Crafts, Gifts, and Do-It-Yourself (DIY) Projects

So for the past few weeks, I have been bouncing around from Michael's to Wal-Mart to the Dollar Store, online apothecary web sites, and the new web site I talked about earlier - Pinterest.

With its zillions of user-uploaded ideas for craft making, homemade bath and body products, and do-it-yourself around the home projects, I have become completely enamored. As an environment enthusiast, animal lover, and admittedly, a bit of a purist, the idea of making my own body butters, shampoo, soaps and body wash, pet food, enzyme cleaners, laundry detergent, and other everyday items is extremely appealing. Not to mention the fact that I simply LOVE learning creative new ways to repurpose items around the house - which is, essentially, recycling after all!

I have ordered a whole slew of raw materials from an apothecary web site, which will jumpstart my homemade bath products (and gifts!) - and I have "pinned" a hundred ideas for repurposing and home decoration when I get back to the Netherlands. But to get my feet wet in the crafts, I started with tutorials I found on Pinterest.

My aunt Lynnie's birthday was today. Blending ideas I found with research I've done on the current craft trends (aromatherapy, skin care, etc.), I filled a gift bag with various items I handmade for her over the past few weeks.

1. This is more of a housewarming gift for her and my uncle's new home in North County - they have a pale green/white accent theme in the decor and walls, so I tweaked some gift ideas I read about and made this little decorative object. It's just a plain flower vase with a silk daisy I got at Michael's - I held the flower against the glass as I filled the vase with sand, then topped it off with a tealight. Voila - an easy, but cute, trinket.

2. A Post-It mounted pad! I took a plastic photo frame (I chose one with a magnet on the back) and cut out a piece of scrapbook padding to slide into the insert. I adhered a Post-It pad to the front, then chose embellishments -- the possibilities with this are endless, but I chose a blue ribbon and a little decorative label for my aunt's.

3. Coasters! To match the green theme in my aunt's house, I chose a sheet of scrapbook paper with green polka dots and a distressed cream background. I found ceramic tiles at Home Depot, and cut out squares of the scrapbook paper, leaving a thin border around the edges. I adhered the scrapbook paper to clean tiles with Mod Podge, and then applied two additional coats on top of the paper to seal it in. I found a finishing spray in my dad's garage (this one was matte, but gloss should look better) and sprayed it on top once the Mod Podge had dried, and then applied felt pads to the bottoms of the tiles. Voila, drink coasters!

4. This is one of the endless bath/body product ideas I've found -- all of which are customizable to personal preference, and versatile/flexible enough for personal tweaking. This particular "recipe" is almost entirely my own - guided by my research in skin care and aromatherapy, of course. I mixed one cup of ground oatmeal (thank you, Magic Bullet!) with one cup of coarse sea salt, and four tea bags (about 3 tbsp) of peppermint tea (sans the bags). This concoction yields a moisturizing, exfoliating, and refreshing foot soak - perfect for relieving sore, achy, tired, or even stinky feet. It has dual uses too -- after you pour it into warm water, you can exfoliate your feet with the sea salt before it dissolves, then let the mixture soak into the water and dissolve slowly, which creates a relaxing bath. I'm going to make some for myself, too! Oh, and the jar is a recycled Starbucks Frappuccino jar - decorated with, you guessed it, scrapbook paper and Mod Podge, while the cap is painted white with acrylic paint.

5. My favorite gift in my aunt's goody bag today -- I am even making one for myself. This is a homemade aromatherapeutic hot compress! I bought leg warmers at the store (personally chosen cute designs, of course), and sewed one end closed. Then I filled the tube with rice, alternating a tsp of ground ginger with the rice as I went, and then sewed the other end closed as well. Pop the whole thing into the microwave for 30-45 seconds, heating up the rice and ginger, which creates a powerful ache/pain relieving compress. There are several variations of this, including other ground/powdered roots or spices, or even essential oils. I liked the benefits of ginger (relieving muscle and joint pain to reducing inflammation, aiding in digestion, soothing nausea, and minimizing headaches, to name a few) and chose that for my aunt's compress. The only downside? The leg warmer I selected is a bit more porous than I first realized, which means the ginger powder seeps out a bit. Trial and error, my friends.

And thus begins my journey through crafts and homemade DIY projects -- we'll see how long it lasts! ;)

A beautiful, lonely sunset

Tonight's sunset - on the eve of a big storm.

Bringing out the crafter in me

Thanks to my willingness to try practically any new site/social network on the web and my love of crafts and do-it-yourself projects, I have become the latest crafter on the block.

Pinterest, a new website in the form of a virtual pinboard, has taken over my creative life. The sole purpose of Pinterest is for users to "pin" images from the web, but the possibilities from this are endless. Find recipes you like? "Pin" the image of the dish, which will link to the site with the recipe. Planning a wedding? "Pin" images of the dresses, flowers, or decorations you like, complete with link. Laughed out loud at one of those popular humor graphics and want to share it with people later, or revisit for your own benefit? "Pin" it.

And the best part of it all: crafts, DIY (do-it-yourself) projects, and alternative uses for everyday items you never thought of.

Use a plastic soap box to protect your digital camera while traveling.

Use a contact lens case for vitamins and pills.

A clean, empty ketchup bottle is the perfect pancake batter dispenser.

An eyeglass case turned travel manicure set.


It is ADDICTING. I have pinned zillions of ideas I've found by browsing Pinterest, being inspired by other users' clever ideas or ideas they've passed on from others. It's like a giant sewing circle, with everyone sharing their own "my mother taught me this" or "did you know?" tidbits.

I am definitely inspired to start making my own beauty supplies like soap, shampoo, body scrubs, facial cleaners, toners, and even makeup. And some of them are even eco-friendly. (Ever heard of whitening your teeth with lemon and salt?) I also found an interesting article on making your own enzyme cleaner from lemons and brown sugar!

Because I've got a list three miles long of things to try, I thought it would be perfect to share them here once I have done so.

The first items I've made have been decorative crafts, with no purpose other than they're cute and easy to make. I cannot WAIT to get back to the Netherlands and take over Dunhei #2. It will be ALL sorts of crafty! ;)

This is a simple project I found and made on Saturday: homemade coffee candles.

What you need:
Cup, saucer, or other small container
Whole coffee beans
A tea light

Fill the container with coffee beans and stick the tea light in the middle. Light the candle, and the coffee beans are enhanced, giving off a lovely aroma.

My friend Kelsey and I bought little ceramic pottery saucers from Michael's (69 cents) and acrylic paint ($1.27). She made hot pink saucers; I made one white and one purple.

Then we bought whole bean coffee from the grocery store, where you can fill your own bag from dispensers. (1/5 bag = $2.88, enough for three or four saucers) We also selected flavored coffee to make it even more fun - I chose vanilla nut so the coffee smell wouldn't be too overpowering.

Total price: $4.84 (with enough paint and coffee beans for more saucers)

(And Mom and Dad love it. ;))

The times, they are a'changin...

A lot has changed in a very short time. I'm back in the States for awhile, working full time as the front desk receptionist at a dermatologist's office (the same doctor for whom my mom has managed the billing for about 15 years). I'm busting my butt 8-5, adopting old lady habits in the evenings, and spending my weekends catching up on my absolute favorite show, The Big Bang Theory. (Post about that coming soon, I'm sure.)

All this work, while beneficial for my savings fund to go back to the Netherlands, also mandated that I stop mooching off my parents' chaperone routine (despite how generous they were to putt my butt around as long as they did) and get my own car.

And despite my deep-seated fear of debt and cars (A.K.A. money-sucking machines), I finally found a sturdy little red 2001 Toyota Corolla for sale on AutoTrader. A week, two loan applications to Mission Federal Credit Union (the first was denied because I haven't held my current job long enough), back and forth phone calls with the car seller, two trips to Chula Vista, ten thousands forms to sign, registration and title transfers, cashier's checks, and sales tax payments later...the car was mine.

It's a dandy little thing, if I do say so myself. I still can't make it feel like mine just yet, but my dad helped push it along a bit.

I'm still reeling from the sudden outpouring of money, and a previously healthy bank account sucked dry, but I know it's for the best. And now my paychecks can start going toward my savings - once they've paid the monthly loan payment, insurance, gas (which alone is enough to suck my account dry again), cell phone bill, groceries, and health expenses. Savings what?

My writing has been put on the backburner while I try to get all this business in order, and I'm hoping I won't lose my touch. My thirst for travel documentaries and all things Rick Steves is absent for now, and I can't remember the last time I listened to Bon Jovi. (Gasp)

To throw more changes into the mix, my aunt and uncle have recently moved up to North County - cutting a 45+ minute trip into a 15-20 minute trip to see them. I love that they're closer, but it's weird - even for me - to picture them in any house other than the one I've always known them in. (Even though it's a really cute house, and I'm not just saying that because I know my aunt will read this. ;))

And my little sister is moving to Nevada any day now - and how hypocritical of me to not want her to go, when I moved clear out of the country last year. I still can't come to terms with the fact that she doesn't live in my parents' house anymore, let alone that she will soon live out of state.

It's a strange time right now, that's for sure. I tell myself every day to just keep moving, keep plodding along, and that what I'm doing now is what I need to do in order to get to where I want to be: back in the Netherlands with Bjorn, hopefully teaching English and traveling.

I actually miss school. Where did THAT come from?! After pushing hard to cross the college finish line, which felt like it took a hundred years to cross, I thought I'd never set foot on a campus again. Yet not even a month after graduating, I had started considering my Master's degree. And now, 8 months later, I sit on my bed on a rainy Saturday night, wishing I had something to study. Some sort of project to work on. Something to research and learn. I'm a scholar at heart, I guess.

I've never done very well with unpredictability. And when I was in school, everything was laid out for me: it was routine and planned, and I lived in a little proverbial box of comfort. Despite my whining to get out, I liked the safety of that box. The certainty of its paramaters.

I'm spontaneous in that I will up and go to the movie theater on a weekday, or try Cherry Coke instead of my standard Dr. Pepper. (insert chuckle here) I'm not equipped to be calm and collected when I don't know what the next day will bring. It's been a big struggle the past few months to learn to take each day one at a time, and accept that I have little control over what happens next, no matter how much I think I can mold it to fit what I want. I am definitely learning life's biggest lesson. (And my mother is now saying aloud, "What have I been telling you all these years?!")

In other news, my 23rd birthday is in two weeks. Unlike my aunt, who sent out her carefully organized and charted birthday list weeks ago, I have none. All I want is a healthy savings account, because that will be the foundation for my achieving all the "things" I DO want in my life right now: my dreams and goals to become reality.

(So if you were looking for ideas for birthday gifts for me, there you have it. :))