Summer Projects

It has been a BUSY summer!  We toured a friend through Turkey, took a European cruise, moved back to America, attended 4 bachelorette parties, celebrated at 4 weddings, went to 2 family reunions, DROVE ALL OVER CALIFORNIA, found jobs and an apartment, and still found time to craft.  

If you follow my crafting through Facebook, you may have figured I gave up my craft-a-week goal.  Not true.  I did give up regular internet access though, so here's the round up. (Click on the link above each picture if you are interested in more details, or instructions.)

I made lots of wedding crafts...

A box for cards...

My amazing husband saved the day, by making these beanbags 

 Napkins and napkin rings

 50 embroidered totes

 

Love birds

 And a wooden guestbook

Lots of aprons..

 The time I made 5 in one weekend.

 One more round.

Some baby gifts...

4 transportation themed onesies for baby Jaxon.

And a baby afghan for someone in need of a little love. 

Some jewelry...

Bridesmaid necklaces

I did some woodworking...

Jewelry rack!

Some painting...

Painting one of my favorite views

Some ugly ceramic animals got a make over

And we celebrated our anniversary in a crafty way!

 1 year is paper, and for us it had to be homemade.

So there's my summer in the quickest review possible.  What have you been up to?

 

Antiqued Wood Guest Book Letters

 Another wedding craft!  Starting to feel like I should go into business...

For this weekend's wedding, the bride had a super fun idea of getting a jumbo T&J for the guests to sign rather than a guest book.  I knew I'd seen these huge letters everywhere, and went on a hunt.  A disappointing hunt.  The stores in our area were only carrying flat letters rather than 3-d, and the stores online had no "&" signs.  Tawnee found some on Etsy for like $50 a pop.  

Then she found out she had a family friend with some mad wood working skills who could make them, exact specifications and everything!   Awesome.

So here's what he sent.  He painted them gold.  Pretend like you can't see the blue.

Tawnee wanted them in her wedding colors, and she wanted them to have an antiqued finish.  This made me nervous, seeing as I've never antiqued anything, and I had a sinking feeling it was going to be more challenging than just taking a piece of sand paper to it.  

I tried to talk her into solid colors. She wasn't interested.  Then, as we were looking at paint colors, my eyes were magically drawn to a bottle of Crackle Medium, and all my problems were solved.  Carckle Medium would certainly do all the antiquing for me.  At least that's what the instructions seemed to be saying.  All of a sudden I was SO EXCITED TO START THIS PROJECT!

The instructions said to paint one layer (gold=done), let it dry, paint on the crackle medium, let it dry, and then paint on a top coat that would crackle when dry. 

 

I was seriously disappointed by the lack of crackle. 

 Maybe I didn't do it right.

So I re-painted it all, giving it a nice thick layer all the way around, and letting it dry for a long time. 

Only slightly more crackle. Time for some sand paper...

I sanded all over lightly, with a fine grit paper, exposing some of the gold below. 

And focusing extra time and effort on the edges. 

My favorite is this lovely ampersand. 

But they all turned out great.  Sand paper... not so difficult. 

At the wedding, guests signed in...

Their welcome table was somuch fun!

Super fun idea! I love how they turned out. 

Week 37: "Love Birds"

The 4th and final wedding was today.  Tawnee and I have been friends since kindergarten, my longest running friendship.  Her wedding was on the beach in Carmel, a setting almost as lovely as the bride.  

During the planning season, Tawnee asked for lots of crafting help, including some little love-bird cake toppers.  She sent me a few ideas from Etsy, but gave me the freedom to design something myself.  Love it. 

 I made the bird bodies like I did this time, with just a few changes...  First of all, I have my sewing machine again!  So I didn't have to hand sew the seams, but sewed them on the machine, with the right sides facing. I started with muslin bodies, and I added football shaped tummies in their wedding colors.  First I attached the tummies to each side of the body.  Then I sewed from the neck all the way around to the tip of the tail, and stopped there so I could flip.  I ironed out the creases, filled them with stuffing, and then hand stitched the openings closed.  

I used embroidery floss to add eyes, and to attach burlap wings.  (See other bird post for easy attaching.)

The legs were a fun adventure. I used jewelry wire (and the Leatherman, of course).  

I cut about a foot wire, and started bending one toe.  I used the needle-nose pliers to make a tight bend for the first toe.  

Then a made a fold for the second toe, making a "U" shape. 

I did the middle toe last, so that the leg could come out centered.

  Then I went around to the other end of the wire and made the other foot the same way.  

I had about 4 inches of wire between the feet.  

I pinched the middle 2 inches together and twisted.  This twisted part slid right into the seam between the base of the tummy and the tail.  

 

I had to pinch and wiggle the wire to find the right angle for the legs.  When I found it I added a bit of hot glue to keep it in place.

I love how those little toes came out. 

After I was all done, I sent the picture to Tawnee, only to find out that she didn't want a cake topper anymore, but wanted to use the birds on the welcome table.  

When I found out that she was using a birdcage as a card collector, and she wanted me to make a sign for it, I thought it was a craft-match made in heaven.

I wired the birds feet to the top of the cage, and got to work on a banner the birds could hold. 

I embroidered letters on the same fabric I used for the bags, spelling out the words "CARDS HERE."  I made sure to keep about an inch of space around each letter. I cut a little triangle around each letter, and strung them all on a string of floss, making a tiny bunting.  

I used a home-made fabric stiffener I found on one of my new favorite blogs, (I used the corn starch one).   Then I ironed them all flat.

Lastly, I used a needle to poke each end of the banner through the birds beaks, and tied them off with knots.

Tawnee's friend Janice found the beautiful ribbon. 

This might be my favorite wedding decoration ever.

Blanket Ministery

We stayed with Alan's parents for a few days this week.  I was out of crafts, but itching for something to do with my hands.  Luckily, Alan's mom heads up a crochet donation group with her church.  Members of the church donated TONS of yarn, and Kitty has been collecting it to share with her group at the next meeting.  She let me pick some out to make a baby blanket to donate to the cause. 

 I used 5 skeins of yarn to make a 36"x36" granny square.  

I started at the middle, with a magic circle, and 4 little "bundles".  Each bundle is made of 3 double stitches, with 2 chains between each.  

 Each new row was made in a different color.  In the chain 2 spaces of the row below, crochet a bundle. At each corner add 2 bundles.

 As you can see, the down side to yarn donations is maybe not having enough of the right color yarn.

 I hope this blanket brings warmth and comfort to a new mother and her little one.

Week 36: Flouncy Rosette Apron

I just love rosettes. 

I have another friend getting married this summer, and like all of my other girlfriends, I decided to make her an apron for her shower gift. Again, not because all wives should be in the kitchen, but because aprons make cooking, cleaning, hostessing, and all other activities cuter.

I made a bunch of little rosettes for this apron, all out of scraps of fabric I had. I happened to have a bunch of scraps in her wedding colors.  Score!

Each rosette was made with 2 inch wide strips, folded in half (hotdog style) and sewn using a basting stitch.  I didn't bother sewing inside out and flipping, because I was going to hide all the seams when I spiraled. 

The smaller rosettes were made with a 6" (ish) strip, and the larger ones were made with three or four 6"  strips. 

After basting, I scrunched by pulling one of the threads almost all the way out.  (Note: Make sure to back stitch at the beginning of your basting stitch, so the thread doesn't come all the way out.)

Once I had a pile of ruffly scrunched pieces, I started curling them into rosettes.  Once I liked the look of them, I pinned them into place. I sewed them on to circles of muslin that were just slightly smaller than the rosettes.  I machine sewed, starting with the outside round, sewing so that the folded edge of the ruffle overlapped the seam on the previous round, by a centimeter or so.

Once all the rosettes were made, I attached them to the body of the apron using buttons from my stash.  (The apron body was SUPER simple this time.  I took a piece of muslin about 2' wide, and 3' tall, folded it in half so that it was 2x1.5, sewed up the sides, flipped and ironed.  I left the top open, so that I could do all the hand sewing from the inside.)

 I embroidered her new name a few inches from the top of the apron...

 

used a basting stitch to gather the apron top (shrinking it to about 1'5 at the waist), and then sewed a ribbon on as the waist band.

Week 35: Fancy Napkins and Rings

Have I mentioned it's wedding season? This week was Wedding number 3, set in a fabulous winery in Temecula.  The bridal party wore "watermelon," the bride looked AMAZING, and the groom teared up when he saw her.  It was absolutely perfect. 

I knew I wanted to make part of their gift, because she is a crafty gal.  Also, I knew it had to be classy, because she is.  I figured something that would spruce up a dinner party would be the right choice, because she's the kind of girl who could throw a great party.  

I made a set of 6 napkins using muslin, and a quilting cotton.  I cut the muslin to 12"x12" and cut a triangle off of each corner before double folding and hemming.  Then I single hemmed the decorative fabric and layered it on top. 

Sorry about the wrinkley picture.  I folded them up before I took the picture, and then was too lazy to re-iron. 

For extra class, I made a set of napkin rings. I used copper wire left over from this, orange beads, and faux-pearls.

Make sure the beads have holes big enough for the wire to go through.

I also used Alan's trusty Leatherman (my best friend).

 I started with a few feet of wire, strung on some beads (I used 2 of each), and then twisted the wire around a wine bottle neck.

I used the pliers to bend the ends of the wire into little hooks, that I hooked together and closed.  

So elegant, and pretty easy.

Ready for a party!

Congrats Smelli and Jon!  Can't wait to come over for dinner some time!