I had the opportunity a few weeks ago to guest post on Todays Creative Blog showcasing this super easy beach bag diy. I've always said the word ‘totes' to my best friends and they think I'm a little strange about it but I don't care! That's why I decided to embrace it and make this beach bag. I brought it to church Sunday and would you believe it, my husband wouldn't carry it. LOL. I guess I know that it's mine. By now you should know my love of Hazel and Ruby and the ease of use with their products. You can now find them at Michaels all over and that to me is totes AWESOME!
Materials needed:
- Any size desired of plain tote, mine was the larger of the two sizes offered at Michaels for $2.99
- Color Shine spray from Heidi Swapp, retails for $5.99 at Michael's
- Desired font stencils from Hazel and Ruby
Hazel and Ruby have so many styles to choose from, the possibilities are endless with how you can customize this bag. The stencils I have here are the Chalk Art Alpha and the Broad Side Alpha. Their stencils retail from $9.99 to $24.99 but they are reusable. It works as if they are the vinyl stencils. You just apply, paint over them, take it off and wipe it down with a baby wipe. If your paint has dried, that is ok, it will still work but your lines may not be as crisp.
You're going to need a barrier so the paint doesn't bleed though to the other end. It just so happens that a half sheet pan fit perfect and gave me some stability.
What you'll want to do before you work with any type of spray or ink is decide if you want this to be permanent. I don't intend to use this bag a lot so I went with a water based spray which all of Heidi Swapp's color shines are. You can do this with an acrylic paint or fabric paint and pounce it on with a sponge brush. However, if you use the spray, you'll want to make sure that your nozzle is clean. Get a wet paper towel and really get in there and get all the dried ink off. Even if you clean it after you use it, it tends to still have a bit come out. Also, shake it really well. See at the bottom how it is sticking? That is all the shine pigment. You want to really get that mixed well so pay attention to that and give it a couple swirls so that the ball can pick that up.
Now it's time to start spraying! You'll want to keep your hand moving in a sweeping motion whichever direction is comfortable. If you stay in one spot you'll get a really dark circle and the color won't be fluid. I wanted to have the pink in the middle and have gold around the outside. I started in the middle and worked out softer towards the middle and then grabbed my gold and just sprayed softly around the edges. You can work on a mat but again, this is water based so it will come out with windex or water. Super easy clean up.
You'll notice as well that the ink has pooled on the letters, go ahead and blot that so the paper towels can soak it up so you don't get drips on your tote. Place the letters back on the plastic film and wipe off. Seriously, so easy. You can see for me that I didn't press hard enough on the first e. You can tell it says ‘awesome' but it bugs me as a perfectionist. This is where it being a water based ink comes in real handy. If it bothered me just enough, I could wash it and redo the whole thing. Use a different saying, different color, whatever I choose. This was a really fun project to make. I loved guest posting for another blog, this was my first time and she was really nice cause I couldn't figure anything out. It was a shot in the dark and she totally helped me through it. Her blog is really awesome too. Can't wait to work with her again!
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Audra @ RealityToDreams says
I love this!! I’d TOTES carry it around church 🙂
Frenchie says
HAHA! I can’t believe my husband wouldn’t.