Dollar Tree Faux Windowpane and Wreath

Today I'm sharing more of my DIY fall decor.

I found a tutorial on YouTube for making this faux windowpane mirror. It uses frames from Dollar Tree glued together with E6000 and then glued onto the back of a piece of foamboard for stability. I changed it up just a bit by buying mirrors in a larger size and only using four of them.  That put my cost right at $5.

There are so many variations you could do on these mirrors. You could paint the frames, but black matched my decor. You could also buy a fancier frame and add the mirror panels into them (effectively doubling the cost), but I liked the simple black for this project.

I added a sawtooth hanger to the back (again with E6000 - hot glue won't work), and it was ready to hang on my wall after the glue cured.

The wreath is another Dollar Tree creation. It wasn't quite as inexpensive as my $3 Dollar Tree wreath, but it wasn't expensive as wreaths go, either. I bought a wire frame, six bunches of flowers, and one pack of small pumpkin clips (all from Dollar Tree) for this project. I used a metal sentiment sign from a pack I already had (3/pack from Dollar Tree). So this project cost me $8. If you needed to buy the sentiments, it would be $9.

There is no magical formula for arranging the flowers, but I like things to be methodical. I aimed for the equivalent of one bunch of flowers for each section of the wreath. It worked perfectly for me, but it really does depend on the fullness of your flowers. I tried to mix up some of the scrawnier ones with some of the fuller ones in each section.

To attach the sentiment, I simply wired it on with some floral wire I had on hand. It doesn't take much. You could probably use a bread tie on each side with the paper bits stripped off.

I really enjoyed making these! I hope they inspire you to look for inexpensive ways to make your house look prettier, too.

$3 Fall Dollar Tree Wreath

You might remember that I'm a pastor's wife. One of my duties is leading our monthly ladies' meetings. Our ladies appreciate a nice craft just as much as the next person, but it's hard to find an inexpensive craft that is actually useful and adds value to our homes. I'm a firm believer in making pretty, practical, and inexpensive crafts. As you might imagine, this taxes my creativity to the limit some months.

This year, I wanted to create seasonal wreaths for our homes. Since we take the summers off and start our "year" fresh in September, the first seasonal wreath was for fall. I browsed my local Dollar Tree stores for inspiration and was not disappointed.

With the same supplies (roughly $3.33 worth - 1 wreath, the equivalent of one batch of flowers, 1 package of small pumpkin clips and one metal sentiment sign that came 3/pack), I came up with the following variations:

The pumpkin clips came in three varieties - white, orange, and red. I used all white pumpkins on this wreath.

I switched out one of the white pumpkins for an orange one on this variation.

I reversed the pumpkin color selection this time, with two orange and one white.

Then I tried all orange. This was my favorite of the pumpkin variations. Ladies with a farmhouse decorating theme (the current rage) would probably prefer white pumpkins.

After all that experimenting with the pumpkins, I started experimenting with the placement of the sentiment. This was my favorite, and we ultimately ended up making most of them just like this.

The nice thing about these wreaths is that everything just tucked into the wreath without any hot glue. We can take out the fall decorations and make a fresh arrangement any time we want.

I hope this helps someone else who may be looking for an inexpensive wreath or inexpensive ladies' meeting craft ideas!

DIY Maxi Dresses: Cheap and Easy

If you know me in real life, you know that I only wear skirts and dresses, I wear my skirts and sleeves long, and I like a high neckline. Only someone else who dresses this way would understand just how difficult it is to find clothing that fits these guidelines. You might say it's about like finding a unicorn, especially when you consider the fact that I'm unwilling to pay anywhere near $100 for anything I'm not being married in. (My wedding dress - nearly 16 years ago now - was a sample gown from a California bridal shop that I picked up on Ebay for $125, shipping included.)

So you might imagine my excitement to run across an idea on Pinterest of how to easily make your own maxi dresses without having to sew them completely from scratch. I'm a fairly accomplished seamstress, but I can't say that I relish sewing a lot with silky knits, which are my absolute favorite to wear. Besides, those silky knit fabrics can be pricey. I've been spoiled for thrift store prices.

So, let me tell you about how easy this is - after I link back to A Small Snippet, the blog where I got my inspiration. The really funny thing is that I modified her idea a bit (by using premade clothes - all knit), and she modified her idea from the woman who inspired her (Talk to the Trees). This could go on endlessly ...

I had recently done a closet purge, and a few of my favorites went out with that purge. As my body changes with midlife realities, some of my formerly favorite clothes just aren't flattering on me anymore. Therefore, I didn't wear them. This allowed me to rescue a few favorites and change them so that they were flattering on my new proportions.

The basic idea is this: Cut a tee to about empire-waist length (just slightly under your bust area). Sew on a maxi skirt or the bottom of a dress (being sure to use a stretch stitch), and you have a dress! It's really that easy.

This is the first one I made. I loved the flower detail on the neckline of this top, but it irked me to always have to layer it to make it modest enough for my personal standards. Oh, and it was longer than my ideal. I'm short.

The bottom part was from a dress that had thinner stripes on the top. When I bought it at the thrift store, I thought it wouldn't bother me. In reality, I just couldn't bring myself to wear it like that. Mismatching stripes are not my personality.

The bonus part of this dress was being able to fill in the neckline of this top with what I cut off the bottom of it. I love it now! 

This was my second dress. I loved this yellow top but had somehow managed to get a pink stain near the bottom of it. This allowed me to cut off the stain but still use the good part.

The skirt part came from another dress that I bought when I was a size smaller than I am now. I loved the big, bold houndstooth print and the silky knit. But I didn't like how it showed every imperfection of my new size. Raising it slightly to sit just below my bust made it flattering again. I can't tell you how happy I am to rescue this one!

You'll notice that I added a belt as an option. They fit fine without one, but I think it dresses up the look just a bit. I could really wear them either way.

This borders on life-changing. Summers don't have to be spent sweating in layers. I don't have to pay $80+ for a pretty dress (thanks to thrift stores where I can buy the tops and bottoms to sew together) - not that I would anyway.

On a side note: Did you notice that I have a dress form now? I've been sewing since I was somewhere around 13 (let's not talk about how many years that's been), and I've always wanted one. But I never wanted to spend what they cost brand-new. I picked up this one at a yard sale for less than one-third of what it's going for in the store. It's in excellent condition, and I'm enjoying the ease of sewing and mending when I don't have to personally try on all of the clothes at every step of the project.

Altered Composition Books

A few weeks ago, I ran across the "lowest price of the season" sale at Michaels. I was there for something completely different, but the 12x12" paper stacks for $5 each caught my attention. I used to do a LOT of papercrafting, but I haven't done any in a long time.

There were some gorgeous paper stacks. And at $5 for 48 sheets, that's a lot of papercrafting for just a little bit of money. How could I say no? (Please don't tell me if you know how to resist this. I've enjoyed my foray back into papercrafting.)

Since it's so close to back-to-school season, I was also able to get a great deal on college-ruled composition notebooks. I've made decorative composition notebooks before, so it was a logical project for this pretty paper.

This one came mostly from the Marishka paper pad. I just added a little accent of gold foil paper along the corners.

This came entirely from the Marishka paper pad, as did the next one.

The front image on this one was a full 12x12" page. The word "love" fit onto the front of the composition notebook, so I just cut it down to size.

This is the inside of the "Love" book. I added solid cardstock inside the front and back covers of each book to hide the ugly school charts and completely disguise their humble beginnings.

All of this came from the Marishka paper pad, except for the accents of gold foil paper.

I really like the page borders that come in these paper pads. There are two whole pages of them. I just had to cut them apart.

This one came from the Grace paper pad. I added accents of gold foil paper, as I did on several of the others. The "Have Faith" sentiment was one of several 6x6" accents in the paper pad.

This one came from the Pink Champagne paper pad. I would have made a lot more with that paper pad, but I'm trying to save some for an activity for my daughter's 13th birthday party that has a black, white, pink and rose gold theme.

This was another 12x12" full page that happened to fit onto the front of my composition notebook.

I made this one from the Bless Our Home paper pad (minus the gold foil accents underneath the corners of the flower card).

This also came from the Bless Our Home paper pad. I just added a strip of matching washi tape where the two papers joined. The flower paper was a 12x12" border page. This is a perfect way to use that type of page.

This was actually the very first one I made, and it came from the Bless Our Home paper pad. The sentiment came from the bottom of a full 12x12" page. The sentiment and accents are all in gold foil, which is a little tricky to capture on camera.

There was a tree image above the sentiment, and I used it to make another notebook (up next). I thought this would be particularly neat for someone collecting genealogy information. I added gold foil paper to the insides of this one.

Lastly, this was made from the tree image leftover from the last composition notebook. Everything except the silver glittered washi tape came from the Bless Our Home paper pad.

So ... what am I going to do with all of these?

I like to give something to each of our church people for their birthday. This year, all the ladies got handknit dishcloths. (Guys got candy and will still get candy next year. They're impossible to shop for.) Next year, I plan to give each of our ladies a pretty composition book. These would make great journals, guest books, recipe books - almost anything you can think of.