DIY Painted T-Shirts

I got so excited last night watching The Antonio Treatment, that I started yelling for Scott to come check it out. They were spraying t-shirts with our Tulip Fashion Spray for the kids to wear as smocks at the Hollywood Boys & Girls Club. They looked amazing as you can see here.



The renovation was unbelievable as the crew transformed the art room into a fabulously functional and fun place for kids to come to.

Awesome!

Oh, and I grabbed my iPhone and took lots of pictures so you can see how cool the room looked when they were finished.











Come see me at Pattiewack.com!

Crystal Studded Stilettos

Any day is a good day for jazzing up a pair of high heels shoes, right? These gorgeous stilettos caught my eye at the payless shoe store, and were perfect for a wedding project we are doing here in the iLoveToCreate Design Studio.

They are so pretty just the way they are, and perfect for the budget-minded bride. BUT, think of the options, girl! With crystals and glitter at my fingertips, I really got carried away.

The heels are not covered in fabric, but some kind of leatherette, so instead of heat-setting I decided to grab the Liquid Fusion and get busy. I started by doing a polka dot of glue all over the heels, and then grabbed my Tulip Fashion Art Tweezers to pick up the largest crystals out of the adorable Tulip 300-pack Crystal carousel.

After those dried, I filled in the gaps with smaller crystals.

Turns out, that the carousel had just enough crystals to cover the heels.

The trick is, having those large crystals on there and letting the glue dry about an hour before you add all the rest. That way they don't move around like a big mudslide!

Of course, I had to glitter them. The Tulip Fashion Glitter Bond went on very smoothly with the little applicator that comes in the kit. I pretty much covered one side at a time with glitter bond and then sprinkled them solidly with Multi Ultra Fine Glitter is absolutely amazing, and looks so glamorous!

Not only are the perfect for a glam bride, but they are faulously fun for dancing at the reception!

CHA Summer Highlights

It's great to be back home after a long week in Chicago for the CHA Summer 2010 trade show, and the Craft Super Show. I am pooped, but happy with the success of the designs my team created for the iLoveToCreate booth.


All of the mannequins made it through shipping. I was so worried about the jewelry stand that I made, but it was still intact. (More about that later...)

Dr. McTacky made it too! He was there to take care of any glue emergencies.

The Chicago pizza was absolutely incredible. Scott and I were a little delirious after working our tushies off to assemble the booth with the iLoveToCreate team.



We had some crazy fun crafters come by to do make-it-take-its with the new Tulip Fashion Dye Kits.

We even had some male crafters, including this dude that made a bag for his mom. Sweet!

The Creative Juice hosts Cathie & Steve dropped by for a happy hug.

Margot Potter was stunning and chic in her incredible jewelry and gave me an autographed copy of her new book, "Bead Chic" !! I love it! I love the extreme jewelry, so head to the book store and check it out!

My Statement Necklace Workshops were filled with amazing people at the Super Show. They were a big hit! The Rorshach design was a huge aha moment and they loved all the bling you could get out of recycled pair of jeans, turned into a bib necklace.

Tiffany Windsor was a terrific host for her live web cam at the super show on COOL2CRAFT. We had a blast with everyone being on camera and covering the great crafts being made by the consumers in our booth.

The super show was wild with crafty frenzy. But we had fun!

Ahhh.... it was a good show, and my bathtub was my best friend.
I'll be posting about more of the projects to show how to use fashion embellishing products to their fullest!

Color Wheel Frame

I use my color wheel almost every single day at my job as a designer. And when I was creating a project for Hancock's project sheets recently, I was so excited to make this super simple but relevant frame for a mirror. I admit that the thread was a bit pricey, what with them being over a buck apiece, but it was worth it. I took my color wheel to the local Hancock's store and laid the spools of thread around it to color match. Fun! Then I ran over to Target to pick up a round mirror. Of course the perfect glue to use is the Aleene’s® Fast Grab™ Tacky Glue because it's kinda like hot glue in a bottle. Sets up really fast and holds just about anything to anything. I am hoping to steal it out of the photography studio and make it mine. You know, you could totally use spools out of your thread stash to make this.

Party Bubblewands

When I think of summer parties, I love to think that we are sitting around the pool and sipping sweet drinks and giggling. And to make the giggles, you need bubbles! I mean, really. What could be more fun than blowing bubbles with these cute little dainty bubblewands?

I took my Pattiewack Shrink Plastic and first covered the sheets with polka dots and swirls with silver and gold paint pens. You have to let the paint dry before you go to the next step. Then I just sketched a fast pattern for these darling wands. I laid my painted shrink plastic over the patterns and traced right onto the shrink plastic with a black Sharpie and cut them out. I also decided that they needed a cute little bow on the ends, so I punched a hole at the end of the wand with a hole punch.

Now, if you make these, be sure that you set your printer to make them as large as you can on a 8.5 x 11 sheet of paper, because they are going to shrink!!

I set my oven for 250 degrees and laid the cut-out wands on a brown paper sack on a cookie sheet. To be sure, this is an adult project cuz we don't want the kiddos messin' with the oven. Watch the shrink plastic curl up and then lay flat... it's magic! Everyone loves to watch.

Last of all I tied little bitty ribbon into bows on each of the cute Pattiewack Party Wands. To make a party statement, I poured my bubbles into crystal goblets and let the guests dunk their wands and let the bubbles begin!

Happy summer, everyone!

CHA Summer Sneak Peek

I've been working along with the iLoveToCreate designers, on the booth for the CHA Summer Trade Show. I just couldn't help myself when I took a few sneaky-peeky photos of some of the wild and wacky and fabulous projects that show how to use the Aleene's glues. As you know, I'm a glue fiend, and I did an extreme sculpture with an old mannequin, fabric, a table, a recycled veggie steamer, and more things than you'd care to read here in a list. One of our freelance designers made this cool piece of jewelry with the brown bag technique, that I glued to my sculpture as an earring. Of course, there's some outrageous amount of glitter, and my signature zippers. After the show, I'll be able to post the full photo of my creation.

My fellow designer Allee, and I did this statement necklace for our showstopping mannequin. She designed these beautiful robin's blue eggs with of all things, cornstarch and glue and 3-D fashion paint. I love it! We were inspired by the Miley Cyrus video where she can't be tamed. Woot woot! Or should I say, tweet tweet!

Steampunk Jewelry Caddy

I was in the grocery store yesterday, picking up the latest Crafts N'Things magazines, when I thumbed through and saw the latest iLoveToCreate ad campaign for Aleene's adhesives, and low and behold there I was!


I had totally forgotten about the project that I made and the photo shoot, as we do them about 6 months out.

When I found out that I was doing the ad, I was totally excited because the product was Liquid Fusion, and I knew I could really do an industrial-strength-mondo project, since the glue is hard core.

I'd been dying to use this paper mache dress form and I had the idea to turn it into a jewelry caddy. So I went to the hardware store to find things to pimp it out. I found this aluminum vent cover for the base and while I was there, I picked up a roll of the thinnest aluminum flashing. I don't know what normal people use it for, but the minute I saw it, I knew it was going to be perfect to cut into a flirty metal skirt. I also grabbed 2 metal drapery tie-backs and a wooden finial. I didn't have a clear image in my mind, but I just knew I liked them.

Since I'm crazy about the steampunk trend, I decided to use old watches, metals, leather, and hardware to glue to the dress form. The drapery tie-backs made great arms for hanging jewelry, and the finial was perfect to mount at the top for holding bangle bracelets. I glued cup hooks around the waist to hold my rings.

To soften the whole look of the jewelry caddy, I cut strips of fabric and starched them heavily with spray starch, and glued the fabric loops underneath the metal skirt. I love how it turned out, and hope you like it too.

For the instructions to make your own version of my jewelry caddy, go to the iLoveToCreate website for all the details.

Patio Party Lights

My patio lights were so simple, and believe it or not, they were super inexpensive to make. I found the paper lanterns at Pier I and they are easy to hang anywhere with the light kits that double as the hanger.

I simply took Aleene's Crystal Clear Tacky Spray glue and adhered circles of polka dotted and plaid tissue paper to the white lanterns to jazz'em up.

I couldn't leave them alone, and just had to add ribbon streamers to the bottoms. Love it!

Eclipse Saga/Twilight Jewelry Box

If you are a Twilight fan, and can't wait for Eclipse to premier on June 30th, you'll love this jewelry box with the hidden photo of Edward and Bella that I decoupaged on the inside with Collage Pauge.


I took discarded mannequin hands and glued them to the top of the box after I painted it and rubbed a bit of silver paint on the edges. I glued metalic beads to the bottom with Liquid Fusion


I covered a glass apple that I found at the Dollar Store (yeah, the DOllar StOrE!) with Tulip® Glam-It-Up!™ Iron-On Crystals™. I know, they're for ironing to fashions, but they were just what I needed to make the apple look like it mysteriously fell from a mystical world to the feet of Bella.

I love how it turned out, and how great the apple glued into the center of the hands.

Statement Necklace

Patio Party Lights

It's that time of year again, and I'm ready to move my wicker loveseat and chairs to the patio, pour a glass of light wine, and dine with my friends. But I need a pretty little light to bring a bit of ambience to the party.

This patio party light was much easier than it looks. I found the cup and saucer at the thrift store. I had the flat glass stones and the wired beads. And the copper pipe and cap came from the hardware store. Love it!

Here's the project instructions to print out and make yours:

Patio Party Light Supplies:

• Ceramic or glass cups and saucers
• Copper pipe, 3 feet long
• Copper cap
• 2-part Epoxy
• Adhesive gel
• Flat glass stones
• Buttons
• Figurine
• Beaded wire
• Alcohol
• Paper towel
• Paper plate
• Craft stick

Steps:

1. Clean cup and saucers with alcohol and paper towel.
2. Glue the cup to the saucer with adhesive gel. Embellish with buttons, stones, and figurine with adhesive gel. Let set according to the glue label.
3. Mix the 2-part epoxy on paper plate with craft stick, according to the label.
4. Turn the cup and saucer over and apply the epoxy in the center of the saucer bottom. Apply epoxy to the copper cap. Press the cap onto the saucer. Let set according to the epoxy label.
5. When the glue is set, position the copper cap to the end of the copper pipe.
6. Wind beaded wire through the cup handle and down the length of the pipe.
7. Push the pipe into the ground, and add tea lights, bird seed or fresh water.

Happy Easter Everyone

Confetti Easter Eggs

Easter gatherings are always a fabulous time to be with family and friends. And if you're looking for something to craft, this is ideal. I made these gorgeous confetti eggs that look beautiful placed inside the paper cones on a bed of shredded tissue.
The eggs are so pretty until you bust them on someone's head and they explode with confetti! Kids love'em and I love'em and adults will love'em too. Confetti eggs, also called cascarones, are a Mexican tradition for Easter as well as other holidays. A cascaron is an egg that is decorated much like an Easter egg and then filled with confetti. Cascarones are broken over the head for good luck.

For complete instructions and a supply list, go to iLoveToCreate.com and you'll be on your way to a fun day!