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my daughter’s creative space

paint yourself silly christmas tree ornament

I think my daughter is officially in love with painting pottery. In the past few weeks, we’ve been to Paint Yourself Silly twice. Her first time she had fun, but didn’t really know what to expect. The second time she painted like a pro and once she saw her first project finished and sparkly, she was hooked.

paint yourself silly christmas tree ornament

Both times we went, I didn’t paint. I’m the official pottery holder so she can paint the edges and other side. I point out places she missed and remind her what needs a second coat. I’m also in charge of adding her name and date on the back.

I try to provide art direction, but this girl has a mind of her own. She knows exactly what paint she wants where. It’s difficult for me to not pick up a brush and “fix” something. (I might have sneaked in a few touch ups here and there when she wasn’t looking!)

I guess it’s good practice for me. I have a feeling there will be lots painting in our future. Next time I’ll just have to get my own piece of pottery.

This is the last official creative space of 2010 over at Kirsty’s blog. I’ll be posting them through the end of the year, though. Want to join me?

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finished: baseball bookmarks

baseball bookmarks

So many little baseballs. Seventeen, in fact. They turned out cuter than I imagined. Don’t you just love when that happens? I first posted about these in my creative space. I haven’t forgotten that I promised a pattern. Maybe by the end of this week? In the form of a Christmas ornament?

recycle: White yarn unraveled from a sweater. Red yarn left over from chromium star blanket.

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home ec class: hemming jeans

home ec class how to hem a pair of jeans

I haven’t abandoned my home ec class. I keep looking at the projects hoping to steal a bit of time here and there to finish some more up. This one was a necessity. When my daughter tore a hole in her best-fitting pair, I had to face the pile of size six jeans that are too long. It’s a big pile.

I knew I was going to have to hem most of them, but since she’s growing so fast, I decided to only do a few at a time.

I picked an easy pair to start with: straight leg. I only broke one denim needle — my machine’s motor is definitely not a match for that side seam. I stopped and started on either side and hand stitched that part of the hem.

I’m pretty impressed with how they turned out. The real challenge will be tackling flare and boot cut styles.

refashion: I like how the original hem is retained with this technique. They don’t have that “my mom hemmed these” look to them. I have a feeling that I’ll be using this skill a lot in the coming years.

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finished: beach blanket to go no.2

wedding gift beach blanket to go soulemama

The second wedding blanket is finished! I decided on brown trim and spent a good part of my time at the craft retreat cutting, pressing and zig zagging everything together. The trim fabric was from my stash. I borrowed some brown thread from a fellow crafter because navy, which I had planned to use, didn’t look as nice as I thought it would.

I’ll be adding a tag like the first one and then it’s off to the happy couple.

pattern info: I finally got a copy of Amanda Soule’s Handmade Home. Thanks, Mom!

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little thrifted turkey

turkey beanie baby

Yesterday while I was digging through all of that yarn, my daughter asked me if I could crochet her a turkey for Thanksgiving. Geez, that’s not a lot of time to get something like that finished. I told I’d see what I could do to get her a little turkey by Thursday.

When we got home, I checked to make sure this little guy was still in my closet. I got him a few years ago at a garage sale. There were boxes and boxes of brand new beanie babies. I spied this turkey and thought it might make a cute gag gift for my brother some day. (He’s a die hard Hokie.)

I hope my daughter will be ok with the fact that I didn’t make it. Oh, and sorry Phil. No little turkey for you.

To those who are celebrating today, Happy Thanksgiving!

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my creative space

In my creative space today I’m untangling this beautiful mess of yarn. It’s not as bad as it looks, at least I hope it’s not. There are three hanks that are loosely tied. If I can get them on the swift properly, it should be smooth sailing.

thrifted yarn

Where did I get such interesting yarn? I got a phone call yesterday while I was shopping for groceries.

kelly: I’m at the thrift store and there are huge tubs of beautiful yarn that are only 99 cents each.
me: Thanks for thinking of me, but I have so much yarn.
kelly: Yes, but some of this stuff looks hand dyed. It’s really beautiful.
me: Can you send a picture?

thrifted yarn

I think she sent four pictures, actually. One of those “tubs” was a large bin on wheels. I felt weak. A little defeated by my desire for pretty yarn that I really don’t need. I drove up to the store.

thrifted yarn

I exercised tremendous restraint and bought only six skeins. The pink/purple/blue skein is for my daughter. I let her pick out one because she was so patient while I dug through that big bin. I also bought her some stickers.

I’m a little early posting my creative space today. Make sure you check out Kirsty’s blog later today for more spaces.

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bee’s knees denim knee patch

denim flower patch applique

A few weeks ago, my daughter fell and skinned her knee. Her knee healed fine, but her pants not so much. We love these jeans. They fit her really well, which is rare. She asked me to fix them, so I put them in the pile for the craft retreat. I was planning a boring patch, but the collection of creative minds turned it into something special and cute.

me: I’m just going to do a patch with some denim and heat-n-bond.
crafty friend #1: Why not cut some cute shapes with the BIGkick?
me: Hmm… that would be cool.
crafty friend #2: Are you going to stitch around the edges?
me: I don’t think so. How would I get it under the presser foot?
crafty friend #3: Open up the side seam and it will fit easily over your sewing arm. Then re-stitch and re-serge the seam.
me: Y’all are brilliant!

refashion: Mended clothes don’t have to look boring. This patch turned out most excellent! I’ll definitely be saving my denim scraps for future repairs.

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24 hours of craft

craft retreat

Some enjoy 24 Hours of Le Mans or 24 Hours of Daytona. I prefer 24 Hours of Craft. Last weekend I attended another local craft retreat. It was just as much fun as the first one. I brought my sewing machine this time and was very productive.

• finished a beach blanket wedding gift
• used the Big Kick for the first time to patch my daughter’s jeans
• sewed half of a rollie pollie (bean bag chair)
• hemmed a pair of my daughter’s jeans
• taught friends how to unravel a sweater for yarn

The one thing I kept thinking all weekend was sewing [insert any craft here] isn’t hard. Finding time and space to get a project finished is the challenge. No one played with the on/off switch on my machine or jumped up and down on the fabric I had laid out on the floor. I didn’t have to stop and make food or put anyone to bed. I worked from 1 pm to 1 am on Saturday and then after breakfast on Sunday until checkout.

Thank you Kaitlyn for organizing this event and for the super cool pin. The weekend was just what I needed to get my sewing mojo back.

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original 1977 moosewood cookbook

1977 moosewood cookbook

Last week organic carrots were on sale and I bought three pounds. The colder weather has me thinking about soup and wandering around the internet looking for some fresh recipes. I found a couple of references to The Moosewood Cookbook carrot soup, specifically that the originally published version was much tastier than the one found in later printings.

1977 moosewood cookbook

I picked up the original version this morning at my library and Oh My Goodness is it ever beautiful! All 221 pages are hand lettered and illustrated. We are talking tons of text, right down to the table of contents and index. Every recipe has some type of illustration: some simple, some super ornate.

1977 moosewood cookbook

Can you imagine anyone taking the time to hand letter that much text these days? The only person who comes to mind is SARK.

1977 moosewood cookbook

I had a hard time choosing only four pages to show you. If I could, I would have posted half of the book! I haven’t tried the carrot soup recipe yet. I’ll let you know when I do!