Crafts

by ingredient

DIY Homemade Soy Candle Tutorial

February 11, 2013 23 Comments

I have a recipe for you today, but it’s not for food. You don’t mind too much do you? You see ever since my Mom & I made soy candles as favors for my wedding, and after the wedding was featured here, I got several requests to share our recipe/process. Our guests absolutely loved them and we’ve made more candles since with lots of success. They make such a wonderful gift with a special, personalized touch- and the options for scents and colors are endless! Would you believe that making them is really pretty simple once you get the hang of it?

We chose to use soy wax, and have made them in a variety of scents. These were Hazelnut Coffee (amazing,) and we did Cinnamon Vanilla for the wedding. All of our supplies came from Candle Science, including the jars, wicks, wax, and scents. When ordering, you can choose the right wick size for your jar which is helpful- and there are customer service reps who can help you figure out the right quantity of supplies to order for what you need. (I’m not paid to promote them I swear!) We experimented a ton before the wedding to create a candle that smells great before and while it’s burning.

Filed Under: Crafts, How-To

Behind the Blog- Wedding Napkin Quilt

January 16, 2013 16 Comments

Hello! I had planned a recipe for today, and even though I’ve made it before, it was a bit of a disaster yesterday and I didn’t want to share it until I’ve worked out some kinks. So, I decided to start a new blog series based on several comments/emails I’ve gotten about sharing more about myself and my life “Behind the Blog.”

I’ve always been a lover of crafts, so it wasn’t a surprise that I wanted to do a ton of them for my wedding. I made so many things for that beautiful day and I couldn’t have loved that time more. I really am so happy sitting on my couch with a project laid out on the coffee table with some music or a guilty pleasure TV show on.

Behind the Blog Wedding Napkin Quilt %The Baker Chick

One of my later craft ideas was to make my own mis-matched vintage-y napkins. I thought that my tables needed a little extra something and I just wasn’t having the plain ivory napkins that my caterer was providing. I looked on Etsy, only to find that simple fabric squares cut only with a pinking shear were upwards of $1.50 each. I also- would get whatever the sellers had without getting to choose my own fabrics to match my color
scheme.

So- I decided to take this project on myself. Finishing the edges with a sewing machine didn’t seem possible with only a month before the wedding, so I bough a zig-zag rotary cutter and just left the edges like that. No one really saw them until they were opened and I think it was just fine. Also- I figured if I finished the edges I’d feel horrible cutting them off to make the napkins into a quilt, which I decided right away I wanted to do

So- the napkins were used for my wedding, washed and I spent the fall re-purposing them into a beautiful quilt that’s now in the guest room! I love it so much and feel like I’ve created a new family heirloom which such special meaning! (Link to the pattern I used from Purl Soho here.)

PS- Guess WHAT? My wedding is going to be featured on Style Me Pretty in a few weeks! If you’re not familiar it’s only the most beautiful wedding blog of all time and I’m so incredibly excited/honored.

PPS- I have gotten several emails lately with questions about saving/printing/finding recipes. I am SO sorry that my site is such a pain when it comes to this. Lucky for all of us- I’m making a switch to WordPress soon that will come with a really easy to use print/save icon. Woohoo! I’ll keep you posted on the changes the next couple weeks!

Filed Under: Crafts, Wedding

Fabric Flag Bunting Cake Topper How-To

September 14, 2012 3 Comments

As it was with most of my wedding, I wanted to DIY something special for my cake. Now, I didn’t have a traditional cake with lots of tiers and fancy decor. After tasting several wedding cakes in the area- I found them all just “Eh.” (a curse of having such high dessert standards.)

So- It didn’t take long before I realized a dessert bar was the way to go. I found a cupcake place I adored, and our caterer made cheesecake lollypops, and mini lemon tarts that were to die. Add to that, my Mom making 200 of her famous chocolate chip cookies, and my Dad making traditional middle eastern baklava. Dessert heaven! I couldn’t have been happier with how the whole thing turned out.

Anyway- I did want a small cutting cake, so our cupcake shop made up a 6 inch cake in our of our cupcake flavors: Vanilla Salted Caramel. (Surprised??) I knew it needed something cute to go on top of it, and I’d seen flag cake toppers around etsy. Why pay $20+ for something I could easily make it hours? You can either leave it plain like you saw here, or stamp letters on for a special occasion like I do below. And here’s how!

Supplies needed:
1. Scrap fabric
2. Small piece of cardboard
3. Fabric glue
4. 3 bamboo skewers
6. Rotary cutter/mat/ruler

1. This is a great use for scrap fabric. Both the linen for my wedding topper and the fabric for the topper of the Vegan cake came from leftovers from my napkin-making project.

2. Fold a long piece of the fabric in half, and press if needed to create a crisp crease. Using a cutting mat/rotary cutter, Measure about an inch and cut a strip. (You could also just do this with a scissors.)

3. Create a cardboard stencil of your flag. Measure it to be an inch long and trim the sides at your desired width

4. Using the rotary cutter and a ruler, cut however many flags you want for your topper- making sure the flat side is always on the folded crease

5. Repeat. :)

6. Using some fabric glue and a wooden skewer, spread a thin layer of glue inside the triangle, leaving the very inside of the crease glue-free.

7. One-by-one, press each flag onto the piece of twine, leaving spaces for separate words if desired.

8. If stamping, test out your stamps many times before trying on the flags. For these, I had to wipe down the edges of each one very well before stamping so it didn’t leave a rim. You could also hand-write letters on!