What's Been Keeping Me Busy...

Hi Angel!

I can't believe how this year is flying so far. I owe you an update on the crafty front! I have been so busy with my little business, which is great. I feel like things have finally kicked into a smooth, steady gear. I have had a constant stream of projects to work on, mostly custom orders. (See below for a few examples!) But eek, it's hard to stay afloat on all fronts and I feel like my blog posting has fallen by the wayside, along with my socializing. I'll try to catch you up here!

First, I wanted to show you the little Valentines I made with the kids for Valentine's Day last week. I had noticed this adorable lollipop-holding photo idea on Design Mom a while back and pinned it. The weather was horribly rainy and gloomy in the days leading up to V-day, so I had to take indoor photos of the kids, which of course were slightly blurry. They turned out pretty cute though, and were a big success with their friends!



Ben has a little friend named Angel in his class!



In the spirit of Valentine's Day, I also made some heart-y table runners for my shop. I love how these turned out, fun!






A few weeks ago, I scored a whole bunch of new fabrics from both Drygoods Design Online and Hawthorne Threads. Here are some photos to make you drool. There is some Stamped, some Bella, some Notting Hill, and more loveliness. Pretty much all of this is going into projects for my shop, though I'm thinking of saving some of that Notting Hill sateen to make a pillow for our living room.






Here are some of the custom orders I completed recently: a book cover for our friend Carrie's bible study tome, some quilted table runners, and a custom set of coasters.








Also, I am in charge of the auction art project for Ben's kindergarten class. Their curriculum is project-based, and their winter project has been "Fabrics through the world". How fortunate! As you can imagine, I've been invited to do show and tell a couple of times.

For the auction project, we've been working on a large piece of fiber art, involving fabric. I had visions of branching out from my usual burlap art and doing something edgy and cool. But all the feedback I received from the adults involved has been to stick to the type of stuff I've made from my shop, so the project will involve a tree and some birdies. Here's a glimpse at my prep work. I'll share more soon!!




I think that about rounds up all that's been keeping me busy lately. How about you? What is occupying your hands lately? What fabrics are you drooling over? What projects are getting you excited? I'd love to know!

Heart Garland for Valentine's Day

Happy Monday! I did NO crafting or sewing this weekend, not for lack of several piles of WIPs needing attention. I'm in withdrawal and can't wait to get stitching during naptime today. Instead, we visited family -- which was lovely -- and rearranged the living room and dining room furniture -- which was stressful. I need a weekend to recover from the weekend. I hope yours was wonderful!

All right, I mentioned last week in my Lovely Hearts post that I would share the how-to for making my felt and fabric scrap garland. This is a super easy project, it took no more than 1 hour from start to finish, including multiple kid and baby interruption, AND the 4-year-old was "helping" me. So really, easy-peasy project with a great result, I think! (ALL my photos of this garland suck, I'm sorry, we have too many windows!)


First, we selected all the pink and red fabric scraps from my scrap bin, and we also got out the red and pink felt (a rayon/wool blend, but I think any kind of felt would work here).

Lovely Hearts

Hello there!

I am not usually one to be inspired by Valentine's Day. I tend to find this holiday commercial and kind of cheesy -- or maybe I still hold some resentment from my lonely single days! In any case, this year has been different and I've embraced the kitshy red-hearts-for-everyone lovey-dovey aspects of V-day. Ben and I made some Valentine's decorations and I created some artwork for my shop. I thought I would share some photos with you!

Last week we had a crafty playdate with friends and made needle-felted heart ornaments. Angel, we used your tutorial but since the kids were involved, we skipped the embroidery. This was such a fun project! And with a lot of supervision and reminders about the sharp needles, the kids (aged 4.5-7) did great!

WIP: Valentine Burlap Art

Both kids are napping (someone pinch me!) and inspiration suddenly struck me to make some burlap art pieces for my shop for Valentine's Day. Here are my works in progress.






"Put a bird on it!", I know, I know. But they're love birds, get it?

What are you working on today? Happy Tuesday!

Valentine Collage Cards

Happy Valentine's Day!! Unlike you, we didn't have to make a bunch of Valentine's cards for classmates this year. However, Ben still owed thank you cards to friends and family members for Christmas gifts (shameful, I know), so I finally decided to combine the two occasions: hearty Valentine-y thank you cards.


We've had so many snowy and rainy days this winter that I've been jumping on any project that requires several steps to complete. This ends up keeping us busy for several mornings at home. In this case, we decided to make collages to then use in making cards. The first step was to cut a bunch of different papers into little bits. Fun!



We used some of Ben's paintings that I'd saved up for months (years?), as well as catalogs and magazines. The best magazines for getting some good paper bits are gardening, food and travel magazines. You get so many fantastic textures in the images: flowers, beans, landscapes, maps, tiles, polka dots, etc.



Once we had filled up our box (formerly housing fabulous almond shortbread snowmen cookies from Trader Joe's!) with a bunch of paper bits, we lathered some construction paper in Mod Podge and went to town covering it with these paper bits.




Once the first layer was dry, we went over it with Mod Podge to sort of secure all the paper bits into one solid layer. I love the look of these collages!



A few days later, I cut cardstock paper in half and folded those pieces in half to make cards. I cut hearts out of the collage sheets, and rectangles (slightly smaller than my cardstock cards) out of construction paper. With Mod Podge, again, we pasted red rectangles and then hearts cut from the collage onto the cards.



And there you have them. Fun little cards that kept us entertained for several mornings, cutting, gluing, arranging...



I apologize to our family and friends who will see these cards here before receiving them. I am on an alternate schedule called Baby-wakes-me-up-200-times-per-night-and-I-no-longer-know-which-day-it-is Time, and thus our cards will be late!



Jenny, what a creative way to use paper scraps! The collages look great, and it is so fun for 3 year olds to use scissors! I love the way the cards turned out. How do you organize all the paper scraps you collect? I get overwhelmed by the piles sometimes, and end up recycling it all instead.

Link Love

Since Valentine's Day is right around the corner, here is my obligatory round-up of Valentine's posts and others' round-ups, for last minute inspiration and printable materials:

- It's Not Too Late: Valentine's Day Printables by IndieFixx

- Valentine's Day Arm Warmers and Valentine's Cards: A New Twist on an Old Classic by Alisa Burke


Photo by Alisa Burke
- For crafts to do with kids, check out all the Valentine's Day ideas on The Crafty Crow

- Valentine's Round-up by Dana at MADE

- Get Your Valentine Make On by Design Mom

- Printable Valentine's Cards here and here via How About Orange

- Valentine's Day Round-up by One Pretty Thing

- Printable Valentine's Card Round-Up by Allisa at Quiltish

- 35 Printable Valentines on The Long Thread

And because I'm not that big a fan of Valentine's Day, here are some of my non V-day links for the week:

- Great idea for making a quilt out of a jelly roll by Rita at Red Pepper Quilts. That Sherbet Pips fabric is so cute!

- Free "Flirting the Issue" skirt pattern from Anna Maria Horner (PDF here)

- Cute and inventive Felt Ball Trivets on The Purl Bee


Photo by The Purl Bee
- Check out the finished Echino quilt top with improv blocks by Elizabeth at Oh Fransson!

- Great stashbuster by Noodlehead: pillow cases!

- Super cute swaddle blanket tutorial on Prudent Baby via Whip Up

And that's about it! Enjoy, and have a lovely weekend (and Happy Valentine's Day if you celebrate it)!!