Sometimes these Home Sweet Home projects really only need a little updating to make them work. With that in mind I remade my old eyelash holder, check out the original tutorial here.
So after a good few years my eyelash storage solution was looking a little worse for wear. It really needed the tape replaced but I figured that I would give it a completely update while I was here anyway.
While I was at it I did some very much needed maintenance and cleaned/sorted/chucked my old lashes.
The new version was done in the same paper that my doors are covered in with light eyelet lace.
I filmed doing it so if I’ve edited it by the time this goes live I’ll include the video here too ^_^
It’s amazing how much a little change like this brightens up the room though!
Sometimes ideas are good the way they are, they just need a little update to perfect them for a new space 😀
One of the things I keep stressing to myself when doing these Home Sweet Home projects is that functional doesn’t have to mean ugly and that was my main point in this mini project for our bathroom soaps dispensers.
The diary page:
I hate ugly bathroom stuff but good products often come in ugly packages.
This is another easy solution! Decent, good projects into pretty bottles.
Never give up function for beauty, you can have both!
So let’s get started.
It’s not a complicated concept, I’m just rebottling the products we buy often into prettier packages.
I had these two matching MOR bottles, one with lotion and one with body wash. They were the perfect size for the bathroom soaps and actually matched.
So I poured the bodywash into another container to use in the shower:
And the lotion too. This was a very thick lotion, so get it out I held a plastic bag around the bottle and shook it all out.
Then I cut a hole in the tip and piped it into another bottle to use later.
This is the kind of activity you should have some fun with XD
Repurposed shampoo bottles for the win! I’m going to decorate these later too.
After washing and drying them out it was just a matter of pouring the new products in.
Done! Matching and pretty 😀
Now of course you could just buy matching bottles, or only buy products which come in pretty bottles but the whole point of Home Sweet Home is that I want to use up things I have in new ways, I am on a strict budget so I don’t want to waste stuff like this! There’s no point for me to buy new things when I can just jazz up the old ones!
Stay tuned because I’m almost ready to reveal the first completed room in the project and it’s the bathroom. Can’t wait to show you the before and after photos!
This craft project was really inspired by James. Our conversation went something like this:
Violet: I have all this string, what should I do with it?
James: *inappropriate suggestion not fit for the internet*
Violet: -_-‘ I meant a craft project!
James: That could be considered a craft project…
Violet: What about something for around the home?
James: How about some kind of nautical home accessories? Like to hold flowers or candles or something?
Violet: Holding candles in flammable string might not be a great idea but sure let’s see how that goes!
This was the pile of string I was trying to be inspired by:
Now if this had been a particularly lazy day I would have said “I know, I’ll make a scale model of the flying spaghetti monster. Oh look, I’m done!”… but I wanted something slightly more challenging. I thought of doing something bathroom-ish because that’s where nautical rope themed things seem to end up but it really didn’t fit how I wanted my bathroom to end up looking. In the end I settled on a basic container which could be used for pretty much whatever.
The process is extremely simple:
Get string, make a spiral out of the string and hot glue as you go.
The finished base:
Once you have the base make a spiral going up. If you’re concerned it’s not looking straight you can put a cup or something in the middle to hold the shape better while you glue.
I did two strands at once because my rope was all tangly.
Done. Yep that’s it.
And once finished the only problem was that it still really didn’t go with anything in our house XD
But if your house is more this kind of theme, it’s an extremely quick project to do!
You could hold pens in it or something?
And to please James here’s what it looks like with a candle. Very pretty but also very flammable and, you know, probably melty because of the hot glue so I don’t suggest doing this at all!
Almost 3 years ago now on Twitter Miss Esme and the Laneway asked me if I had any ideas on how to store belts in a more organised way. At the time I didn’t own any belts but I do actually remember these things XD
So 3 years later here we are hahaha!
Living in an apartment with very limited storage space means having to find ways to display things as well as store them neatly. I collect scarves and now I have a decent collection of belts to my name as well so it was time to do something useful with them rather than hiding them in a drawer which could be used for better things.
The solution: commandeer a suit pants clothes hanger and arrange the belts and scarves in one easy to hang area!
The belts are looped through the top 2 tiers with the decorations pointing out. This means they can be easily removed and put back without disturbing the others on the rack. The long parts hang at the back so they are hidden.
The scarves have two rows as well but because there are more of them I hang the least used ones on top and most used on bottom. There’s another row below it to use when I collect more too. Let the scarf obsession continue! They too can be removed easily without disturbing the others.
Previous to this solution I’ve tried out many other ways to store them including making a hanger rack but none of them worked so generally the belts would just end up dumped on the end of my clothes rack.
… or more realistically on a pile on the floor 😉
This solution is much prettier but more importantly it’s practical too which is really what the Home Sweet Home project is all about! One more thing done, only the rest of the house to go haha!
It’s funny, making the little changes like this seems to inspire me a lot more than making the big changes. I’m sure that will change when I get to the really big stuff like the couches but these things keep me happy in the mean time!
A little while ago my friend Kim was nice enough to give me this cute bow shaped pencil case for my birthday. So cute!
I realised when she gave it to me that I had a big bow at home in my craft pile that came off a really cute bag which I’d accidentally spilled a drink on. I thought why not make a matching bigger version to keep even more pencils in!
And here they are together!
You could easily do this tutorial just with some spare fabric you have though.
This is the bow I started with.
I used:
Velcro
Ribbon
Needle and thread
Glue gun
First thing was taking it apart so it wasn’t joined up in the middle anymore.
I unpicked all of the stitching in the middle.
Then restitched it up the bottom, it wouldn’t be a very useful pencil case if they all just fell out the bottom haha!
So this is what I was left with.
I stitched the back pieces together as well.
At this point it was basically a big pouch.
Then on each side I folded the pleats up individually and stitched them together so they are held in place.
Next was creating something to hold the middle in place and hide the ugly marks from the original stitching. I only had thin ribbon rather than the thick stuff so I used 3 layers of it.
It was easier to just glue this than stitch because of the thick fabric. So two lots first:
Then one in the middle to cover the gaps.
And the ends were folded into the middle and glued in place.
Last thing to do is find a way to keep it closed. I didn’t have a zip the right colour so I used velcro. I snipped the middle so it would curve and follow the natural line of the bow.
After being glued in place it looked like this:
Not too bad!
Then it was just a matter of filling it with some more pencils!
Not quite big enough to fit all of my copic markers but maybe I’ll make a gigantic one!
This is the story of how I made our new headboard out of $7 of plastic sheeting and some pillows.
Now it looks like this 😀 😀 😀
And before it looked like this…
No Home Sweet Home page, I’m really behind on those >_<So my old bed was ok but it really didn’t match the rest of the changes I’d made to the bedroom. Meeeeh.
You need:
Plastic board, I used 4 sheets
Pillow cases/fabric
Stuffing/old pillow
Buttons
Glue gun
We rent so obviously I couldn’t screw anything to the walls nor could I afford a new bed frame so instead I made one that just slotted in.
This is the kind of plastic board I used, it was from Bunnings.
I taped it all together into one big piece.
And cut it down so it was the right width and height to slot in behind the bed.
Then James and I sat down on the bed and traced around ourselves to work out how big I needed to make the curve so we could still lean on it comfortably.
We filled them in to be terrible drawings of ourselves… because we’re awesome.
Then we added in some love messages because we’re smoopy like that. And now when I lean against the headboard I always think about how much I love him!
So classy!
Aaaaaaanyway….
I drew on the design of the headboard making sure to leave room for James’ abs.
And the other side too.
Then I cut it out.
To save time later I drew the placement of where the buttons would eventually go. To make sure they were even I made a grid with a fancy thing called a ruler 😀
Then I poked holes through with a pair of scissors.
Now for the design! We managed to get a doona (duvet) cover for $40 on sale at Target and it came with pillow cases. I wanted different pillow cases so I decided to use them on the headboard instead. Luckily the pattern matched up.
I opened them out so there was enough fabric to cover the whole thing. It didn’t reach the bottom but that really didn’t matter because it would be covered up by the actual bed.
Now it was time for the fun part: pillow stuffing.
I emptied an old pillow all over the plastic.
And hot glued it in place. I didn’t have too much stuffing so when I have money for more I’ll be buying some and opening it up and restuffing.
Kinda looks like a big cloud 😀
Once it was fluffy I laid out the fabric and hot glued it along the bottom to the plastic.
I then made sure there were no wrinkles and slowly went around the edge hot gluing it around the back side. It was very important to pull it tight. It was also important not to burn myself. I only managed to do one of those things though.
While gluing the edges I made sure to put stuffing over them too so the fabric didn’t show the sharp edges of the plastic.
Taadaaa…
It started looking more like something useful at this point! And James said he doubted I could make it work!!!
And the back. I reinforced it with some off cuts to make sure it didn’t bend.
Close ups of glue…
And this is it slotted in the bed:
The last step is to add in the buttons. At first I tried to make my own buttons by covering more plastic but that was extremely tedious so instead I got off my butt and bought some nicer ones 😀
To hold them in place at the back I used some cardboard off cuts cut like this. I threaded each button, stitched it through the hole leaving the ends both out the back of the hole then tied them around the piece of cardboard so they were kept in place. Hard to explain but it works. It’s very important to keep the buttons as tight as possible so they make nice dents in the fabric.
Like this:
The buttons pucker the fabric through the padding.
And that’s it!
I am extremely happy with how this turned out. While it’s not the most professional thing in the world it brightens the room up beautifully, matches all my new decorating and it was extremely cheap.
What do you guys think? I think the Home Sweet Home project is starting to come along nicely~
Illustrator. Strong tea, knitting, watercolours, and making a video game called Moonlight in Garland. Living with her adorable husband Jimmy, fluffy puppy Miss Lottie and Bergamot Bunny in Melbourne, Australia.
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