Made 2 Match: Fail

Well as proof that no project is perfect, I learned my lesson about making sure you're gentle when working with these napkins as I applied the mod podge a bit to carelessly to my vase and ended up with this on the back.

Grrrrr.

In theory - I could have found a matching piece of the pattern and filled it in. But the back of the vase faces the wall so I left it as a little reminder of the need to be gentle.

Friday Fail - Phone Photos

This is what happens when you let your kids play with your camera - they lose it and you end up having to use your phone to take tutorial pictures for your blog.

No matter how you try to adjust them in iPhoto or photoshop, they just don't do your project justice.

Ughhhhhh

Friday's Fail: The less than perfect pumpkin

The first pumpkin I made last weekend, didn't turn out all that well. I made 2 mistakes.

1. I didn't stuff it enough...
2. But more of a problem - I hadn't thought of using a button to use on the top and bottom. I just tried winding the string around the previous piece. I couldn't get enough tension, I kept pulling the other ridges out of place. It didn't go well.

Here is a picture of the less than perfect pumpkin:

He just doesn't have the right firmness to him. (Yes, it is a boy, don't let the shinny fabric fool you.)

And the underside of the pumpkin:

I couldn't get enough tension to really get it to work and it was just awful.

I almost gave up. Had I not thought of the button solution I think I would have given up.

But then, I thought of the button. Here is the underside of a button pumpkin:

So much neater... and just look at the tension I was able to get by winding around the button:

Now, THAT is a pumpkin!!! Isn't she beautiful???

And look at this little guy (yes, another boy.)

Ready for the funny part - what first seemed like a terrible fail, my less than perfect pumpkin. The one that almost had me ready to give up. Well, he now works in the collection of pumpkins. I wouldn't want to have him be the only pumpkin, but with all his friends and family around him - he totally works.

Just goes to show you - just because something didn't work the first time doesn't mean you should give up... and don't necessarily throw away that "fail" until you've really seen the total picture.

Friday Fail - Definitely NOT Charming

I'm still playing around with the wine charms and was looking for something very simple and understated.

These seemed like a good idea 'till I got it on the glass.

Generally, my mind isn't in the gutter, I swear. But whenever I walked by that charm I could only see one thing. Being that this is a family friendly blog I'll just leave it at that...

Am I the only one who is seeing this for more than it is?

Friday's Fail: Mid Project Oops!!!

So yesterday I posted my little Jewelry Display... but did anyone notice the mid-project oops in my tutorial??? I mean aside from being really cheap and not running out for the forth corner bracket.

Take a look at this picture:

Notice anything?

Here let me help you:

Look at the direction of the bevels, inside on the bottom, inside on the right, inside on the top... outside on the left.

Yeah, that isn't going to work. I found out as I was assembling it. Thankfully, I had just enough molding left to cut a new piece and go along my way.

Friday's Fail: How NOT to wrap a bobble

So I'm not really feeling the "Friday's Fixin' to Do..." So what I'm "Fixin' to Do" this Friday, is change my mind to make Fridays all about Fails.

Welcome to the First Edition of Friday's Fail.

I could make this easy and say what failed was "Friday's Fixin' to Do..."

: )

Let's face it, project don't always go as planned, and if I've learned anything, it is that failure often teaches us the most. 

About a year ago I bought this bracelet, I LOVE LOVE LOVE this bracelet:

Now that I'm experimenting with jewelry, I wanted to try and make my own variation. What I'm not sure if you can see in the photo above, is that the bobbles are actually routed a bit around the edge so that the wire cuts into the bobble just a bit. 

I wasn't up for breaking out the dremel and cutting into glass. That just didn't seem like a beginner project to me. I figured I could wrap the bobbles.

I grabbed some simple dollar store bobbles and some 24 gauge wire... and started wrapping.

That may not look too bad, but if you touched the bobble, it fell out.

Yeah, isn't that attractive.

Yikes!!!

Oh my....

This is getting embarrassing.

No wait. THIS is embarrassing. 

So, I didn't figure out how to wrap bobbles. Yet. What I did learn is that 24 gauge wire is NOT the way to do it. It doesn't have enough strength. 

I have learned how to wrap beads though, more on those next week!

Flip Flop Fail...

Well, this is embarrassing.

I've been dreaming of these flip flops since I saw Ashley's over on Make it and Love it.

I had everything I needed:

• Flip flops
• Velcro
• Fabric
• Scissors
• Gorilla Glue (epoxy)
• Tooth picks (to stir the epoxy)
• Clothes pins (to hold the velcro while the epoxy dried)

And we're off... cut the velcro to apply to the flip flops:

I mixed the epoxy:

Applied the velcro to the flip flops and secured it with clips while I went to work on the straps.

And that is where the failure happened. It turns out Guerilla Glue is not the epoxy to use on this project, the velcro just did not hold and peeled right off when I removed the clips.

So... I'll be stocking up on epoxy this week to find exactly the right one to work. We must have these flip flops for the summer!!!

Failed Candle Holders

So not all projects go as planned, we all know that... figured I'd share one of my failures...

I had high hopes to make these little "love" votive holders. I assembled my materials.

• 4 Glass Votive Holders
• Glass Etching Cream
• Contact paper to use as a stencil
• My cricut to cut the contact paper
• Some red vinyl that I was going to try a little something different with.

So I cut the contact paper and applied it to the votive.

I even burnished down the edges

(Photo by my son, had to use it...)

I then applied the etching cream according to instructions. Which I didn't want to photograph for fear of touching the camera and the etching cream at the same time.

Batch one didn't work out... at all really. I left the cream on the full 5 minutes, thought I had applied it liberally enough, but ended up with spotty results.

Yeah... that is not the look I was going for.

So I reviewed the instructions, and decided that it could have been because they weren't quite clean enough and maybe I didn't apply the etching cream liberally enough or leave it on long enough...

I tried again.

I failed again.

Parts turned out better:

But no single votive was even close to being what I wanted.

I might try again... I might not.