Minnesota Mug Madness

Michael was gone for a whole week over the holidays.

This leads to the question: When you're new in a town and don't really know anyone, what do you do with your time?

You read, you drink wine, and you craft. That's what you do folks. Or at least that's what I did. I grabbed a few mugs from the local dollar store and a black Porcelaine pen from Michael's and got down to business.
I'd seen these super cute monogrammed mugs on Pinterest and totally loved them. (You can find out how to do them here on Designmom)

I am the most impatient crafter known to man, and the idea of printing out a letter and taping/tracing/etc it was not and idea I was liking. I decided to start just sketching out some letters on paper to see if I had the skills to freehand it.

Spoiler alert: I DIDN'T.

As you can see below, all my attempts at "B" "P" "L" or "M" turned out pretty poorly. This meant it was time for plan B.

I stared at those danged blank mugs and thought, "what else do I love enough to put on a mug?" I know, super serious and deep, right? Stick with me people, I promise I'm going somewhere with this! I actually have a Minnesota mug collection, (because I have a lot of love for my home state) and figured I should try my hand at making one to add to my collection.

I finally decided on trying the Minneapolis skyline for a mug. I'm not from Minneapolis, but rather a smaller suburb...which definitely doesn't have a skyline...unless a gazebo and a Caribou Coffee counts as a skyline.

I started out by just Googling an image and free-handing the outline:

It definitely needed to be filled in to give it more of a nighttime silhouette look:

The skyline was finished with a simple "MPLS":

It's hard to capture the whole panoramic view, but hopefully you get a feel of it from the pictures above!

I decided that mug needed a mate, so I whipped up this guy:

Just a simple little Minnesota nice mug. Yes, my MN state outline is a little wacky, I'm aware.

The side seemed a little plain, so I added "ya, sure, ya betcha". I'll need to add a "dontcha know" too I think. I hope all of you reading either know someone from Minnesota or have at least seen Fargo.

Yes, we really do talk like that there. Just like people down here in the South really do say "y'all fixin' ta get some sweet tea?" Yup, movie stereotypes are real folks.

So there you have it, some easy MN mugs. After letting the Porcelaine set for 24 hours they just needed to be baked in the oven for a few minutes and they are all microwave/dishwasher safe!

How would you decorate your mug representing your state? Georgia Peaches? Wisconsin cows? Idaho potatoes?


(p.s. my MN mug collection is mainly made up of thrift store finds- if you see any near you, send 'em my way!)