9 Wearable Festive DIYs

1/ Christmas Tree Earrings (via Legendary Beads) - if you want to practise your wire work skills these earrings are the perfect project. Made simply from coils of wire with bead embellishments they're great for beginners.

2/ Snow Globe Necklace (via Tatertots & Jello) - this design takes a classic Christmas decoration and recreates it in miniature to be used as an eye catching necklace pendant.

3/ Icy Earrings (via Epbot) - this idea is perfect for anyone who loves to upcycle as these pretty statement earrings are made from bubble wrap!

4/ Bracelet For Christmas Day (via PandaHall) - if beading is your craft you'll love this festive bracelet made using tiger tail wire and Swarovski crystals.

5/ Quickie Candy Cane Earrings (via All Free Jewelry Making) - another beginner project is these cute candy cane earrings that can be made in no time! Again they are perfect for beginners and don't require too many supplies.

6/ Frosted Snowflake Charm Bracelet (via e-elise etc) - this tutorial uses frosted shrink plastic to create snowflake charms which hang alongside simple beads for a fun festive bracelet.

7/ Ornament Headband (via in-lala-land) - if you want to go for something more quirky this bold headband is sure to turn heads. Made from colourful baubles this one could be perfect for a festive party!

8/ Quilted Christmas Booties (via Fave Quilts) - if sewing and quilting are your favourite crafts you'll love these cute patchwork slippers, brilliant for a handmade gift!

9/ Glitter Christmas Light Bulb Necklace (via Sugar Bee Crafts) - another colourful piece, these glittery bulb pendants are sure to make a statement.

We'd love to hear from you if you give these DIY's a go - use the hash tag #eightandsixteen to share your photos with us!

Erin

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DIY Button Snowflake Ornament

Today is the final DIY in our week of button projects - we hope you've enjoyed them!
These decorations are great for the Christmas tree, but could also make sweet stocking fillers or even gift tags for presents!

Note: I collected some lolly sticks to make this project even thriftier, but you can easily find packs of craft sticks to buy if you plan to make lots of decorations.

First you need to glue your sticks together to create your snowflake design. Leave this to dry as you don't want them moving around when it comes to the next step!

Starting with the stick on the bottom, start glueing your buttons into place.
Tip: Use smaller buttons at the centre of the sticks for a better fit.

Continue glueing your buttons onto each stick, finishing with the top stick.

Using a piece of twine or ribbon, create a loop and glue this into place on the back of your snowflake. Hang your decoration on the Christmas tree, and step back to admire your handiwork!

We'd love to hear from you if you give this DIY a go - use the hash tag #eightandsixteen to share your photos with us!

Skye

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DIY Button Flower Brooch

Today's button tutorial is for this cute accessory that's perfect for a handmade gift this Christmas! These brooches would make great stocking fillers - just customise the design to suit your friends and family members by using their favourite colours.

You will need: buttons, felt, a brooch back, a pen, scissors, fabric glue + a needle & thread

1. Arrange your 'petal' buttons in a circle on a sheet of felt, draw around them and cut out two of this shape.

Tip! You can choose any buttons that you like for your brooch however I would recommend heart shaped ones as they lend themselves well to creating the button flower's petals. 

2. Next take a needle and thread and sew each of your buttons onto one of your felt shapes until you have your finished button circle. Then sew your centre button.

Tip! You can also make any sized brooch you like - just make sure your centre button is large enough to slightly overlap the 'petal' buttons for a 3D effect.

3. Take your second piece of felt and neatly stitch on a brooch back. Then use fabric glue to attach this onto the back of your first piece of felt, covering up your stitching for a neater finish. Once dry your button flower accessory is ready to wear or give as a gift!

We'd love to hear from you if you try out this or any of our other DIY projects - use the hashtag #eightandsixteen to share your photos with us.

Don't forget to check back tomorrow for another button project idea!

Erin

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DIY Button Gift Tags

I'm pretty sure that most households contain a button jar/tin/box somewhere... right?! These button gift tags are a great way to upcycle those odd buttons, and you can create so many cute Christmas designs really easily as a finishing touch to your presents.

First, have a play around with your design until you're happy with the layout.
Then glue your buttons into position on your gift tag and leave to dry.

Draw on any extra details in pencil - for this snowman I added a hat and stick arms.

Finally, use a sharpie or similar to fill in the pencil details, or try glitter glue as I did for the baubles gift tag.

And that's it - such a simple DIY, but so effective!

We'd love to hear from you if you give this DIY a go - use the hash tag #eightandsixteen to share your photos with us!

Skye

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DIY Button Bunting Necklace

With Christmas fast approaching we've decided to share four button projects including gifts and decorations! For the first project of the week I wanted to share this necklace design that I think could be the perfect DIY for anyone looking to give unique handmade gifts this year!

To make your own you will need: buttons, jewellery wire, wire cutters, flat and round nose pliers, an assembled chain (or supplies to make your own)



1. To make your bunting necklace you will need to turn each of your chosen buttons into a charm. Start with a piece of wire approx. 2" long, thread it through one of the holes in your button and bend in half

2. Use your flat nose pliers to bend out the lengths of wire in the opposite directions, creating a loop around the edge of the button



3. Take your pliers and bend the wire that sits on the front side of the button up at a right angle - this will be the piece you turn into the loop

4. Move a little way along the wire then add a second bend in the opposite direction



5. Switch to your round nose pliers and bend the end of the wire around them to create a loop

6. Finally, wrap the other length of the wire around it securing it in place and adding a decorative finish



7. Once you have all of your button charms, find the centre of your necklace chain and attach on your middle charm. To do this use pliers to gently open up the hanging loop you created, thread through the chain link and close.

8. Repeat this process to add on the remaining button charms making sure to space them apart evenly, and your necklace is done!

We'd love to hear from you if you try out this DIY project - use the hashtag #eightandsixteen to share your photos with us!

Erin

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DIY Cardboard Tube Wreath

Today's DIY is a super simple festive wreath made from painted cardboard tubes and a few decorative berries. Depending on how many tubes you have to hand you can make this wreath as simplistic or extravagant as you like, and you could also try adding different embellishments such as bows or mistletoe.

To start off, take your cardboard tubes, flatten them and cut them into 4 pieces. If you prefer, you can paint your tubes before doing this, but I didn't want any plain edges showing once they'd been cut.

Paint all of your tubes (inside and out!) and leave to dry.
Once dry, divide up the tube pieces into the 'flower shapes' and start glueing them together. I used a little glue on the points, and then used paperclips to keep the pieces together until dry.

Repeat with all of your tube pieces, and then join all of these flowers into a circle and glue/paperclip in the same way. Leave to dry.
You can then embellish the wreath - I have used decorative berries on wire that I simply wrapped around the centre of each flower.

This wreath will only be suitable for indoor use, but is a great addition to any festive decor and it can be so easily customised to suit your colour scheme :)

We'd love to hear from you if you give this DIY a go - use the hash tag #eightandsixteen to share your photos with us!

Skye

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DIY Festive Miniature Bottle Ornaments

These pretty glitter-filled miniature bottle ornaments are the perfect addition to anyone's decor this season, no matter how much space you have! With just a few supplies they're easy to make and can be customised to suit your colour scheme.

You will need: miniature glass bottles with corks, headpins, flat and round nose pliers, a pin, glitter/beads/sequins, thin ribbon, scissors & strong glue



1. Fill up your bottles with glitter, beads, sequins or other sparkly items and set aside

2. To hang the bottle you'll need to add wire hoops to the corks. To do this first use a pin to pierce through them vertically - this will allow you to thread through a headpin more easily



3. Next use pliers to turn the end of the headpin into a hanging loop. Start by bending the wire to the side then use round nose pliers to shape into a loop



4. Use strong glue to secure a cork into each bottle

5. Cut lengths of ribbon and tie one into a bow around the bottle neck for an extra embellishment. Use another length of ribbon for hanging by threading it through the wire loop and tying a knot

We'd love to hear from you if you try out this DIY project - use the hashtag #eightandsixteen to share your photos with us!

Erin

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Bloggers Love Hub DIY Booth (+ Free Template Printables!)

Last Monday evening we were kindly invited along to host a small DIY booth at the Bloggers Love Hub taking place at Kanaloa in London.

As we were asked to create a project related to organising we decided to decorate some plain notebooks, perfect for jotting down all of those blog post ideas! Instead of sticking on washi tapes or scrapbooking papers we chose to stitch into the notebook covers creating a textured finish.

We arrived at the event ready to set up our little booth and prepare everything to get crafting. Luckily we arrived super early which turned out to be a good thing - as you can see from the photos the lighting in the venue was not great for crafting, and we decided to use this time to make things a little easier for everyone taking part.
To create the notebooks you simply tape your chosen template onto the front cover of the notebook, and use a pin to pierce holes into the cover about 5mm apart. Then you can use a needle and thread to sew your design on and the pre-pierced holes mean that your design comes out perfectly! Due to the lack of light we decided to pierce the notebook covers with our three designs before people got stuck in as otherwise it may have taken all night to finish!

We had three designs to choose from: a festive snowflake, a cute cactus and "little book of ideas". If you want to make your own version don't forget to download the free templates at the end of this post!

Wamiri & Josh with their finished notebooks

We had a great time at the event and met some really lovely bloggers too - Dani @ Floral Danielle, Daisy @ Daisy Jet, Chantelle @ Topix & Tales, Josh @ That Kid In The Bow Tie, Wamiri @ Omowamiri, Afshan @ Afshanesque, Chrissie @ Caprichia, Rebecca @ Rebecca Coco, Victoria @ My Little Black Book,  Justine @ Justine Pendrill & Brenda @ Time & Couture 

Daisy & Chantelle's notebooks

If you'd like to try any of our templates, you can find them here:

Snowflake Template
Cactus Template
"little book of ideas" Template "blogging notebook" Template

The snowflake is intended to be the quickest of the three, with the "little book of ideas" being the most complex. The text templates aren't dotted, but just remember to pierce the holes onto your notebook around 5mm apart.

Once you've given these templates a go, why not try making your own? You could try your blog name for yourself or monogrammed notebooks to give as presents - perfect for a DIY Christmas!

Thank you to everyone we met at The Bloggers Hub for taking such an interest in our little DIY booth, and of course to Danielle for inviting us to be a part of the event! :)

We'd love to hear from you if you try out this DIY - use the hash tag #eightandsixteen to share your photos with us!

Erin & Skye

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DIY Upcycled Bottle Cap Badge Inspired by The Hunger Games

For my DIY as part of our We love The Hunger Games series, I decided to recreate the infamous Mockingjay pin that Katniss wears and I thought this would be a great way to combine a popular upcycling technique to reuse bottle caps.

You could also try making a template with your favourite quote from the book, or photograph of your favourite character, but if you'd like to stick with the Mockingjay template, you can download the templates I used HERE. Just make sure that your scaling settings are correct when you print them :)

For this DIY you will need: a bottle cap, paper template and scissors, PVA glue, Mod Podge 3D Dimensional (or similar), superglue and a brooch pin.

Print out your chosen template and cut to the size of your bottle cap.

Glue your template into the bottle cap, and then cover in two thin coats of PVA glue and leave to dry.

Mod Podge 3D Dimensional is a great glue for jewellery and craft making, and worked amazingly for these badges. Apply to your bottle cap, being careful not to overfill as it will spill over and get messy very quickly! Leave to set.

Use superglue to apply a brooch pin to the back of the bottle cap and leave to dry.

May the odds be ever in your favour...

We'd love to hear from you if you give this DIY a go - use the hash tag #eightandsixteen to share your photos with us!

Skye

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DIY Upcycled Paper Garlands (featuring The Hunger Games)

To celebrate the release of Mockingjay - Part 1, which Skye and I are both very excited to see, our latest We Love... topic is of course The Hunger Games!

Today's very simple DIY project shows you how to make your own upcycled paper garland and in honour of Mockingjay's release I have used the better looking pages from an old battered copy of The Hunger Games for this tutorial. I know everyone won't have a falling apart copy to hand so as an alternative you can pick up bags of book confetti on Etsy, use photocopies or type out some text including key words, places and your favourite character's names.

If you're as excited about the film's release as we are why not whip yourself up one of these cute garlands to celebrate? If not, they can easily be customised - try using old magazines, newspapers, maps or pretty scrapbooking papers to make this project perfectly fit the decor of any occasion or party!

You will need: old book pages, a 1" circle punch, a sewing machine & thread


1. Start by punching out your circles until you have enough for the length garland you would like to make - I used approx 60 circles for a 50" garland

You can either punch the circles out at random (this way you can punch through multiple pages at once) or choose to frame specific words or character names within your circles


2. Pair up two of your circles and place under your sewing machine foot. Make sure that you leave a tail of thread (approx. 3") before sewing to use for hanging the garland

If you want the text to sit the correct way on your garland make sure you have the circles facing the right direction before you start to sew. Alternatively for a more random arrangement just pick up the circles as they are!


3. Sew through the centre of the circles, then continue on sewing for another 0.5-1" before placing your next set of circles under the sewing machine foot. This way you will get the gap between your circles on the finished garland

4. Continue adding on more circles in this way until you reach the desired garland length and your garland is done!


You can leave your garland as is or create more of a 3D effect by carefully pressing out the circles to look like the ones shown above!

May the odds be ever in your favour...

We'd love to hear from you if you try out this DIY project - use the hashtag #eightandsixteen to share your photos with us!

Erin

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DIY with Hobbycraft: Wooden Advent Calendar

*Wooden advent calendar & craft supplies c/o Hobbycraft, available HERE.

It's time to spread a little festive cheer here at Eight & Sixteen! Today I'm sharing a DIY with you courtesy of Hobbycraft, who provided this wooden advent calendar along with some craft supplies with the challenge to make it my own.

I've always loved these advent calendars as I'm a sucker for traditions, and love the idea that these can be used for years as well as being personalised to suit you. Here's how I personalised mine...

First I made the decision to stain my calendar with a dark oak wood stain. I wanted to keep the calendar looking quite natural so that I could add Christmassy details without overpowering it, and I think that the stain worked really well for this.
The next step was to number the drawers with the wooden numbers provided by Hobbycraft. I think it's great that they offer both red and green numbers in one set as I was able to mix and match them onto the drawers and I also love the pop of colour that they add.

Once I'd finished glueing the numbers on, it was time to get glitter glue happy! I really struggled to pick one way to decorate the calendar at this point - there are so many ways that you could customise it - but in the end I decided that polka dots would be perfect. I also added in a few random drawers with little crosses on to mix it up.
Finally, I gave the the wooden stars provided a coat of the glitter glue and glued them to the top of the calendar to finish it off.

Overall I'm really happy with my finished calendar and I particularly like the effect of the glitter glue when it catches the light :)
It's been a really fun DIY to take part in, and I've really enjoyed working with the Hobbycraft materials. If you're stuck for a Christmas present with a personal touch or are looking for a way to entertain little'uns for an afternoon, I think that a wooden advent calendar might be the way to go!

We'd love to hear from you if you've used this advent calendar from Hobbycraft or if you give this DIY a go - use the hash tag #eightandsixteen to share your photos with us!

Skye

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