A Case for Art

I made these fold-up art cases for the cousins, who are traveling and love to draw. Perfect!









I followed this tutorial for the dimensions. Half the fun was picking out contrasting fabrics that I thought each child would like. What was not fun was being sent the wrong size Moleskin notebook from Amazon.... I found a close-in-size drawing pad from Target and used the Exacto knife to trim it to size. My thumb is still numb....

Fake Tree

The idea for this project came from Under the Table and Dreaming. I used painted balsa wood on ticking fabric stretched over a canvas. (I had a little helper for the painting.) After everything was glued down I thought, "It needs a star...." I tried to cut one out of the balsa wood, but it didn't work out. Lo and behold, like the shining star of Bethlehem, a piece of dried starfruit peeked its head out of my holiday potpourri bowl. Glue that sucker down!

For the Dogs

I had a request to make a pair of snow booties for a furry friend. Turns out the request was a joke, but I was up for the challenge. I used this tutorial, and after some sewing machine versus leather wrangling, I whipped up four of these.



The fleece was from a Dollar Store blanket, and the leather (pleather?) was a remnant from the craft store.

Here she is, kickin' it in the snow with her warm booties. They stayed on and, more importantly, her feet stayed warm and dry!

In Barbie News...

It continues to be all Barbie, all the time around here. Even Santa has been dragged into it -- everything on K's Christmas list this year was Barbie themed. The only saving grace was, the other day in the bath, she kept referring to one Barbie as Melissa Block, as in the NPR news correspondent. Good to know that the public radio I play in the car is sinking in. It's all about balance....

Slippers Galore

Or, shall I say schleppers?

The Head Turner

THIS hat is the epitome of the phrase "third time's a charm."

In order to make it according to the custom order ("I want a pom pom, and ear flaps, and those dangly things") I had to piecemeal patterns together and, at first, ended up with very unhatlike results.

All in all it turned out cute. Just like its wearer. :)