While I own a 1 inch button maker, my friend Joanna and I rented a slightly larger one for a weekend a while back and went crazy making larger magnets. I packaged mine into little zip locks, in sets of 2 or 4. Joanna had a great idea to create larger sets of her photography magnets and she packaged them in old CD cases.
They look great and it’s a great use of cases when you store your CDs in another way.
Posted in fun finds
Tagged Etsy, life in a lens, magnets, photography, repurposing
I should be making loads of new stock. Instead I’ve been sidetracked by making a new table cloth for my craft shows.
I ran out of doilies. But the beauty of this project is that it looks pretty awesome the way it is. I was planning on going all the way up so that the entire hanging down part of the sheet was covered in doilies. I’ve got to run off thrifting.
I usually use bright crazy coloured vintage sheets but I think my bright products will show up better on a more neutral background. I’ll take some photos at Saturday’s show and let you know. If you live in Peterborough come by the public library on Saturday afternoon, I’ll be hanging out there!
Posted in crochet, repurposing, vintage
Tagged craft show, display, doilies, repurposing, table cloth, thrifting
Hello everyone, well hopefully I’m enjoying some great weather in Belize, maybe I’m even on a beach! Which is why I asked Janee of Yellow Bird Yellow Beard to guest post for me. Here’s her cute DIY.
Hi Fun People!
I’ve seen these adorable little figurines floating around the internet recently, I’m sure quite a few of you have seen them also. Now I’m normally not a huge fan of glitter, but these are simply irresistible. Enjoy!!!
DISCLAIMER::: I’m going to say this just in case you’ve been living in a cave up until now and have never worked with glitter before. Your going to want to do this on an easily cleanable or throw-away-able surface. Or better yet, outside. Or even better still, outside on a throw-away-able surface.
xoxo
Janee
Posted in DIY, other crafts, repurposing
Tagged decor, DIY, glitter, repurposing, yellow beard yellow bird
So I signed up for 2 craft swaps this year and in the first one I was lucky enough to get Shealynn for my partner. After a few emails I wasn’t really sure what to send her, she makes/made these great camera strap covers and I didn’t know if I could impress her with anything.
So I just plunged in and sent her a sewing machine cover and some other goodies. I figured if I went first I wouldn’t feel pressure to be awesome like her creations. Sure enough, this amazing ipad cover arrived for me a little bit ago.
Now I had made myself an ipad cover before, but it was showing signs of wear and it was like a sleeve and there have been a few times my ipad was on the verge of just sliding right out when I wasn’t paying attention. So a snazzy new cover was just the kick in the butt I needed to finally cut my old one up and reuse the material.
On the weekend I turned my kitchen table into a bit of a nightmare so I could squeeze in some crafting while Nate was avoiding his nap. I was working on a project with vintage pillow cases and inspiration hit and took me on a bit of a detour.
Start with a vintage pillow case and trim off the nice finished edge at the opening where you put your pillow in. You can either trim really close to the stitching and have a closed loop piece, or cut into it and have an open edge. I’m going to show you how to work with both options.
Now you have 2 big loops, cut off the seam so you have one long piece of fabric.
I was cutting the orangey one for another project and in the process I trimmed a bit into the seam and created an opening on one edge. So here’s how to finish that off and make a nice clean edge, and a thinish headband.
Open the fabric up and use the fold inside, the part that was the very end of the pillow, as a guide to fold the unfinished edges inward. I didn’t go all the way because I wanted my band a bit thicker.
Then fold it again so the raw edges disappear inside. You can iron and pin at this point before you sew. Of forge ahead like I did.
Top stitch along the sides to make nice clean edges. Fold the bottom raw edges up inside the ‘tube’ to create a clean edge and topstitch to seal it all in. Then you have one nice ruler shaped piece of fabric that you can wrap around your head and tie at the back.
For my blue headband I just carefully trimmed around the pre-existing stitching. Why make more work?
Then I cut the ends on an angle just to had some interest to the ends. Fold the raw edges inside and top stitch around the whole thing.
There you have it, a lovely new headband that was half made already!
Posted in DIY, repurposing, scraps, tutorial-ish, vintage
Tagged accessory, DIY, floral, headband, linens, pillowcase, repurposing, sewing, thrifting, tutorial, vintage
I’m slowing making my way through cleaning up in the basement. We’ve been purging things for a while, my son has been very excited to “share” his toys with other kids who can use them. I’ve taken things into my school for classrooms, to the consignment store and off to donate. I’m doing everything to avoid making garbage. The other day I spent a load of time sorting my scrapbin. Since I’ve changed my cup cozy design a bit there were some pieces previously too small that will now work. Usually I make pin cushions but I’m getting a little tired of that. I’m going to make some of these pouches, with Wesley’s help, for some of the important women in his life. I also want to make a cover for my bodem so I’ll quilt the little pieces into a larger piece of fabric to make that. Plus I really want to try Keyka Lou’s technique.
So I cut what I could into 2 X 2 inch squares. Not entirelly sure what I’ll make with them yet but I’ll figure something out, or ideas are welcome!
Posted in repurposing, sewing
Tagged organizing, quilting, repurposing, scrapbusting, scraps, sewing
As if playing around on etsy isn’t dangerous enough already, the other day while poking around I clicked ‘shop local’ and stumbled onto some pretty neat stuff. My favourite was JewlezyBug so I’m sharing her first! Julie has created some really cute characters and uses some interesting materials. She paints on rocks to make neat pendants and uses pages from old books and phone books as the canvases for her whimsical paintings!
I sent her a message on etsy and she seems really fun and agreed to do a GIVEAWAY!!!!! Soooo free stuff to someone who’s in need of cuteness! Julie is willing to giveaway one of her prints, see them all here in her flickr pool, just leave a comment here telling us which one is your fav (they’re numbered 1-90). I like this little guy.
I asked her a little bit about herself and she sent this little blurb, thanks for sharing!
“I have always doodled and painted for as long as I can remember. I am drawn to bright colours and happy motifs that catch the eye and make you smile. I like my art to make you feel good and brighten your day. I use old books and phone books as my back drops because they visually stimulate the eye and provide texture to the art. I feel my art is a reflection of my inner child just wanting to play. I take inspiration from colour, from my day, nature, from the people in the my life and from my furbabies (4 cats and 1 dog: Jewels (hence the name!)”
She also has a blog where she shares her new creations, fun crafts and her cute animals. I love these ribbon curtains she made.
I’ll do some magical random winner picking Sunday night and announce Monday morning! Ohhh the suspense, I’d better set my iphone alarm . . .
Posted in fun finds, other crafts, papercrafts, repurposing
Tagged art, Etsy, oshawa, papercrafts, pendant, recycling, repurposing
Remember this? That I was soooo excited about? Yeah, it’s been sitting neglected in my craft area all this time. That’s a little embarassing. Last night, for a change from taggie blankies and juice pouch totes, I picked it up and finished the little sucker.
The handles are made from a belt I thrifted and the main white fabric with the brown plantlike print was on crazy sale for $3 for a big huge remnant. I love the little detail of the brown inner fabric peaking out at the top. I’m pretty happy with the results considering it was my first attempt.
Although it feels like I haven’t been very crafty lately somehow I’ve managed to create things. I finally assembled my German juice pouches, from Spain, into a cute little tote that I now use as my work bag. If work is at a school is it a ‘school bag’?
When I came upstairs with it my husband said, ‘Oh cool, are you going to sell that one?’. I nearly died, after all that drinking and saving and trying to explain with gestures to the maid at the resort the pouches weren’t garbage . . . AND packing them to fly to England and then back to Canada! No way. This bag is mine! Plus they say ‘kirsch’! How cool is that?
I’m going to visit my cousin tomorrow for the night, I’m packing the cover and some pages for Nate’s counting book. Some embroidery is needed so perhaps I can get that done while the gaggle of our 5 children play. Here’s a shot of the #1 page, there’s a robot on it.
I’m taking her daughters some crayon cozies gone wrong, I cut them a tad too short and they only hold 15 crayons instead of 16. They’ll still like them and I figured rather than waste fabric I’d make them anyway. I also made them some little juice pouch totes as well. Lately some of students in my class have been bringing them for lunch so the lunch lady has been saving them for me.
Posted in kid fun, other crafts, repurposing, sewing
Tagged cloth couting book, juice pouch totes, kool aid jammmers, repurposing
As if losing my own socks wasn’t enough, then there was a husband’s socks for me to lose. Now there’s 2 little ones and more socks I have to keep tracks of!! So I’ve been keeping this little pile of lonely socks lying around for months ‘just in case’ the other sock reappears. Then I had an idea. Wednesday I brought home a paper box from work and started my project.
I cut off part of the box to make it angled to sit on the floor nicely. With a Sharpie I drew some big circles on it, I was going to make flowers but then I figured two boys would probably go for something a little less girly. So I turned the circles into mouth of goofy looking aliens. They’re sort of our family, a big daddy alien, a eyelashed mommy alien, a boy alien and a little baby alien.
Cut out the holes with a blade or sharp knife. Then I painted them in, while watching LOST. I just used craft paints, nothing special.
Back to the pile of socks, pictured here. I also used a lonely single scratch mitten since we don’t need those anymore.
Since, coincidentally, I had been researching bean bag fillings I decided to use rice. You can rinse them and air dry, if it breaks open it’s pretty easy to clean and if Nate did try to eat it no big deal. The socks were pretty easy to fill, I just used a spoon and sewed them shut with the machine since it was fast, hand sewing would work. Cut off the excess sock and you’re ready to go.
I hoped for an action shot today but it was harder to get than I thought. Wesley turned the game box into a machine and was driving it around the house while stacking the ‘bubbles’ (aka the socks) in a pile in a corner of the kitchen. Oh well, the point was for them to have fun and they did.
Posted in kid fun, repurposing, sewing
Tagged games, painting, repurposing, sewing, socks
