Sunflower Studio

A COUPLA CRAFTY CRAFTS

I've recently been working on a few non-stamping craft projects so I thought I'd share them with you...

I made up a bunch of fabric sunglass cases for some friends last week.  I've probably mentioned before that I like QUICK projects.  I don't normally do do-overs so if it doesn't work at first...I shuffle it aside and move on.  Well, I'd already purchased the linen for the outside and a pile of fun fat quarters of matchy-matchy fabrics for these.  That meant that they HAD to be done.  After trying three different sets of directions and making three variations I settled on this one.  I ended up making them in the same way that I made those Cat's Pajamas bags a few years ago...just smaller.  The template for the sunglasses came from this book, Sew Darn Cute.  I love how they look all together here...they remind me of our dear Baltimore Hons.

I recently discovered some really fun sewing and crafting blogs.  One of my faves is THE PURL BEE which is a companion blog to a store in NYC called SOHO PURL.  (I am seriously gonna have to plan a visit...it looks amazing!)  One of the projects that they spotlighted for Valentine's were these little felt heart pins.  I fell in love with them and managed to whip up a few last night.  I'll just show you the one that I actually pinned on my shirt here.

And, last but not least, I had to share a picture of this tiny little pottery bowl that my sister gave me for Christmas.  I think she's a really good potter.  In fact, she's great at a lot of crafty things that require really small detail work.  (Stained glass, amazing painted wood Christmas ornaments...just to name a few.)  She gave me three great bowls, a very handy trivit, and a handful of fabulous buttons that she made this year.  Yea me...I am such a lucky gal!  Thanks Lynn!

 

HAPPY BABY! {sfytt}

Here's my take on this week's SKETCH FOR YOU TO TRY.  I started a little knitted baby throw during the snow last week for a neighbor who had a little girl at the beginning of the year.  So I finished that but I needed a card...not that I probably couldn't dig around in my piles and find one...I just felt like a new baby would need a NEW card.  Thankfully, the sketch gave me a great jumping off point.

All of the animal images here are from WHIPPER SNAPPER DESIGNS.  They have great expressions, don't they?  The sentiment stamps are both from A Muse - still my fave for small sentiments in fun fonts!  I dug deep into the paper stash for these pretty patterned papers from the Basic Grey Oh Baby! Girl collection.  I also used my Fiskars Apron Lace punch for the scalloped border, ribbon, buttons and twine from Papertrey, and a paper flower by The Card Co.

Why don't you sit down with this week's sketch and get to work on your card?!  REMEMBER...JEN has a fantastic prize package this month.  It's full of must have goodies...see the picture here!  All you have to do is upload your card using one of this month's sketches to the correct guest book slideshow on Jen's blog.  Eazy peazy!  Jen has all of the details on her blog so be sure to take a look there.

Wanna see what the other SFYTT girls did with the sketch this time?  Here are the links:

Amy Rohl
Amy Sheffer
Susan Liles
Kelly Lunceford

and Jen del Muro with this month's guest designer, MONA PENDLETON.

I thought I'd also share a photo of the baby throw.  I get the LION BRAND YARN catalogs and I'm always inspired.  I'm pretty much a beginning knitter so I stick with the easy ones.  This one is called SUNSHINE DAY BABY THROW and the pattern was free (although, you may have to sign up to see it).  I have two other friends getting ready to have babies this year so I know I'll be making a few more of these!

TCP TOTEBAGS

I was hopping around on some blogs this evening and got hit by a brick over at AMY ROHL's blog.  She's really on a creativity roll....amazing cards and projects that will really WOW you.  I highly recommend a stop over at her place!  Last week she was showing off a fab market bag with goodies to go along with.  It's a really great project and she was inspired by JOANNE BASILE's project in the Splitcoast Fan Club gallery a few month's ago.  {You can find pix of Joanne's yummy project through the link at Amy's if you are a fan club member.}  And then KIRSTEN DUBOSQUE had this really terrific Amy Butler "Nappy" bag that she'd sewn and I was just drooling all over it.  Soooo many crafty and creative gals out there, right?!

Well with all of that, it hit me that I had forgotten to post a photo of the totebags that I made for THE CAT'S PAJAMAS design team gals for CHA.  There were four of us meeting up at CHA...that was before Joanne joined our ranks.  So, I made four bags and four tags.  I was really happy with the way these turned out.  They're matchy-matchy with the TCP signature colors too...yellow on the inside (as you can see in the inset photo).  I don't have a photo of the tag right now and my camera batteries are dead as a doorknob so maybe I'll add that here later.

 

BUNCO!

We started started a BUNCO group in our neighborhood this year and we've been having a ton of fun.  And while the game IS fun it's really the "hanging out with the ladies" part that really makes it all worth while.  This month is was my turn to host and I went a little crazy with the pink and black color scheme.  (I am actually playing with some other gals here but I cropped them out since I didn't know if they'd want their photos broadcast to the entire world.)  If you get a chance to play in your area, you really should.  We have a blast!  AND....there are prizes too! 

In our group, everyone contributes a small amount of money that goes to hostess of the following month so that she can buy prizes.  (Some groups just play for money and that's cool too.)  I decided to make up some more of my reusable grocery bags.  I've gotten a little neurotic about making them.  Anyone else jump into a craft with both feet and buy enough stuff to make a ton of whatever it is and then, most likely, don't ever really use all of the supplies?  Come on!  I know that YOU know what I'm talkin' about out there!

TOTEBAG FOR THE TEACHER

As usual, I waited until the last possible moment to think about a gift for the little boy's teacher and the bus driver and then decided to "make" something.  They've had some gorgeous canvas home dec and outdoor fabrics on sale at JoAnn's this month so I bought some of that and sewed up some reusable shopping/grocery bags.  They're all the rage right now, right?

I found my patterns online by searching for "reusable grocery bag patterns" and found tons of them.  The first pattern that I tried called for piping down the sides and, well, jeesh!, I didn't have time for that much detail.  I did sew a seam on the outside of all of the edges to give it a bit of stability and that made the corners nice and crisp.  I used some really pretty yellow fabric with white flowers by Better Homes & Gardens.  This bag was fairly close to what you can buy at your grocery store.  No real "body" to it and it's pretty floppy.    But, it is a good fold up bag that you could pop into your purse.  Don't forget that I waited until the last minute!  There wasn't time for do over...so this bag was a trial and error project but it was fine for a first try.  Wrap it up and add a stamped tag and off it went to the teacher this morning.

For the second bag I used a fun brown fabric with a circular pattern.  Lesson 1 learned:  ah, duh, there's a difference in the quality of canvas fabric.  This one was made by Tommy Bahama (or a company making fabric for them).  It was thicker, the weave was tighter, and the edges didn't fray one bit as I worked.  Now I know what to look for! 

The pattern for this one was a lot more like those duffle bags that I've worked on recently.  The handles support the bag from the bottum up and that gives the bag more strength.  And, this bag is lined and you create corners on the inside bottom - that gives it stability.  You know how sometimes you just can't imagine how a pattern will look until it's all put together?  I was a little "iffy" on this one but was thrilled with the finished product.  It's tres trendy, don't ya think?  I almost didn't give it to the bus driver...did she "really" deserve it, afterall?  Maybe I was the one who deserved it!  Oh well, stamp the tag and tie it on and off to the bus stop it went.  (I think the bus driver was more appreciative of the $10 Dunkin Donuts gift card that Holly gave her...hmmmph!)  Now I'm in a groove....gotta make some more!

VALENTINE CUPCAKES

After yesterday's all day paper cupcake making session, I decided that it would be neat to see them in a few different patterned papers.  So, I worked up a few more last night.  All use pretty papers from Basic Grey's Bittersweet line and ribbon from American Crafts - except for the gingham - not sure where that one was from.  I also added some glitter to the edges and a big ole brad at the top to stand in for the cherry.  Kinda spiffy if I do say so myself!

CHRISTMAS PRESENTS TO SHARE!

I mentioned a few posts back that I hadn't had much time this holiday season for stamping due to lots of other non-stamping Christmas presents that I was making.  I thought I'd share a collage of most of them.  Thanks to some size 50 Speed (knitting) needles, my trusty Knifty Knitter, and a little sewing class that I took at Jo-Ann's, I made the following...

Mom - a duffel bag, a hat, and a throw
Dad - a hat
Lynn, my sister - a duffel bag, a hat, a scarf, and a throw
Mary Lou (MIL) - a duffel bag and a throw
The Little Boy - a hat (not pictured) and a throw (also not pictured but in bright ORANGE!)
Bill (DH) - a scarf and a hat
The teacher - a throw
Denise - a hat
Debbie (my neighbor who had a birthday on the 20th too) - a throw
Friend A (who hasn't yet received her gift) - a hat
Friend B (who also hasn't yet received her gift) - a hat
and
Holly - a scarf

...plus a few other odds and ends things thrown in. 

I even ordered up some neat little tags to sew into my projects so that they'd know they were handmade.  Very fun....NOW...what should I make for myself!!

I also realized that I hadn't shared some Whipper Snapper cards and such that I did actually get to make earlier in the month.  I'll hopefully post those tonight or tomorrow too.

Edit (12/30/08) - Since a few have asked about patterns, here is that information...

The hats and scarves were made on the Knifty Knitter Looms by ProvoCraft.  The hats on the round looms and the scarves on the straight ones.  It's cheating for knitters but makes such a nice uniform pattern that I couldn't resist.  The patterns come with the looms.  Use your coupons at Mike's or JoAnn's to get a deal!

The pattern for the throws is from Lion Brand yarn - The 6-Hour Afghan.  The pattern here calls for Homespun yarn but when I originally downloaded it a year ago it used Jiffy.  You can adjust the look with your own choice of yarns.  I made one with all Jiffy, two with all Homespun, one with Jiffy and Homespun mixed, and I used three lengths held together of Wool-Ease Thick & Quick for a nice heavy look too.  It depends on what you like.  The fuzzier, thicker yarns do look better though since it's such a big stitch and a more open weave pattern.  Again, I used the size 50 Speed Needles - also from Lion Brand.  Look for these things on sale at JoAnn's and Michaels or use your coupons!

As for the duffel bags, the pattern came from the class that I took at JoAnn's.  I'm sure you could find something comparable in the patterns there.  I'm ready to do some more too so I think I'll take a look through and see what I can make next....I was thinking some curling iron covers and some oven mitts too.  I'm really getting into the sewing.  Maybe I'll see if they have a class to make an actual article of clothing....interesting!

DUFFLE BAG UPDATE

Holly and I finished our duffle bags today! (I mentioned them in my TCP Tuesday post yesterday.)  I was sort of skeptical that we could actually do it but we did and they turned out great!  (Good thing since we went crazy and bought stuff to make more on Monday!)  I'm sure there are tons of you out there who can complete a project like this without any major instruction but we took a class at our local Jo-Ann's.  After five in-class hours we still weren't finished.  For us, this was more like a six to seven hour project.  It's so worth it though.  We're thrilled with how these turned out!

MOTHER'S DAY BAG

I can finally post these photos since I FINALLY gave this bag to my mom....long after Mother's Day, unfortunately!  Time and our vacation in May got in the way of getting together so it wasn't until Father's Day that I gave this to Mom. 

This is just like the black/cream bag that I showed a little while back.  (You can read the details of that one HERE.)  My mom is a Red Hat Lady so her bag had to be red or purple or both.  But I didn't want to go overboard.  I chose these fun red canvas fabrics and then I added this adorable Fimo clay Red Hat Lady button to the front pocket.  I bought her for a counted cross stitch project years ago and never did make that project.  I think she's the perfect addition to the bag!  And did you notice the little sunflower charm?  Well the purse came from the Sunflower Studio, right?  NATCH!

And I posted my Mother's Day card so long ago that my mom had already seen it BEFORE Mom's Day.  I'm not sure what all of this says about me and my gift giving habits.  It's not that I don't appreciate my mom.  I DO!  I like to chalk it up to the fact that the Lawrence's (my maiden name - including my mom, sister, and myself here) aren't alway timely in our gift giving.  I think we're trying to make the "party" last longer!

MY NEW PURSE

    Yea!  I did it!  I took a little sewing class at the local JoAnn's and I actually finished my purse and I love it!  Normally, my projects end up costing me three times more than what the same thing costs already made.  KWIM?  (This was no exception!)  I'm hoping that I can do it myself next time though and I won't have to pay for the teaching part.  I'm very excited to go and get some more fabric and make another....one for every day!  Ha!