7 Great Crafts for Spring

Spring is finally here (even though it doesn't quite feel like it everywhere). Get yourself in the spirit either way by making some of these cute Spring crafts. :)

Make some paper flowers. No matter what flower is your fave, you can find a paper variety to whip up on a weekend.

If gardening is your thing, these fabric covered flower pots are sure to brighten up your space. I love them as part of my tiny windowsill garden.

I saw these adorable bees over on The Experimental Home. Use your leftover plastic Easter eggs to whip up a hive full of them :)

These dinosaur garden markers were one of my favorite garden projects ever. They add whimsy and color to your garden while you are waiting for everything to sprout!

April showers bring May flowers, so you might as well join in the fun with a rain cloud brooch. If storms are more your style change it up with a cloud + lightning brooch instead.

Don't forget to brighten up your office with some candy colored binder clips. Some clips, glue and scraps of paper or fabric are all you need!

Take a few minutes and make some bright Spring stationery! These cards are super easy and will brighten anyone's day when they open the mail.

What are your favorite Spring crafts?

Etsy Crush: Spring Fever

I don't know about you, but I am having some major Spring Fever lately! Last week here in Portland we got a little taste of Spring (it's supposed to cool down and bit and rain more the next couple weeks now, boo!). My super Spring Fever got me searching through Etsy to find some great handmade Spring time items; I have a crush on all of these:

Seeds from SmartSeeds to start your garden this Spring. I ordered the scarlet milkweed pictured above along with some cute French mini melons and Hungarian sweet peppers. I can't wait for my container garden this summer!

This super cute camper birdhouse from birdhouse20. I don't have a yard or any kind of space to put a birdhouse at the moment (I use all my balcony space for container gardening), but I really love the look of these birdhouses.

These planter rings from wearableplanter come in bright Spring colors and can house a tiny plant (they come with moss). Super cute!

Finally, these awesome glass terrariums from Glimpse Glass are right up my alley. I have a TON on hen and chicks from a plant I propagated last September, as well as some air plants I have purchased. I think a cute little hanging home would be perfect for some of them (and my window sill is getting really cluttered!).

Have you seen any great Spring items on etsy or a favorite blog? Leave me a comment to share, I'd love to take a peek!

Starting the Garden

Happy belated Earth day everyone (Aren't I just about a day late for everything lately?). I thought a great thing to talk about this time of year would be starting a garden (and May is National Salad Month in the US, so I'm actually getting a little jump start on something!). I'm not an expert gardener by any means, in fact, I grow my entire garden in containers on my front patio or on my windowsills. As such, I am pretty limited in the scale of my garden, and what things I can successfully grow. No matter how large or small of a space you have, anyone can grow a small garden of their very own!

Above you will see a photo of my radish starts. I'm not huge on radishes, but the husband likes them. They are also a great crop to try if you don't have much gardening experience (or if you don't want to spend lots of long term attention on things). Radishes have a pretty short grow time (about a month) and you will get almost instant gratification because they sprout after only a couple of days. It's a great thing to plant if you have kiddos around because they will get to see something happening very quickly and could measure the progress daily.




I am also being rather brave and trying to grow some watermelons this year. I have one large pot with a vine growing right now and the plant is supposed to have personal sized watermelons, not the big guys. So I am hopeful that despite my small area maybe I will get a watermelon or two this year, and if not it's a nice experiment.

I also have visions of a "someday" garden dancing in my head, as someday the hus and I will have a house and yard. If you'd like to check out some of our ideas and lots of helpful info, you can check out my new Gardening board on Pinterest and follow along!

I also have some herbs, flowers, etc that I'm growing this year. Are any of you extra excited about your garden this year? If you need some cute ideas for labeling your garden try these Dinosaur Garden Markers or Glass Garden Markers.

Springing Back!

Well, it's officially Spring! Along with many creatures of the wild, I have decided that it's time for me to stop hibernating and get back to work! These past few months have been very busy, and I think we can all agree that sometimes you just need a break. The easiest thing for me to take a break from is blogging. It isn't my main source of income (or even a GOOD source of extra income), it takes up lots of time and energy and the darker months make it hard to get decent photographs. I guess you could say Winter just puts a huge rut in my blogging schedule.

I would like to thank everyone who has been sticking with me these past months (despite the very few and far between posts! Also, as many of you probably know, Google Reader is going away soon, so if you follow The Craftinomicon via google reader you may want to switch over to following me via bloglovin'!


In the coming months there are going to be lots of things in the works including: great new tutorials, recipes, tips and tricks as well as some book reviews. Also, I noticed my favorite site of embroidery tutorials has gone away (I have been waiting to make sure it wasn't just a temporary bug!) so I will be bringing back slowly but surely some new Embroidery How-To's for everyone that liked my previous series so much! Also, I have been on a Spring Cleaning kick lately, so look for some posts on neat ways to tidy up your craft supplies stash!



Photos via my Instagram account. Follow @Craftinomicon

Butterfly Wall Art

I'm breathing a huge sigh of relief as I am finally unpacked, with internet connected and my craft supplies all ready to go! I had some requests for Spring and Summer DIY art projects, so I thought I'd start out with something pretty easy and highly customizable!

To make a paper butterfly collage of your own you need a few supplies:

Decorative paper
Scissors or Xacto blade
Butterfly images to trace and cut out (I have provided some at the bottom of this post which can be made to any size you like, but feel free to make some of your own or image search around the internet)
Pins for mounting butterflies to the wall, or a canvas to mount butterflies to before wall mounting.

You can use any paper you like, but for butterflies you want to stand alone and mount to your wall individually, I would recommend card stock as other papers do not hold their shape as well (wings may get a little droopy, especially on larger sized cut outs). All you need to do is trace your butterfly image onto your paper, cut it out and position any way you like. For something you want to be able to move (or if you aren't allowed to make a bunch of holes in your wall in a rental) You can get a canvas to secure your butterflies to, or a magnet board (then attach magnets to your butterflies).

I also recommend thinking outside the box a little with your paper. I have some wonderful photo realistic scrap booking paper, and I think my favorite butterfly is the one with an image of a sparkler on it. Never would you find this in nature, but it sure reminds me of 4th of July cookouts and all of the other Summer activities that I just can't wait for :)

Using a more decorative paper also makes your butterflies much more interesting without having to cut out extra details. If you use a plain colored paper, you may find yourself wanting to cut out some designs in the wings to add extra visual interest (this is great but can be time consuming). The sky is really the limit on a project like this, so have fun with it!

Here are some scalable templates for butterflies. Some hand drawn, the other found on an image search at Butterfly Utopia.

Magical Mason Jars

Portland has finally gotten a small taste or two of Spring this year, and with that I have my renewed love of gardening and putting everything into a mason jar. They aren't just for preserves to me, once Spring and Summer hit, I want all of my drinks, gifts, desserts(spoiler alert for Friday Food Craft!) and more to be packed in a mason jar.

As you can see, I like to doll them up on occasion and using scrapbook paper on the lid inserts is a great easy way to start your own love for mason jar decorating. I also like to make sticker labels, use a ribbon tie, etc. This is one you can really personalize and go nuts with, and the containers are reusable so you and your friends can pass them around forever if you want!

For the lids you see here, all I did was trace around the circle insert for my lids, cut out the circle inside the lines (you don't want it to end up bigger than the insert). The best part of this is your circle doesn't need to be absolutely perfect around the edges because your jar ring will cover the edges when you close the jar. If you don't have scrap booking paper, or another colored paper, scraps of fabric would also be lovely.

I will be sharing a few more Spring inspired crafts this week and next! What are some of your favorite Spring time crafts?

Butterfly Collection Pillows!

It has been a very busy week! Lots of working, laundry, packing and gift making for my upcoming trip to Wisconsin to see my family. I'm excited for the trip but I am also exhausted from all the work! Here is the final outcome of my butterfly project from a couple days ago, butterfly collection pillows! These butterflies would make a lot of other great projects as well: tote bags, a sciency looking butterfly pincushion maybe? Some wall art, shadow box, etc. The best part is you only have to sew around the little body shapes so the wings are free to give your project extra dimension.

For the butterfly template I used, check out this post.

I got the original idea for this project at Ruffles and Stuff but I liked a more intricate butterfly, and wanted to use brighter colors.

Spring is in the air!

It is an absolutely beautiful day outside! I know I have been MIA in the crafts department as of late, but I assure you it is a time constraint, not a lack of crafting that is keeping me from you all. I am taking a trip to Wisconsin next week to visit my family and have been hard at work on gifts for them (nothing is actually finished yet, I'm multi-tasking them all at the same pace to be done Friday).

This is going to end up being projects for my grandmother and my sister-in-law, for their respective birthdays. I thought the butterflies and bright colors were fitting for the day, and it will give you all a chance to start guessing at what I am making. I also have a little template photo you can use to make your own colorful butterflies! These would also make a great paper craft, but for now I'm sticking with the felt and sewing projects at hand. You could also find some images of your favorite type of butterfly, or many different butterflies to make a more diverse collection. I'm hoping to get the finished project(s) done and posted for you all tomorrow!

What kind of ideas do you have for springtime colors and/or butterflies?