JESSIKA REED

Hip & Simple Creativity

Custom Gift Tags

As I mentioned before, I recently got a Silhouette cutting machine. I have used it for vinyl and for stenciling but that is about it at this point. I had this idea to make custom gift tags for a few homemade gifts I am working on for Christmas. I designed the files and imported them into the Silhouette studio program, printed them out and then ran them through the machine to cut them.

I love the way they turned out and can’t wait to put them on my gifts!

[Read more…]

Lazy Sunday

Today has been a great Sunday. I wanted to say we were lazy but really we did quite a bit. I cooked 5 meals for this week and got them ready so we just have to pop them in the oven, which will save time and money since sometimes (more often than it should) I come home not wanting to cook and we go out instead. I also worked on a Christmas gifts, finishing up craft projects and blogging. But in all honestly, most of the day we were laying around, like the pictures below show.
This was while Stephen was on the phone with his brother after the BCS rankings came out and it was official that Alabama and LSU will have a rematch fighting for the National Championship on January 9! You can tell he is quite happy. I can’t believe how much I know about football now and how excited I really am for that game and if you really want to know why it is a big deal that those two teams (from the same conference) were selected, I can tell you all about it – well actually I can repeat what I have heard from Stephen and his conversations with his brother!
I just couldn’t resist snapping this with Molly, she is just so cute!

Royce too.
Molly has the hairiest feet! We just cut her hair like a month ago and already the hair is coming out of his paws! I just love them both so much!

Silhouette Cutter – Alabama A Shirt & Kids Horse shirt

I recently bought a Silhouette Cutter. Stephen was all about it, he has all of these ideas for Alabama shirts and Christmas gift ideas.

I have only played with a couple of features but so far it is pretty awesome.
The first thing I got is their tshirt starter kit. It comes with stencil vinyl and fabric ink. You design your project (or download an image), cut it out in the stencil, stick it on the fabric, then use the included sponge to dab on the fabric ink. When it dries it is a lot like silk screened shirts. I like that I can control the amount of ink so it can have more of a “vintage” feel, there is just a lot of control with this process.
I of course made some Alabama shirts for us to wear and support the team! Stephen loves his shirt.

Here is mine, just a red “A” that is worn all over!

I am going to make some Christmas presents with this thing. I have had some shirt ideas for a while and thought for my little sister I wanted to do something with horses since she loves them so much. So I made this.
Front

Back


I used the flocked heat transfer vinyl. It is iron on vinyl but the flocked material is soft and doesn’t feel or look like regular heat transfer vinyl. I can’t wait until Christmas to give it to her!

I am excited to see what else I can make with this thing!

$5 Cabinet Door & Wreath Project

I have recently discovered a ReStore. It is run by the Habitat for Humanity and people can donate their unused construction products or old items when remodeling and they will resell it and the money goes towards Habitat for Humanity. What an awesome place and why haven’t I heard of this before?
Here are the items you need:

Cabinet door (or wood board)
Wreath (Hobby Lobby)
Paint
Sponge Brush
Antiquing glaze or wood stain
Ribbon
Hot glue gun and glue
Sawtooth hanger
Sandpaper

I picked out a cabinet door for $.50 on sale! I guess if you added up all of the items at once it would be over $5 but I used left over paint and scrap ribbon, a used brush, already had a hot glue gun, etc. It is still a cheap project though!

I sanded down the cupboard to prepare it for the paint.

I painted two quick coats of paint on the cabinet. No need to be perfect, you sand it and make it look worn so projects like these are very forgiving. I painted it with yellow first and then a little white on top of that.

I ran the sandpaper along the edges and corners to give it a more antique look. The more you take off, the more worn it looks. I like to randomly take off areas along the project to make it look more naturally weathered. The harder you press, the more that comes off.

Paint on some of the antique glaze or stain and wipe it off with a paper towel. I do it in small sections because you can always add more to make it darker but it is harder to get excess off if you stain it too dark.

I originally bought a knob ($.15 at Restore) to hang the wreath but didn’t end up liking it the end. So I hammered in a sawtooth hanger in the back and then tied some ribbon and glued it to the top of the cabinet.

And you are done! This made a great birthday gift for a friend, was really quick and easy – just my type of project!

New Bedroom Decor – Grey & Yellow

Our bedroom is not the most relaxing place to me and I would like it to be. The wall are empty and I haven’t really loved the decor. I painted the walls and got a new white bedspread that I liked for a while but then Molly got a hold of this big vitamin pill and got pink stuff all over the bedspread, completely ruining it. Since then I have been determined to make the room more me.
I didn’t want to spend too much time or money on all of this so I went around my house looking for things to take from here and there or that were being stored. I found the following items and hung them in a collage and I love what it looks like! Most of what I had was sitting in a box waiting for a table to set them on or something. I am really happy with the way it turned out!

Right now I love grey and yellow – as do most people – it is so hot right now! Since I painted the walls grey (the grey looks more like he first picture in person), I wanted to find a yellow comforter. It was not as easy as I thought. I searched the Internet looking for the yellow I had in mind. Everything was too pale or too neon and just plain ugly. While at Target one day, I came across the bedspread below and I fell in love!
It wasn’t exactly what I had in mind but I love the patterns and the balance of the other colors with the yellow! And we saw the same comforter on HGTV’s House Hunters and somehow that made me really proud like I picked something that ended up on TV! HA.
I like the overall look of the main part of the room now.
I am thinking that some homemade painters canvas curtains painted with a chevron pattern would be fun! We have to keep the blackout curtains though as there is a warehouse behind our house with bright spotlights that shine right in our windows at night – lovely.
I just had to point this out – do you see what we keep in the corner?
That’s right, a bat. Robbers beware, we mean business.
Back to the walls – I had a round art piece from Ikea that was off white with brown birds painted on it. I wanted to create something more me with that and so I made this more modern looking piece. I really hate it. I have had it on the wall for a while trying to get used to it, but it just isn’t working for me – but at least I tried. One day I will get around to making it into something else!
I remember moving into our house after it was built thinking I had to have everything the way I wanted it right away but I am finding that decor is more of a collection over time that you build upon here and there. I have a long want list but I do love going to my more comfy bedroom at the end of the day! The rest of my list can wait a while!

We’re back!

To be more efficient I was hoping to move my blog over to JessikaReed.com. Well I have found that I am really picky about what I want to put over there so now I don’t post anything personal in fear of offending a potential customer and I miss blogging. So I am back here.

What is up with us?
Well Stephen got a job working as a Community Manager, managing hoa properties. He is really liking it. It really was a good in the end that he got laid off. I was made full time at work the day after Stephen lost his job and then about a month later I was promoted. Luckily I am able to still focus on school and school is now free which is awesome!
The only problem is that I can’t figure out what I am doing in school. I went back for graphic design. But I have fallen in love with photography and don’t really like the teachers or direction of the design program. I am struggling on what to do. I will be receiving my second associates degree at the end of this semester, it will be in art and visual communications with an emphasis in graphic design and photography. I have an associates in general studies already. How many associates degrees equal a bachelors? Ha:) since I am struggling with this I am only taking one class this semester and hoping to figure its out soon!
I recently purchased a silhouette cameo cutter. I have been thinking about getting into vinyl and Stephen wanted something so we could make custom university of Alabama T-shirts. This option was pretty cost effective and if all we end up using it for is personal stuff then I won’t feel as guilty as I would have if we bought a full cutter. I haven’t had much chance to play around with it but am excited to soon. This is the cutter.
This morning we took Molly to get her hair cut. She is a Pomeranian / long haired Chihuahua and her long hair is hard to manage. It is a lot to brush it and she still gets knots, especially behind her ears. We have gone with the lion cut since the first time we got it cut and I decided to go with something different.



She looks like an entirely different dog now and she is actually smaller than Royce it was just all that deceiving hair that made her look bigger. We now see what a dark face she has in comparison to the rest of her light coat and she really huge ears that stick right up. We love the new look!
All in all life is good. We always seem to be busy but we are enjoying what we are doing. Our three year anniversary is coming up in a little over a week. Some days it seems like we have been together forever and others it seems like we are still so new! I am just really happy where we are!

The Fam

The other night I was playing around with my speedlight flash and got a couple of shots of the “fam”. I love our dogs and Stephen is a keeper.