How to make a photo transfer.

 

What you will need:

Magazine Pictures of what you want transferred, or black and white prints from the computer.

A wide paint brush,

Clear Gel medium preferably high gloss,

and a small tube of warm water

Begin by adding a layer of the gel medium on top of your photo, in horizontal lines. Than let dry.

Once dry apply another coat, but this time apply the gel vertically. Let dry than repeat step one and two, until you have seven or more coats of gel medium on your photo.

Let the last coat dry for a good amount of time before placing it in the water. This is one of my dried photos from an art magazine. 

Place your photo into the warm water face down. The magazine of paper should begin to soak up water right away. 

Once the paper starts to soften, carefully rude the magazine. Eventually the magazine will begin to peel off leaving your image on a thick gel skin.

 This is the finished copy. I used a matte gel, which made the photo more dull looking than if you would use a high gloss gel. My next step is coming up with a nice idea in using these transfers. I'm thinking about making some curtains. :) hope you enjoy creating your own photo transfers and hope you found this tutorial interesting.


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Chicken with chick peas and raisons!

This is a really good recipe. When I made it my whole family loved it! So good!

Ingredients:
- Chicken
- Garlic
- Chick peas
- (you can add some sort of nut if you want)

Dressing:
- 1/4 cup Red Wine Vinegar
- 1 bay leaf
- Rind of 1 lemon
- 1 cup Raisons

Steps:

1. Mix together all the ingredients for the dressing and put in a pot. Bring to a boil and remove from heat.
2. Remove the bay leaf and lemon rind from the dressing. Once cool, stir in raisons and put to the side.
3. Cook the chicken and garlic together. Once cooked add in chick peas and or nuts.
4. Remove from heat, mix in dressing and serve. 

ENJOY!

How to make Hemp Necklaces.

For those of you who do not know how to make hemp necklaces here is a step by step tutorial on how to make them!

First meassure out your hemp. For making a necklace I use two and a half arm lengths, from the tip of my right hand finger to my left hand finger, for one string. The second string I meassure out a little more than the length of the necklace. 

The first string you cut find the half way point and make a loop. Add the second sting and line both strings up. Like so.

Tie the strings together with a knot. Make sure it is not too close to the end of the string, but make sure the loop is not too big.

I use a long board to make my hemp necklaces. A screw is on one end and a place for me to tie the middle strings is on the other end of the board. I have written out meassurments on the board so I know where to stop beading. I find the board makes it easier and faster to make hemp jewellery. You don't need to use a board. I know people who tie the end on themselves or things they find laying around.

Seperate the strings into outside strings and inside strings. Depending on the beads you are using, I bead them onto the inside strings before I begin braiding. Tie the inside strings down so they are very tight and hard to move.

Take the left side string and cross OVER TOP the middle strings.

Next you want to take the left string and bring it over top the string you just crossed.

Bring the right string under the center strings and through the hoop made by the left string. Like so.

When you pull the strings together it should look like this. Pull hard to make the braid tight together.

Now do the same steps but to the other side. Braiding both sides back and forth will make the hemp go into a flat design braid. If you braid only on one side it will turn into a spiral.

When you want to add a bead, just move the bead up and into the next braid.

This is an example of the flat design and the spiral.

Hope this tutorial works for you. Once you get the hang of it, it becomes very easy. Enjoy making bracelets and necklaces!

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Stuffed Red Peppers!

I made these stuffed red peppers the other night and they turned out great! I made a chicken breast with a creamy sauce but thats for a different day. :)

Ingredients:
- Four red peppers
- Rice
- Garlic
- Onions
- Mozirella cheese
- Carrots
- Celery
- Pepper

Steps:

1.) Preheat oven to 375. Cut the four red pepper tops off and remove the seeds inside. Boil the peppers for five minutes, remove from the water and put to the side.

2.) While the rice is cooking cut all the vegstables into small pieces. Cook the onions first than the rest of the vegstables. Than put aside.

3.) When the rice is cooked mix the vegstables and rice together, and stuff the peppers. Grate the cheese and stuff it into the top opening of the pepper.

4.) Put the stuffed peppers on a baking pan and bake for 15 min or until cheese is nice and melted. Take out of the oven, and enjoy.

This is what it will look like. This is a great recipe! Hope you enjoy it as much as I did!

My fiancee

This is Tyler. Who I have to deal with everyday! He hates getting his picture taken but the other day he let me take some pictures of him. I'm taking full advantage of this moment and posting them on my blog.

So stubborn and wont look at the camera. Oh well at least he is letting me take the picture.

I love you.

Drawings and Ink Work

This is a pencil drawing of a friend on mine. It sometimes takes time to see it but it is drawn from a top view. She is sitting cross legged on the floor. I drew this when I was in high school in grade 11. Sorry for the fold in the paper!

                                    This is a drawing I drew a couple months ago. It is done with ink.

     This is another ink drawing I drew. The picture was taken from national geographic. I was practicing my drawing and ink technique. Hope you enjoy!

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Simple Stir Fries.

I basically live on stir frys. They are so easy to make and they taste super good! I just cut up any vegstable I can get my hands on. Always adding onions and garlic (my favorite). I cook everything up and make some sort of sauce. In this stir fry I just added some chicken broth. Uber good!

Recycling!

I`m always into finding old or broken objects and changing them into works of art. I found an old globe that was being thrown out which I could not let that happen. So I took it in with all the other objects I bring home. The map of the globe was peeling off but i fixed that. I painted the whole thing, painted a new map and wrote and old saying around the center. "Open your eyes Dreamer and Explore the World"

I think it turned out pretty cool and it looks great in my office!

 Very Old Project-
My family is very musical. My dad has a gorgeous twelve string guitar which he adores. He usually brings out his guitar on special occasions and we all listen and sing along with him.  His guitar case was so used that it started to fall apart. He was very lucky though, because on one of my strange adventures of cleaning an abandoned apartment I found a guitar case in perfect condition. I gave my dad the gently used case, but when I saw that he was going to through out his old guitar case I had to stop him.
It was in a very bad condition. The leather was peeling off and the hinges were broken in half. It no longer was together but I could not let it go to waste. My family thinking I am crazy as I was running away with a broken case had little faith in my creative talent.
I bought some gorilla glue and black tape and used that to keep the leather down. I was not expecting it to work as good as it did but it turned out pretty good. Next I went to Canadian tire and bought some new hinges. I attached those and decided the paint the front of the case.
Here is what it looked like:

So than I had a finished guitar case, beautifully painted with new hinges. My family to this day believes I have a problem with collecting objects that are "trash" and turning them into something useful. The day I sold this guitar case for $40.00 I think changed their minds on my little hobby.

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Wooden Man

My friend had an old carved wooden man that was broken and missing his wooden hat. He was going to put it in a bonfire but just before he was about to burn it, I told him I would like to have it. I believed I could find a better use for this broken man than just firewood.
So I carried my new wooden friend home, mind you I did get a lot of strange stares from the neighbors near by but I was destined to find some sort inspiration to fix him up.
I found a bucket of old rusted nails, and thought I could do something with them. I picked out the best nails in the best conditioned  and off I went. I had an idea of nailing these nails into the top of the wooden mans head to give him an interesting look.
I was going for a walk one day when I came across a whole pile of beer bottle caps. I saw one that was flattened completely and had another great idea. I began collecting beer bottle caps from everyone I knew. I would go to parties and tell people that I would like their caps. I got a lot of strange looks but when I explained to them my idea they would become interested. My idea was to create a armor looking body using flattened bottle caps.
Finally I had enough bottle caps and started to put my wooden man together. I than took some left over clay from my mask, and covered his face creating that cracking look. Once it was dry I used modge poge to keep it all in place.
The last little touch I added was wired flowed with thread wrapped around it to the top of his head. I think this sculpture turned out quiet neat!

Tell me what you think!

Update:

A couple days after I made my fondant cake (see other post), I decided to use the left over fondant to make cupcakes! They turned out really cute and were really delicious! This time I rolled out the fondant really thin so it was not as sweet! I only wished that I had enougb fondant left to make small poka-dots on the top of the cup cakes. Oh well maybe next time!

My first post on this blog was about my pop can tab bracelet. Well I had more time and I made a full belt! I think it looks great! I can't wait to wear it out!

Stop Motion.

I have been playing around with Stop motion animation! It is super fun, but it takes a good amount of time. This is just a little test of it. Something small. Hope you enjoy it! Tell me what you think.

Step Stool.

When I was in High School I came across an abandoned Stepping stool someone made. It was in bad condition with screws poking through the top and a wood burning mess on the top. However that did not stop me in taking it in and to see what I can do to it.
Here is a picture of my new Stool!

I fixed the screws, and sanded down the top. I painted the top with flowers! I think it looks great.

Value Village

I love going to Value Village. There is something about old and used items that gets me inspired. Last year, while shopping there, I came across an amazing collapsible chair for only two dollars! I had to buy it, and I did. At the time my only way of transportation was the bus, and once again people were giving me strange looks.
My mistake was going over to a friends house before taking it home. Upon which I forgot the chair, and there it stayed for almost a full year.

Finally I got my chair back a couple months ago. I started painting it and finally I have finished it.
I think it is a great design! Tell me what you think!

I just recently went back to Value Village and bought another chair. This one does not fold up and is very heavy. I`m thinking about wood burning the whole thing with random designs. It is going to take a very long time. Hopefully you will see it on my blog in the future!

Pizza Fun!

This is a recipe for a really good homemade pizza crust, that has no yeast in it! It was super good, and I really recommend making it!

 Ingredients:
- 2 cups Flour
- 1 Tbsp baking powder
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1 Tbsp Oregano 
- 1/2 Garlic Powder
- 2 dashes Cayenne Pepper
- 2/3 cup Water
- 1 Tbsp Cooking oil

Steps:  
Preheat over to 400 degrees and prepare a pizza pan with non-stick spray. I have a pizza stone and did not have to spray the stone.

Mix dry ingredients together.

Mix in wet ingredients. I noticed when making the dough that it was very dry looking, and that lots of flour was left behind; don't worry about that.

Lightly cover your counter with some flower. Knead the dough 6-8 times. Again the dough will look dry just keep following the steps. In the end it tastes great!

Roll out your dough. As you can see I am horrible at making a circle out of dough and bet you can do way better.

Place your dough on pizza pan or stone, and rube some oil on the top to make sure the crust does not get soggy from the sauce. Than add any toppings you like on the top. Depending on how thick you made your crust, cook for 18-20 minutes.

Than add any toppings you like on the top. Depending on how thick you made your crust, cook for 18-20 minutes.

These are my finished products. These pizza's tasted so good! Make this crust and tell me what you think!

Knitting Pillows!

A while back my grandmother showed me how to knit. I picked up the craft very quickly, with her great instructions and a book she bought me for Christmas. I started off with the intentions of making a blanket. I picked really bright colors because at the time that was what I liked. Red, orange, yellow green, blue, and purple were the colors I picked out. I started making knitted squares for my blanket, but after awhile of knitting eventually I went on to other crafts. A couple weeks ago, I finally sat down on my living room couch and started to knit. As I was sitting there I realized I should have made my squares a lot bigger. At the rate I was knitting; I would have my blanket done in three years. I was laying on a really comfy pillow at the time when it donned on me, why not make a knitted pillow? Really excited about the idea I counted and laid out all my knitted squares. I found an old travel pillow that I knew no one would miss and started sewing my pillow together! It was a great project, and I even used my first testing square for a pocket for a book! I put a cute flower button on it and I must say it is a super cute pillow!
If you know how to knit, try making a pillow! It is super easy and they turn out great! Here is mine.

Cake With Marshmallow Fondant!

I always love watching cake shows and watching the bakers decorate their cakes. They make beautiful cakes that I would consider master pieces. I have always wanted to try to make a cake with fondant but never have, until now. I heard that the fondant that bakers use does not taste very well, but as I was looking up recipes I found many sites that talk about Marshmallow fondant. So I decided to give it a try. These photos are taken from my first fondant making experience and trust me you learn a lot as you make it. Here is how I made my cake!

Ingredients:

- One Bag of Marshmallows
- One bag of Icing sugar
- Tender flake shortening
- 2 Tbsp of Water
- Food coloring

You will also need a spatula, a microwavable bowl, and some plastic gloves.

First wash your counter. Than grease the counter really well with the shortening. You want to have a thick layer of shortening and a large area covered. Otherwise your marshmallow will stick to the counter.

 

Than pour half of the icing sugar onto the greased counter.

Pat the icing sugar into a large circle. This is going to be what you are going to pour the melted marshmallows onto.

Grease the microwave able bowl and spatula really well. Than pour in the Marshmallows.

Pour the 2 Tbsp of water on to the marshmallows and lightly stir. Next you want to microwave the marshmallows for 30 seconds. Stir the marshmallows and microwave them again for 30 seconds. Continue these steps until there is no clumps of Marshmallows.

It took me three times putting my marshmallows into the microwave until I got this smooth liquid marshmallow. Than pour the marshmallow mixture onto your circle of icing sugar.

Rube shortening all over your hands. Make sure you get between fingers and even the back of your hands. Otherwise the marshmallows with just stick to you and not the icing.

Begin mixing the marshmallows into the icing making sure you stay on the greased surface. Don't forget to keep the icing sugar close by at all times. You will need to add lots more but in the end you should have a cup left.

Keep mixing the Marshmallows until the mixture can be kneaded. Than your fondant is finished. Your marshmallow fondant can be stored up to three days in a tightly sealed container. Do not refrigerate. The next couple steps is adding color and my finished product.

Cut a portion of the kneaded fondant that you want to color. Wearing gloves put a couple drops onto the gloves and rube hands together. Than begin kneading the color into the fondant. Keep putting drops onto your gloves and kneading it in until you reach the color of fondant you want.

I rolled out my fondant and made pink circles to put on my cake.

While I was rolling out my fondant and making different shapes, I baked to circle cakes and iced them. (The icing on the cake will act as glue keeping the fondant on the cake.) After they were iced I put the cake into the fridge. I rolled out blue fondant to cover the whole cake. I also made green stripes and pink circles to decorate. When attaching the fondant together use a little bit of water. Water will act as glue when you are attacking fondant to fondant.

This was my finished cake!

I recommend trying this fondant! It actually tasted really good and kept the cake really moist. When storing your cake it is preferred to keep it in a cake box. The cake needs to breath. Do not refrigerate otherwise condensation will appear on the fondant.
Hope you enjoy making your cake as much as I did! Comment below and tell me what you think!