them that way.  I liked the rustic look of them.  So I just lightly sanded the edges and tops and bottoms to smooth them out so there wouldn't be rough edges to catch on things or scratch up the furniture.

Once they were sanded and ready to go, I painted them.  Each piece got two coats of paint, which I let dry in between coats.

Like so.

Then it was time to add the "wicks."  I used three pieces of hemp for this that I just cut at random lengths.

Then glued to the top of each firecracker.

So they looked like this.

Then I wrapped a piece of hemp around the whole thing a few times and tied it in a knot at the back, then slid the star in.

Here they sit with some of my other red, white and blue decor.

I quite like the way they turned out.  And since I had almost everything on hand already, they were super-cheap.  The only thing I had to buy was the little star, which was a whopping 79 cents at Michaels!

Hand Towel Bag Dispenser

I'm a big fan of reusable grocery bags.  They make my life easier.  But I some times forget to bring them into the store with me, so we do end up with plastic bags.  I use them as liners for our trashcans and in lieu of fancy diaper pails.  So I need a place to keep them organized and at hand.  For about $3, I turned an ordinary dish towel into a nice little bag for my bags.

This one hangs in our garage, right outside the kitchen door and I made a second one for in the baby's room.

To make one, all you need is:
A dish towel

Skinny elastic

Small safety pin

Hot glue gun and glue

Cut two lengths of elastic just a few inches longer than the ends of the towel.  Take one of the pieces of elastic and the safety pin and pin it to one end.

Using the tube created by the hem at the end of the towel (it should be open all the way across, so look for that when picking out your towel) thread the elastic through, safety pin end first, using the pin to pull it through.  Make sure you hold on to the other end while you do this.

Grab the two ends of the elastic and pull tight

Until it's a tight as you can get, forming a circle.

Like so.  Tie the ends of the elastic together in a knot and trim off extra.

Repeat on the other end.  Keep the opening at this end a little looser when you tie it closed.

Your towel should look something like this now.  Flip it inside out and line up the outside edges.

Using your hot glue gun, draw a line of glue, a little bit at a time, down one of the edges and glue the other to it.

Turn it right-side out

It should look something like this-a tube with holes at either end.

I added a small loop of ribbon to the loose end to hang it with.  Just tie a piece of ribbon or twine or whatever you choose around the elastic, knotting it at one end.

Hang and fill with bags from the top (where your hanging loop is)

Pull the bags out through the opening at the bottom.  And there you have it-a cheap, easy and quick way to store those plastic bags you've got laying around.

{Blast from the Past} Purple Rosette Tee

I dug this one out of the vaults and dusted it off for you all, in case you missed it the first time around.  I'm sure you have a tee or two hiding in your closet or shoved in the back of your drawer that could use a makeover.  Here's some inspiration for you:

Purple Rosette Tee

Today I'm sharing a simple way to disguise a holey tee.  I'm still a novice seamstress, so when it comes to me and sewing, simple is best.

I had a little bit of a mystery-a bunch of almost new tees were developing holes in them, all near the bottom of the shirt, thus ruining otherwise perfectly good shirts.  Not only was it frustrating because I didn't know what was causing the holes, but I felt like I was wasting money because these shirts that had only been worn 2 or 3 times were now trashed.  

This is only about half of the pile of shirts with holes.  I needed to come up with a creative way to cover up the holes without it being obvious that I was hiding something.

With the purple tee (which is also right there on the top), the holes were kind of big and covered a wider area

They were also a little off-center, so it presented a bigger challenge. 

To fix yours up, you'll need:

A holey tee

A tee to cut up in a matching/coordinating color

matching thread

rotary mat, cutter and ruler

tailor's chalk 

Then I found this tee at a consignment shop and had an idea.  It matched the contrast stitching on the purple holey tee perfectly.

It was only $3!  And HUGE!  I've never seen such a large medium-sized tee!  But that meant there was plenty of fabric to work with.

To start off with, I folded the dark purple tee in half and with tailor's chalk, marked a line diagonally down from the collar to just past the last hole at the bottom.

I pulled it out flat like this, still keeping it folded in half (see the chalk line) so that the area I cut out would be even.  Then I cut out that chunk-bye-bye holes!

I measured the length of the piece I cut out and the width at the bottom and cut a piece out using those measurements from the lavender tee.

I wanted it to have a gathered look at the top, so I stitched some thread in about 1/4 in. down from the top of the edge and gathered it by pulling on the thread.

Then, using the piece I had cut out of the purple tee as a guide, I trimmed up the lavender piece

Then pinned it in place.

And sewed the pieces together.

Like so.

Now, you could stop here if you wanted.  But I felt it needed a little something more.

Rosettes make everything prettier!  I cut a few strips of fabric from the lavender tee and rolled them into rosettes, stitching them in place as I went so they wouldn't come undone.

Then attached them to my tee at the collar.

And there you have it!

Holes? What holes?

I'm quite pleased with how it turned out and I hope you love yours too!