Contact Information

If you have any questions please feel free to contact me at marilyn@hanuchic.com

A little bit about me!

I am a stay at home mom of 2 children and 1 Angel. My husband and I met in Orlando, Florida while I was there working at Walt Disney World for their College Internship Program. We only dated for 1 month before we were engaged and then we were married 2 months later. In April we will have been married for 7 years.

I love to be outdoors especially in the mountains and I love to play all kinds of sports. I also love to do an array of crafts from scrap-booking to woodworking and I'm not afraid to get my hands or clothes dirty.

Sewing is my specialty and I've been doing it since I was 13. I sewed my prom dresses and my wedding dress. My sister has now asked me to sew her wedding dress and I am way excited. I love trying new things and learning new techniques. Right now I am learning more about pattern making.

I've also found a new love and that is Recycling. I'm not talking about putting my empty water bottles in the recycle bin, but turning old, outdated items into fun useful items. Also reusing everyday household items has been fun, but I'm finding my closet is getting cluttered with things I "might" use someday.

I hope you enjoy my blog and feel free to leave comments or send me an e-mail.

If you have any craft ideas I would love to hear them!

Are Cute Spiders possible?

YES they are and your kids can help to!!!

Here they are:

What I used:

Plastic cups for the body

Pipe cleaners for the feet(chenille stems)

Buttons for the eyes

Fabric Flowers

Colored Foam for the neckties

Red Yarn for the mouth (for the spider above I used a red paper clip)

Black Paint (for the spider above I used a sharpie)

Hot Glue

Tutorial:

Paint the cup

I only painted the bottom portion. Cut the cup down in size keeping the bottom portion.

Cut the Pipe cleaners in half and the fold them in half. Hole punch 4 holes on each side of the cup for a total of 8 holes. Feed the Pipe cleaners through two hole at the same time.

Put a little hot glue around the Pipe cleaners on the inside of the cup to give the legs more stability.

Bend the legs to your liking.

Add the eyes, mouth, and flower or bowtie.

Here’s where they have invaded for right now!!! Just an FYI I think I like the way the spider that I used the sharpie on the best (the spider in the very first picture). I like how it’s shiny.

Participating in Thrifty Thursdays go check it out!!

Technorati Tags: Spiders,Halloween,Chenille,Pipe Cleaners,Children,Activity,Kids,Buttons,Recycle,Plastic,Cups

Freezer Paper Stencil

Sorry I haven't been very good to my devoted 6 Followers, but I'm hoping to make up for that over the next few days as I have several projects to post. So, if you are not already one of my devoted followers click the link on the right side to start following me!!!
So to start off I wanted to jump on the bandwagon of using freezer paper for stenciling (scroll down a little bit and you will find a link to a PDF file for a tutorial). I really wanted to bleach the design into the shirt. So I created a design, and using Sure Cuts Alot I had my Cricut cut it out on the freezer paper. Unfortunately mid way through the 24 x 6 inch design my computer decided to restart itself and therefore my cutting process stopped. So I had to peel the paper off the cutting mat, put a new strip of paper on, and restart the design. It worked out great, except I didn't get the freezer paper that is suppose to go on the inside of the shirt down very well and so the bleach leaked leaving me with this:

So I then decided to try the design again only this time I used fabric paint and this is how it turned out. My husband modeling his new shirt for me. I was making a cheesy smiley face at him so he would smile for me!!!

Sock Animals

I have a group of girls that I get together with and we do a little craft. We just started trading off who's going to host it and basically they come up with the craft that we are going to do and then let all of us know what we need to bring. This last week we were getting together to make sock monkeys. I decided to give it a try before going and as I was making one out of a green pair of socks I decided I wanted to try and turn it into a sock frog instead. So here he is:

Basically I just followed this sock monkey tutorial here on Craftbits.com, except after creating the legs I did this: (Sorry I didn’t take any pictures so you’ll have to settle for my beautiful drawing)

I then used DMC floss and an outline embroidery stitch to create the mouth and attach the felt tongue. For the eyes I embroidered white felt circles and then I just made a few loops from top to bottom near the center of the circles.

After I finished the frog which was for my son, I asked my daughter what animal she would like and she said giraffe. So I went searching online for ideas and I found this one here and used it for my inspiration. Here’s how I made him:

Create the legs just like in the Sock Monkey tutorialThen find some yarn, thread it onto a needle, with the yarn doubled tie a knot in the end and insert it through the hole between the legs. I followed the crease line that was already in the sock and near the top of his head I pulled the yarn through. Then I cut the yarn about 1 inch from the sock. Now tie a knot in the yarn that is still attached to your needle and do it again. I created 2 rows one on each side of the crease line.Then on the other sock I made the tail similar to the monkey tail only shorter and I gathered about 6 yarn strands that were about 4 inches and tied a knot in the end. I then inserted the strings in the bottom of the sock so the know was sticking out. Then I stitched it. Here’s a close-up of the knot sticking out. What the tail looks like after you turn it inside out. After cutting the tail out of the sock this is how you will cut the remaining pieces. Follow the sock monkey tutorial for creating his arms. We are not using the heel for his nose instead we are using to toe portion of the sock. This makes for a larger snout.I created a half circle out of felt to go above his nose. I used DMC floss and did a quick embroidery stitch to hold it in place. Then I pinned his nose in place. *Pinning the items in place really helps keep them where you want them as you hand stitch them down. **I also hand stitch around all of my pieces twice. It makes for a more finished look and also holds them on better.** Here’s the ear. You make these out of the same section of sock as you would make the ears for the sock monkey. I can’t seem to find my template, so I’ll draw up a new one and post it. Tim the excess off. I didn’t put any stuffing in the ears. I liked the more floppy look. Pin them in place and hand stitch. Attach the arms and tail. I made little horns out of two pieces of felt sewn together. I then stuffed them a little and then stitched them on. I just used the same stitching method to create his eyes as I did for the frog. You can also use buttons but I prefer to embroider them on so there’s no choking hazard.

I am currently working on creating an elephant, but his trunk isn’t looking quite like I want. I also have planned to make a zebra, horse, dinosaur, pig, and a dog.

I’ll be posting pictures of my other creations later.

Technorati Tags: Sock,frog,giraffe,monkey,animals

Shadow Boxes

I've been wanting to do little baby shadow boxes for some time for each of my children but just didn't make the time until this last week. Michaels had a great deal on these shadow boxes (I got them for $10 a piece). They are 11" x 14". I used a staple gun to tack the hats, socks, bibs, shirts and then Velcro for the bracelets and pictures. I just used sticky tack to get the items that are at the bottom to stay in place.

I couldn't find Christian's hat from the hospital but my sister is going to pick me up a new one. So that's why there is an empty space in his box.

Sorry not the best of pictures. I wound up hanging them over our bed.