Crayon Monograms (with Tutorial)

**Update**
(as of 12/8/13)

I am NOW able to make custom templates!
(see instructions at end of tutorial)
However, I am in college full time, so during finals and midterm weeks, I will NOT be making any, but I will do them when midterms/finals are over, so please allow enough time for me to get them done.  Thanks for understanding!

Finished Project!

I found this cute project on Testosterone Times Three and knew I had to make it for my daughter's teachers.
I found some Shadowbox Frames at Walmart for about $8.00 each.

The 8x8 size was perfect.

Using Microsoft Word I made a template and printed it out for each teacher. 

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At the end of the tutorial I have included a link to download each specific letter (A-Z) from Google Documents. You MUST download the files to view the large monogram and fonts correctly (The fonts do NOT look right UNTIL they are downloaded). The fonts used are Batang (for the initial) and Lucinda Handwriting (for the script name).

I have also started a Flickr group.  For those of you who make the Crayon Monograms, I would *LOVE* it if you would post your picture in the group.  It's also my first group on Flickr, so let me know if you are having any problems with it.

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I had lots of crayons saved from the start of the school year (bought at .25 each) and dumped those out to use.
I found that if I poked a hole in the crayon with my exacto knife, that the crayon broke cleanly

and right where I wanted it to.

I printed out a 'test' sheet on plain copy paper and then lined up my crayons the way I wanted, before gluing anything.
Then I printed out my 'good' copy on a thick ivory cardstock.

I filled in my monogram letter with tacky glue and started transferring the crayons. I put tacky glue on some of the crayons directly. I didn't use a hot glue gun, because I always seem to get the "spiderweb" effect. Tacky glue also has a longer drying time, which is a benefit with this project in case you need to move a few crayons around.

I also made sure to break my crayons in long enough lengths so they covered my printed monogram.

I let them dry overnight and then put them in the frame.

I think they turned out perfect!

Hannah wrote a note to each teacher, which I laminated and put on the back of each frame.

The best part was that the teachers LOVED them!

Here is a new picture from Dawn who made an 'S'

Many have asked how to create the 'S' since it's so curvy!

I hope this helps :)

Here are the downloads from A-Z.  These are all made to fit the 8x8 Shadowbox frame from Walmart.

Try the download FIRST, if you can't get it to work or are not computer savvy, then leave a comment WITH your email address, template letter and name OR you can email me at lisainnevada@gmail(dot)com with the same information and I will make the template.

• Mrs. A
• Mrs. B
• Mrs. C
• Mrs. D
• Mrs. E
• Mrs. F
• Mrs. G
• Mrs. H
• Mrs. I
• Mrs. J
• Mrs. K
• Mrs. L
• Mrs. M
• Mrs. N
• Mrs. O
• Mrs. P
• Mrs. Q
• Mrs. R
• Mrs. S
• Mrs. T
• Mrs. U
• Mrs. V
• Mrs. W
• Mrs. X
• Mrs. Y
• Mrs. Z

Scrabble Tile Pendants

Scrabble Tile Pendants

I decided to have Hannah made some Scrabble Tile Pendants for her brothers for Christmas. We decided to do Shaving Cream Art and pick our design from the finished picture.

Here is our finished art for Ernest's pendant.

Then I took a piece of cardstock and cut out a scrabble sized rectangle. We moved the hole around the picture until Hannah found a spot she wanted to use for the pendants.

Then we traced inside the rectangle and cut about 1" around it.

Here's our leftovers to recycle.

Here is the piece we are keeping. You want some around the edges so you can work with it easier.
Using tacky glue, glue your paper onto the scrabble tile and slice off the extra pieces of paper using an exacto knife.

Then we followed the tutorial from Make and Takes to get our finished product! The 1st two are for Hannah's brothers and the last one is for her!
And of course. the backside.

Recycled Crayons

Recycled Crayons!

Crafty Dasies has a great tutorial on making recycled crayons. I already had a box of crayons that had an unfortunate accident,

and even more crayons that are the the larger (aka baby) size that my daughter won't use anymore. Perfect for making recycled crayons!

1. Using an exacto knife (or a 3 year old), take the wrapping off all of your crayons and break them into 1/2" to 1" pieces.

2. Option 1: Put "like color" crayon pieces into a mini muffin tin and bake at 275 for 6-8 minutes.

3. Option 2: Put "like color" crayon pieces into a microwave safe cup/mug and heat for 30 seconds to 2 minutes, depending on how many crayon pieces you have in the mug. When it's melted, pour into a cute shaped ice cube tray or candy mold. I found my snowman and santa ones at Deseret Industries for .50 each. Don't use ones that you love or paid a lot of money for, because mine broke when I pulled it out of the freezer.

4. After the crayons come out of the oven, let them sit on the counter for a while, and then put them in the freezer for about 30 minutes. They should just pop out of the molds and you've got some great recycled crayons for little artists!

Put them in a gift tin with some tissue paper and you're ready to go!

Aren't these snowmen so cute!!! I love them!!

For the snowmen, I found a tin that fit the 8 colors perfectly and had some room to spare for a few sheets of blank paper (rolled up and tied) for coloring. This one is for my nephew :)

Here's just a couple of "crazy" santas we did with the extra melted crayons.

Cleanup was pretty easy too. We just soaked our mugs that we melted the crayons in, for about 30 minutes, in hot soapy water. The crayons cleaned right off the mugs!

Quiet Book for Church

My Sister's Quiet/Busy Book

When my (very active) sister was little, my mom made her this cute quiet book to keep her busy at church. Now my sister is all grown up and has a (very active) son of her own. I decided to refurbish her quite book and give it to her son. The plastic bags were ripped and falling apart, so I ripped out the stitches, and replace the bags. Then I put some fun activities and crayons for her son to do. It's so nice to still have this great book that my mom made. Hopefully it will be in the family for quite a while!

Here's the double stitching to hold the bags in place.

Here's a quick tutorial to make the book.

(I'm sorry this is a horrible tutorial, I'll make a better one when I sew my own bag. With lots of pictures!)

2 pieces of fabric 8 1/2 x 20

1 piece of lightweight batting 8 1/2 x 20

2 lengths of ribbon about 10" each

5-7 ziploc bags (Glad quart zipper bags work the best and look the nicest)

Optional: Sew ribbon, ric rac or lace to the front of the top piece.

Pin ribbon to inside of the fabric on the 8" ends about 4" up. One ribbon on each side, baste if needed. Place fabrics wrong sides together, with batting on the outside of one piece. Sew (seam allowances 1/4") all sides together, leaving about 3" on a 20" side for turning. Clip corners and turn right side out. Press and either top stitch edges or slipstich 3" opening closed. Fold and press bag so that it measures 9.75 x 8. Slip 5-7 bags into folded bag and double stitch on folded end, about 1/2" in. Fill with crayons, paper, snacks, etc.

Emergency Pocket Kit

Emergency Pocket Kit

Cost for unfilled kit - $1.24 each + tax

1 Wal-Mart Potholder (2 pack for $1.50) - .75
8 Snack Sized Ziploc Bags (100 for $2.68) - .24 (.03 each)
1 yard of ¼” or 3/8” Ribbon - .25

This is a cute little emergency kit that I saw in an Etsy shop. It was such a cute and simple idea that I thought I'd make a few for Christmas this year. It was easy, except that the Ziploc bags are really slippery!

1. Take tag off potholder.

2. Tape 4 bags together, and then another 4 bags together. This picture is just 1 set of 4 bags. You will need 2 different sets.

3. Overlap ends of bags together about 1/4" to 1/2", alternating sides.

4. Pin bags down to potholder (see photo). The pins work just fine if you just stick them straight down into the potholder. Just like you would use a thumbtack. Be careful, pins do leave holes!!

5. Sew Ziplocs onto potholder down the center of the Ziploc.
6. Attach 18” of ribbon (folded in half) to one side of potholder.
7. Optional: Sew ribbon down center of Ziplocs to cover stitching. Here are 2 examples. One with the optional ribbon and one without.
8. Fill with items of your choice (Band-Aids, wet wipes, medicine, Kleenex, safety pins, cough drops, toilet seat cover, etc)

Reusable (Recycle) Grocery Bags

My favorite bag

My Reusable (Recycle) Grocery Bags are finally done! The original idea came from Elizabeth Kartcher and this post of hers.

Here is my fabric that I bought from Joann's.

These are my bags. I bought them (wholesale) through our work so they were only $2.50 a bag. They are Port and Company brand which you can also purchase at Amazon.com. Bags measures 13w x 15.5h x 7d. I couldn't find any black bags like the ones I was trying to copy, so I bought these instead.

The bags are very sturdy and hold 2 gallons of milk side by side.

I used this pattern and enlarged it by 129%. Then I cut out the arrows in each color of fabric. Make sure the fabric is NOT right sides together. All the fabric must be facing the same way or you will have arrows facing the wrong way (I learned that the hard way). The arrows measure approximately 7" x 3 1/2", so you can get 12 arrows on a 1/4 of a yard of 45" fabric. (I'm still not sure why I bought 2 yards of each color!!)

I placed the arrows on each bag approximately 3" down from the top of the bag, and 2" in on each side. I tried holding the arrows down with pins, but that did work too well, so I used some temporary fabric glue to hold them down. I am sure heat and bond will work just as well.

Here's all the bags ready to be sewn! I stiched about 1/8" to 1/4" around the edges of the arrows. It took me about 10-15 minutes to sew each one (I made 10 bags total).

Here's a couple of my favorite color combinations.

Now I just need to go grocery shopping with them!