Jigsaw Puzzle Party

I threw myself a birthday party on Saturday. The theme was one of my favorite things: jigsaw puzzles!

To make my party hat, I started by coloring old puzzle pieces with Apple Barrel paint pens (affiliate links here and below). When they were dry, I coiled Twisteezwire in corresponding colors around each piece, then threaded the wire into a blue party hat. I secured the ends with masking tape. I used a Sharpie to write 54 on another puzzle piece and glued it to the front of the hat. 

Here's what the party invitation looked like. I had so much fun designing it! (I used PicMonkey, of course.)

I wore my puzzle piece necklace. It's from Springbok. I got mine for free awhile back for joining their loyalty club. I don't know that they do that anymore; probably not, since they're selling it now. 

So what do you do at a puzzle party? Puzzles, of course! We solved a neon 80's themed puzzle and a chocolate mystery puzzle. 

We made crafts using puzzle pieces. 

We played Puzzle Trivia (I'll share that tomorrow). And we played multiple rounds of Puzzle Chess. 

If you're not familiar with Puzzle Chess, I highly recommend it! We used a 48-piece puzzle; you can play with a puzzle up to about 100 pieces. Someone who is not competing completes the border and turns all the pieces face up. The contestants sit across from each other with a chess clock beside the puzzle. Start the clock, then the first player puts in a piece and hits the clock. The second player does the same. When the last piece goes in, the person with the least amount of time on their clock is the winner. It's really fun!

In between it all, we grazed. I love charcuterie boards for parties. They're so much fun to put together and everyone can grab what they like. Check out the puzzle piece candies!

I used the Celebrate It! Puzzle Piece silicone mold, sold by Michaels. I'm so frustrated that they don't sell it anymore, because it is AWESOME. As you can see, the finished candies actually interlock properly like puzzle pieces should. To make the candies, I prepared Wilton Candy Melts and added a drop of different LorAnn flavorings to each of the different colors before molding them. I didn't match the colors with the flavors logically (for example, purple was green apple), which left my guests a bit -ahem- puzzled.  

I had such a good time at the party! Thanks to my friends for helping make it so fun. If you're a jigsaw puzzle fanatic, I highly recommend throwing a puzzle-themed party of your own. 

Twisteezwire Name Art

If you like tedious and frustrating crafts, boy do I have the project for you!

I thought that making a name art project using TwisteezWire (affiliate link) would be fun. I started by printing my name with the super cool Monoton font. I picked four colors of wire, then cut my letters apart. 

I grabbed my Ohuhus and found colors to match my wires. Then I colored in my letters. Not only would this make it easy to see what wire went where, but if I didn't place the wires exactly perfectly, it wouldn't be as obvious. 

Time to start cutting wire! I started with the Y, lining up each wire against the template and giving it a snip. So far, so good!

 

I used a toothpick to dab tacky glue onto the letter template and then carefully placed the wires onto the glue. It wasn't as easy as I'd hoped, but it wasn't terrible. But things went downhill soon after. Letters I and N weren't bad, but it was difficult to get the smooth curves needed for the C. The D was an absolute nightmare. Shaping the wires (and then checking and re-checking against the template) was tedious. Gluing them in place was frustrating and time-consuming. It was hard to get the right amount of glue to hold the wire without having extra that showed. I tried putting the glue on the wire itself vs on the paper, but it was equally challenging. 

The last step was gluing the letters to a piece of black cardstock. I only managed to pop off a single wire in the process, which was a small miracle, but I also managed to glue the N upside down. That would seriously bug me if the rest of the project had turned out well, but that obviously wasn't the case. 

This project was a bust... for me, anyway. Someone with more patience and better fine motor skills might like it more. For that matter, maybe TIM or ELLA or someone else with a short name with no curves would enjoy it more than I did. 

I want to clarify that TwisteezWire is a really fun craft material that you can use to make tons of neat stuff. Some of my favorite projects I've made with TwisteezWire include these critters, this puzzle piece person, and this bouquet of button flowers. I've even used TwisteezWire to make letters before (with curves) with no issues.  

Playdough Texture Tools

I was a big fan of Play-Doh when I was a kid. Specifically, I liked the play sets. My favorites were the barbershop, the ice cream maker, and the barbecue set. (These affiliate links go to the modern versions of the 1970's toys I loved.) I still like playing with doughs and clays, but it's been years since we've had any Play-Doh in the house. (Trevor played with it occasionally when he was little, but it just wasn't his thing.) Now I use Model Magic, Sculpey, or homemade salt dough when I am in the mood to play with clay.

The last time I had my clay out, I made myself a set of texture tools using random items from the craft room. I'm really happy with how they turned out. 

 

The first step was gathering craft sticks and a bunch of random stuff. I wasn't sure what would print well on clay, so I tried a wide variety of things. 

Next, I attached each item (pony beads, buttons, a wooden swan, a rubber band, yarn, a chipboard tree, pipe cleaner, a shiny trim, Twisteezwire, pennies, and a feather) to craft sticks. I used hot glue for everything except the rubber band, pipe cleaner, and Twisteezwire, which I just wrapped around their craft sticks. 

I pressed each into the clay....

.... lifted them up to see the results. Most of them printed very well! The only total failure is the feather. The clay stuck to it and it didn't print well. The thin trim isn't great, but it was better than expected. 

I am most happy with the pony beads and the buttons. They give great texture to the clay. My second favorites are rubber band, pipe cleaner, and Twisteezwire. 

Make your own set of texture tools for playdough! Kids will love every step, from searching the house for items to use, to pressing their tools into dough to create textures. If you try anything that works particularly well (or particularly poorly!) let me know in the comments. 

Puzzle Piece Monarch Butterfly

After you turn a puzzle piece into an alien, the next logical thing to do is to turn one into a butterfly. A monarch, to be specific. Affiliate links below. 

Puzzle Piece Monarch Butterfly

Materials:

• puzzle piece (yet another from the puzzle gift fiasco of 2011)
• white gesso
• Folk Art paint
• black Sharpie
• Uniball Signo white pen
• Twisteezwire
• black pipe cleaner

Steps:

Prep the puzzle piece by painting a coat of gesso on the glossy surface. When the gesso has dried, add an orange base coat. Let it dry completely. 

Use a fine-tip Sharpie to color the sides and edges of the puzzle piece black. Then use an ultra-fine Sharpie to add lines that mimic the patterns of a monarch. 

 

With the white Uniball pen, add dots around the outside edges. 

Wrap a pipe cleaner around the puzzle piece to make the body of the butterfly. The top and bottom should extend beyond the puzzle piece, and the ends should be hidden on the back side. 

Cut a piece of Twisteezwire and wrap it around the the top of the pipe cleaner, twisting to secure it. Curl then ends around the body of the pen to create the curl.  

So far, I've turned puzzle pieces into a ladybug, crab, reindeer, girl, wreath, alien, and now a butterfly. Trevor has made a spider and a bug. There are still several dozen pieces left from the terrible puzzle - what should I make next?

Puzzle Piece Alien

One craft idea begets another. After making my footprint alien, I realized that a puzzle piece would make a great alien, too. Affiliate links below. 

Puzzle Piece Alien

Materials:

• puzzle piece (I'm still using up the ones from the puzzle gift fiasco of 2011)
• white gesso
• construction paper or cardstock
• Folk Art paint
• Twisteezwire
• googly eye
• scissors
• craft glue

Steps:

Prepare the puzzle piece by painting a coat of gesso on the glossy surface. Use a stiff brush or an old toothbrush to make a starry background on black cardstock, as described in the footprint alien project.

When the gesso has dried, paint the alien. I'm a fan of green aliens, but you can obviously choose whatever you want. 

When the paint has dried, cut a piece of Twisteezwire and wrap it around the base of a tab, twisting to secure it. (Did you know they're called tabs? Check out this interesting article.) Then twist the ends of the wire around the paintbrush handle, one at a time, to create the curl. Glue a googly eye in place. Cut out a friendly mouth and glue it beneath the eye. (Or whatever. It's your alien. If there's ever a place where there's no right or wrong way to do something, it's when you're making an alien craft.)

Cut out a planet for your alien to sit on and glue it to the starry background. Then glue your alien in place. 

There are so many creative possibilities with this project. Give it a try!

Diamond Art Gingerbread Family

Remember the snowman family portrait on a pillow I shared recently? Similar concept, different holiday icon. Affiliate links below. 

Diamond Art Gingerbread Family

Materials:

• wood gingerbread men
• 1.5" wood hearts
• Fiskars craft drill
• Plaid Teddy Bear Brown acrylic paint
• leftover gems from diamond art
• tacky craft glue
• white twisteezwire
• Supertite glue

Steps:

Drill holes in each gingerbread man's hands. Paint the gingerbread men and hearts Teddy Bear Brown.

Add white gems to the gingerbread people's face, arms, and legs using tacky glue. I used our family colors for the buttons.

Add white gems around the edge of the hearts. Thread the wire through the holes. I curled the ends of the wires around a toothpick.

Glue the hearts to the wire using Supertite. Alternately, you can drill holes through the hearts so that you can string them as well.

I thought about adding dates to the hearts: 5/30/04 for the heart connecting Gingerbread Steve and Gingerbread Cindy, then 6/07/06 for the heart connecting Gingerbread Cindy with Gingerbread Trevor. I love the idea, but at this scale it's not possible to do in a way that realistically mimics royal icing. I might go back and add it anyway. What do you think?

Lucky Alphabet Block Photo Holder... and a WINNER!

Sometimes crafts come together exactly how I'd imagined them. Such is the case with this 'Lucky' photo holder made with alphabet blocks. I'm so happy with how it turned out! That's my niece, Allison, and my nephew, Timothy, in the photos. Both pictures are ridiculously out of date. (Hint, hint... Aunt Cindy needs new portraits.) Affiliate links below. 

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Lucky Alphabet Block Photo Holder

Materials:

• wooden alphabet blocks
• Folk Art white gesso
• Folk Art green paint
• hot glue gun
• Twisteezwire
• wire cutters
• large star punch / small star punch
• Folk Art Treasure Gold paint

Steps:

Find blocks to spell LUCKY. Color doesn't matter, which is fortunate because the one blue with four yellows looks ucky. Literally. 

Give each block a coat of white gesso. It doesn't matter if you can still see a slight color difference. That will be hidden with the next coat of paint. Use a glue gun to connect the blocks. 

Carefully paint the letters and the border of the blocks green. Let the paint dry completely. Punch out some stars from scraps of cardstock and paint them gold.

Cut two lengths of green twisteezwire, one approximately 12" and one 10". Curl one end of each wire around something round with a small diameter, like a pencil. Make two complete loops, then remove the pencil. Gently bend each wire against something round with a large diameter, like a basketball.

Arrange the two wires so that their arcs bend outward. Check that the length of the wire puts the photos where you want them to be. Trim as necessary, then attach them to the back of the center block using the glue gun.

To display your photos, just slide the pictures between the loops. I opted to sprinkle the stars on and around the photo holder without attaching them permanently to it, but you can glue them in place if you wish.

It would be easy to adapt the design to display more than two photos. Simply add a third or fourth wire with enough space between them so that the photos aren't crowded. I don't think I'd add more than four wires on a LUCKY design, but you could squeeze in a whole bunch if you spelled out something like GRANDCHILDREN. That would be really cute and would make a great gift. 

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Now, the winner from the Diamond Art giveaway! Thank you to everyone who entered. All of you correctly identified my latest Diamond Art project as the Hot Air Balloon. It's soooo pretty in real life. The sparkle is amazing. I loved reading which kit each of you would pick if you were the lucky winner. Congrats to....

AMY MARTIN!!!

Please email me your address and I'll have Leisure Arts get the Rainbow Tree kit out to you asap! Thanks again to Leisure Arts for sponsoring this giveaway and for being such an amazing company. For those of you who didn't win, think about adding the Diamond Art kit you wanted to your holiday gift list. Or buy it for yourself before the holidays... you deserve it!

Dragonfly and Damselfly Garden Stakes

As you know, I'm a Plaid Ambassador, which means that the folks at Plaid send me boxes of products to try. (I know. Coolest thing ever.) When I opened a box with two bottles of  Dragonfly Glaze (affiliate link here and throughout the post), naturally I used it to make dragonflies! (Actually, one dragonfly and one damselfly.) They look so cute bobbling around in my houseplant.

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Dragonfly and Damselfly Garden Stakes

Materials:

• jumbo craft sticks (1 per insect)
• mini craft sticks (4 per insect) OR standard craft sticks (2 per insect)
• Plaid paint and Dragonfly Glaze
• craft glue
• googly eyes
• Twisteezwire
• wire cutters
• clear straws

Steps:

Paint a jumbo craft stick the color you'd like your dragonfly or damselfly to be. (I made one green with mini craft sticks representing Washington's state insect, the green darner dragonfly, and one blue with standard craft sticks, representing Nevada's state insect, the vivid dancer damselfly.) Paint the mini or standard craft sticks white. When the paint is dry, give each a coat or two of Dragonfly Glaze.

When the glaze is completely dry and you're happy with the shimmer, glue the eyes and the wings to the body. Leave a small gap between the wings. When the glue is dry, place a white Twisteezwire between the wings.

Twist the two ends of the wire together close to the insect's body. Then continue to twist the two wires around each other. 

Thread the twisted wire into a clear drinking straw, then press the straw into the potted plant. Adjust the wire as desired. 

My dragonfly and damselfly will be staying indoors, but you could put these in the garden instead. A coat of sealant will help it stay intact and shimmery throughout the growing season.

Twisteezwire Girl with Flowers

It had been far too long since I'd played with Twisteezwire, so I challenged myself to make a person, with puzzle pieces providing the main structure. This post contains affiliate links. 

Twisteezwire Girl with Flowers

Materials:

• puzzle pieces (mine are still leftover from the worst customer service ever)
• Twisteezwire
• wire cutters 
• googly eyes
• craft glue

Steps:

These are the steps I used to make my sculpture. Feel free to follow my instructions or be creative and come up with your own design!

1. Wrap the center of a blue wire around a puzzle piece torso, then attach the ends to puzzle pieces to make feet. Adjust everything until it balances nicely.  

2. Cut a yellow wire in half. Wrap each half around the handle of the wire cutters to make curls, then attach the hair to a puzzle piece head. Glue the eyes to the face.  

3. Wrap the center of a cream-colored wire around the neck, then wrap each end around the torso. Fold the ends of the arms back slightly and twist to make hands.  

4. Cut four lengths of green wire, each twice as long as you want the flower stems to be. Cut short lengths of red, pink, orange, and yellow wire, and wrap each around one end of the green wires. Thread the bundle of green wires through the girl's hand, then twist the non-flowered end of each green wire around the flowered end of a green wire.

Twisteezwire Critters

I was browsing the Twisteezwire website while writing up my review of their Mask Kit when their Puzzle Piece Bug tutorial caught my eye. I'm always on the lookout for fun crafts using puzzle pieces! (You may recall the ridiculous situation with a puzzle purchase awhile back that resulted in me having a large stash of useless puzzle pieces.) I showed the tutorial to Trevor and he was totally onboard with the idea of making puzzle piece Twisteezwire bugs. Affiliate links below. 

We each started by choosing a puzzle piece and Twisteezwire. We followed the steps to make three sets of legs to create a basic insect. We continued with the antenna. Then we used Glue Dots to attach googly eyes. With the basic technique mastered, we were able to use our own creativity to make some totally cute (if I do say so myself!) critters. Introducing....

  

Dot, the Ladybug

(by Cindy)

To make Dot, you need a red puzzle piece, 3 Twisteezwires (red, black, and white), six red beads, two googly eyes, glue dots, six black sequins, glue, and wax paper. Make a basic bug with the puzzle piece, red legs, and black antenna. Slide a bead about 1/2 inch up each leg and twist to secure. Add eyes. Create wings by looping the white wire, sliding it through a set of legs on the underside of Dot, then forming another loop. Tear two small pieces of wax paper that are slightly larger than the loops. Put glue on the back of the loops, then attach the wax paper. Let the glue dry completely, then trim the excess wax paper away from the loops. Glue the sequins to Dot's back.

Buggy, the Bug

(by Trevor)

To make Buggy, you need an orange puzzle piece, two Twisteezwires (green and orange), six orange buttons, two googly eyes, and glue dots. Make a basic bug with oversize antenna. Thread each leg through the button holes, then twist to secure. Add eyes.

Chesapeake, the Blue Crab

(by Cindy)

To make Chesapeake, you need a neutral-colored puzzle piece, Twisteezwire (blue and black), eight blue beads, two black beads, glue dots and googly eyes. Start by making a basic bug. Add a bead to each of the middle and back legs, twisting to secure. Add two beads each to the front two legs to form claws. Cut a small length of black wire for the eye stalks and attach like you would antenna. Glue googly eyes in place.

Spinner, the Spider

(by Trevor)

To make Spinner, you need a neutral puzzle piece, tan Twisteezwire, a large black pom pom, a medium black pom pom, glue, glue dots, and googly eyes. Begin by cutting the tan Twisteezwire into fourths, not thirds like usual. Attach the first three sets of legs as usual, and add the final set of legs opposite the third set, using the same technique. Bend up the end of each leg slightly to allow Spinner to balance. Glue the large pom pom onto the back of the puzzle piece and the medium pom pom onto the front. Use glue dots to attach the googly eyes to the face.

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What do you think? Any favorites? Trevor is already talking about the next set of critters we're going to make!