Welcome to my blog ~ where aesthetics are a passion, details are a priority, and pleasure in simple things is celebrated!
I invite you to share my inspirations for a creative life and a lifetime of adventures.
Thanks so much for visiting, Jackie
Hello all! Please have the very happiest of weekends! It is a hectic one for me since I am working this weekend and also trying to get ready for a family meal on Sunday – I’m on desserts! I am taking inspiration from Chef Adam at Sift Bakery :)
For Friday field trip today, please enjoy my favorite homage to Earth Day, coming up on April 22nd.
Click here to see Repurposed Brown Bags. Have a wonderful weekend!
Remember to take pleasure in simple things, Jackie
Comments Off on happy spring friends! | diy, holiday, inspiration
Something about my sense of aesthetics makes it really hard for me to use manila file folders in the office. And, keeping them in plain view is irritating!
It would really make my work life more pleasant if I could keep a dozen or so file folders handy on my desk for current projects. So, I set out to find some pretty file folders to replace my manila eyesores!
After shopping around in stores and online, I was shocked to find out that any cute looking folders would cost me $15 for a package of 6! How could they be $15? A box of 100 plain manila folders cost $7.95!
The solution, of course, was to make some myself. I would simply cover some of the inexpensive plain ones I already owned. And, with Earth Day on my mind, (it is tomorrow – April 22nd) reusing something to decorate the folders seemed an appropriate and earth-friendly solution!
I would transform the inexpensive, manila folders at no cost by reusing something I found visually appealing. Right away I thought of my favorite item to recycle – Terrain shopping bags! Perfect!
There are plenty of attractive options for reusing that can substitute for Terrain shopping bags if you don’t have a Terrain store near you – here are a few ideas:
• Sheet music
• Old maps/nautical maps
• Newspaper from a significant date or a foreign newspaper (if you use newspapers, you will need to cover them with a clear laminate paper to prevent the newsprint from making a mess!)
• Pages from unwanted books or magazines (library book sales are great for this!)
• Wrapping paper (when you get a gift with great paper, don’t you always save it?)
If all else fails, and you have no paper you can recycle, pick up some decorative paper at a paper or craft store. I love Paper Source for finding great decorative papers. (The feather motif paper shown here came from Paper Source.)
Attaching a decorative paper to the manila folders is pretty easy. Be sure to have one straight edge. Then, apply spray adhesive to the front of the folder – masking off all surrounding areas from overspray. Use that straight edge to line up your paper on the folded edge of the front of the folder – good side of the decorative paper facing out – smoothing the paper flat. Trim excess paper with a craft knife or scissors.
I adhered the decorative covering to the front of the folder – the part I see – but, I also wanted the visible part of the tab covered. I decided to use chalkboard Contact paper for the covering on the tab. This way, I could easily update the information on the tabs. Since I will be using these folders on my desktop for current projects, the chalkboard tabs will make for easy updating!
I cut 12” x 2” strips of chalkboard Contact paper for this purpose and adhered them to the inside tab section of the folder, smoothing the paper to eliminate air bubbles. Then, I trimmed the excess with a craft knife.
Cute file folders? Check! Sigh…so much better! :)
Happy Earth Day! Other fun Earth Day projects:
Items to make from Terrain bags, click here.
Instructions to make decorative pencils from tissue paper, click here.
Thanks so much for stopping by! Remember to take pleasure in simple things, Jackie
Sharing with Sand & Sisal and Elizabeth & Co.
Comments Off on diy decorative file folders | diy, inspiration, style
Pretty much every item you can think of on this earth (pun intended) has been covered with chalkboard paint, hasn’t it? So, I am pretty certain someone has already thought to paint a globe with chalkboard paint.
I think it is a great way to revamp an outdated globe and to honor our dear Mother Earth on Earth Day! I just couldn’t convince myself to throw it out during the purging of all the old ‘stuff’ I cleared from the ‘new’ guest room…I have a particular fondness for globes – outdated or not – since one of my children was born on Earth Day!
So, now the old globe sits proudly in the new guest room.
And, since the globe is an accessory (my second!) in the room where guests will be staying, my idea was to decorate the chalkboard in one of two ways:
1. To write Welcome! in an outline shape of my state (Connecticut), or
2. Draw two states – mine and the one the visiting guests hail from!
In light of the occasion, you may also enjoy this post on repurposing brown bags…Happy Earth Day!
Thanks for stopping by!
P.S. I took the butterfly photos in this post used with the quotes last summer – we haven’t had any weather yet this year that warrants butterflies!
Remember to take pleasure in simple things, Jackie
Sharing with Finding Silver Pennies, Sand & Sisal, and Coastal Charm.
Comments Off on homage to earth day | diy, holiday, inspiration
April 22nd is Earth Day…in the spirit of the day, I am repurposing the brown bags I have accumulated from my Terrain purchases to use them in some fun and beautiful ways. If you aren’t lucky enough to have a Terrain near you, any brown bag will do! The Terrain bags have one up on the traditional brown bag since they are embellished with some beautiful floral designs. You may have other stores you frequent that use brown bags with some type of design that would make your creations more interesting…Trader Joe’s, as an example.
Once I got started with this, I realized I could create a number of posts…I had so many ideas! But, I limited my creations to seven. Here is the bag I started with:
This first item I made is a place card. I used a piece of cardboard from the bottom of the bag and glued some of the bag onto the front and back. Then, I rounded the corners and stamped a name onto the front of the card. Anchoring it into a piece of driftwood gave it the perfect finishing touch!
Wrapping paper is an obvious use for the bags and here I used a bag as wrapping… in combination with some pretty forest green ribbon and a natural twig pencil (both from Terrain):
Cutting a bag into strips and weaving the strips together suggests a wealth of possible items…here, I created a basket with some woven strips. I also used the handle of the Terrain bag as an accent on the edges and shredded (in my home shredder) some of the tissue to create the filling. I was even able to utilize a piece of Terrain ribbon that was used on one of the bags I received from the store.
For the next use, I created a pretty utensil holder using a bag, a bag handle, and a paper punch:
If you read my Valentine post, you know I made Valentine treat containers…I love to make treat containers for any occasion. Here, I printed this beautiful vintage rabbit image I found on The Graphics Fairy onto the bag…I cut a piece of the bag and fed it through my home printer. Then, I used my sewing machine to create a beautiful treat container. This one contains jelly beans…the container needs to be ripped open to discover the contents! Fun, right?
Here is another Terrain bag…notice the green stitching on the bottom of the bag and the cut out handle…
I was able to utilize the stitching and the flower description on the back of the bag in creating a couple different variations of a bookmark. The one with the stitching also utilized the handle from another bag:
I embraced the style of bag for the dry erase board I created. I simply framed the bag. I love how the opening for the handle serves as a place to write ‘notes.’
So, these are some of my creations made from repurposed brown bags…a great way to serve the environment. I hope you will be inspired to create some repurposed projects of your own :)
Thanks for visiting!
Remember to take pleasure in simple things, Jackie
I am sharing at Little Red House, Pinch of Joy, Craftberry Bush, Common Ground, The Shabby Nest, and Coastal Charm.
