Crafty Gifts

I recently created some handmade gifts.

These upcycled candy tins are great containers for Art-on-the-Go projects. 

I glued bits of scrap fabric to the tins with thinned white glue,
avoiding the space where the lid overlaps the base.

There is an article in the June/July 2014 issue of Quilting Arts Magazine 

that describes how to make a pocket for carrying index cards, 

so when an idea strikes you have something to draw on.

I embellished small silk screened fabric scraps with fabric markers and embroidery floss.

I really enjoyed the process of stitching through the 

muslin and felt, and the gifts were well received!

Twisted Stitcher Loot

Last night we did our belated Twisted Stitcher Christmas gathering. After a fabulous pot luck dinner we exchanged a wide variety of handmade ornaments.

Here's a link to the 2011 ornaments.

I made wool birds.

Robin made rayon batik stars.

Sandy made fabric crosses.

Jaunita made mushrooms of wool and vintage polyester.

Judy made zipper Christmas trees.

Sherrie made notebooks with handmade paper.

Sherrie also made paper ornaments.

Carol made paper ornaments too.

Becky made felt darling dolls. (I wish I had a better photo.)

Julie crocheted cute yarn balls.

It such a pleasure to spend time with these talented ladies.

Thank you!

progress

I had fun making these wool and felt ornaments for my arty friends this year.

This cat entry for the "Quilting Arts" calendar is ready.

 

My Rusty 12x12" is in progress...

as is this commission of Murphy.

Rusty has been busy watching squirrels.

"Buddy"

Buddy, 12x12" 

My neighbor commissioned me to make a quilt of her dad's cat Buddy. 

She had this great photo for me to use.

I printed Buddy's face on cotton sateen with my friend Linda's big inkjet printer. I fused the fabric onto freezer paper and we fed it into the printer from the back. After several wadded up attempts, we put scotch tape on the leading edge to get it to feed correctly.

I cut out the face and fused it to a fabric background. The machine quilting caused the edges to wave, so he is fused to two layers of canvas to keep him flat.

Busy, busy

Lots of graphic design work! Good!

Not much time for gift-making.

A few gifts complete.

Some started.

Some close.

A beautiful end to the day.

Microwave-Dyeing Wool

I made a bunch of felted wool ornaments last fall. So when my friend Mary was given a package of white wool roving, she shared it with me. Thanks Mary! The next day Nikki Wheeler posted a blog about Food Color Yarn. I had heard about dyeing wool with Koolaid and decided to try it.

Here is the finished wool dyed with Tropical Punch Koolaid.

Last year I needle-felted wool roving onto a purchased felted wool purse in the style of Artgirlz.

The small purse below is made with felted wool sweaters. The patterned sweater in the background was given to me by Pat. It's on the back of the purse which was made for her daughter.

Calendar Boxes and Block Challenge

While at coffee with a bunch of quilters, someone mentioned that they couldn't bear to throw away their old quilt calendars. I remembered a box that was made from squares that are cut from greeting cards. Here are some instructions. I thought it would be easy to adapt the instructions to calendar pages and showed everyone how to make these boxes at the next two coffees.

Each year the Quilters Guild of Dallas issues a challenge to make a block for a quilt to be made for their collection. This year the theme is Oriental Expressions. We had to use the provided black, red and gold fabric in an original oriental design and had to include one 3D element. I've made a challenge block every year since 2000. I like that it makes me practice my traditional appliqué skills. Here is the block I did for this year's challenge.

Handmade Christmas gifts

The Maxine calendar page for December 10 really hit home today.
I'm making felted wool ornaments the I learned to make in Judy Coates Perez's Make It University workshop at Houston Quilt Festival.

I made a kiln full of fused glass earrings.

I made felt needle cases.

I made felt Post It Covers.
And... I made a wool drink cozy out of the sleeve from a cashmere sweater that the moths destroyed!