Dress This Mess > 2 Minute / $4 upgrade

We all have them: dollar store vases. 

You probably started off with one or two but then they had somehow multiplied like spring bunnies into 5 or more in your cupboard. (how DOES that happen?!) But before you send them out for adoption at your local goodwill, take a look at my cheap and glam upgrade!

I grabbed two different height candle pedestals  from my local Walmart for only a total of $5, and one candle holder from my dusty garage. Then I borrowed a tube of silicone adhesive from the Hubby. You could also use any kind of strong, water proof, adhesive.

Next, place one dollar store vase on top of one of the pedestals. You will want to try and find the most level position before applying the glue, which may require lots of turning and standing back to see which is the most level position. (Note: they won't be perfectly level but find a happy imperfect medium-just like in life, right?!) Once you’ve found the sweet spot, make a mark on the pedestal and bottom of vase so that you can line it up when its time to glue.

Wipe the bottom of the vase and the pedestal free from dust and grime and try not to judge yourself over the amount of dust that has accumulated....hey- living fabulously doesn’t leave a lot of time for dusting!

Then take your silicone adhesive and spread a thick bead of glue all around the lip of the pedestal. Line up your marks on your vase and pedestal and place together. Apply some pressure for a couple of minutes and then let it sit for a couple of hours.

Next you are ready to accessorize your vase! Add some small river rock and a herb plant for a fragrant window sill bouquet. Or add the plant that your sweet husband bought you for Valentine's Day. (But for the love of decorating, don't leave the tacky plastic pot on it like I did!)

Or add some fruit, real - or not. These could be great for entertaining too!

How about some great Spring decor?

Now give yourself a hug for being so crafty chic for so cheap!

p.s. Check out this similar high priced version from every one's favorite, Pottery Barn (or as my son reads it, giggling: potty barn):

Recycled Glass Footed Vase - $59.00

Feeling preeeettty proud of yourself right now aren’t you?! You're Welcome.

~Angela

Dress This Mess > Get Out Of My House

I know I said that January should be SOUP month instead of GO (Get Organized) month like all the magazines are calling it but . . . . I take it back, it should be called GO as in "GET OUT" of my house.  Call me fickle.  I have a bunch of stuff at my house that I need to get rid of.  Not get rid of, as in throw away, but as in use for it's original purpose or reinvent it into something else that's usable.


Number 1 on my list is this cool chair:

This chair was originally bought at a yard sale for pennies and was dressed up in fabulous 1960's green tweed, which I quickly recovered in a sunny yellow print.  In its' next reincarnation, it was remade in blue with an adorable helicopter pillow for my oldest grandson's room; which went with the airplane theme he had at the time.  It was then rehomed back to my house when his mama updated his room decor.  It had a cozy little spot in my toy/reading nook upstairs --- but then I got the GIANT elliptical and I had to shrink the toy/book area so that I could fit in that instrument of torture lovely piece of exercise equipment.  Now I have redesigned the back pillow to fit in with the little boys western themed room.  And FINALLY, once again, it is out of my home.  Whew! Was that TMI?! That chair has had more lives than Shirley MacLaine...


Check it out - don't worry no steers were hurt in the making of this pillow (some Naughas were - although I've never seen a Naugahyde).


I know you're thinking, "I heard appliqueing is difficult and time consuming and takes an expert seamstress," but this is Chaos & Gloss's quick, easy and smart version, or "Smeazy" for short. Smart because, probably like a lot of you readers out there, I'm not an expert seamstress but yet I want to make something that looks great. 


 Lets take a closer look at the helicopter  pillow because those Naughas are really shiny creatures.  This looks pretty good for being nine years old.

Anyone can make a pillow like this in any type of basic silhouette.  The steer silhouette is easy to make as it is a one color silhouette.  The helicopter was also easy although a little bit more involved as it is a 4 color pattern.  


Materials:

• Fabric for Pillow
• Fabric for Silhouette
• Sewing Machine
• Good Scissors - You really need a good sharp scissors as this is probably the most important part of the pillow making.  If  you mess up on this part you might have to start over.
• Pattern - You can make your own by finding a silhouette of whatever you want by doing an image search on the internet.  Kids coloring books also are a good source of basic images.  I used my printer to resize the pattern and taped it together for the perfect size for my pillow.

Directions:

• Decide what size you want your pillow to be.  Cut your front and back fabric to size.  Don't forget to add in your seam allowance, I used 1/2".  Set the back fabric aside.
• Cut your other fabrics a little larger than the silhouette.  Stack fabrics right sides up, with your main pillow fabric on top.  If you are using more than one fabric, stack the fabric under the main pillow fabric in descending order, from smallest cuts to largest cuts.  For example, on the helicopter, I stacked the fabric starting with top layer of blue fabric (main pillow fabric), then yellow fabric used in rotors, then black for base, then blue for windshield, and then the red for the body of helicopter. 
• Pin your paper pattern to top of the fabric stack you just put together.  Sew around outline.  See photo below, the arrow points to the stitched outline.
• Slowly tear off paper pattern.  Here's a tip:  Use light weight paper - it will tear off a lot easier.  I had a heavier copy paper in my printer and I also didn't cut away the overlaps when I put the two pieces together.  

• Now comes the cutting part.  The steer was fairly simple because I only had one color below.  Lift your top fabric away from the next fabric and cut inside the stitching of your silhouette.  If you are using a multi-color pattern, make sure know which parts will be which fabric.  On the helicopter, I cut the rotors first by lifting the blue fabric up and making a little snip, then carefully cutting away the blue fabric on the inside of the rotor outlines, leaving the rotors showing the yellow fabric below.  Next came the black base.  For this I cut through the blue fabric and the yellow fabric.  To cut the windshield I cut through the blue, yellow and black fabric and for the body; I cut through the blue, yellow, black and pale blue fabric.  The cutting is really the most detailed part and you want to cut slowly and carefully, being sure not to cut through your stitching or getting to close to the stitching.  I left about 1/4" of fabric around the stitching.
• Put your pillow front (with your silhouette) and pillow back fabric together, right sides together.  Stitch around three sides, leaving one side open for stuffing. 
• Turn right side out.
• Fill with stuffing.
• Stitch bottom edge closed.
• Now pour yourself a big glass of wine or iced tea and let out the breath you've been holding for an hour.

I should have named this post, "The Longest Post Ever."  Honestly, it took me longer to write this post than it did to make the pillow. Do not let this post intimidate you!  Anyone can make these pillows, including you!

I was going to share some more great "GO" projects that I did this weekend but I will share those on another day.


-Laurie

Dress This Mess > Wall Art

Today's post is about original art work for your wall, what to put on a large wall, recycling book pages, and a novel idea on how to frame canvas art.  

But what I really want to talk about is Hostess filing for bankruptcy.  Not Ho Hos and Ding Dongs, say it's not true.  Okay, I'm done crying - back to your originally scheduled program.

Check out this original art work hanging on the 2Wicked's wall.

The Future Mrs. 2Wicked (FM2W) is quite the artist and she made this for her future husband one year for Christmas because he had a large blank wall to fill and I think she wanted to class him up a little.

It is four canvases of different sizes overlapped and put together (screwed together on the back) to make one large canvas.   FM2W painted a tree trunk and branches and then for that touch of something extra, she made the leaves out of old book pages instead of painting them.

Let's get closer:

The large canvas looked great hanging there, but it really needed a finishing touch, like putting on your jewelry after you dress.  That's what the frame is to this canvas.  Now for the novel way to frame the artwork.  After hanging the canvas, Mr. 2Wicked used molding to make a frame but attached it to the wall, leaving about 1 1/2" all around between the canvas and the molding.  Doesn't it look great?!!  Okay I'm winging the part of how much space he left between the canvas and the frame, once again no one likes phone calls at 6am, maybe it's only one inch, or two inches, or an 1 1/4".  

No one get your panties in a bunch over the destruction of books.  This is really about Recycling, Reusing, & Repurposing.  There are a lot of books out there that would be going nowhere but to the landfill if we didn't use them.  The book I'm currently using looks like this:






Want to see something funny:

This book doesn't have a copyright date, I guess they didn't do that back in the day for textbooks; but the first person to use this book got it in what looks like July of 1959.  I was almost two years old and really they were going to school in July?  The last person that signed the book cover was some girl who apparently was "stacked."  Too funny!

Okay, back on track - 




I already used some of these pages to make my Mama's 81st Birthday Banner.








Some things that I'm working on using this pages are:

Watch for future posts.


Everyone go out and buy some Hostess Twinkies to show your support - that's where I'm going.


-Laurie

Dress This Mess > Baby Nursery Wall Decor

Happy Hallooooweeeen Everyone - Yup, today is the day your kids have been waiting for.  That's all they'll be thinking of is candy, candy, candy.  Here at the Glossy Flossy's we have our eye on Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas - that's right I'm a cyclops, but just for today cause it's Halloween.  
While keeping my eye on those three things I'm helping another Mrs. Glossy Flossy with a baby shower she is showering a friend with.  Yes, you heard me, there is another Mrs. Glossy Flossy who is talented and looooves to entertain, and yes it apparently is the year for babies.  
Remember the shower the future Mrs. 2Wicked gave for her sister and I said I would show you the wall decor that we made for the nursery - well here it is.

The inspiration for these silhouettes was the fabric that I spoke of before that I don't have a pic of and again it is 6am so no one is going to take a pic for me (I might get more organized at some point - but today is not the day.)  FM2W actually did all the work on these, I only provided technical support.

We picked out scrapbook paper that went with the nursery decor made by FM2W's momma, then found images of safari animals on the internet and sized them to fit the IKEA frames.  Printed silhouettes of animals out and FM2W traced it onto the scrapbook paper and cut them out.  The ostrich is actually scanned from the fabric used in the nursery.  A large frame with a large silhouette makes quite the impact. They turned out great and the possibilities are endless.  If your nursery theme is planes, trains, and automobiles you could use those silhouettes or how about cowboys, horses and steers.  For girls how about ballerinas and ...., I've got nothing else.  I don't have any girl grandbabies and I can't think of anything except boy stuff.


Note:  Photographing frames with glass is tricky and beyond our capabilities so we had to have FM2W's momma photograph them (she also photographed the shower.)  A big thanks goes out to her.  My suggestion is to photograph without the glass in the frame.
-Laurie

Dress This Mess > Spooktacular Halloween Decor

If my kids had their way, our house would be "Halloweened" all year round. The chorus of "Can we decorate?" usually starts somewhere towards the end of August. In an effort to NOT give the neighbors the impression that we worship anybody other than the big G, I try to hold them off until the last weekend in September. After that, It's game on, or should I say, ghoul on. Oh, come on. That was funny! Here's some ideas to steal for your own Halloween haunt:

A flock of bats:

Use a bat template (download here) and trace onto a folded piece of black cardstock. Then find yourself some bored minions to do all your bidding bat cutting for you. I find that you get great results from them when bribed with dessert...

Add some fun spooky accessories and you have yourself a cool, bat flocked mirror. Feels very Edgar Allen Poe, doesn't it?

Or how about a little scare for your guests as a creepy skeleton peers out from what looks like an ordinary mirror?

You too can do this by taking a cheap mirror and removing the paper backing. First print out your image and decide where you want to place it on the mirror. Next, turn the mirror over and use a razor blade to gently and slowly scrape off the finish from the back of the mirror. Keep checking the position and how the picture looks from the front as you do this. You don't want to completely remove all of the finish from one spot, just remove enough that you can just barely make out an image, as you are peering at the mirror from the front. Once you have the desired effect, tape the image to the back and hang for a great Halloween effect.

Another great and easy way to spookify your home, is to take simple tablecloths and sheets and drape them over your furniture to give it that "abandoned" look.

You can even use it as a fun, Halloween party photo op!

Another great Halloween decorating tip to get the most bang for your holiday decorating buck is by checking out the dollar stores. All the big stores carry fun and pricey decor this time of year, but the dollar store has all the same stuff for, well, only a dollar!

Check out what you can do:

Lots more to come, keep checking back. Happy decorating!

~Angela

Frock Me Friday > Stripe Me Pretty!

Anyone who knows me, knows that I LOVE line patterns. I love them on the horizontal, on the vertical, zigzagged, herringboned, chevroned. I love them printed on a top, on a dress, across a wall, on a pillow, in the rain, on a train, on a boat, printed on a goat....(sorry. After three kids, Dr. Suess is embedded in the brain.), well, you get the picture right? I luuvve me some stripes.

So when Target announced that later in September they were debuting a new line with the fashion house Missoni; I practically ripped off a pretty striped painted toe nail, running to my computer to google some pics of the new line. Missoni is the king of line patterned fashion and I am the crazy president of their unofficial fan club. I'm kidding,(sorta) but their new line is no joke! Behold the striped frockness of my dreams:

I know this is a frock me post, but it would be a crime not to show you the other fun stuff in the rest of the line:

Exactly how wrong would it be to serve my family a nightly dinner of top ramen for a couple of months; just so I can ride around in the fall weather on my fabulous missoni bike, while wearing my adorable new missoni wellies???

I'll see you at Target on Sept 13th!
~Angela

Say Yes To.......

You will be envious when you see what I have.  Check out this side table that I bought at Costco – which just so happens to go quite nicely with my patio furniture.

The real reason I bought this table is because it has another function – a party function!!

Now I’m ready to party!          

- Laurie