Sarah Jane's Craft Blog

As I'm getting ready for the season, I thought I'd share some of my Easter crafts. Check out the collection here: Easter Craft Collection

I've decorated a few mugs with alcohol ink over the years. As much fun as it's been to create these decorated mugs, I never really know how best to seal them so they can be used as mugs. I've used some as pen cups, but you only need so many pen cups. So, when I found some white mugs at Dollar Tree, I decided to try to decorate some mugs and test out some sealants. To make sure these mugs could be used as mugs, I started by cutting a strip of permanent vinyl about an inch wide to wrap around the top of the mugs to keep sealant and inks off of the part of the mug that would touch your lips. I selected some sailboat blue for my first ink to apply on the mug. For my past mug projects (using mugs from Big Lots), I was able to drip the ink onto the mug and control the way that it traveled by carefully rotating the mug. I was even able to thin it a bit and control it's movement. The glossy finish on the mugs from Dollar Tree made it much more difficult to control the move

Well, I had to print something fun for Valentine's Day, and when I found this cute vase, I thought I'd give it a try. It's described as a Love and Kisses vase since it has as heart-shaped base and opening and a pattern of Xs on the sides. I printed the vase using the recommended settings of 0% infil in vase mode/spiralized. I used a red PLA which is a beautiful shade of red in person, but apparently a shade that is really difficult to get good photographs of. The vase setting is so much fun to watch print. The print goes up really fast. One minute it's printing the base and ten minutes later it's going vertical. This vase is about 5 inches tall and took about an hour and a half to print. It turned out really cute for a quick little print project! Check out some of the other Valentine's Day projects here: Valentine's Day Craft Collection .

I found this glass plate from Dollar Tree in my craft stash and thought it would be fun to get back to doing some inking projects . I printed a heart template that I found online and it out of copy paper. Then I found a piece of vinyl to use as a resist. If you don't have any permanent vinyl in your craft stash, you can use contact paper or painter's tape, but permanent vinyl will have the least bleed through. I traced my heart template onto the paper backing of the vinyl and used a scissors to cut it out. You could use a cutting machine, too, but this was easier and faster than dragging out and setting up my Silhouette. I peeled the paper backing off of my vinyl heart and positioned it as close to center as I could and then rubbed down the edges. I got out my craft mat , my red and magenta alcohol inks, Pinata brass , some rubbing alcohol , a can of air , and a hand bulb . I started by dripping a drop or two of ink and a drop or two of rubbing alcohol and blowing it around