Being Crafty

On the night of our Olympics party, a friend thought he had ruined a pair of leather gloves.  I was able to save the gloves with a little glue, needle/thread, and some material.

Our friend was wearing his leather gloves inside a pair of oven mits as he carried in a hot pot.  The heat from the pot ended up going through the oven mit to his gloves and burned a little hole in the finger.

He left the gloves with me and the next morning I headed to the store for some material.  I found some pleather that would match perfectly.  Thanks to a coupon + getting only 1/8yd, I got the material for less than $1. I found some dry cleanable fabric glue, made my purchases and headed home.  

 I individually cut little pieces of the pleather to fit each finger of the gloves.  After I had each one cut to size, I glued them on each finger.  I set the gloves in between some heavy books and let the glue dry all day.  In the evening, I hand stitched some thread around the edges of each new tip to make sure the pleather wouldn't slowly peel off over time.  This was the hardest part as I had to make sure I didn't sew the wrong things together (for instance, I wasn't paying attention at one finger and ended up sewing the tip closed.  Ooops!).

I was able to finish my little project up by bedtime and take them to church the next morning to hand them off to their owner.  I was pretty impressed with myself and hope they hold up!

Sew Crazy

I had a list of sewing projects I've wanted to get done for some time now.  I waited until I was further along in the pregnancy to accomplish that list (so that I could get more physically demanding things done sooner).  I spent a whole week with my sewing machines camped out in the living room (thanks Steve for your patience!).

This sewing go around, I was able to complete a curtain for Bean's room, a couple of changing pad covers, a boppy cover, and put binding on a couple of baby blankets.  I had dreams of making leg warmers for baby as well, and I attempted a couple.  I'm not sure how they're going to turn out so I decided to put the rest of that project on hold until I know more of her size!

(This by far is my favorite accomplishment!  My sister gave me her old Boppy and it had a simple green removable cover with colored circles on it.  I was able to girl it up by making a removable cover that matches fabric used in her nursery!  I didn't follow a pattern, just outlined the original cover - giving seam allowance as well - and it came out perfect!)

(This fabric is also used on Bean's curtain that hangs in the nursery.  I came across this fabric at Joann's and was blown away at how it closely matched the birds on her mobile and it is in the same color scheme as her Pottery Barn bedding!)

(I came up with the pattern for this valence all by myself!  Steve wasn't sold on using the pink bird fabric in her nursery and just wanted a simple green curtain.  He trusted my sewing skills and vision and I had free range.  I absolutely love how it turned out (and Steve says it looks nice)!)

(Bean's quilt!  I have been making baby blankets in this style for the past year of so and have given several away.  I was excited to finally be able to make one for my own little girl!  Her name will be put on the backside, but you'll have to wait to see it until after she's born - and after I put it on of course!)

(Close up of the little birdie squares.  I hope all of this forcing of birds on this poor child doesn't make her scared of birds - haha!)

(Another one of my proud accomplishments.  I made 2 covers for the contoured changing pad.  Again without using a pattern.  I just sort of traced the ends and made 2 pieces from that template, then cut a big rectangle for the center & long sides.  Sewed up the edges, put a hem on the bottom, and threaded elastic through it.  Ta da - a fitted cover!)

Not counting the baby blanket (which probably is about $15 in material), I got the 2 changing pad covers, Boppy cover, and the curtain accomplished for under $15!  Considering 1 changing pad cover (for the contoured pad) is around $15 and is a plush material (cotton cleans better!), I'm pretty proud of my savings.

Christmas Crafts!

Two weeks ago, I was diligently working on making some more doll items with my serger & sewing machine.  I have a crafting room located in a sunroom/porch right off of our living room.  The weather has been too cold to sew in there, so I moved the table, chair, and machines into the living room for an entire week.  The little sewing heaven I created somehow managed to put a cramp in the entire house.  Over a week later, I finally cleaned it all up and got the house back into working order.  It's amazing how quickly stuff falls apart around here!

(Remember back in October when I blogged about working on Christmas crafts?  Well I don't either. . . ha!  While I was busy sewing in Lima, my sister assembled all the desks & chairs back home in Indiana.  I had completely forgotten all about this project.  Good thing I blog to help me remember!)

(Each of the 3 Adams nieces has a bitty baby  -- and after this Christmas, they'll each have an American Girl, too!  My sister found a real Bitty Baby diaper bag -- all the way on the right-- but wasn't able to find one for each girl.  I found a pattern online to recreate the bag and made 2 more!  I debated on just making 3, but it didn't happen.  The oldest niece will get the original, she can choose if she wants a "Zee made" bag in the future.)

(Since Emily, the oldest niece, doesn't get a handmade bag, I decided to make her a couple of dresses for her dolls.  These dresses were tricky because I didn't have a pattern.  I just made it up based on dresses I have for my dolls.  Not too bad!)

(Another dress whipped up out of thin air.  I had a pattern for a shirt and just extended the bottom to make it a dress.  Ironically, this little dress was made from a bad bridesmaid dress. )

(For the littlest niece -- my brother's daughter -- I made her a little apron and chef's hat to go along with her kitchen playset.  Her mom is quite the chef and really into cooking, so I figured her little helper needs to look official!)

Fall Favorites

Fall is by far my FAVORITE time of year.  The air is turning cooler, I get to snuggle under blankets, light candles, bake pumpkiny and appley items.  Although, I do love winter -- Christmas music, Christmas lights, snow, warm furry boots, scarves, more snow, hmmm. . . okay maybe fall isn't my FAVORITE, but for the sake of this post, we'll say it is.  

October snuck up on us, and November is just around the corner.  Here are some random pictures for the fall this far:

(Our door is still very blue, but we're pretty used to it.  The decorations really help it out, too!  We bought the pumpkin at Menards, but apparently the squirrels really like it because they've taken a chunk out of the top.)

(I made this wreath on a challenge from Steve.  He didn't think I could make one for cheaper than what you could buy one for -- I proved him wrong :).  I'm not happy that I proved him wrong (okay, I do like being right!), but I'm happy that it was cheap & made all by myself.  I only inquired 1 burn from the glue gun in the process.  And thanks mom for my bow-making skills.)

(Dairy Queen Pumpkin Pie Blizzards -- I'm more of a ChocoCherry Love kind of girl, but Steve loves PPB's.  With a BOGO deal, we got these two beauties for under $4.  I only ate about a 1/3 of mine, leaving Steve to indulge in this October only special.)

(MMMmmm, probably one of the BEST pies I've ever had -- and probably the BEST apple pie I've ever had.  Thanks to Sarah Cardinal, I now own a family recipe that is amazing.  I have also made a couple of pumpkin pies so far this year, but they weren't picture worthy (I just follow the recipe on the back of the can).  But this pie, I made the crust, sliced the apples, and assembled all by myself.  I was pretty proud of it.)

Christmas Crafts

I'm beginning all my preparations for Christmas crafts!  While in Indiana, I spent a lot of my time painting a bunch of different letters and shapes for my nieces' Christmas gifts.  I am keeping up my American Girl gift tradition and making more clothes and accessories for my nieces' dolls.  I tried to find pictures/stories about my gifts last Christmas, but I failed (either in the documenting or researching).  I made a bunch of clothes, purses, and a sleeping bag for their dolls last year.  I had grand plans of getting more done, but it didn't happen, so it's all on my list for this year!  My sister (their mom) found a way to make your own desks & chairs for American girls so we took advantage of me being in town to get the project started.

(You would not believe how long it took to paint all this.  It took even longer just discussing the logistics of the project, color schemes, and how to go about doing it.  I made some mistakes and painted the wrong items the wrong color, but it was easily fixed -- whew!  The round pieces and squares with the fancy corners will be assembled to make chairs, while the letters and plain rectangles will make desks)

(Here's a semi-finished desk.  Although the top still needs to be painted and then glued together.  I didn't get everything all the way done.  I painted as much as I could then dropped everything off at my sister's for her to assemble, but I wanted an idea of how it would turn out.)

Now that I'm back home, I need to begin the rest of the crafts.  I have some diaper bags to sew (for Bitty Babys); American Girl doll clothes, sleeping bags, pillows, slippers, hats & jackets; and I already completed some crochet booties & hats for their Bitty Babys.  So far I have no money invested in these gifts.  I have tons of fabric that I can use for the sewing and had yarn for the crocheting.  I will have to purchase some more fabric for the diaper bags and things like buttons/zippers.  Thank goodness for Joann Fabrics & their awesome coupons!

Lovely Visitors

My mom and youngest niece Gabbie came to stay a couple days this week.  I had some stuff to pass off tomy mom and she had some stuff of mine, so she decided it was worth driving all the way to Lima for a visit to exchange the items (the items were merely an excuse to come!).  They didn't stay long, just a couple days, but anytime with family is better than no time with family!

While they were here we did lots of shopping (we were on a mission for some items for my oldest niece Emily's birthday), crafts, and re-potted a couple of my plants.

(We made a "note-board" for Emily's birthday present.  She turns 9 next week and her big gift form her parents is a newly decorated room.  It's semi-ballet themed with bright colors.  This board will hang on her wall and she can slip notes and photos in between the ribbons to display.)

  We had intentions of using a staple gun to assemble the board, but my mom got injured just opening the box of staples.  So we used a hot glue gun instead -- much better idea!  It took us way too long to assemble, but the end result is worth it!  While we worked on our project, Gabbie was busy coloring and creating pages to give to people.  That girl is so creative!

(Ha ha, this picture was too funny to share.  In the morning after Steve left for work, the other two would come and crawl into my bed.  We attempted to take a picture together, but the flash got us all.)

Thanks Mom & Gabbie for making the trip to visit!