Trick or Treat Party and a giveaway

It’s that time of year when all the ghosts and goblins and superheroes and princesses go out trick or treating. So here at Purple Paisley Pinwheels I am having a party with a giveaway.

So tell your friends because what is a party without the people. =) At least 5 people must enter linky in order for prize to be given out. Here is how you can win the great prize below (must be from the US, sorry):

1. Follow Purple Paisley Pinwheels (sidebar)
2. Follow @alelell on Twitter (sidebar)
3. Like Purple Paisley Pinwheels on Facebook
4. Link up your favorite, you created Halloween projects, may enter up to 5 (make sure you link to the post not your blog)
5. Add my button either in your post or in your sidebar (I couldn’t get the button to post here again, but it is on my sidebar)

Why: A side note here, because my owls were featured. My very first feature. This is where I was featured. So I have decided that my treat (giveaway) for this party will be


Happy Haunting.

Serenity

Never give up, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.                    ~Harriet Beecher Stowe

Candleholders

Inspiration:

From Entertain Exchange. I loved hers more than mine.

My Creation:

I need to learn how to stage my pictures better. I got the glasses from Dollar Tree and the longer candle holder, the two short candle holders are from Goodwill. The plate is from Walmart. I actually got it for another inspiration but it is too big. I need a perfect plate for that but I have not been able to find it. I used the E6000 on all of these as well. I actually talked about the eyeball one in the Eyes on You post. The good thing about the big holder, I didn’t glue any thing on it so I can use it for any holiday. (Those are my golf ball spiders!)

Halloween Birdhouses and Fences

Some of this I have shown in other pictures but I never really talked about them. So here I am to share these projects with you.
Inspiration:

From Crafty Sisters. They are so colorful and fun. I loved these so much, but didn’t think I was going to do them. I didn’t even pay attention to what the actual shape of the birdhouses were.
My Creation:

I picked up the first birdhouse at Walmart, I saw it in the craft aisle and decided I was going to try it. I had so much fun making it, I picked up more houses. I am doing them for Christmas as well.

I picked up some fences at Dollar Tree. My son had liked my big fence project and decided I could make the little fences spooky.
Before:
They all looked similar to this in the beginning. The one I started with had a bird, a house and a flower. I removed the flower but left the house and bird. The bird didn’t look spooky enough after painting it so I ended up cutting off the beak and making it look more like a ghost. On the other two fences I removed all the flowers and stuff before painting them all black.
I will definitely make more of these next year, I liked them so much. And I LOVE the eyes.
Speaking of those eyes, I have posted 2 other times projects that I did with the eyes. But what I really wanted to do I hadn’t done yet. I finally did.
Magnets. So fun. I need advise though, I don’t really like the quality of the glass beads from Hobby Lobby, any suggestions? I also didn’t like how the stick on magnets from Walmart had the black part all over the part you can see. I guess the kind I have to glue on will be better.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I linked this with




In 2011 I also linked with
Be Different, Act Normal's Favorite Post of 2010
Tatertot and Jello's What was Your Favorite Post of 2010

I went to a custom domain

I decided to go with a custom domain for many reasons. I just did it today. lilisbuzz.com wasn't available. To my 15 (thank you) followers, I wanted to let you know I will be found, starting Wednesday, at PurplePaisleyPinwheels. I just hope that all my posts from here move over okay.

On another note I will be hosting a Trick or Treat Party this weekend with a giveaway. Tell your friends. I am going to allow up to 5 links per person, favorite Halloween projects you did, but in order to qualify for giveaway, at least 5 people link up, follow PurplePaisleyPinwheels, ect. I will post more on this tomorrow after my transition.







<center><a href="http://www.purplepaisleypinwheels.com" target="_blank"><img border="0" alt="Purple Paisley Pinwheels" src="http://i157.photobucket.com/albums/t60/alelell/1-1-011.jpg"/></a></center>

Sweater wreath and snowman

When I saw that the Iron Crafters’ Challenge’s secret ingredient was sweaters I thought there was no way I was going to be able to enter that contest. I had no idea how to use a sweater that wouldn’t entail sewing. I saw some wonderful projects out there in my blog following of pillows and others using a sweater and I kindly let all these lovely ladies know about the contest and that they should enter. Then one night when I should have already been asleep an idea came to me, after an idea came to me how to make my mom’s birthday present even better. I was so giddy I laid there quite some time trying to fall asleep. My excitement didn’t make my project so dandy though. I am disappointed in my snowman.
First I found some different shaped balls at Dollar Tree and pulled out a wreath I had gotten at Dollar Tree previously (I can’t find those wreathes now and I need A LOT more of them, 5 Dollar Trees later I have only found 5 more). My plan was to make the smaller balls as snowballs to cover the whole wreath. But it didn’t progress that way. I then found a sweater at Savers.
A nice white, not a shade of white, and I liked the different stitching on the collar. I washed the sweater and let it air dry over night before I started cutting into it. I wasn’t sure how to proceed, so I just started wrapping sweater around the wreath, stapling it to the back as I went. When I was all finished with that I then went over where the two sides came together on the back with hot glue. I then used part of the collar to make a little design part to cover where the ends met.

That was about the time that I decided I wasn’t going to do snowballs but just the snowman. With pieces of sweater and LOTS of hot glue, I covered the 2 silver balls and 1 Styrofoam ball to make the snowman. As I was putting him together, I also used pieces of the sweater to make roses that I glued onto the wreath.

I am actually very pleased with the wreath. I attached a sparkly red ribbon to the top and some tiny pinecones and leaves to the roses. I think it came out very pretty. It can be used as a winter, or just Christmas, wreath. It was once I got the snowman together (as lopsided as a real one) that I realized it wasn’t going to make it on the wreath and I would have to figure something else out for it.

I pulled out a picture frame I had previously purchased for another project and printed out a snowman sign. Attached that to a bigger piece of paper. Painted the black frame copper and then topped that off with Silver Extreme Glitter and glued the snowman to the finished frame.

The snowman’s hat, belt and scarf are made out of pieces from another sweater I forgot to take a picture of before cutting up. The rest is buttons. Maybe some stick arms would top it off better.

Even though I am not so pleased with the snowman, I am still entering this in 

Explore. Dream. Discover.

Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover. ~Mark Twain

Adorable little owls

I think it has been about a month since I first posted that I had tried to sew and ended up with .
I learned that I had forgotten to put the foot down. Honest mistake since it has been years since I had sat down at a sewing machine. Doesn’t help that I could never get the hang of it.
The same post, I declared an owl was born. My mom sewed him for me.
I had picked up some crafty magazines back in September and I had found this owl idea in one of those. The woman makes them with Christmasy fabric and makes them into a garland. So I got the idea from this magazine and borrowed her pattern to cut them out. There the similarities end. If I could find my idea book I would thank her here, but not sure where the book is (I cut the article out of the magazine). When I saw these owls I thought, how cute those would be for Halloween instead. I picked up all this fabric and ribbon. My cousin got me felt with adhesive so I didn’t have to worry about sewing the eyes or beak on. It is the Holiday Crafts 2010 from Better Homes and Gardens Creative Collection. The designer was April Foss.
I traced the pattern onto the fabric and cut them out. I have a lot cut out. The rest probably won’t be sewed until after Christmas. They aren’t much bigger than the one in the picture. I traced eyes on the back of the felt and cut them out by hand. The beaks I just cut out, no two are the same. I then used black brads for the eyeballs. I even blew up the size 150% and 200%. After my mom sewed the purple one, and I saw how cute they really were, I got more fabric. And, like I said, I have several sets cut out, faces on, pinned together with their ribbon, just need to be sewed.
I did get my mom to finally sew a set for me the other day. I went with a fall set. After she sews them, leaving an opening at the bottom, I stuffed them with fiberfill and then hand stitch the bottom shut. 

There are 7 to a set. I still wasn’t sure what I was going to do with them until the other night it finally hit me.

Aren’t they adorable? I picked up this grapevine at Hobby Lobby and glued the ribbons to a twig and then the ribbon to each other (after sealing the end of the ribbon in a candle flame). 6 of them are on here, the other one got its own grapevine.

My mom also sewed one of the bigger ones for me, with the polka dots, and I actually sewed the medium sized one.

I have been featured for the first time ever. I am so honored:





~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I linked this with
       
       

  

I also linked this with for their favorite projects of the year party.

Saving projects

Several months ago I was turned onto Pinterest. It is another social media outlet, of sorts. If you have ever tried out Delicious or Diigo, you would love Pinterest. You in the picture you want to save. I wasn’t really using it at first, but now. Let me tell you how great it has suddenly become for me.

I follow about 50 other crafty blogs right now (I am very grateful for my 13 followers) and when I am going through Google Reader I star the projects I like, share the projects I really like and for some reason star and share the ones I really, really like. If the project is shared from another blog (I share other projects a lot) I go to the post and save that link in Delicious. So when I am looking for a project in either Reader or Delicious I have to go back through all the saves.

Now mind you Pinterest is only in the beta stage still so if you try to sign up you will be put on the “waiting list”. I didn’t wait that long to be accepted. What you do there is pin pictures you like. So when I see a project I like I click on the PinIt button in my menu bar and save it to the corresponding pin board. Just the picture. It automatically puts what web address it came from. I am loving Pinterest. If you want to see an example, check out my pin boards: http://pinterest.com/lilisbuzz/ 

Now I can easily find a project I was saving for inspiration. If only I will remember to save all I even sorta like because those are the ones I want to go back to but didn’t save. If for some reason it won’t let you sign up and you really want to, send me your email address and I will invite you through mine. My email is purplehysteria@gmail.com.

Chip and Dip Stand

I have seen some great ideas out there on different “stands” for cake, candy, whatever.
This Inspiration is one of my favorites

It was done by Kristi over at the Speckled Dog.
My Creation

I actually had already picked up these bowls and plates from Target before I saw Kristi’s post. After seeing her post though I knew what I wanted to find for the “stand”. I found these wooden candle sticks at Goodwill. I took the base off, the metal out of the top and sprayed it with primer, then painted it that pretty Razzle Berry color. Then sprayed Mod Podge Acrylic Sealer on it. Glued the pieces together with Beacon E600. I love that I had the perfect color of paint to match the set =)


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I linked this up with