Hello Friends,

I just wanted to give you a quick update on what I have been working on lately. This is a fun, budget friendly craft I put together with odds and ends from my craft kit and caboodle. I cannot honestly state where I got this idea, so I will just play the odds and say that I say it on Pinterest at some point in time. If you know of the original concept, please let me know. I prefer to give credit where the credit is due. 

While sorting through my scrap yarn materials, I found this frosty tone of green that I thought would make an ideal cactus. With a bit of yellow or pink yarn, I completed the flowers. To create the spikes, I used embroidery thread. Once tied, I stiffened the thread a bit with simple white school glue. I think the heart shaped cactus turned out exactly as I imagined, and went about creating the rest of my design.

I found these mini terracotta pots at my local Dollar Tree in sets of three. With white acrylic craft paint, I easily covered the base of the pots in white, leaving the terracotta uncovered around the lip. With some small letter stamps and black ink gifted to me from friends, I was able to stamp out my “stuck on you” message. I think the pun perfectly fits my personal sense of humor and really made this project worth doing for me. 

You can see that the ink bled and faded a bit while drying, but I think that is because I impatiently stamped the lettering before completing the next step. If I complete this project again, I will work to be more patient and stamp only on fully dried paint and after the Plaster of Paris sets. 

To keep the heart-cactus upright in the pot, I used some popsicle sticks inserted through the base of the heart, and then set into some Plaster of Paris. This set quickly and worked out perfectly. Although, if I do this project again, I would secure the cactus and set the Plaster of Paris prior to adding any paint or stamped details. 

“This is just one of countless examples of why my grandparent’s “waste not, want not” lessons work so well…”

I tried two different methods for the sand I placed on top of the Plaster of Paris. First, I simply added some sand loosely on top. While I felt this looked the “most natural”, it was also a bit messy in the long run. I spilled the sand twice while trying to take pictures of this project. This prompted me to experiment. In one of the pots, I poured some clear school glue and mixed it gently with the loose sand. I initially thought the difference between the two would be too visually different, but it looked better than expected. 

To finish the project, I added a few mini wooden clips I received from a friend last fall, in a collection of leftover holiday ornament supplies. This is just one of countless examples of why my grandparent’s “waste not, want not” lessons work so well in my crafty obsessions. And with the generosity of my friends, I always have materials on hand to help me stay creative!

This article is an original by Christy Hagan of the blog Christy Makes Friends. Please do not steal images or content as your own. If you’d like to share this article, you may provide a link to this post, but please do not reprint it on your website.

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