meet my 20 year old crafty (crafted) friends

My mother gave me a box a while ago that was full of odds and ends... old photographs, letters, yearbooks... and these little girlies. I remember so vividly spending all afternoon pouring over toothpicks and embroidery floss with my cousin. We would wrap the thread around a toothpick and wet it... when it dried, you had lovely curls. We designed their outfits and hair styles. Magic moments of being lost in childhood creativity. I know my cousin treasures those memories, because when I was visiting her the other day I found a few of her little toothpick girls mixed in with her sewing notions ;-)

Amazing that the curls have lasted at least 20 years!

I decided that it was time to give these girls a proper home (20 yrs old seems like a good age for getting your own place right ;-)

An Altoid box, scrapbook paper, glue, ribbon and a VERY quick, VERY tiny sewing project and these ladies are set!

and there you have it, TA DA!

** these are what we call restaurant toys. they are only played with while we are dining out or in particular places- like waiting rooms. small and lightweight for my purse...and something that I like to be supervising, so they don't get destroyed or lost (my daughter is only 3;-)

tiniest mary janes

It has been a WHILE since I made a pair of my favorite baby shoes... I had to sit and scratch my head for a minute to remember the steps in order. There was a time when I was making quite a few!

A friend of mine is having her third baby, but first girl... so of course I had to make her some absolutely, adorably girlie tiny shoes for her Sprinkle. In our group, you get a Baby Shower first go 'round and a Sprinkle for subsequent babies... I love a Sprinkle. We get together for dinner on a weeknight and eat yummy stuff (more often than not a baked brie is involved) while we share birth stories, and laugh over potty training disasters, and then settle down to finding out what is weighing most on the soon-to-birth mother's heart and then pray for her and her family. It is such a very sweet and treasured time.

But, back to these little mary janes... they are wonderful... they stay on, they are cute, and they are lined with the softest felted cashmere from a recycled goodwill sweater.

I took a few pictures (some very poor quality) of my process... I can write out a full tutorial (and maybe add a few more pics even?) on this if you want me to, but you are going to have to sweet talk me into it ... just kidding, really all it takes is just commenting that you are interested ;-) sometimes I feel like I'm sending this out into oblivion.  And if the pictures are enough to get you started on a pair of your own, I would LOVE to see a pic... tiny shoes just make my day!

got holes? ... a towel repair tutorial

Isn't it a shame that the towels that get holes are the well loved, worn in, favorite ones? I am pretty pleased to have my nice old towel back in the game... with a lovely addition. It will certainly be a favorite again! Do you want one?

Grab your holey towel...

And some Pellon Wonder Under iron on adhesive and fabric scraps big enough to cover the hole.

I cut my Wonder Under out into two birds(that would be big enough to cover my holes) while I had it folded... so I then had two of each bird, mirrored. Iron the Wonder Under to your fabric and cut the shapes out.

** I used birds, but be inspired by the size shape and placement of the hole/holes you have to cover... you can use design for this project. And, yes, I was laughing at myself and thinking of the "put a bird on it" clip from Portlandia... but what can I say- I like them.

These mirrored pairs are for covering the holes from both sides of the towel.

Peel the back paper off and iron the birds onto the towel covering the holes strategically. Then, stitch around the edges on your sewing machine.

Notice the back side of the towel... you can see the hole and the stitches. Use the stitches to help you line up the other pair of birds directly over the back side of the first pair. Iron the second pair down into place.

Stitch around the edge. I actually like to go around several times to get a flowy movement with my edge line. (I like how it masks any imperfections ;)

Ta Da! Now, if I could figure out how to give second life to my favorite pj pants that are disintegrating!

birds of a feather...nestled

from sew sweetness blog

Have you seen this pieced feather? Well, it was made by Anna Maria Horner... I love it.

So, when I was trying to decide what to put on the front panel of the wrap I was making for my cousin's first baby (who was born friday night and I have been helping with the past few days... Oh- delightful!) what do you think came to mind? You must know me well ;-) Of course I had to copy Anna Maria! 

Here is tiny baby in her feathered pouch... if you are interested in a step by step of how I made the feather follow right along(I have no doubt that Anna Maria had it refined a bit more- you are getting my first copy cat attempt).

I paper pieced the colorful sides, so here is my paper. (The shape should be narrower at one end- I forgot and fixed that later).

I sewed strips of fabric together on top of the paper at an angle and ironed each strip open as I went along. When paper piecing set the stitch length tight; this will help the paper be very perforated and easy to tear away.

When this step is finished, the back should look about like this.

Then you trim off the excess fabric to get it into the shape of the template/base paper.

Now tear the paper off of the back.

One down, one to go....

When colored pieces are finished, you sew them to a piece of background fabric that looks about this shape.

Match up the edges the way you would pieces of bias stripes.

Next, sew your center strip to both side pieces.

Add little triangles to close in the top...

Then, add background fabric to the sides... Ta Da -- feather complete. Now, what to do with it?

I sewed more background fabric until I had a square that measured about 16"X16". I sewed a free form feather to finish the design. Then, I hemmed the top edge under.

I ironed all my edges under and pinned the two sides and the bottom to the center of my jersey. (to make a moby type wrap you use a ~20" X 5.5 yard piece (give or take depending on size of intended wearer) of jersey fabric. I like a medium weight that is mostly cotton with a little bit of lycra).

Sew the three sides down using a coordinating thread. (The white feather looks splotchy because I had just sprayed it to erase my marker sketch.)

See the handy pocket for keys and dipes? The panel is also nice for marking the center when putting on the wrap.

Peep eye ;-)

ten minute shorts

The following is a post from summer of 2008... with the seasons changing these shorts are great! PERFECT for beginners or those needing some instant gratification:

this is sooo easy ... you've got to try!
this pic doesn't do them justice-- they are extremly cute! a light weight denim w/ a little scrap of quilting fabric for a pocket.

i found this post { http://madebypetchy.blogspot.com/2008/06/tutorial-10-minute-trousers.html } on a crafty blog i like to read. i took the 10 minutes (plus a little extra b/c i put a cute pocket on them) to make darling pair of shorts. she has a whole tutorial including how to pictures. check it out and make a pair.

i don't know if y'all have seen the pledge to 'buy handmade'... these were so easy, i'm tempted to take the handmade vow and make elisha's clothes next season... maybe i'll vow to make half, and buy the other 40% at consignment sales... we'll see...

village cardigan tutorial

There may a cool spell yet... But, at the very least this cardigan is perfect for the chilly mornings and evenings during spring.

I have a passion for demystifying 'art'. I want to show my inspiration so that you can see how you too can find things that make you happy and then copy the parts you like ;-) As Mason Cooley says," Art begins in imitation and ends in innovation." I'm pretty sure I like the originals more than my version, but at least I can wear something close enough! These next two pictures are my darling darling inspirations!

from here

from here

I had to decide on a coastal village because I couldn't choose which inspiration to go with ;-) 

I photographed my process so that you can follow right along. I give a little more detail about the applique process in this tutorial.

I started with the water by cutting out a piece of Wonder-Under in the size and shape I wanted and then sketched with pencil the divisions between the waves. I was afraid that if I cut the waves apart and ironed them to fabric all at once they would get switched around and it would be a pain to fit them together again. So instead I cut out one wave at a time, ironed it to fabric, cut the wave out of the fabric and then placed it back in it's spot.

Once I finished the water I started on my little hillocks. I laid my Wonder-Under over the area I was going to cover and sketched it out while I could see through the paper exactly what size and shape would work best. It is important to remember lay the paper out with the rough adhesive side up or else everything will be mirror image when you iron your fabric.

Land and sea are ironed on-- now it's is time to add a boat and some homes...

See how I got the boat the right size and shape? It is really great to utilize the transparent nature of the wonder-under.

Adding rick rack ups the cute factor ten fold ;-)

Everything is laid out, now the pieces need to be stitched into place so that they peel off in the wash. I also added some finishing details like button windows, embroidery stitch doors, smoke coming from a chimney, and a tree trunk for those floating green tree tops in between the houses. I did all of that with my machine, but I like to add some hand stitching to give it a handmade presence.

You can see the washable maker I used to draw my clouds and primitive birds.

I stitched along the lines with embroidery floss....and...

Ta Da! All done!

*** a point to note when sewing a lot of woven fabric (i.e.-quilting cotton) onto stretchy knit: enough gaps need to be between the areas of applique to allow for some stretch and give. at first I was going to have my land and water pieces touching each other with no spaces, but luckily I tried it on before I sewed it down and realized that having all the woven fabric took away the stretch and I could no longer button it... it was too tight.***