A must-do event during summers in Georgia is the Stone Mountain Laser Show. It’s quite the cultural event down south and I’ve been going to it since I was a child. Anyone that has been a part of the Laser Show tradition knows that the grand finale is a rousing rendition of Proud To Be An American with plenty of Americana and tons of fireworks. This year we stood with mouths dropped open as the show wrapped up void of the traditional finale!? How could they leave out the show stopper? I left feeling jipped and like my kids had been robbed of a part of their childhood.
Since this event, I decided I need to ramp up the patriotic decor and compensate for Stone Mountain’s total lack of good judgement. Ok, so I’m being a little dramatic, but I did make some pretty sweet patriotic decor out of recycled items around the house and I thought you’d enjoy them.
I’m going to first show you how to make some fabric scrap flags, and then a few ways to create things to help display them. I started by gathering a pile of scrap fabric and felt. I have a hard time throwing out little bits, when there are projects like this one that just needs a little bit. So, I was thankful I had some scraps on hand that worked perfect.
I cut out a few flag pendents. You might remember this technique with my fabric arrows. I cut the flags out on a piece of fabric folded in half, so I had a fold that separate two sides. This worked perfectly to glue my stick in the middle and then glue one side over to create a clean and front back on my flag.
After I made one, I made a few more and made sure to have two different styles cut to add a little variety and fun.
The flags were so cute left like that. I decided to embellish two of mine with some materials I had left over from my Christmas Spoonful Lab. Aren’t these leftovers fun? 🙂
I love how easy these flags were to create, yet what a fun little embellishment they can make! I see these helping to decorate a food spread. For example, how cute would they be sticking out of a of big bowl of popcorn!?
I displayed my flags by simply adding them to a few recycled crafts. I took an old beer bottle and literally just wrapped a piece of fabric around it. I used some jute rope to hold the fabric in place. This was much easier than trying to peel off the beer label or heating my hot glue gun back up to glue it place. I love how it turned out. I also used a little white acrylic paint and painted a recycled refried beans can. I used a little sandpaper to scratch it up to look a bit more rustic, and it was done! A few of these cute cans would look great holding silverware on a party food table. The possibilities are endless! Have fun creating and using your imagination!
What other trash could you turn into patriotic treasures?
**Thank you to everyone who entered my Albion gift card giveaway! Our winner is Brittany T. D! Congratulations! I will be in touch. If you are bummed to not have won and would like to purchase a suit, use code spoonful15 for a 15% off discount before July 1 on their site!**
Do you know that moment when your porch turns into a kid jungle? There are kids climbing, doing chalk, looking for bugs and shoes strung all over. In these moments, you wonder if you should use another door to join them outside?
I then ripped fabric like I did on my 
I painted a little mod podge onto my pot, and stuck a fabric strip on top. I slowly did this all the way around my pot. When I did a complete circle wrapped around the pot, I slanted my strip to go a little further down the pot till the pot was completely covered.
Next, I added more mod podge on the bottom of the pot and curved my fabric over the sides and let it dry completely. Once it was dry, I painted the whole thing with a coat of mod podge, to protect the fabric. I let it dry. Put my plant back inside it, and it was done!
Do you have a mission in life?
I cut my felt and fabric to create sweet ends and points for my arrows. This is a great way to mix patterns and colors. Your pieces could be all felt or felt on one side and fabric on the other. The big thing to note, is you need two identical size pieces for each part of the arrow. They create a front and a back as you will see in the following pictures.
I used hot glue to attach some feathers to the end piece of my arrow and then glued the identical size piece on top.
Once I had made a few of the end pieces of my arrows, I sewed all the identical size pieces for my arrows together. I could have just used hot glue, but I liked the look of the sewn pieces with stitches. The thing to be careful here is to keep an opening on the different pieces for a dowel rod or kabob stick (which are much cheaper!) to slide through.
After all my pieces were sewn, I simply started sliding them onto my wood kabob sticks and squirted in a little hot glue to hold them in place. They were done!
They were so fun to make! I am already dreaming of making more! There are so many possibilities for how to display these and the options for colors and patterns to use to create them.
Now, if you are like me, and create something you are excited about (and you voice it), your kids may want to get on board and create some too. After I made these arrows, my kids wanted to make some arrows. I adapted this idea to fun paper and just using hot glue for them. I created a stencil piece and let them trace and cut out their own arrow parts. I let my oldest hot glue his own arrow, while I did the younger three kiddos’ arrows for them. They loved being able pick their papers and place feathers where they wanted too.
This was such a quick little craft for them, where they got to use their imaginations and practice some easy skills like tracing and cutting. Reagan also decided to color hers. So, although it is the same idea, every arrow is different. Just like each of my kids are different. I love them! They have been enjoying flying these off the steps as if they were paper airplanes. Oh, to be a kid! 🙂
How about you? Do you have a passion that excites you? Something you want your life to be marked by? I hope you can make a little arrow or something that helps remind you daily that the grinding moments matter!
Does gold make you swoon?
I found these beauties at the thrift store for around $1.00 each. I love the shape, the metal, and the designs. I kept one gold for a little while, but when I found more for my collection, I ended up spray painting all of them with my favorite paint.
When Rustoleum has so many beautiful colors, it is hard to keep things gold for me. After I spray painted my candle sticks, I pulled out one of our butter knives and did a little widdling as I shaved away the ends of candles so they would fit down in the candlesticks.
Once my candles were in my new colorful candlesticks, I stuck my washi tape on the candles. I love it! I love the color of the candlesticks with the fun patterns and colors of the washi tape. I use this stuff so often. It is fun to have it displayed and act as a decoration to enjoy.
Now, I can enjoy looking at my washi tape as much as I enjoy using it. This might be a slight excuse to make sure my collection stays stocked well. 🙂
What do you think of the gold trend? Do you love it? Or do you join me and spray paint over it with COLOR!?!