And now for a little bit of organization to my chaos...

When you walk into my kitchen from the front room you are greeted by the side of my refrigerator. A looming wall of white. As you can imagine, that much clean surface area of a fridge screams for magnets. It yearns for artwork. It begs for cards, invitations and reminders. The desire was fulfilled and here is what it looks like now. It has become my office.

The problem with this setup is that as my family grows and schedules become a little more packed, so does the poor fridge. It's a little embarrassing. So I put my crafty mind to work and came up with a little somethin'.....

I had some great fabric my sister had left over from a project that matched my kitchen, a can of spray adhesive and sheets of magnets. So with the purchase of a package of four, 12 " cork squares I was ready to get to work!

(The candle is optional. I just like a little bit of ambiance when I craft.)

First thing is to CAREFULLY remove the cork tiles from the packaging. You may want to have a Dustbuster on hand. This stuff is crumbly! Next I used a pencil to trace the cork tile onto the backside of the fabric. I had four tiles and about a yard of each fabric so I was easily able to get two squares out of each yard.

When cutting, you need to decide if you want to bring the fabric down over the sides of the tile or just cover the top of the tile. If you are going to fold the fabric over the sides of the tile, you'll need to cut about a 1/2 inch out from the line you traced. I did two of each. I cut one fabric to fold over the sides and cut the others to cover just the surface of the tile.

Now it's time to get out the spray adhesive and get messy! Unroll your magnet sheet, spray the paper side with spray adhesive and stick it in the center of your cork tile. The sheets were rolled up so I got out the craft glue to help tack down the corners of my curly magnet sheets. It's also probably a good idea to go through your house and grab the biggest, heaviest books you own (you know...those college text books that you can't remember why you held onto but you refuse to get rid of them!) These will help weigh down those curly sheets after they have been glued.

Now go have dinner, go meditate, wash your car, floss your teeth.... You want to make sure these suckers get good and dry!

And you're back and the mess continues....

You'll want to make sure your fabric square is nice and smooth. I ironed mine since they had been folded up for so long. Place the fabric face down on your table and make sure the cork tile you'll affix it to is nearby and ready. Now spray! Get every inch of that fabric! Don't drench it but be liberal!

Next, grab the tile and press it onto your fabric with the magnet side up. Be sure to center it carefully. And if you're folding the fabric over the sides of the tile do it right away while the adhesive is still wet. I used a little craft glue to help hold down the corners of the fabric.

(No, I don't have man hands. That's my husband helping out.)

Once you've pressed on it for a minute or two, flip it over and there it is! Your first tile!

I'm fickle so I made two with the edges folded down over the tile (pictured above) and I did two with a frayed edge that I just glued to the top surface, no edges (see below).

Two more to go and then you have this:

Feels good to be a little more organized!

But that's not it....
If you're anything like me you have buttons reproducing in your sewing basket. I've had some of these buttons since 1992 and it's time I came up with a clever way to use some of them. So since I'm going to need tacks to attach things to my brand new fabric-covered-bulletin-board-refrigerator-magnets why not bedazzle those tacks with some buttons?

I found so many fun ideas when I was Googling and looking at other crafty bloggers for inspiration. This one is a must for my daughter's room in the future. The possibilities with this kind of project are endless!


Happy Friday!