glittergoods

running for the bus

There was a whole scene this morning involving me dashing out into the street to flag down the (early, but then again we were a little late) schoolbus while my son was running back down the hill to retrieve the Something-or-Other Trooper that had fallen out of his pocket (it's Sharing Day) & then me breathlessly explaining to the busdriver that her weeks-long substitute had always been late & so we must have gotten used to it, sorry, & as I was walking back home I was thinking that the bus scramble is a very apt description of my life lately, then suddenly the neighbor from around the block who also puts her kid on that bus comes flying down the street in her car, honking & frantic, trying to catch the attention of the bus which has stopped at the intersection & which may or may not have noticed her & be waiting for her child, & I think no, THAT'S my life.

Anyway due to life-as-nearly-missed-bus, I've been taking a break from all things internet lately, have you noticed?  I was flipping through my photos, looking to see what I've been doing this whole time, & apparently I have 1. not been up to all that much, & 2. taking a break from the camera, too.

Though there was that too-hot afternoon when we built a fairy porch to my girl's specifications:















(Scrap wood, twigs, white glue)















Complete with hanging lanterns.  I wanted to drape something across from the other two twigs, but she says I haven't thought of anything good enough yet.

We also had another good gocco session when it was time to make her thank you cards.



 











I try to involve my kids in their thank yous as much as possible, & this time around I drew a blank fairy for her to color in (featuring an unfinished head so she can draw whatever hairstyle she wants).  I used a dotted-line font to spell out "thank you," & her job was to trace over the letters as she finished each card.















Things to note in this picture:  she is currently favoring fairies with SERIOUS BANGS, she's got a handy reference book open in the background, & off to the right you can see that my son got in on the gocco action too (my kids LOVE that thing) & we have mighty many blank fairies around now.  For the smaller cards, I put a post-it over the "thank you" to block the ink & then let them go to town printing out a whole stack of fairies for us to add to the art box.

I have also been thinking a lot about sewing, though not to the point where I have been DOING any.  This sundress has been in heavy rotation recently, & it finally fits her perfectly (TWO YEARS LATER), so I think I might see if I still have those pattern pieces around. 

The sewing itch has to wait a minute, though, because the most exciting thing around here is that on Friday I am off for a fancy weekend in San Francisco with my husband/without my kids:  any vegetarian restaurant recommendations or shopping must-sees (including good fabric stores)?

she'd put bells on her toes if she could

Today is a sitting around kind of day, everyone is tired & half sick, plus there is nothing truly pressing that has to get done this instant.  But then my girl found a scrap of pink pipecleaner & turned it into a ring (because she loves nothing so much as adorning herself), & the box of leftover auction project jewels caught my eye, & hello, fastest kid-pleasing project ever.

Obviously, a girl can't stop at just ONE jeweled pipecleaner ring.

Wrap the pipecleaner around the finger, twist a time or two to keep your loop in shape.

Trim the ends to a couple of inches above the loop.

Take a pair of beading pliers (or similar) & make a little loop at each end to get rid of the sharp bits, then smash the loops flat.

Holding the two ends together, twist them around into a circular "nest" that sits perpendicular to the ring loop.  There is no particular trick to this, just twist & tuck until the setting is the shape you want.

Once you've got your nice flat setting, you could put just about anything on top (as I type this, I am suddenly wondering where I put my shrinky dink sheets).  We put on our jewels with Fast Grab Tacky Glue, which is my current favorite kid-craft glue due to it being thick &, well, fast-grabbing. 

After you've made rings for every single finger, don't forget the matching bracelet.

handmade 2007

Continuing the "begin as you mean to go on theme," after the new pajamas went to bed, my husband & I had our annual fancy cheese/chilled split of Veuve Clicquot midnight picnic, then we all woke up to a lazy morning & late brunch of apple waffles, veg sausage, & cocoa with vegan whipped cream (no, really).  I love 2008 so far.

I also love this extremely satisfying year-in-review idea, from pixiegenne from Green Kitchen:  things I made in 2007.

(2007 sure was aqua, wasn't it?)

the jazz hands were an accident

It's hard not to feel like a big dork when modeling a pair of gloves, no matter how much you love them (& your cool new ring) & how charming your six year old photographer is.

On the other side of the lens, focusing a camera you can barely hold up turns out to have its own set of challenges.

They are, perhaps, better suited to still-life photography.

Now is the season of my freezing fingers, & I have picked up another new pair of fingerless gloves since last I talked lovingly about them, but shortly afterwards I realized that though I think (in a purchase-justifying kind of way) I want to wear them while working, I sort of can't because they're too nice.  So then I thought, well, what about that drawerful of felted sweaters that you keep collecting but not doing anything with?  Two seams each once I got the pattern figured out, & the felted wool is the perfect combo of warm & slightly stretchy.

Of course, now I love these too much to work in them.  Oh, cozy, cozy, dilemma.

bookish

I bet that just about every craft blogger out there has a SouleMama post that sends them sprinting for the worktable, & mine was the one about the tiny books.  My kids are dedicated artists & storytellers (especially my daughter, who loves narrative like nobody I've ever met, except maybe me, which I suspect is sometimes very, very tiring to the men in our household), we have teetering piles of pads & notebooks & story pages & drawings all over the place, & still it had never occurred to me to have a stack of little books around waiting to be filled up instead of waiting to bind the finished product.

I had the cardstock & paper, but no working stapler.  I did, however, have plenty of embroidery floss, a longtime love for the book arts, & an inability to pass up the opportunity to make something just a little bit more complex in the name of aesthetics.  Though, really, simple stitched books like this are barely harder than stapled ones.

Cut a sheet of cardstock in half (to 8.5" wide x 5.5" tall), then cut six sheets of paper to 8.25" wide by 5.5" tall. (Trimming that 1/4" will keep your pages from sticking out from the edges of the cover when the book is done.)

Fold the cardstock in half (to 4.25" x 5.5"), then do the same with the stack of paper.  A bone folder will give a nice crisp crease.

Put the cardstock on top of the stack of pages, matching at the fold line, then clip together on one end.  Punch three holes along the crease.  I happened to have a spring action "anywhere" punch around, so I punched 1/16" holes, but you can use anything that will make a small hole, really.

Using 3 strands of an 11" piece of embroidery floss, take your needle down through the center hole,

up through one end (leave a long enough tail at center to tie a square knot),

down through the other end,

& back up through the center hole.

Use the ends to tie a knot around the long stitch

& you're done.  Barely more time than stapling, right?

My kids spent the entire afternoon with these. 

ENTIRE.  I am not exaggerating.

EDIT:  My punch is the "instant setter" from Making Memories, which I picked up at my local stamping store when I needed to set some Paper Source snaps into wedding programs without ruining the smooth tops.  I like it fine & use the hole-punch tips pretty often, though I don't think it's that much quieter than the old-school individual hit-with-hammer "anywhere" punches I already had (I see Making Memories has a lo-tech punch-only version too).  Keep in mind, though, that you don't need fancy scrapbooking tools for this project:  try an awl, or a hammer & small nail.

the wedding post

I spent much of the weekend eyeball-deep in the pictures I took at my sister's wedding, putting together slideshow cds & little photo albums to send off to various family members, & so I am finally ready to write about it (I say "finally" as if it were the longest-languishing event that I have not written about, ha).

The thing about making my sister's wedding is that it was like an excellent wedding do-over, with none of the pressure of making once-in-a-lifetime choices for myself, plus 8 years more design/craft experience on my part.  My sister is not like me in many ways, & one of them is that she's not particularly visual & doesn't really fuss about the tiny details & probably thought I was just nuts (or else I was intent on making HER nuts) during a lot of the planning process, but seeing her face when she walked into her pretty, simple, whimsical reception made all the work & the fuss & the nutsiness worth it. (And don't kid yourself:  those sweet simple handmade-but-polished weddings?  Plenty of work.)

Way back in the fall, we set the tone with the save the date card:  a little drawing, a little sparkle, a little lightheartedness.

The actual invitation was very simple in the midst of the other colorful, whimsical pieces.  I know I at least posted a picture of the invites back when I was working on them, but in case I didn't mention this at the time (I see I didn't), I would like to note that the gocco ink + Paper Source Luxe paper gave me complete fits with ink bleed as the cards dried.  In the end I think it was worth it, because the whole concept was beautiful textured cream paper with black ink = beautiful textured sparkly lacy ivory dress with black ribbon (as seen on my sister), & I love the variations that handprinting brings, but I ended up having to print way more than we needed to make up for the ones that were too blurry when dried (because there's variation & then there's variation).  It may have just been me, but still, word to the wise if you're looking at goccoing small clean-lined text onto textured paper.

She decided to have cupcakes instead of a cake, so I designed these to go on top.  The little paper airplane first showed up above, on the response cards, & since her husband is a pilot, it seemed appropriate to bring it back here & there.

I did not bake these (though I did end up bringing 3 dozen vegan cupcakes along to the reception, which possibly is a sign of that nutsiness I mentioned earlier), but I was very happy with the way the cupcake maker kept things homemade-looking.

The groom's cupcakes, made from a very particular recipe of my brother-in-law's late grandmother.  He was a little worried that they wouldn't be right because his grandmother never made cupcakes; I think, in the end, he was a little too busy being freshly married to notice any difference.

Favor, program, flag.  The program cover swiveled to the side on that little purple dot (tiny snap) to reveal the ceremony info printed on chartreuse card stock.  I really like the clean look of the snap, but when using those babies, give yourself enough time that you're not running all over town at the last minute looking for a tool that works without ruining that smooth little dot.  Ahem.  Anyway, I think that they came up with a genius idea for favors, which was to get cases of customized Jones Soda.  We went with the cream soda (the groom was a little disappointed that we didn't go with bright blue, but it didn't match) & tied a little favor tag around each one with ribbon in the various wedding colors.

One of my sister's friends spent a long time trying to get the bottles lined up just so.  Better her than me.

The escort cards have the name handwritten on the front, table number printed on the back.  I made the board from an acoustic ceiling tile:  cut it to size with a box knife, stapled linen-blend fabric & some ribbon around it, then hot-glued a piece of felt to the back to cover the staples.  I got the fabric on big sale at Joann, so I think all told I spent less than $10 on the board.  It won't hold up as well as -- I assume -- homosote would (ours was broken by the end of the weekend), but it will do the job for table cards & has a much more substantial look than something like foamcore.

I was pretty amused by the tissue paper pom pom blog mini-craze that happened a little while ago, since at the same time we were again considering making puffs for the wedding reception (having already been through at least one cycle of consider/reject/examine-the-budget before slinking back around to the idea).  I made a sample, & we got a lot more excited about it than we thought we would, plus, our budget loved the idea.  We followed Martha's directions, but our largest size came from a 20"x15" sheet of paper, & the smaller was approximately half that size -- the 20"x30" we tried just looked too sloppy -- & we curved the ends for a more floral look.

It was a lot of tissue paper trimming (my mom = tissue puff hero) & fluffing but we were delighted with the finished look -- though, to be fair, it's hard to go wrong when you're having a sweet little summertime wedding reception in a room with charming white ceiling beams, hm?

All in all, I think I showed enormous restraint, only putting glitter on the save the dates (&, really, just the tiniest speck) & on the table numbers.  You may recognize these as being near kin to my glitter letters, though I added floral wire to the bottom so they could stand up in the table arrangements.

The very beautiful arrangements by Anne Fordham, who came through with the exact right flowers for the event.

The lighting in my pictures could be better, I know, but really, the room looked terrific. 

They look like they liked it, don't they?  Happy wedding, little sister.

pink princess party flags

I'm deep in planning for my daughter's upcoming birthday party, & since I already did the glitter name banner plus I have a whole lot of pink fabric left over from the doll quilt (which is going to get its own post one of these days, once I finish the whole big project) plus there's the whole princess theme that I have to orchestrate, I've made three strings of pink party pennants over the past week.  I am a party flag machine.

This is not a difficult project, as probably everyone but me knows, since I am maybe the last person around to  make a set.  I wanted double-sided (if all goes well weatherwise, we'll be hanging these in the backyard, otherwise I may be using them to cordon off a pen in the living room for seven tiny sparkly sugar-rushed princesses), with pinked edges (while I was googling around about these, I saw a very nice set with bias tape edging, but I wanted fast & dirty), with the minimum of cutting fuss.  Here's how I reinvented the party flag wheel:

I made a template (very sophisticated technique = folding a mag subscription card in half, cutting from top corner to bottom middle, then retracing the whole thing 1/2" bigger onto an old manila folder), but because I always, always end up hacking up my templates with my rotary cutter, I cut out my pieces 1/4" larger than the template (sticky tape on the back of the template keeps it from moving around on the fabric).

I stacked the pieces wrong sides together, sewed down one side & up the other with a 1/4" seam allowance.  My pieces didn't always exactly match up, but as long as the mismatch stayed under 1/8" I didn't bother with it.

After I sewed the flag together, I put a pinking blade on my rotary cutter & trimmed off 1/8" inch from each of the long sides (marking my 1/8" from the line of stitching).

The first string I made, I did a very careful job of pinning the flags to the bias tape, but quickly realized that  I needed to shift things around while sewing anyway, so from then on I just put in a pin or two to keep each flag in reasonable order as I worked my way down the line.  If you were doing an easy repeating pattern, I don't think there'd be any need to pin at all, but I'd given myself a slightly complicated repeat (two main fabrics, alternating every 4th flag, with the three flags in between being somewhat randomly chosen except one of the three needed to be one of the predominantly non-pink flags, also I wanted it to look like I just threw it together & it landed perfectly, you know the effect I mean), so pinning was easier than trying to keep a whole bunch of piles organized.

I was planning on a 1/2" wide tape holding the flags together, but I accidentally bought single fold instead of double fold & didn't feel like going back to the store, so 1/4" it is!  The tape is folded in half, sandwiching the  unsewn short side of the flag, stitched 1/8" from the folded edge.  I put my first flag about 12" in from one end, & just tucked each following flag into the tape when I was about 1/2" from the end of the flag before it (this worked better than pinning to keep the flags placed tightly together).  After I got all the flags on (last one placed about 12" from the other end of the bias tape), I went back & put the same 1/8" seam in each loose end, after unfolding the tape at the end, folding 1/4" up crosswise (to hide the raw edge), & then folding the tape closed again.

They seem to cause my husband to cast meaningful glances at used car lot flags when we drive past, but I think the tiny princesses are going to love them.  Too bad that, as of now, there's only a 40% chance that they'll get to love them out in the backyard.

all my snacks should be so happy

My daughter loves the clothespin dolls, which is gratifying because what if I decided to give them up & she thought they were boring?  She plays with them in her wooden doll house, unlike her beloved (plastic) playmobil, which she will only play with in her old (plastic) Little People house -- there's a purity of concept there that deeply appeals to me.  Somewhat unexpectedly, my son instantly requested one of his own, so:

I need to work out the whole short hair thing a bit more (& I see now that my son is right, the arms are too long), but I had fun painting the details on this one, especially the robot shirt.  I realized, while working on this, that one of the things that appeals to me about the clothespins is the sweet little challenge posed by the limitation of form.  Not to get too philosophical about clothespin dolls or anything.

Look at that popcorn!  I'd been seeing around the blogs that Alexander Henry fabric is showing up at JoAnn stores, so I set off in search the other morning.  I did indeed get my hands on a couple of AH prints, plus the usual half-yard or two from the calico wall, & THEN I found this ridiculously irresistable flannel.

I think that it's excellent of my sister to be giving me the chance to do a set of wedding invites, since I didn't own my gocco when I did my own wedding junk.  The invites themselves are very simple, on cream textured paper, but the other pieces are more playful & today I'm going to try my hand at a little two-color printing.  I'm in love with screenprinting as an art form lately (look at this great print I found on etsy), so of course I am jumping at the chance to play around a little.  (I am also jumping at the chance to go wedding cake tasting with her this week, hurrah.)

big project, little project

In true little-project-after-big-project fashion (see also:  felt box) I tried to dive right in to the next thing on my list yesterday, really I did.  Only, I've been picking up bags of clothespins & pipecleaners here & there for a while now, & I've been sort of half-thinking about making little personalized clothespin dolls for party favors (all of my plans for my daughter's party hinge on my ability to talk her into the fairy tea party concept, an idea that I love because 1.  clearly, it would be sparkly, 2.  I could make tiny food, & 3.  it's not My Little Pony/Barbie/Dora/Princess/etc), & so yesterday I thought maybe, while I was gearing up to start doing some actual work, I would just see about a clothespin doll for a little minute.

The blonde is my daughter (the skirt gives it away), the brown is one of her best pals, & I've got another best pal on the drawing board, if I can figure out a couple of hair issues.  These are quick & addictive & I can see myself getting [more] completely ridiculous over them (the t-shirt has a freezer paper stencil on it, ok?). 

Now I just need to see if I can bring myself to let my daughter play with them.

in like a transformer, out like a butterfly

Q:  Can I run a paper lunchbag through my inkjet printer with excellent, timesaving results?
A:  No.  You're going to break that thing one of these days, you know.

Happily, I had a Transformers screen just hanging around.  I also took the opportunity to bust out the tiny xyron, which is a lot of fun when I remember it.  See?

But, really, that's old news by now.  Oh, except:  thank you all so much for the great comments on the tees, & that also reminds me that I have a thing or two to say about printing with Versatex inks.  My usual black ink is some house brand or other, & the heat-setting process I use for my glitter means that I have never once had a problem with ink fading.  HOWEVER (yes, I'm a little shouty about this because it just about made me cry), if you would like to print something up with Versatex (despite nearly reducing me to tears, it's otherwise very nice ink, smooth & flowy & easy to mix, I picked up a couple of sampler sets at Dharma Trading) & you are, say, not sure that your hottest ironing action will really heat-set it because you read on a blog somewhere that it doesn't always work, try this:  preheat your oven to 350F, put the shirts on a cookie sheet, turn off the oven, put the shirts in & let them sit for half an hour.

On the other hand, if you're after that distressed, vintagey look for your prints (which, luckily, was pronounced super cool by the birthday boy, so I felt a little better), the insufficient-ironing method is a great way to get it.  (Except with the silver ink, which washed out enough to ruin the image but not enough to re-use the shirts.)

Ok, so, after the party, which was immense rollerskating fun, I was immediately sucked into yet another vortex of school auction prep (this being vortex the second, after the week where I spent all my free time in the classroom helping kindergarteners paint chairs), since I had somehow become the decor co-chair.  With the help of about 400 paper butterflies, I think we did a pretty respectable job transforming a huge gym into, well, a fancy huge gym.

What you can't see here is that our very excellent crew of balloon assemblers weren't quite as excellent with the balloon filling, so over the course of the evening the "floating butterfly" concept became more like "drunkenly hovering" butterflies.

I spent a lot of time cutting out these flowers.  I'm pretty proud of the butterfly bush, though I wish the glitter showed up in this picture.

Nothing was particularly fancy, but we managed to do quite a bit with paper (& glitter).  Having a clear theme made a huge difference (the person I was working with is a graphic designer, & everything we did was based around the auction invitations she'd already designed).  Also, we gave the flowers more water, they looked much better by that evening.

And here's my pillow, ready to go.  I'll always love you, pillow!