Halloween Countdown

I just participated in another Craftster swap, one in which you send one awesome item to your partner. One thing about my partner, she is a huge Halloween fan. I love working on Halloween crafts no matter what time of year it is, so I decided to make her an October calendar that she can use every year.

The calendar consists 31 ATCs, bound together with a Bind It All, and mounted on a collapsible cardboard frame. I also included a little costumed rat, to keep her company.

The back cover folds up to create a triangular stand for the pages. Each day in October, she can flip one over as Halloween approaches. I used playing cards for the bases of the ATCs. They're just the right size, and it's easy to quickly cover them with scrapbook paper and then cut them out. I didn't cover the backs because I don't mind the way they look, and the cards would be way too fat with all that extra paper involved.

Here's the calendar on October 1:

on the 5th:

And on the Halloween itself:

I really had fun making a card for every day of October. Here are all the cards before they were bound:

 

I hope this gives her many years of Halloween joy.

GIANT X-acto Knife Prop

Have you ever needed a really, really big X-acto knife? Well, I have, so I thought I'd make one of my own, mostly with stuff we had around the house.

 And here it is. I think it looks real, although it's actually 4 1/2 feet tall. (That's an actual X-acto knife lying beside it on the floor.)

The knife itself is made of 1 1/2" PVC pipe, spray painted silver. The blade is made of thin wood, and sits in a black rubber end cap that I slit open with a box cutter. I think the part that's under the cap is what really makes it: I went looking at Home Depot to find something to mimic that grip part on a real knife, and almost cried real tears of joy when I found this 2" clear pipe with nylon reinforcements in it. It fits perfectly on the PVC, with no adhesive necessary!

 

I cut the stencil out for the logo on my Silhouette Cameo, then traced around them with pencil and hand-painted the logo on with black. It's a tiny bit wambly, because it's not easy to paint on that round surface, but I'm pretty happy with it.

What does one do with a giant X-acto? I'm going to use this for a prop in a costume I'm making, and then it's going to live in my craft room as decor. 

Housewarming

My cousin and his wife are moving back into town after several years (yay!), and we're going to go see their new place on Wednesday. I want to bring them a housewarming gift, so I got a scrap of wood, painted it white, stenciled on some letters and then painted them. Then I sanded the front and the edges, which are painted black. This is a quick and easy gift. It probably took less than two hours to complete.

Now I hope they'll stay put for a while!

Tin of the Month Club, March

Is it March already? Then it must be time for this month's tin. I went a little Eastery with this one, even though most of the time Easter falls in April. I think I just needed to feel like Spring is on its way! Here's a cute little fellow and his friend the Easter bunny.

Here are the first quarter tins so far: January, February, and now March. I already feel like this year is flying by!

My friend cackle, over at CackleAndHoot is also in the Tin of the Month Club. Check out hers here!