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St Patrick's Day Signs Made with Vinyl Decals Used as Stencils Two Ways

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While I was cutting the vinyl decal for last week's project on my Silhouette Cameo , I made a spare vinyl decal design (in case something went wrong). Since it was a simple design, I had the idea to try to use it as a reverse stencil (inside letters) and, if I could salvage it, a regular stencil (outside of the letters). To start out, I needed to prep a wooden sign to be used with the letters from the decal as a reverse stencil. Since the letters will be peeled away, I needed a nice surface or color to show through. I have used a paint wash in the past, but since I found out you could use alcohol ink to dye wood different colors, I thought making it green would be appropriate and a lot of fun. I got out a silicone craft mat to protect the table and a small container in which I could put some green alcohol ink. Then I added a bit of rubbing alcohol to thin the ink and grabbed a foam brush . I used the foam brush to paint on the thinned green ink and then set it aside to dry fo

Dollar Tree Metal Sign with Vinyl St. Patrick's Day Decal

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If you've been following the blog, you know that I'm addicted to these little metal signs you can pick up at Dollar Tree. So after acquiring a few more, I made a cute little St. Patrick's Day sign to add to my collection. I started by selecting a design one of my freebie designs from the Silhouette store and setting it to cut using standard glossy vinyl settings. I put my sheet of green vinyl on a cutting mat for easy loading and let it cut the design on my old Silhouette Cameo . I separated my design from the rest of the sheet of vinyl with a scissor. Then I grabbed a weeding tool and carefully peeled and picked away the excess vinyl. The thing letters were a bit of a pain (each one pulled off the backing and had to be freed from the vinyl and positioned back into place), but the weeding only made me swear a couple of times. I applied a piece of transfer tape to the design and rubbed it down with the handle of the weeding tool. I peeled off the paper backing and placed

Spray Painted and Alcohol Inked Washer Necklaces

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After sharing the  washer jewelry projects  collection last week, I had an idea I had to try. I've inked on spray paint a few times before, but I've never started washer necklaces on spray paint. I figured it would make the ink pop and provide a contrast if I let it peek through the ink. Since this was a bit of an experiment, I went through my stash of washers and picked out some dinged ones, and then I used a piece of sandpaper to scuff them up to get the spray paint to stick better. I used an all-purpose spray paint and gave them a couple of quick coats and let it dry overnight. The next day, I put down a silicone craft mat and grabbed my inks. I also got out my rubbing alcohol, a couple of paintbrushes, and a hand bulb blower . Since this was a new way to ink washers, I started inking without taking pictures. I covered the whole washer in purple ink and then came back with more ink and rubbing alcohol to get the ink to move around and create patterns. Unfortunately, the

Washer Jewelry Collection

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Over the years, the blog has featured many projects decorating washers with paper and alcohol ink to create necklaces and bracelets. Check out the collection of washer projects here: Washer Craft Projects .

3D Printed Thumb Book Holder

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When I saw these nifty thumb book page holders available to print, they looked like a simple and useful project.  I used some black PLA on our printer with standard settings (.2 resolution, 20% infil). The first one came out a bit stringy, but otherwise perfect. It printed in about 30 minutes, so I printed a second one. Now I have two of these lovely book page holders!