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I wanted to give everyone who doesn't already know a heads up about Sew, Mama, Sew's Handmade Holidays Month. Each day in November, SMS will feature links to multiple tutorials, with a different theme for each day (kitchen, baby blankets, handbags, etc.).
My little door stop tutorial is going to be one of those featured. I can't wait to see what else they've found.
I'm going to miss Olivia's birthday party on Saturday, but I wanted to make sure she had something from me to open. I recently purchased Last Minute Patchwork & Quilted Gifts and loved the colored pencil roll pattern. I made it in denim instead of linen and I made an elastic loop and button closure, which I think will be easier for a child to operate than the twill tape ties recommended in the book. I love, love, LOVE having the fabrics and pencils all organized and matching. (I may have to make one for my Prismacolors.)
I also made a coloring/notebook using the method described in Denyse Schmidt Quilts -- a method I was extremely skeptical about because it left raw edges. Her instructions suggested painting fabric glue onto the edges, but that seemed kind of messy to me. Instead I ironed fusible webbing the fabric before it was sewn on. The webbing sealed the edges as well as fabric glue would have, but without the mess.
The people at Kinko's were much more receptive than I expected to the idea of binding pieces of chipboard to which I'd sewn a bunch of fabric. They even gave me free chipboard samples to take home and practice!
The inside has blank construction paper and a coloring book I originally made for my niece, Lily, when she turned four. It's an alphabet with a child doing a different job for each letter. I used pictures from old issues of Martha Stewart Kids, so it's actually kind of cute.
Here is the bag I made to hold it all.
And here's a shot of the book and pencil roll in the bag. I ordered that "Olivia" fabric almost a year ago and am happy to have finally gotten around to using it! Hopefully she'll like her present!
My fall swap package for Regina is ready to go! The three items I've included are a set of notecards made with Amy Butler's new paper line and my bird stickers and stamps, a Moda Blossom charm pack, and a wristlet made with Freshcut fabric in a fall-ish green and golden orange with dupioni silk handle and band. I hope she likes it!
It's going to be interesting to see it I can actually complete the rest of the loooooong list of things on my to-do list for the week. I'm trying to finish two baby quilts, two birthday gifts, and my share of tasks and food for a baby shower. We'll see how much of that I'm actually able to complete!
Do you ever have projects that you just don't want to finish? That you have no enthusiasm for, but that you do because somebody else really, really wants them done? For me, these giant tiki heads are a prime example. I'm helping with a Halloween Party tonight, which has a vaguely tiki theme. The other people arranging this party really, really wanted giant tiki heads that people could stick their faces through and take pictures.
I found this idea problematic for a number of reasons. First of all, we aren't allowed to have paper or cardboard decorations. The party is in an industrial space that we are using just for the evening and they won't allow anything flammable. (In fact, the expectation is that guests should be able to actually attempt to light the decorations on fire without them burning.) As someone who has spent most of her life making holiday decorations from paper, this is a big obstacle to overcome. Secondly, tiki heads don't really lend themselves to the traditional cut-out-face-photo-op-wall-thingie, henceforth "CoFPoWtT." (Is there a proper name for these?) I alway thought the gag with those was supposed to be that your face is on someone or something else's body. This isn't funny with tiki heads, because the head is the whole point. If you remove it, it just looks like a giant log!
I tried explaining why I thought it wasn't going to turn out like everyone was imagining it would, but everyone was gung ho about having these things at the party. Sooooo . . . I took a deep breath, bought some 2' by 8' strips of extruded polystyrene insulation and went to work. They still aren't set up like the traditional CoFPoWT, but they have some holes cut in them for people to stick faces through for pictures. I'm sure people will be drinking enough to find them amusing! In the end, I'm glad I made them because, even though I think they're kind of ridiculous, I know they're going to make the party planning people happy.
I did get to make some fun stuff though. Martha Stewart has some groovy plastic skulls and bones, which I hot glued to some plain black melamine trays. I made soft gingersnaps, peanut butter blossoms, and "urban legend" cookies, which are my version of the ubiquitous Neiman Marcus cookie recipe. I also made Rice Krispie Treats, which I've only made once before. I know they're kind of ridiculous, but I like the way they taste.
Well, I'm off to get my costume ready. If it's not too dark, I'll try to get some pictures of the actual party.
This is a week of firsts. My first Etsy shop. My first time making giant tiki heads from extruded polystyrene insulation (Don't ask! I'll post pictures this weekend) and my first tutorial.
Download ninepatch_door_stop_tutorial.pdf
It's on kind of an unusual subject . . .doorstops!
At my house, I need doorstops to do two things. The first is, obviously, to keep doors open. We have a sliding door off our master bedroom and, when it's open, the upstairs doors slam shut crazily every time there's a gust of wind. During the Summer, I braced them by shoving smallish paperbacks under the door (Thank you, Galapagos!) but that's obviously not the most attractive solution.
I also wanted to have something I could put behind the door -- between the door and the baseboard -- to protect the wall from getting all banged up.
Happily, I was able to come up with a doorstop that accomplishes both objectives, has a removable cover, and uses multiple fabrics in a patchwork pattern. Fun!
I hope you enjoy it!
I'm so excited. I've finally opened my Etsy Shop. For the time being, I'm only selling wristlets. I have no idea whether anyone will actually want to buy them, but it's still satisfying to have the shop set up.
Today is Blog Action Day, which I learned about last week on Whipup.net. The idea is for as many people as possible to post about the same important topic which, this year, is the environment. The idea is that a wide variety of blogs participate and that each one includes a post the has something to do with its usual theme. Since my blog is all about making craft projects, I've decided to post about an easy, energy-saving project I was able to complete in less than two hours, a draft snake.
According to our electric company, leaky doors and windows can account for five to 40 percent of a home's energy use. This is surely more of a problem in older houses, but even in practically new houses like ours we have an energy-sucking one-inch gap at the bottom of the door between our kitchen and garage, as well as a somewhat lesser one between our master bedroom and an uninsulated storage closet under the eaves.
A draft snake is basically a long skinny beanbag that sits at the base of a door or widow to block a draft, hopefully cutting down on wasted energy. Lotta Jansdotter's book, Simple Sewing, includes instructions for a very basic draft snake. I liked the pieced exterior of hers, but needed to change a couple of things. First of all, I had to make a removable cover. One of these is going to be sitting on my kitchen floor, below a cat door and I'm absolutely going to have to be able to wash it. The second was that her instructions called for making a tube out of a four-inch wide tube of fabric, which is way too small for my doors. (It's probably a great size for windows, as in the picture in her book.)
I ended up making a patchwork panel 9 by 36 inches. I used a six-inch solid panel on each end and pieced cotton prints in the middle. The downstairs snake used fabrics from Moda's Uptown series with chocolate corduroy as the solid panels. The upstairs one used a bunch of random and vaguely Asian themed fabrics with linen as the solid panels.
After I made the panels, I ironed fusible fleece onto the back, then pinned a piece of satin (shiny side out -- it's the lining) to the panel and quilted it. The idea behind the satin lining, is that it will make it easier to put the beanbag insert in.
Once the panel was quilted, I folded the panel with right sides together an stitched around the exterior, leaving a six inch opening in the middle. (In retrospect, this was not the best idea, since the beanbag part is not flexible enough to bend exactly in half. The opening should have been placed toward one of the ends.) I turned what was now the cover right side out and topstitched around the edges of the opening. I then added a button and an elastic loop so the cover could be closed.
Then, I made the beanbag part, which basically consisted of making a 7-1/2 by 35 inch tube out of flannel, filling it with beans and then closing up the end. Because this goes inside the cover, and because the cover is quilted (which gives it some structure on its own) there was no need to turn this inside out or use slipstitching to close up the end. All of the seams are visible, but you can't tell once the cover is on. It took me about six cups of beans to fill the flannel tube. This part of the project was kind of awkward and messy. If you're making one of these, I would suggest having someone help you with this part. It's easy enough to make a cardstock cone to guide the beans into the tube, but I found it difficult to hold the (very long) tube and the cone and scoop the beans all at the same time. I ended up with lots of beans on the floor of my work room.
Now that both parts were done, I just put the beanbag part into the cover. The satin lining may have seemed a bit excessive, but it really did make it easier to put the cover on. The kitchen/garage snake has been in place for two days now and, except for a brief investigatory mission by my cats (which involved them pulling it away from the door and halfway across the room) it has been working beautifully.
I am not, in general, a fan of table runners. I think it's because they're often have kind of a "country kitchen" vibe and I'm just not into that look. Nevertheless, I wanted to make something for the Handmade Halloween Pool AND I had some really, really cool Halloween Pinup Girl fabric that was just crying out to be used for something.
Here's the result:
I started by making three blocks, each with one of the Halloween pinup girls as a centerpiece. There's the devil:
The witch:
And the cat:
Here's a shot of one of the patchwork strips that I made to subdivide the blocks:
And a shot of one of the ends, which I finished with a beaded upholstery trim:
The black fabric is from Moda and is covered with glittery, flocked starbursts. (The glitter shows up much better in lower light.) I used a bunch of random fabrics for the patchwork, but my favorites are the small and large skulls, which are from Kaufman, and the purple on black print (also used in the witch block) which is cut from a different colorway of this Kaffe Fassett print.
The pinup girl squares were fussy cut, but there were still little bits of the surrounding images visible in the corners, which distracted from the look I was going for. I ended up hiding them by appliqueing felt stars onto each of the squares.
Overall, I'm pleasantly surprised with how this turned out. I was especially happy to finally find a home for the Halloween pinup girls. I think I may try to make a non-holiday version. It's a great project for highlighting a cool fabric.
I can't seem to decide how to finish these.
This one is made with Moda's Funky Monkey and Building Blocks, with a couple of prints from Katie Jump Rope and Lightning Bugs. I'm thinking it needs a giant sock monkey applique in the corner, but I can't decide what materials to use. I also can't decide on the back. I have a piece of brown Minky and a piece of red with white dots. Hmmmm.
This on is made with Michael Miller's Retro Rocket Rascals and bunch of geometric prints, including Retro Stripe and Dumb Dot also from Michael Miller. I think I want to put another space duck on it, but I don't think I want to use the yellow faux-Minky for the back (although I do have a giant piece of it). Again, hmmm.
I need to make a decision, as the babies these are for have been born for a while now!
My friend, Jenny, is expecting a baby girl in December and a couple of other friends, Tasha and Amy, and I are giving her a baby shower. I'm in charge of making paper goods and the first thing I made was invitations. They're inspired by two things: Cavallini & Co.'s Birds & Nests stamp and sticker sets (above), and Moda's new Blossom line.
I scanned one of the large bird and nest print and one of the small sparrow print fabrics and then printed them onto matte white paper. I paired these with kraft cardstock and a rich cream linen stock. I accented the inside and out with the Cavallini stamps, one of the stickers, and a persimmon organdy ribbon.
Because I'm so infatuated with the Chopin script (Thanks, Adria, for introducing me to dafont.com!) I printed the guests names on the front of the envelopes. I realize this is not, strictly speaking, very correct ettiquette, but I'm willing to be flexible if something improves the overall aesthetic. I also used on the bird stamps on the envelopes.
I really hit the jackpot on stamps too. My Post Office currently has these awesome stamps, which I thought went well with the overall look of the invitations.
