Dish Towel Cake Tutorial

I'm going to a bridal shower this weekend, and I decided to make a dishtowel cake as my gift. I've made these a few times before; they are so much fun and very easy to make. It's also a much more fun way to give items like place mats, dish towels, and cloth napkins as gifts. You can decorate them in any theme....the bride's wedding colors, colors fitting the shower theme, colors matching items on the registry. For this one, I went with colors that match their registry theme. You will need four place mats, a table runner, a pack of six cloth napkins, and three flour sack towels for the layers, and silk flowers, ribbon, and whatever you want to put on the top of the cake (I have a letter for the top for the bride's soon to be new name). You will want wire cutters, scissors, and maybe some floral wire or tape (I don't always use it, but it was helpful for this one because I used longer stems). I started out with this:

And ended up with this:

Here's how:

It takes quite a few dish towels to make something like this, so I usually use a set of four place mats, a table runner, and a 6-pack of cloth napkins, along with a 3-pack of flour sack towels. I just found that to be a bit more cost-effective.

I got both the napkins and the flour sack towels at Cost Plus World Market. The awesome thing about the flour sack towels is that they come in packs of three shades of the same color, so it gives an ombre effect to the cake.

For the cake base, you will want a dinner plate (I usually get a plain white one at the Dollar Store) or charger and a bottle of something....I usually use a nice bottle of wine, but the couple I made this one for aren't wine fans so I got a nice bottle of sparkling cider from Cost Plus. Just a tip....white wines tend to make the best centers for the cake because they are fatter bottles. Any bottle will work though. Anyways, center the bottle on the plate or charger like this:

I don't usually anchor the bottle to the plate, but you could do that with some glue dots if you wanted to. Anyways, you will also want a pack of colored paper clips, a bag of mixed size rubber bands, and safety pins or straight pins (I usually use straight pins, as they are more discreet, but I'm out of those so I used safety pins). You can pick up all of those items at the Dollar Store.

Next, take your place mats and table runner (or towels or napkins) and fold them so they cover about 1/3 of the bottle height (the bottom layer will probably be a bit bigger than 1/3 of the bottle...that's totally ok). If you need to safety pin them so they stay folded better, go for it.

Wrap it around the bottle as tightly as possible, and then rubber band it in place.

You will need progressively larger rubber bands, which is why the mixed bag is perfect (smaller ones are great for diaper cakes....which I will post about in the future!). Anyways, wrap all of the place mats/table runner/whatever else you are using around the bottle until it is the width you want for the bottom layer (I usually fill the diameter of the plate or the center of the charger). By the way, you will want to stagger the "seams" so that you don't end up with a giant bulge on one side of the layer (see picture). Once you are done with wrapping the first layer, double rubber band around it to keep it secure.

It's ok if it's not perfectly round; for one thing, I've never been able to get it to be perfectly round, and for another in the end it kind of evens out....you'll see.

Next you take a flour sack towel and fold it to match the height of the layer.I usually put the darkest color towel on the bottom, with the lightest on top....this gives it the ombre effect. Anyways, after you fold it, wrap it around the layer as tightly as you can.

Paper clip it in the back (which will be wherever the seam ends up being) and then smooth out any wrinkles. If there is excess on the bottom, tuck it under the layer (you'll notice that the layers rotate around the bottle and can lift up, which is helpful for making it look polished).

 Start adding your next layer (I used the cloth napkins for this one). The bottle I used narrowed significantly and wasn't as tall as most wine bottles, so I folded one around the narrow neck first and then wrapped the rest of them around it. Also, I found it helpful to paper clip the seams of the napkins as well as rubber banding it.

For the top layer, I did not have much bottle left to work with, so I found it easiest to just roll up the last flour sack towel and stick it on there.

At this point, I rotated the layers so that the seams were all in the back. I did have to safety pin them, but I usually recommend straight pins. However, this will probably just sit on the back corner of a table, so I don't really care about the safety pins.

Now it's time to "frost" the cake!

Take your ribbon and cut it to fit your layer. You can put it anywhere on it you like....for this one I put the ribbon on the center of each layer. I safety pinned it in the back (to the flour sack towel) so it held in place.

I also added a bit of blue twine over the ribbon to tie into the bride's wedding colors:

You'll notice each layer isn't totally smooth and wrinkle-free; it's ok to have wrinkles. It's a cake made of towels after all! :)

This is the best part now....time to add flowers! I always just buy silk flowers from the Dollar Tree. They usually have a decent selection of colors and flowers and you can't beat the price! I usually have lots leftover too that I end up using for other projects (the flowers in my spring apothecary jars were leftover from a towel cake!). Anyways, I was going for a sort of country-foresty feel, so this is what I picked up:

This is the part where I just experiment with the flowers until I'm happy with it. I used the wire cutters to trim the stems, and the floral tape to hold a few of the bunches together. Once you have your flowers cut, just stick them between the towels and tweak until you're happy with them.

Remember, odd numbers are ascetically more pleasing to look at, so that's a good rule to keep in mind (and I just realized I need to add one more to the bottom bunch to fit the rule!).

Finally, time for your cake topper. I found a camo-covered "S" for the top, which fits perfectly with the couple :). I taped a large popsicle stick to it to make it stand up, and then tucked it into the top towel layer. I then arranged a few more floral pieces around it until I was happy with it.

Here's the finished product:

I always make a mess when I make these! :) Also, here's what the back of it looks like, so you can see all the pins and such:

Here's a few other towel cakes I've made. The pink one was the first one I ever attempted; I didn't use towels for the outside, but cut fabric to cover the outside. I think the flour sack towels are easier.  The first one is also comprised of mostly dish towels, which was just crazy to put together. The second one I actually cut the "S" on top out with my Cricut and covered it in glitter; that's another way to make this a less expensive project.

So that's it. Pretty easy...really it's just about tweaking until you're happy with it. I'd love to see pictures if you make one yourself....so please share! :)

Sola Deo Gloria!

Wine Charms

I've always held that when you host a party or give a gift, it's the little touches that make it special. Wine charms can be one of those sweet little touches. They can be ridiculously expensive in stores, but they are so easy to make yourself. The bonus about making them yourself is that you can customize them any way you like....charms, colors, etc. I like to customize sets and give them as gifts. I've made a cupcake set, a rubber duck set, and all kinds of other cute sets for different things. I love coming up with different theme ideas (I've done Twilight and Harry Potter sets....I'm trying to figure out what charms to use for  a Hunger Games set too). Even if you don't drink wine, they are fun to use for ice tea glasses or coffee cups too. Even if I'm just home having a glass of wine by myself, I usually put a charm on the glass because it's fun.

Here's what you need to make your own wine charms:

Select your beads or charms....remember that since each wine charm needs to be different, you can use a variety of charms and have the beads on the ring be the same color, or if you want to use the same charm for the set you can just switch up the bead colors on the rings. That way people can tell which glass is theirs.

If you use charms like the ones above, then you'll need jump rings to put them on the wire. If you are using beads or charms with a hole through them, like the beads pictured, then you'll need head pins.

For the wire ring, you'll need ring-sized memory wire. This wire is stronger than normal jewelry wire, and holds its shape when you bend it to put it on or off the glass stem.

I've actually had a hard time finding the ring-sized memory wire at places like JoAnn's or Michaels. I've found it at Artco in Tacoma, but you can also order it from Amazon. You will also need a pair of wire cutters (I suggest getting a pair and designating them for memory wire cutting. Since it's such a tough material, it really dulls the wire cutters), needle nose pliers, and a regular pair of pliers. You can buy a set of these tools in the jewelry section, or just use ones from the hardware store.

Once you have your wire, tools, and have picked out your charms or beads, figure out what colors you want to put on the rings. You can use seed beads of various sizes...less than .8mm usually will be too small though.

Aren't those little beads lovely? I got the set above from JoAnn's on sale a while ago. It's a great little set to have especially if you are starting out with wine charm making.

Since you have everything ready now, the first step is to prep your charms. Since I'm using the beads, I have to make my own charm to put on the ring. I take my head pin, and slide a little seed bead onto it first, then the big bead, and then two more little seed beads.

Next, you'll take your wire cutters and cut the pin a little bit above the beads. This leaves space to create a loop so the charm can go onto the ring.

Take the needle nose pliers and make a loop....make sure the loop is tight enough that it won't slip off of the ring.

Repeat with the other beads...

Next you need to cut your memory wire. This is tough and takes some muscle. Take the coil, and cut a ring that allows the ends to overlap, much like a key ring.

Cut however many you need....I'm making a small set of four this time. Once you have your rings cut and charms made, you're ready to go.

Take one of the rings and, using the needle nose pliers, make a small loop on one end of the ring. I've found that it's easiest to do this by placing one end between your fingers, and hold it firmly to create the loop. Make sure the loop is tight so that the beads can't slide off.

Start putting your seed beads on, filling the ring about half way.

Slide on your charm...

Fill the rest of the ring with beads, leaving about half an inch at the end so you can create the end loop with the needle nose pliers.

You will still have an overlap, similar to a keyring, which is important so that it stays on the glass stem.

Finish your other wine charms...and look how cute they are!

You'll notice that these aren't perfectly even. The over lap on the purple one isn't very long, though it will still work. The blue one's charm is kinda off center....but it's ok! They are quirky and fun. And SO cute on glasses!

It's that easy. It took me some practice to get the loops on the ends of the rings just right, so give yourself space to practice. Here are some sets I've made in the past. The first pic is all the ones I've kept for myself.

 This is the first set I ever made:

 The Twilight set I made. I kept it :). Yes, I'm a Twihard. Don't judge me!

 I LOVE these leaf ones. I actually used them when we had guests at Thanksgiving. They were a very sweet touch on the table!

If you are wanting to make larger sets or multiple sets of the same charm, Oriental Trading Company has a fairly nice selection at good prices. I have tons of the cupcakes, ducks, leaves, and owls left thanks to them. The seed beads I suggest buying from Michaels or JoAnn's...they sell large amounts for pretty cheap. And you know how I love inexpensive supplies that give me leftovers! For more specific charms, like the ones I used for the Twilight set, came from a bead store. If you don't have one near you, check out Shipwreck Beads online (http://www.shipwreckbeads.com/). They are out in Olympia, WA. I have yet to go into the physical store, but I've ordered from them online and had a great experience.

Hope this inspires you to have some fun making your own wine charms. The possibilities are endless, and they are SO EASY!

Sola Deo Gloria!