St. Patrick's Wreath

I all of the sudden realized the other day that I still had a valentine wreath on my front door.  I  did a search of the garage thinking I must have a St. Patrick's one somewhere.  No luck.  I could just put up the spring wreath, but while I was at Walmart I found a fuzzy green wreath.  They had spools of green glitter tulle on clearance.  I picked up some green and gold spools of ribbon and took it all home to put something together.  This was so fast and easy.  I just wrapped the tulle and ribbon around the wreath three times and tied it in a knot.  That's it.  The worst part was that the wreath shed it's fuzz, which was really like little hairs.  By the time I was done I felt like I just cut my boys hair.  I was covered in green hairs (and glitter from the tulle).  They were sticking into my clothing and skin like little splinters-ouch!  After a shower and new clothes I was much happier.  I even decided I like the wreath.  I just have to remember to handle with care!

Thank You for Sharing

Lately I have been crocheting several baby girl photo props for my youngest daughter. She is a photographer, and is having a baby girl soon.  I have seen a lot of things on Pinterest that I like, and to my surprise, several of them include free patterns.  I like to crochet, and have been able to make up a few patterns, with lots of trial and error, but that takes time.  Time is something that always seems in short supply, so saving the time I would have to put into trying to create a pattern myself is great! I want to give a Thank You to all those bloggers out there who take the time to share their patterns, tutorials, ideas, and photos, with no cost to the public.  I have been grateful many times to find a free pattern for a little something I want to make.  I do purchase patterns online sometimes, and I understand the need to make some money on one’s hard work.  But today, I just want to say thanks to all those busy crafters out there who do share of their talent.  Next time you find a free recipe, pattern, tutorial, instructions, etc, remember the busy person who took the time to share.  

Craftaholic

I am a craftaholic.  I think I always have been.  When I was a little girl, my mom taught me to sew.  My mom sewed almost all my clothes, and so I learned to sew by making doll clothes.  I even got a child’s chain stitch sewing machine for Christmas one year.  I remember when I was about 7 years old doing embroidery, mostly freehand, while waiting for my mom at a church meeting.  As I got a bit older, I loved to go to the library at recess to look at the craft books.  My favorites were the books on making dolls and dollhouse furniture.  I loved dolls and enjoyed making clothes, furniture and other things for them.

My mom crocheted and embroidered as well as sewed. She liked to buy craft kits, which we enjoyed putting together.  Her sister, my aunt Dortha, also did crocheting and many other crafts.  Her husband, Uncle Lee, made knives with bone and antler handles , used wood slabs to make tables and clocks, and for a while they even did rock jewelry.  You can see that I came from a line of crafters. 

When I was a teenager, I learned to do macramé. My grandmother gave me a macramé necklace, and that sparked my interest, so I got books from the library and taught myself the knots.  I even sold macramé items at a couple of craft fairs. 

When I was married and was able to be home with my children, I again started crafting.  Over the years, I have knitted, crocheted, embroidered, made jewelry, quilted, sewed, done ceramics, tole painted, and more.  When my girls were growing up, they tried some crafts, but I feared they were not really interested.  Then, as they have had children and their own homes, they have taken off with crafts.  We often get together to paint, do vinyl, or create other fun projects. Now my grandkids like to do some crafts.  They like doing the rubber band loom bracelets, painting, and drawing. My mom and aunt would be proud of this newest generation of craftaholics.

~Gayle

St. Patrick's Day Welcome Sign

St. Patrick's Day is about a month away, so it's time for some holiday crafting:

This was done the same way as the valentine welcome sign.  We used little wooden rectangles covered with paper.  Add some glitter foam letters.  Then glue your rectangles onto a long piece of ribbon.  We added a loop at the top for hanging, a bow because it's cute, and a little bit of gold ribbon between each of the blocks.  On the W and the E at the end we added a rhinestone clover.  Cute, easy & cheap!  My favorite combo for a quick craft.

So far I've only done one of these for Valentine's and St. Patrick's.  I'm thinking I will add a few more to my collection this year...maybe Easter & something for summer?  We'll keep you posted.

Safety Pin Tip

I have taken a lot of craft classes over the years, and I appreciate the teachers or other students sharing craft tips that are really helpful.  One of my favorite from a quilting class is about safety pins, used to hold the layers of quilt front, batting and backing together.  There are many ways to hold the layers together, but I like to use safety pins.  I found, though, that it is a hassle to open the pins and close them each time I put them away so they don’t get in a tangled mess.  I learned a trick! You just pick up a pin, which is connected to several other pins in a knot, and drop them from a few inches above your surface.  They come untangled! Sometimes you may need to drop a small bunch a second time if they are still tangled.  I am so happy to report that now I put the open safely pins in the container when I am done with them, and don’t worry about possible messes, because I know that I can untangle them in a heartbeat. It saves much time, which is important to me, since I always have so many projects I want to finish. Happy crafting!

~Gayle

How to sew Ruffles

There are a lot of girls in my house, so we love ruffles.  I must admit though, they aren't my favorite thing to sew.  I always manage to get something sewn in the wrong place, they scrunch together, they get tucked up into the seam, ect...

A lot of patterns say to sew one line of gathering stitches along the seam line and one more 1/4'' away in the seam allowance.  I really don't like having a row of gathering along the seam line.  I don't always sew perfectly straight, so I end up unpicking little bits of the gathering stitch that shows below the seam.  

I started sewing two rows of gathering stitches in the seam allowance.  That was better for me, but I would have to pull the gathers down as I was sewing so they wouldn't bunch.

Today I decided (I don't know why this didn't hit me before) to sew one line of gathering in the seam allowance and one below the seam line.   It looked like this:

After I pinned and adjusted my gathers I sewed along the seam line, which falls between the two rows of gathering stitches.  (my sewing is really not straight, but the baby was hanging on my leg and trying to get to the peddal...the pictures are getting posted anyway).  All that was left to do was pull out the bottom row of stitching, which was easy since it wasn't caught up in the seam. 

I like how the gathers turned out.  They seemed much more even.  Definitely a technique I will use again!

Headband tutorial for kids or adults

I love looking at hair styles on Pinterest.  For many years, I had short hair.  I kept asking my husband how I should style it.  Long, short, etc.  He finally sort of gave me an opinion a couple of years ago saying, "You haven't had your hair long in awhile."  I took the hint, glad to try something new.  Anyway, I am always looking for fun new ways to do my hair.  I have seen so many cute hairstyles with a narrow headband and a bun or something similar.  I have a headband like this but haven't worn it in  awhile so I decided to wear it the other day in a bun type style.  First, I teased the top and pulled a section back with bobby pins holding it with some volume.  I then put the narrow headband on,  with a section of each side in front of the ear left out.  Taking the left out sections, I wrapped them around the headband a time or two.  Then I took sections of hair (which I had curled slightly) from the back and wrapped them up and over the headband, pinning them in place. 

It was super fast and I got a lot of compliments on it.  Because of that, I decided to do a tutorial today for the headband.

Here you go!

First, you will want a couple of simple supplies:

Trim that you want to use for the main headband part.
Ribbon
Hair elastic

Hot glue gun

Once you have your supplies together, cut the end of the trim and use something to melt the ends so it doesn't fray.  I usually use a lighter (by the sink in case) and lightly run it past the end of the trim.  This will melt the ends so it doesn't unravel. 

Next you will want to measure the length you will need.  I actually just held it up on my head where it would lay, and held the end where I would want the trim to go.  I have it go a little past my ears so it won’t show as much if I am using it as a headband with my hair down.

Cut the end and seal/melt it.

Get your hair tie and cut it open.

Once it is open, melt it too on one end.

Glue the melted end onto one side of the trim.

Take your ribbon, melt the edge and glue the ribbon over the spot where you glued on the hair tie. 

 

Wrap it around the front with a touch of glue to hold it in place there.

Cut the ribbon so it will wrap around the back, melt it careful not to get the trim too.

Put a dot of glue on the back, then push the end of the ribbon on.

 

Now you will do the other side.  Make sure the trim doesn’t get twisted.

 

Now you are done!

Here are some more fun trim ideas.  You can really be creative with this.  I have even seen some really cute headband with two rows of the trim next to each other.  Play around and see what you can come up with.

You can also do this for girls.  Just use their head measurement.

~Andrea