Halloween: Repurpose Old Decor...Jack Skellington Glass Block

 

Every time I put out decorations Mr. Chocolate unnecessarily tells me, "Feel free to get rid of stuff!"

Not that I need the reminder, and he also knows I've been making new stuff, but since he's the keeper of the bins...

I had a Halloween-themed glass block made years ago that I've debated about making over, but the lights kept working until now, which gave me a reason to make it over. 

Supplies: 

• Glass Block (the kind with an opening / seal unless you want to drill!)
• Black Vinyl and Transfer Tape
• LED Battery Operated Lights (Dollar Tree)
• SVG image of choice
• Digital Cutting Machine (Cricut Maker)

This was my original with some spider webs in each corner and decorative rhinestones. I was initially going to remove them and then looked at the block and the other side was blank so I used it and left this as is. 

Removed the broken lights, cleaned up the block, and then looked for a "Jack Skellington" face to use. I found this one here.

I missed that one of his nose holes got stuck to the vinyl as I was weeding, but didn't feel like cutting again. 

Positioned my image on the glass, and then used my scraping tool to apply the vinyl. I thought I'd just use an acrylic paint pen to draw his missing nose hole in, then remembered I had some rhinestones that would work!

I removed the other nose thingy and used two of the teardrops. 

I had some of these LED lights from Dollar Tree in my stash and thought they'd be perfect for this, so threaded those into the block, and...

It's actually a bit brighter than the pic shows. I love it when I can reuse and repurpose things, and it got the Mr. Chocolate seal of approval! 

What I Did On My Summer Vacation

It's always great to go on vacation but there's also something wonderful about coming home ( I love my bed!).  We had a great two weeks away visiting my mom, friends, brother-in-law, colleges ( $$$) and I got to visit some great creative shops along the way. I blogged about a couple of them or tried to from my phone our the i-Pad ( still not convinced it's the best thing since sliced bread).  I got to go to two of my favorite bead places, Beads Galore and Scottsdale Bead Supply and stocked up on some great things to play with later.

Last year, one of my BFFs gave  my mom a present for Christmas that my mom fell in love with and wanted to give similar ones to a few of her friends. It was one of those glass blocks with lights inside like you see here So she asked if I could make them and if I minded doing any crafting while I was on vacation. HELLO? A chance to be on vacation AND use a glue gun?! In addition to the opportunity to go to craft stores including one I don't have at home? Bring. It.

I'd seen these glass block projects but hadn't made any and now I'm hooked. Maybe they're not new news but they're still fun to play with and there are endless possibilities. There are a variety of places you can get the blocks. Least expensive is your HW store but they typically don't come pre-drilled to put the lights in and I wasn't about to do glass drilling ( I understand you can go through several drill bits). So mom and I used our Michael's 40% off coupons and bought the more expensive ones they sell there ($16.99 pre-discount for the large one) that come with different closures for banks, lights, or simply plugging the existing hole. So started with this: 

Used a variety of ribbon (some from mom's recycled stash ... re-use, re-use!) stickers ( red and gold block) , Christmas picks from Hobby Lobby, and 1 string of 100 mini lights per block and ended with these:

She wanted one for a friend who wants to keep this out all year round, and the friend wanted black and white which I love working with so that's this one:

which I kept really simple using only black and white polka dot ribbon and two vinyl pieces I brought with me that I'd picked up at JoAnns on sale for $.50 !

Crafting on vacation?! WIN-WIN!  And mom now has a glue gun :)

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