2010 Holiday Ornament Swap

Because I figured I didn't have enough on my plate this holiday season, I decided to sign up for Freshly Blended's 2010 Holiday Ornament Swap.  I'm always seeing people do these swaps on blogs all over the internets, and this one seemed non-threatening enough, so I thought, "What the heck!  I'll spread the holiday crafting cheer!"

I whipped up 9 little hand-embroidered, hand-sewn, hand-stuffed stocking ornaments while I was home for Thanksgiving.  I even worked on them in the car on the way home...

Don't be mad at me, but I really don't like traditional holiday colors.  That's a lie.  I don't like traditional Christmas colors.  I actually really, really love blue and silver, but anyway, my point here is that I avoided traditional Christmas colors and went with bright, cheerful non-holiday-specific colors.  And nothing says joy like mini pom-pom trim!

My favorite part of this project may have been the wrapping.  I've always loved wrapping, but never invest that much in it because I don't really come from a family that appreciates that sort of thing.  In fact, growing up, we'd joke that my mom "rolled" presents.  Eventually, I just started wrapping my own (I was that kind of kid.).  Yeah, yeah, that sounds sad, but I liked it better that way.  Once I knew the dirty truth about Santa, my mom would just put my gifts in plain white boxes, tape them up, and have me wrap them.  But I digress...

Anyway, there seems to be this new appreciation all over the blogosphere, Etsy, and whatnot for packaging, and I'm all about it.  I live like 5 blocks from a Container Store (for which Michael holds a special disdain because, as he explains, it symbolizes just how badly consumerism has taken hold of America that we need a specialized store for people to buy a bunch of stuff to store all the other stuff they buy), so it's a little dangerous.  $11.99 for a roll of wrapping paper?!  Yeah, I paid it, but I like to think I offset that expense slightly by using super cheap felt pom-poms and embroidery thread that I already had on hand in place of a bow.

I mailed these suckers out yesterday, and now, I sit anxiously awaiting the 9 little gems that I will receive in return.

Can You Frame a Paypal Receipt?

...because I made my first order! I sold three purses yesterday. Yay.

Stuffed Giraffe

Despite my general fear of babies, I really love a good baby sewing project.  Baby projects are colorful and small and full of joy, so with no specific recipient in mind, I decided to try my hand at making a rudimentary stuffed animal.

I started with some remnant white fabric the I picked up at Joann and this embroidery pattern.

I transferred the image to my fabric with a quick pencil sketch right on the fabric (which is absolutely not the professional way to do it).

Using a few colors of embroidery floss and my embroidery hoop, I employed a simple back stitch, some satin stitching, and a French knot to bring my little giraffe to life. 

Then, I cut out the giraffe by creating a very simple silhouette that would be easy to sew around, leaving room for both my seam allowance and for some plushness.  I cut out a mirror image of my silhouette from some Eleanor Grosch Zoo Menagerie fabric for my backing. 

I then sewed my two pieces together, right sides facing, leaving a little gap at the bottom for inserting the stuffing.

Once this was done, I turned it right side out, stuffed it, and closed it all up with a slip stitch.  And here's my adorable little final product:

I'll probably be making more of these since the embroidery allows me to be creative without tethering me to my living room/sewing machine.  I'm looking forward to coming up with my own embroidery patterns and maybe using some trims.

Etsy or Regretsy?

Despite the blow that the internets hurled at me last week, I'm taking a leap, folks.  I've opened an Etsy shop (or shoppe, for the sophisticates).

This is something that friends and family have encouraged for some time now, but my response was always, "What would I sell, exactly?"  I've always felt that I'm pretty decent at making a whole lot of things, but I'm not amazing at making any one thing.  Making at least one thing really well and really creatively (and taking flattering pictures of it) is what spells success on Etsy.  Even though I've admittedly not formulated a definitive, long-term answer to my former question, I'm moving forward.  (Sidebar: This isn't my first foray into crafty entrepreneurship.  I made some pretty rudimentary purses in college that my boyfriend-at-the-time's mom sold for $10 a pop at the hospital she worked at.  Let's just say that I didn't get rich.)

My shop may evolve over time as I figure out what it is that I'm good at and what niche I can fill, or it may just disappear all together when I realize I don't have time for this or should I reach the realization that I have nothing unique to contribute to the crafting marketplace...which I believe is a completely fine and valid conclusion to potentially reach.  (This actually reminds me of a conclusion that I loudly reached in my sophomore English lit class in college much to the chagrin of my professor who was arguing otherwise: "I don't believe everyone should write a book!  Not everyone has 200+ pages of something interesting to say."  But I digress...)

So, with that said, I introduce you to my first products: Clutch Purses!  Yeah, yeah, I know, that's just what Etsy needs...more purses, but hey, I really liked these guys when I churned them out for my bridesmaids, and I thought others might enjoy them, too.

I've already posted a couple in my Etsy shop (http://www.fabricpaperglue.etsy.com/), and will post the rest in the coming days.  Get excited.  Tell your friends.

What do you think about this new endeavor?  Do you have other ideas for items that others might like to buy for themselves or their friends and family?  Am I crazy?

Happy Belated Halloween

This year, Michael and I went as family fun games for Halloween.  I was a Barrel of Monkeys, and Michael was Operation.  Yeah, yeah, we're lame.  But, what can I say, I love a holiday primed for craftiness.



I made Michael's costume from a box that I simply painted to look like Operation.  His "brain freeze" label was foam board attached to a head band.

I made my costume from several sheets of poster board, pipe insulators, craft paper, glue, and lots of duct tape.

I made the circumference of the middle of my barrel the same length as the pipe insulator, so I glued and taped (for good measure) 4 pieces of poster board end to end.  The pipe insulators will give the barrel structure.  They're sort of like water noodles, and you can pick these up from home improvement stores for about $1 a piece. 

In order to taper the barrel off at both the top and bottom, I measured off at regular intervals at both the top and bottom of my poster board strip and cut along these lines, leaving the middle completely uncut.

At each of these intervals, I overlapped the ends just slightly, glued and taped them, and then held each with a paperclip so that it'd all set.

Once this was done, I created sort-of belt loops through which I could thread my pipe insulators.

I threaded the pipe insulator through, taped the ends of the barrel together, applied loops for the other two pipe insulators.  This is what it looked like:

Once it was all put together, I created my label by printing off large letters that I cut out and glued to a long sheet of white craft paper that I wrapped around my barrel and closed off with glue.  I wore it by creating some shoulder straps with ribbon, and I made the monkeys by cutting them from red poster board. 

While we're  on the subject of Halloween costumes, I just have to share our costumes from 2008 because, well, I'm still sort of obsessed with them.  We went as lawn ornaments.  I was a flamingo, and Michael was a yard gnome.  I put it all together with a bunch of felt, a pipe insulator, some stuffing, elastic, a t-shirt, a beard, and a little sewing and gluing.

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