Thursday, August 20, 2015

Computer Desk

I am living with David at my mom's house until we can afford to move out. For the time being we want a computer desk, but we needed it to be REALLY cheap and something that fit into the space we needed. We decided to make our own.

This is the little nook we wanted to put the desk in:


We went to Home Depot and bought two 2" x 3" boards that are 8 ft long. The home depot guys cut them into 28" sections for us and these became the legs. We also bought a 2' x 4' strandboard and they cut it into a 24" x 29" piece for us. We screwed the legs to the strandboard using 2 screws for each leg. If you drill a small hole into the wood before screwing it in, then screwing is infinitely easier. That's it! It cost us about $10.


The strandboard. You can see two screws at each corner holding the legs in position.

2x3 boards. These are the extras that didn't get used.

The finished desk.


We used the extra wood to prop up the monitor.

Wednesday, August 5, 2015

Embroidery Hoops

I have my thesis defense scheduled, so for two weeks I am not going to school or working. This leaves me with a lot of free time. In the last two days I have made four new embroidery hoops. Embroidery is a lot faster than cross stitch, so it's really easy to just whip out a bunch of them.

The first one I did is a 9" hoop that a friend of mine put on Etsy. It has since been sold, but I think it was going for about $45. I bought the fabric from Joanns and used 6 strands of thread that I already had. I used two layers of fabric, and hot glued the edge of the fabric to the inside of the back of the hoop.

The Original

 My Copy


The second hoop was a Harry Potter quote that I found on Pinterest. This is a 9" hoop as well, made with 4 strands of embroidery floss on one layer of fabric. After stitching, I added another layer of fabric behind the first, and hot glued all the edges to the inside of the back of the hoop.

The original

I trace the pattern on my fabric

Finished product

The extra layer of fabric covers up the stitching from the back.

The third hoop was the fastest one I made. It took me maybe half an hour, if that. I just think it is so cute and funny. This is a 3" hoop with 18 count Aida fabric. I used one strand of black embroidery floss. I found the original hoop on Etsy.

The origiinal

My copy


The last hoop is another Harry Potter one from Etsy and was selling for $38. I used fabric I already had with 6 strands of embroidery floss, and I purshased the felt from Joanns. I stitched this on two layers of fabric. The hoop is 7".

The Original

Pattern

Finished product


The four hoops I finished yesterday and today:


I love them all.