Get Featured on Living Locurto

Are you creative? Want to be featured on Living Locurto?

Living Locurto is looking to meet creative people who can come up with new and original craft ideas. If Living Locurto features you, your idea will be seen by over 115,000 people or more in one month! Pretty cool, huh? You don’t have to blog to be considered. Just crafty!

What Living Locurto is looking for:

§  Super creative ideas that are simple to make. (see a list of ideas below)

§  Simple to understand instructions and a list of supplies used.

§  Quality photos. – Must not be blurry with good natural light (means using the light from a window or outside, no pop-up flash)

§  2-4 photos total. Must have several good images of the final product. Can also have photos of the craft in progress. Step-by-step photos are not required, but fine if you want to include them.

§  If you blog, I would ask that you wait at least a week after your feature to blog about your craft.

Sound like fun? Read the Submission Rules and send your craft idea and photos to this email address.

SUBMISSION RULES

1.       Craft must be something new, not something you have previously blogged about.

2.       Instructions and supply list must be included in an email. No word documents or PDF attachments.

3.       Photos must be no larger than 800 pixels wide. If you don’t know what that means, just send me what you have.

4.       By sending photos, you agree that you own the rights to the photo. If someone else took the photos, please get permission for me to use them and provide credit info.

5.       If you blog, you agree to wait one week after your feature on LivingLocurto.com to blog about your project.

6.       You must provide your name and blog URL to receive credit. Don’t forget to send that information with your craft.

7.       Send Instructions and 3-6 good quality photos to this email: LivingLocurto.Crafts(at)gmail.com

Ideas:

§  Simple Sewing and No-Sew Ideas

§  All Kinds of Crafts

§  DIY Home Decor (Trash to Treasure)

§  DIY jewelry

§  Ideas for kids

§  Holiday – Wreaths, home decor, centerpieces, gifts

§  Party Decor – Baby; Wedding Showers, Birthdays for kids or adults, casual gatherings, centerpieces.

§  Food Crafts – Recipes in a Jar, edible crafts, party arrangements 

Good luck to all those who enter! If chosen, post a comment here so that we can make sure to link to your feature.

Happy Crafting!

Creativity Bug ~ Sue

Tuesday Tutorial: Decorative Candles-I did it!

A while back,  my sister Sue posted about creating decorative candles and  I knew I had to try one of the techniques. I have seen these picture candles using tissue paper all over blogland and just never got around to trying it. Well, let me tell you, it took me longer to take the pictures than it took me to create the candle. I love it!

So, just a little something about my crafting style. I am the sister who's motto is "it's good enough." My workspace does not have to be perfect (or uncluttered), things do not have to be exactly the way they should be, they can just be good enough. Case in point. I knew I had white tissue paper. Where? It's in the recycle bin. Yes people, I grabbed crumpled up white tissue paper from the recycle bin to do this project. I figured if it would fail, no harm no foul.

Here are the steps I took to complete this quick project:

1. Remove crumpled up white tissue paper that was included in my daughter's pajamas from recycle bin

2. Search for a decent picture of my family from my laptop

3. Cut and paste picture into Word so that I can crop and make my picture the size I need. No fancy photo program for me. Just use what I've got

3. Tape crumpled tissue paper (with masking tape because I can not find regular tape) to a white piece of copy paper

4. Print photo (Hooray, it worked)

5. Run into my basement and find small white candle that has already been used (why use a new nice candle if this project is going to H-E double hockey sticks in a hand basket)

6. Cut photo from paper and place on candle with push pins

7. Take heating tool and heat photo to candle

Done and it's beautiful!
Creativity Bug ~ Sandy

Teacher Appreciation Gift ~ Candy Bouquet

Here is another great gift idea to give to your favorite teacher. I showed this about 2 years ago on the blog, but decided to revisit the idea.

Supplies:

paper flowers (punched or cut from large flower die)
straws
small lollipop (such as Dum Dums)
floral tape
glass vase
jelly beans

Step One: Take two paper flowers and punch a hole in the center

Step Two:  Insert lollipop throw hole in flowers

Step Three: Insert straw over lollipop stem

Step Four:  Wrap floral tape from the base of the flower all the way down the straw. Arrange paper flower shaping petals.

Your flower is now complete!

Step Five:  Fill a glass vase with jelly beans and arrange with lollipop flowers. Add additional arrangement materials to personalize.

Your candy bouquet is now complete and is ready for gift giving. Here are 2 arrangements that I made using different flower dies and lollipops.

Hope you enjoyed this project. I would love to see pictures if you decided to try to make a bouquet too, so post links in the comment section!
Creativity Bug ~ Sue

Artsy Addicts Technique Blog Hop

Welcome to the Artsy Addicts Technique Blog Hop. You should have come here from Teri Dorowsky's blog. Come check out the Creativity Bugs blog to see a nifty flower technique, enjoy collecting a few recipes, and then click here to go to Marion Smith's blog for the next technique.

I love flowers!! There is nothing I like better than to create a scrapbook page, card, or tag and embellish it with my favorite Prima flowers. They are big, luscious, glittery, fancy smancy, and stand out on a page.

My problem is that my love of Prima flowers and my pocketbook do not agree. So, I searched all over the web looking at websites, blogs, and YouTube videos trying to find a way to make these flowers without putting me in the poor house.

After countless hours, I found a few great sites, combined their ideas, and came up with the Creativity Bug version of the perfect paper flower.

Supplies:

large flower punch (Retro Flower by Paper Shapers)
double sided pattern paper
light weight card stock paper
coordinating brad
paper piercer
spritz bottle filled with water (optional)
Distressed ink (optional)
Stickles (optional)

Step 1:  Punch out 8 of the same sized punches from pattern paper or cardstock

Step 2:  Distress the edges of the punched out paper pieces with coordinating ink (optional)

Step 3:  Scrunch up punched out paper pieces tightly. If you are using thicker cardstock paper, spritz lightly with water before scrunching up.

Step 4:  Carefully open up scrunched up paper pieces and stack.

Step 5:  Pierce a hole in the center of the paper pieced stack with a paper piercer.

Step 6:  Insert brad and tighten.

Step 7: Re-scrunch the paper pieces starting tightly with the top piece and more loosely with each layer following.

Step 8:  Fluff the paper pieces until it resembles a flower.

Step 9:  Add Stickles to flower tips to add an extra touch of bling!

For variation, punch out 4 flowers in one color and 4 flowers in another to create a variegated rose.

Or try using a different flower punches to create a different style of flower. The first flower shown uses the Paper Shaper punch called Daisy. The second flower shown using the Stampin Up punch called Flower.

Here is a look at all three different flowers.

If you like what you see, please leave a comment or become a follower of our blog.
Creativity Bugs ~ Sandy and Sue

Make Your Own Glimmer Mists

Glimmer Mists are all the rage, but can get pretty expensive to have every color in your collection. To save money, I found 3 different recipes to make your own glimmer mists for all your paper crafting projects.

Color Mist 1

Ingredients:

Liquid non aerosol hairspray

Small spray bottle

Pearl Ex powder 

 Directions:

1. Fill small spray bottle ½ full of liquid hairspray
2. Add ¼ teaspoon PearlEx powder & shake well
3. Add additional PearlEx powder as needed to deepen color

Color Mist 2

Ingredients:

White Glue
Popsicle Stick
Water
Empty Spray bottles
Metallic / Pearlescent Acrylic Paints

 

Directions:

1.       Fill your spray bottle about 3/4 of water

2.       Dip popsicle stick in white glue and mix with water in bottle. The glue will act as a binder.

3.       Add one to two drops of paint to water and glue mixture. Shake well.

4.       Spray onto white piece of cardstock to test out color.

5.       Add more drops of paint as needed.

Color Mist 3

Ingredients:

Spray bottle

Liquid decoupage lacquer or PVA glue

Water

Pearl Ex powder

 

Directions:

1.       In a spray bottle, mix equal parts decoupage lacquer and water, about 20 ml of each will go a long way.

2.       Add ¼ teaspoon of PearlEx powder, put on the lid and shake well.

3.       Spray on white piece of cardstock to test out color.

4.       Add more PearlEx powder as needed to intensify color

Try out some of these glimmer mist recipes and let us know what you think!

Creativity Bug ~ Sue