With school, work, life and what not, I have to work pretty hard at balancing my distractions. That’s why I am pretty proud of myself that while Pinterest is an awesome website, I am able to keep myself from wasting too much valuable time on it.
With that said, I am also proud to say that I have put some of that pointless browsing to good use and joined the “DIY” fad. (You would be amused to know how long it took me to figure out that DIY stood for ‘Do It Yourself’)
Here are my projects and attempts at “oh my goodness that is so creative” so far.
1. Makeup boards
These were Christmas presents I made last year, the pink one for my roommate Megan and the purple one for my sister Janci.
Instructions:
- For the boards I used a white dry erase board for the pink one and a piece of sheet metal and a frame that my mom painted for the purple. I covered them both in fabric.
- Then I just used spray paint, ribbons and random decorative stuff to personalize each one. To hold heavier things like makeup brushes I used kitchen drawer organizer baskets and pencil cup holders
- Finally with both gifts I included a package of magnets that they could hot glue to the back of all of their compacts and other items. It’s not shown but Megan took a rectangle magnet strip and keeps her bobby pins organized that way. I would definitely suggest using as strong as magnets as you can and the hot glue is nice instead of super glue because you can peel the magnets off and reuse them.
2. Necklace Hanger
This was a birthday present that my roommate Kyla and I made for our other roommate Megan’s birthday. It was super easy. We found both the wooden plaque and assorted drawer knobs at Hobby Lobby, spray painted and decorated the plaque and then with a little power tool help from the boys, drilled the knobs in. I hung it by stringing wire between to two hooks.
3. Map picture
So this is more of a modification of two projects that I saw on Pinterest. Here my Grandma let me cut up one of her U.S. maps and so I cut out hearts that were stenciled around my two homes in Oregon and Kansas. Really this is more her project because she free-handed the stencils and wrote the words. But I get creativity points, right?
4. Cake dip
Obviously food does not go under the “DIY” category, however, considering how baking and cooking anything dessert related does not go under the list of skills that I have, I definitely consider it a tally for the win column. Plus I have been the hit at all birthdays, watch parties and tailgates this semester.
Ingredients:
- one box of cake mix (just the mix not all of the things it says to add for a cake,) a 8 oz. tub of cool whip and a cup of plain yogurt.
- Mix. Refrigerate. DONE. So far we like scooby snacks, graham crackers and animal crackers best to dip in.
5. Earring holder
This was actually my very own idea. Go me.
Instructions:
- I got chain link from Ace Hardware and strung two different thin ribbons through each link
- The bows are a product of being raised in a floral shop. Sorry, but can’t really teach that one. But my mom can 🙂
- Then I just draped the chain across 3 finishing nails
Happy Pinning!
– Amanda Jae
The Good Stuff 