Sugar & Spice Nightlight

Hubby's boss is expecting her first (and it's a GIRL!!  Woot woot!) in August.  I meant to make her a little something for her shower last month, but completely ran out of time :-(  Being off of work a few days last week enabled me to spend some quality time (and hard-earned money) at my local Hobby Lobby :-)  Walking thru the store I got a brilliant idea to do a little nightlight for her nursery.

Since "D" (Hubby's boss) is a HUGE Hello Kitty fan and the baby's room is all done in pink and black with Hello Kitty plastered all over anything that doesn't move, I really wanted to do something special for her to display.  HL had all their glass on sale for 50% off last week, so I snagged a Krafty Block, as well as the stand and a light and I was ready to go.

Now, there was NO WAY I was going to spend the crazy amount of money that the HK Cricut Cartridges are going for on eBay, and I don't know anyone with the cart that would have either allowed me to borrow it or to have made cuts for me, so I improvised :-)  Enter my new baby, "R2" (a.k.a. my Cameo).  I found a HK image online, popped into my software, traced it, printed it, and cut it.  Easy peasy!  I mounted it to some leftover pink leopard paper from my MIL's birthday card and the backing was all done.

Now to the fun part... glass etching!  I used a big 'ol bottle of Armour Etch Etching Cream and some vinyl to etch the "Sugar and Spice" collage from the Cricut Word Collage cartridge.  OMG, how do I love, love, LOVE this cartridge!  I cut the design at 7.5" and it fit perfectly on the block. 

Once I got the vinyl on straight (easier said than done.. lol), I went and globbed a whole bunch of the etching creme on using a foam brush.  I used what I had left of my little bottle (pictured above) and then quite a bit from the new bottle so that I got a nice, even, thick coat.

The directions on the Armour Etch say to only leave it on for like 10 minutes, but considering the density of the glass block, I opted to leave it on for about 45 minutes to make sure I got a nice etch.  After rinsing it all off, I took my backing (pink leopard paper with the HK diecut on it) and Mod Podged it to the back of the block.  Gave it about 4 coats of the the Mod Podge to make sure it stuck really well, and let to dry completely.  I added a pink ribbon bow to the top, popped in the lightbulb and put it in the stand and..... VOILA!!

I apologize for the picture.  I tried my best to be able to show the etching, but no matter what I did I couldn't get it to show very well.  I was worried that the little light bulb would shine too much light, but I was pleasantly surprised how subtle it actually is.  Might be due to the paper backing on it which dims the light a bit, but who knows.  I love it and it came out much better than I expected :-)  Just need to wrap it up and drop it off at Hubby's work.  I really hope she likes it!