Remember my shoppng spree???

Well, I haven't gotten around to crafting something out of everything that I did, but I played around a bit with the things I bought.  I learned what I would do "next time" on some projects, and still have to work out the kinks on some others.  Anywho.....here are some of the creations I made.

This:

turned into this:

one of the "next time" lessons I learned is to spray paint the whole thing BEFORE mod podging the paper to it.  You can't see it in the picture, but the inside still showed the cute flower design, but was a more finished look than the dull tin.  I figured after getting the bucket for 25 cents in Targets clearance, with the paper and mod podge I used (I already had them in my stash) I spent around $1 to make it?

Also, with one of the other buckets I have left, I think I may take a page from Make the Best of Things blog and use my glue gun to trace the flowers for 3-d effects then cover with tissue paper.  Once I do it, I will post it!  Such a cute idea though....gotta try that one! :)

I also bought a cheap purse at the Dollar Tree.  It was not very sturdy, and was pretty flimsy, so I took some plastic canvas, made a linen cover for it, and placed it in the bottom of the purse to give it a stronger bottom.  I also made a felt flower and put that on the front of it, to the side to give it a little flair.  Once that was done, I was looking at the straps for the purse and they seemed too thin, and not the right color, so I took a 1 1/2" pink grosgrain ribbon and made a cover for the straps.

I cut two equal lengths , pinned them to the base of the strap (where it was attached to the purse, then pinned the sides together every few inches, and again to the other side. (does that make sense?)  Once it was in place, I took some brown embroidery thread and did a basic running stitch along the sides to hold the 2 ribbons together.  I repeated this for the second strap.

so, I went from this:

to this:

to hide the ribbon ends, I took some pink felt zig zag ribbon I bought at Michaels a while back and machine stitched it to the very top of the purse, all the way around.  (Go figure I forgot to take a picture of it before giving the purse to my niece today for her birthday.

I thought it turned out pretty cute.

My only problem project is the washer necklaces that I was trying to make.  I got the idea on Creative Crates blog HERE but I think she used resin, and I used Papaer glaze, since no one in Tucson that I live near sells Diamond Glaze (I figured they were comparable).

Here is my pic of the washer necklace I made (it is still milky because it isn't fully set yet):

but I can't figure out how to prevent the little bubbles from appearing.  I took a straight pin, and dragged any that I saw to the edge to pop them, but even after doing that, as it set more, I noticed some that I missed.  This project may be my new nemesis!  Any ideas???