Wine Corkboards

         College students always need a great way to organize their work. Whether it is through a magnetic board, storage in their desk drawers, or a white board, things need to be organized. My personal favorite is using cork boards to hang pictures of friends and other things such as jewelry, ticket stubs from events etc. 
         A great cork board that looks stylish and you can DIY is a cork board made out of wine corks. Since you are making it yourself, you can do any design you please.

What you need is:
- A large amount of wine corks (you can either collect them from you and your friends or if you go to a restaurant most likely they will be willing to save some for you for a week or two and that will be plenty)
- Glue gun

How to:
        Lay your corks out on a flat surface and put them into the shape or design you want your cork board to be. Once done, glue each cork together one by one until you have finished. Hang up with a piece of ribbon or with a wall adhesive such as 3M strips.


These are simple, inexpensive and let you show off a little bit of your personality with the many different shapes.  


Check out some of these shapes below:

What did you do for your shape? Would love to see your creative ideas! 

Great Christmas Idea

Just a quick post- saw this on a fellow bloggers site and thought I would share. These are candy christmas lights. Check out her blog to see how they are made!

http://ediblecrafts.craftgossip.com/christmas-lights-from-candy/2012/11/27/comment-page-1/#comment-31575

Happy October!

The fall is one of my favorite months of the year. Apple cider, apple picking, carving pumpkins and the start of fires in the fireplace at home. I love the colors of the trees, and finally having it be boot and sweater season! What is your favorite part of fall? (leave in comments section of blog)

I went home from school a few weeks ago and went up into the attic with my brother to break out the halloween decorations. We set up webs, pumpkins, ghosts and ghouls, witches and wizards and much more. For a dorm room, it is much harder. My favorite craft for a dorm room or for a home is pumpkin carving. I love going to pick out the "perfect," pumpkin at a local farm and being able to carve it into whatever I want. Animals, cartoon characters, logos, quotes and much more. I am not the most artistic person so I typically buy at kit to so that I can use an image and essentially trace it onto the pumpkin. 
Here are the two pumpkins my boyfriend and I made, they turned out great and it was a fun cheap activity! 

If you live somewhere where the use of candles is not allowed, you can use a battery operated candle to  light up your pumpkin! Also, if you have younger kids who can't use the tools, you can also paint them. Pumpkins are a great activity and craft idea and if you do carve one, cook roast the seeds inside-they make for the perfect snack!

If you don't like dealing with the mess of pumpkins, you can buy fake pumpkins that are carve-able at a craft store. Each pumpkin should cost around $10 or less and you can use them for years and years to come!

Check back soon for some more Halloween craft ideas! 

Inspirational Quotes

When I arrived at school in September, the first thought that ran through my mind was "how am I ever going to cover these bare walls!" Of course, I have pictures of my friends and I hanging up all over but there was still plenty of wall space to be covered. As I am not once for posters (they are expensive and always get ruined by the end of the year) I looked for an alternative. I love inspirational quotes and wanted to put them up in my room.

1) Canvas Art

       All you need for this is a canvas and a quote that you like. I used stick on letters so that everything would be even and I wouldn't have to paint outside the lines but if you have good handwriting, trace out what you want written on the canvas in pencil first. I put the stick on letters onto the canvas and used some spare acrylic paint I had and painted over the letters. After letting the paint dry, I peeled off the letters and volia! 

    This is simple and very easy on the wallet. You can buy canvas of all different shapes and sizes at Walmart, Target, Michaels or any craft store as well as stick on letters and acrylic paint. 

Stick on Letters

Hand Painted

Quote on Map

2) Cut up Magazine

    For this, all you need is an old magazine and a pair of scissors. Nothing is better than free, right? Pick a quote you like and simply trace cut out letters on the page of a magazine or draw out letters with a sharpie and cut the letter out. Once you have all the letters, you have your quote, now all you need is some tape and your magazine quote is complete!

3) Print-Outs

    There are many websites out there that allow you to visit their page and use one of their print outs. For mine, I simply printed out a page then used an old frame that had been pre matted and inserted the print out inside. You can find great frames for only a few dollars at thrift shops, the dollar store, or even five below. If you don't want to use a matted frame, you can also use scrapbook paper as a fun background. Try typing up a quote you like in a special font, play with the colors and paste it onto a piece of scrapbooking paper. This is a cheap way to add some color to your room and if you get bored with it, simply print out a new quote and stick it in the frame! 

    Try this blog for printout ideas, she provides printouts for free. All she asks you to do is follow the blog in return! Simple As That 

                         

Typed up quote on scrapbook paper

Print-Out in a frame