Birthday Boy Ribbon (Tutorial)

This post has been a while in the making. I kept sitting down to do it but I’ve been so busy with VBS at our church. Now that things have settled down I’m excited to show this little craft that brought much joy to my little one.

This year we didn’t do much for his 4th but I wanted him to have something special to wear so I made this. It’s a very easy craft but he was extremely excited about it and was happy to tell everybody that I made it.

What you need:

• Button
• Fabric scraps for center
• Fabric scraps for  ruffle
• Embroidery floss, hoop, and needle
• Mod Podge
• Hot glue gun
• Sewing Machine (Optional)

First I Traced the button on my center fabric. I used a pencil but an disappearing ink pen may work better for this. Then I wrote own my letters so I would have a guide to stitch over.

I backstitched over the letters in blue, came out pretty nice as my first time embroidering. You may remembered my review of the book Doodle Stitching where I told you I was going to try it. Yes, I waited this long to try.

I painted my button with white paint because you could see the image through the white fabric, but you may not need to.

I used pinking sheers to cut out my circle just big enough to cover the button in the back. You can see where I tried to erase the lines, which is why I said disappearing ink would work better. Then I just Mod Podged it to the back of my button.

This is the part where you make the ruffle edging. I first want to give credit where credit is due. I learned to do ruffles from a “Make it and Love it” tute found here.
Using a strip of fabric that is 1.5 by 13 with the long size against the fold. Make the strip longer if your button is bigger or if you want a larger ruffle effect.

Use the Make it and Love it method of making a ruffle or you can even hand sew a running stitch since its such a small piece. But I use any excuse to use my machine. then sew the two ends together to form the medallion.






ignore the fabric scraps in the pic. I had some trial and error with the size.
To finish I hot glued the ruffle medallion to the back of my button opening it some to go around the pin part. Then to give it a finished look I hot glued a felt circle to the back, cutting a slot to fit the clasp and just sticking the pin through on the other side.

See, Told-ya it was easy! I just love last minute project ideas that come out nicely (that doesn’t always happen)


Linking Up:

Picture Frame Pin Cushion

I first want to say I am posting this using my new blogger app for iPhone so I have no clue how this is going to look when published but I thought it would be fun to use. It's like sending a text to the blogging world lol. Now on to my project.

This was one of those spur of the moment projects that was done last minute so no tutorial. But it's so easy it really doesn't need one.

I usually keep my pins on a teeny little box that came with one of those starter sewing kits and always said to myself I need to make a pin cushion and never did. When I knocked over the little box on the floor when my daughter was playing across the room I saw it as a hazard and stopped what I was doing and made this little cutie.

All you need us a small frame, some scrap fabric, hot glue, and a little bit of stuffing. For my stuffing I dissected an old cheap stuffed animal of my sons that had a hole in it. Don't worry. It was a cheap one out of the claw machine from Walmart. Not much if a loss and he didn't even know.

Take out the glass of the frame because you don't need it.

Cut your fabric scrap a little bigger than the inside space in the back

Hot glue your corners down first. Then as even as possible glue in the rest

Add the stuffing in and replace back.

Yeah, it's that easy. I finished two in about 10 minutes. Now I don't have to worry about spilled pins on the floor AND I have some added color to my craft table.

Sparkle Clutch

I follow some really awesome blogs but its nice that I have a couple from people I actually know. Stephanie is someone I went to high school with and is an amazing photographer. Seriously, I would really like to do a family / couple session with her, she has a good eye. She also has a blog called My Sketchbook where she features her wonderful work. Recently she posted about this adorable sparkle clutch that she made. Isn't it darling?

The best thing about it is, she offers a well illustrated tutorial so you can make your own! So what are you waiting for? You know you want to make one so get the tute here. Oh, and while you are there, check out the rest of her blog and follow it because I'm sure there are more great and creative things to come. You don't want to miss out.

Gettin' A Little Organized

I've been MIA for a little while, sorry. My 2012 promise to myself was to blog more and have more projects (I figure, if I don't call it a resolution it will get done haha). I have a couple of things to post a bout and I'm working on a crochet project I am very excited about that I hope to have done soon.

Going through my daily news feed everybody is getting organized for 2012, I'm hoping to hop on that bandwagon too. I have already started with a new way to get rid of my many notebooks of randomness where I write down creative ideas and such. I had a few spiral notebooks where I wrote down stuff, nothing was in order, there were notes on random pages and I had to flip through everything and each book if I needed to locate something. The sad thing is, I never realized it was a problem until I was looking for a sewing pattern that I had wrote down a few months back to make more flags for church.

The first idea I had to this problem was to go to staples and get the ARC system notebooks. I LOVE this system. The paper is nice and thick, you can remove it and place it back, there are lots of accessories such as dividers and folders and pockets. I liked that if I wrote something on the first available page (like I always do) I can move it to where it belongs and stay ORGANIZED. But alas, it was out of my budget. There was no actual blank paper (just graph paper) so I would need the 30 dollar punch to insert my own.

So what did I get instead? A simple binder! I know right, why didn't I think of that first. I got the half letter sized (5.5 x 8.5), some filler paper and folder dividers all from Staples. The binder was like 7 bucks and both the paper and the folders for a few dollars each. I've only had it for a few days and I love it. Everything has its own place. I have a section for my crochet and my sewing. I printed out some PDF patterns to size and rigged my regular 3 hole punch to size also. It fits in my bag with my yarn (and my new yarn holder I will tell you about later) and other purse stuff nicely. I really like this size, I think I want to buy binders in this size for everything.

It does look a little plain. I hate the "pretty paper" in the front look, so I'm thinking of sewing up a binder cover for it. Maybe a tute to come in the near future too?

Doodle Stitching Book Review

[Photo]

Border's going out of business is bittersweet to me. That was the only bookstore I actually liked to go to, now that they are going out of business I will probably have to get all my books now from Amazon. Even though it's sad, the good thing is that I now can stock up my craft library for dirt cheap (yay!). There was a big sign on the window of our local store that said 10 days left so we had to stop by and see what the slim pickings were. Poor Noah was upset because "someone took the toys" the whole kids section was completely cleared out. But anyway..

There was only so many craft books left, and only like three that I considered buying. There was this crochet book called Twinkie Chain's Crochet goodies for Fashion Foodies which had really cool patterns that I wanted to try, a few with cupcakes(which I'm into now). Alas, I wanted to learn something new so I choose a book on embroidery called Doodle-Stitching by Aimee Ray.

My first impression when flipping through the pages was that it had a variety of different patterns that seemed very easy to do. As a beginner of anything that "I can do that" feeling is very important and even after flipping through a few pages I got that feeling and wanted to dive right in.

The author gives a little advice on what materials and tools you need to get started which reading that made me happy because as a new craft its super affordable. (I can get everything I need under 20 bucks with coupons from Jo-Ann's)  She explains all of the basic stitches that you need to know to complete all of the designs provided in the book that you could also use in any design you come up with yourself.

My favorite idea in the whole book is the canvas shoe embroidery. I would have never thought to do that and I would love to personalize a pair of shoes like that. I have always seen ones decorated with sharpie doodles, but this is much better.

In the book she also explains how to transfer images and designs on your fabric to stitch over but what I love about the style of "doodle-stitching" is that you could really just draw a design directly on the fabric in pencil, no tranfering materials required. Hopefully this week I can grab some supplies and start on my new hobby with pix to show you guys.


P.S. Hope you guys had a wonderful Labor Day weekend like I did. I got to visit my family which made my whole weekend.

Twitter Inspired Fabric

I was looking around on fabric.com for some fabric to use on a future project and I came across this

[pic]

How cute, I don't know what I would use this for but I thought it was too cute not to post about. When I first saw it I thought it was funny, then I wondered was at an actual twitter name. So I did the logical thing, went to twitter and checked it out. Greatest thing ever. Sew to Speak is a little fabric shop in Columbus, Ohio ran by a mother daughter duo. They also have a variety of different sewing classes. Looking around on their website, I now want to take a trip to Ohio just to go to their highly adorable shop and stay long enough to take a few classes. head on over to their website here or check out their blog here

don't forget to check out their twitter @sewtospeak

while your there you can check out mine @LkyStrCreations

(shameless plug I know, but I couldn't resist)

and if you are in the market for some fabric for a project (or to stock your stash, I wont tell) The Raw Feed has some awesome coupons for fabric.com as well as coupons for many other retailers.

Ice Cream Pint Holder

This tutorial is near and dear to my heart because I've had it on my to do list for some time and never got a chance to do it. I love eating ice cream straight out of the pint like I said on my favorite things post. I never eat it all at once and I hate when it starts to melt from holding it and when I refreeze it the outside tastes a little different. This nifty little cozy not only helps keep your ice cream cold, but it keeps your hands nice and warm too (finger-cicles are never a good thing) and it even has a pocket for your spoon and can hang on the fridge so you always have it on hand.
Disclaimer: I am a newbie at sewing, and I'm known for making things a lot harder than it needs to be, this is the way that I did it, although there may be an easier way, if you know one, please leave a comment and share.
Here Goes!!

Materials:
Outside Print Fabric (or large scrap) I had a quarter yard'
Inside Fabric
Insul-Brite
Coordinating Thread
Empty Ice Cream Pint. If you don't have one, go buy two. Eat one now, Save one to reward yourself when your done.
Round magnets, I got mine from Joann's. They are super heavy duty 18x3mm
Rotary cutter, mat, and ruler. (or good coordination with a regular ruler if you don't have one)
Paper scissors, and fabric scissors
permanent marker
box cutter, or exacto knife
pencil
paper (2 sheets)
Tape
Iron


1. Take permanent marker and mark line where top is on container.











2.Use box cutter or exacto knife to cut along that line, the side seam and the bottom circle

3. Now use your flattened as a pattern and trace on paper. Tape two sheets of paper together so you have enough space to add the inseam. For the top and bottom add a 1/2 inch. on the sides add 1 inch.
I dont have a picture of this because I did it a while ago, but I used my ruler and added small points from the line to where the new line will be, and then played connect the dots all the way around.

4. Cut out your new paper pattern. Then use this pattern to pin and cut out fabric and insul-brite.

5. Next use your rotary cutter ( or ruler if you dont have one) and cut out a rectangle on a folded edge of your outer fabric. The fold should be at the top, and your rectangle should measure 3in wide by 3 1/2in long.

6. The Small rectangle you just cut will be your spoon pocket. To form the pocket, fold under about a half inch on each side, and press to stay

7. Top stitch the top of your pocket (with flaps still folded under). I used this special foot that came with my machine as a guide (if you know what its called, leave a comment to tell me please). I lined up the small size on the right with the top of my pocket.(the fold). Sorry about the bad picture, it was hard to take a good one.

8. Pin the pocket to the middle of the outside fabric. To find the center I gently folded and creased and lined up creases. You could just eyeball it, but i'm not that skilled.

9. Next, sew down pocket using the same method as the top stitch that you just made. Start stitching where the top stitch is. Hint: for the left side, start at the bottom so you can still use the foot as your guide .

10. Cut a square of scrap fabric larger than your magnet, I didnt initally measure but mine came to about 1 1/2 inch but whatever works for your size magnet. This is going to be stitched to the left side of your insul-brite to hold down your magnet. Again I used the smaller presser foot and pivoted the corners. After I did 3 sides, I slid in the magnet, and finished stitching the last side to close. This is a little tricky because when doing the last side, the magnet sticks to your throat plate.

11. Now you can stack and pin your fabric layers in this order.
Insul-Brite, With magnet facing down
Outside fabric, With pocket facing up
Inside fabric, right side down

12. Sew the top and bottom sides down using a 1/2 inch inseam. don't forget to back stitch at the beginning and end of each side. I also switched my presser foot back to the normal one for this.

13. Now you have a tube. turn it to the right side and press down so that it is nice and flat and even. Now you can top stitch the top and the bottom using the same foot as when you made the pocket. Leave about a half inch on each side that is not top stitched. (start 1/2in. in, stop with 1/2in left)

14. Take the side without the magnet next to it and turn in the fabric about a half inch to hide raw edges. Press to stay. To reduce bulk, I cut a small piece of the insul-brite out on that side. you can also do a small piece on the other side to.

15. Slide the end with the magnet in that opening about a half inch in. Pin down. Start sewing from the bottom. This is a little tricky. Be careful not to sew both sides together, because ripping seams is no fun, trust me. I tried to get a pic as i was doing this but I was having trouble at first and forgot. but here is the sewn line

16. This last step is not a must do, but I did it anywy. Go over the top stitching at the top and bottom over the seam you just made to reinforce. Mine was a little uneven at the top, and the back was a little loopy because i had to feed it through myself.

Now pat yourself on the back and take that second pint and reward yourself for a job well done.

If you dont want to eat it now, flatten it, and place it on your fridge so its ready when you need it.

Since this was created and written by me and things in my head may not make sence to other people. If you are confused by anything feel free to leave a comment and ask and I will clear it up to the best of my ability.

Make Your Own Buttons

I saw this post over on over on Craft Gossip and I thought it was amazing. Sometimes I have a vision of a project in my head and get frustrated when I can't find exactly what I'm looking for. In fact I was having this problem yesterday when working on a design for a duvet, I wanted cute buttons for it and couldn't find exactly what I wanted online. ( I know right, you can find everything online) I thought of making polymer clay buttons, but that was no good because they break. These custom buttons made from shrink paper over on S.P.W. (Scissors. Paper. Wok.) are amazing! Get the tute and make your own! I know I will.

Photo from [S.P.W.]

Sew Everything Workshop Book Review

[Photo from Workman publishing]

A few weeks ago we took a family trip to the library. Originally it was to use the internet since ours was out but since I was there I thought I would look for a book on sewing, since I have a machine and only really know the basics of sewing straight lines. Our library didn’t have a wide selection of craft books published in this decade but I did find a book called Sew Everything Workshop by Diana Rupp. Let me start off by saying I love this book. I really need to buy my own copy so that I can stop renewing this one.

Like all my other books this book has a very fun to read, down to earth tone to it. I like craft books that I can sit and read like a novel, not just like a boring step by step instructional. It starts off with an introduction of the author of the book Diana Rupp. She owns a craft school in New York called Make Workshop, where I definitely have to go and check out sometime soon. It also gives you tips and pointers on setting up your sewing area and supplying your sewing box with all the necessities and fun luxuries.

One of my favorite parts is that it explains exactly how a sewing machine works, and the difference between machines and how to pick one that is right for your needs. Not only does it have everything you need to know to get started sewing but an overview of different types of fabrics and notions, and how to use them.

At the end of this book it has 25 patterns to get you started sewing. It has a little bit of everything, a jacket, dresses, stuff for your home, for your guy (boxers, and a tie), even something for your pet, or baby. Out of the 25 patterns 10 have actual paper patterns to follow. Don’t know how to use a paper pattern? That’s ok, in the chapters beforehand it gives you very detailed instructions on how to do so.

I followed the instructions on how to make a sewing machine cover. It said to use oil cloth, but I just used an old curtain I had on hand and it came out great. I plan to jazz it up later with some decorations, maybe something to make it a little sturdier.

Excuse the photo; I’m not in my normal element so I had to work with what I had.

Here is the detail of the stitching at the bottom. It was my first use of a decorative stitch!



The last chapter of the book is titled “hand sewing 101” which gives you a little insight on the basics. A short resources guide lists all the different places handy for a new sewer to know. It even lists a few good blogs, and we all know how much I love a good crafty blog.

Oh, and yes I do realize all the books I have reviewed come from Workman Publishing, that wasn’t on purpose, I realized that after I finished reading this one, but hey, they know a good thing.

Wine Bottle Cozy for Grads

Recently my cousin graduated from college and although it wasn’t to her, it was a big deal to me so I wanted to give her something nice, and hand made. Looking into my trusty little book, Generation T, I made this little number called “stocked up” which is project number 32 in the book. Since the outer shirt I used was a summer tube top that was pretty thin, and I figured a glass bottle needs a little more support, I made an inside layer with a yellow polo, which also added a little more color. Add a bottle of Wild Vines blackberry merlot, and Voila! A great, handmade gift fit for any occasion. Then after looking at it for a day, I thought it looked too plain to give just like that so I made a “Congrats” tag out of a two toned index card and letter punches, added some curling ribbon, and then it was complete.

Laptop Case

Today I finished my first real sewing project and I’m highly excited about it. It is project number 37 “major sleevage”, from the book Generation T: Beyond Fashion (check out my review here). This is the first thing that I have sewn in years, and the first thing I’ve actually had a chance to sew on my sewing machine. It was a pretty easy pattern and in general didn’t take that long to complete. The hard part was rotary cutting. I came to the conclusion that I need to take a class on rotary cutting because for some reason it just wasn’t one of those easy peasy, common sense kind of things I thought it would be. I think the problem for me was the knit fabric. The only other time I’ve sewn anything or used a rotary cutter was a quilt I made in high school which of course used regular quilting fabric. Other than that everything went ok and it felt absolutely amazing to have a project completed and to get to sit back and look at it finished, I haven’t had the chance to do that in forever. I didn’t follow the instructions exact; it called for putting a strip on the front flap to tie around to close it. Instead a put a cute glittery button, I thought it looked nicer that way.