a little linen coin purse

After nearly 13 years using the same trusty black leather Fossil wallet, I recently decided I was ready for a change.  I snagged an adorable fabric wallet made by a friend of mine, but it didn't have a zippered compartment for my coins. 

 

This, of course, necessitated the creation of a coin purse.  I'm not sure how I came to settle on the design that I did, but after making the decision that I wanted some pretty french knots to adorn my new purse, I chose a graduating assortment of yellow embroidery floss and a scrap of grey linen from my stash.  This was the perfect in-front-of-the-tv project and took me several hours to complete.

I started with the darkest yellow and created a cluster of french knots on my linen.  From there I chose ever lighter shades and just made my way out, scattering the colors a little as I went so there would be no hard lines as they blended together.

I picked up a coin purse frame at Joann, and after checking out a few online tutorials for making these little bags, I cut out my pieces and sewed them together.  Assembling the purse and the frame was a little tricky, but I managed. 

 

The holes along the edge of the frame are so you can sew your purse in, but I chose not to and just used glue instead.  The inside edges are a little sloppy, but I don't care.  ;)

My coins now have a safe, cute home, and that makes me happy.

Handpainted baby leggings, 3 ways

 

Have you noticed the baby leggings craze?  How could you NOT??  They're E-V-E-R-Y-W-H-E-R-E.  And even though there are TONS of adorable baby girl leggings to be found, you can't deny there are some super cute boy designs out there, too! 

 

Since I've got a tiny guy of my own, I decided to board the leggings bus-- just to see.  I spied a simple grey pair at a thrift store one day and decided to jazz them up a little before I went all leggings loco.

 

Lemme show ya what I did.

 

First I gathered my supplies:

craft paint

textile medium

a sponge brush

stencil plastic (not shown)

exacto knife (not shown)

cutting mat

 

Using the stencil plastic and exacto knife I cut out a simple, imperfect chevron design.  The grid on my cutting mat was helpful in getting my lines straight and evenly spaced.

 

Next I slipped a piece of poster board into one leg so the paint wouldn't bleed through.

 Then I got to stenciling!

I made my way around the leggings and eventually my design met up in the back.  It wasn't perfect, but so what? 

I made the lines of the zig zags uneven on purpose because I knew I'd never get a perfectly printed design like you see on store-bought clothing.  So I figured if I made it look intentionally flawed then perhaps my mistakes and flubs wouldn't be so noticeable! (???)

I'm pretty pleased with how they turned out.

Don't worry- he likes the leggings, too.  He just doesn't like photo shoots right before lunchtime.  :)

"Please, Mama!  NO. MORE. PICTURES!!  I just want a flippin' CRACKER!"

 

My brother gave me the idea to make some Lego leggings (Legogings?), so I cut up an old knit skirt I had and stamped it with-- what else?-- LEGOS!

Again I used paint and fabric medium, but this time stamping on flat fabric allowed me a lot more control over how the design came out. (See one of my little Lego stamps in the corner of the photo below?)

Then I sewed them up and there you have it!  Another pair of hand painted leggings! 

 Unfortunately a little tragedy befell this adorable pair.  I forgot to heat set the paint with my iron before they got tossed in the wash, so a lot of my painstakingly stamped Legos faded.  Some quite a bit.  They're still cute and wearable, just not as vibrant as before.  *sigh

 

Here's another pair that's in the works.  Just need to add elastic for the waistband.  This time I drew on my design with a fabric marker. 

 

Sorry these photos aren't very clear.  Rowan has decided that it's hilarious to try running away from me before I can take his picture.  The turkey.

 

 

Okay, so now you can see that it is possible to make your very own adorable baby leggings using 3 different methods BUT

what if you don't sew?  What if you don't have the supplies to make these?  What if you the design you want would just be impossible to recreate yourself?  Or what if you just plain ol' don't feel like making them??

No worries.  I got ya covered.  :)

 

 

I happen to know the most affordable and A-FREAKING-DORABLE baby leggings are available at

 

THE LITTLE SPOONS on etsy.

 

Check out just a few of their items:

 

camo

 

wide blue & white stripe

grey and neon

 

ikat 

 (do you recognize this little model?  heehee!)

mustard chevron

 

 grey mustache

 

Most of the leggings I've shown you would be fantastic for boys, but I couldn't resist adding a photo of their precious floral leggings, too.  Seriously, they're my favorite.

 

There are many more designs in their shop, and new designs being listed often.  Go take a peek!  And next time you're out thrifting, keep in eye out for a plain pair of leggings that you can jazz up yourself!



An attempt at dollmaking

A few weeks ago I got the itch to make something.  This happens to me a lot.  Sometimes I get the urge to make something specific, sometimes I want to use a certain material, sometimes I just want to make something for a certain person, and sometimes it's all of the above.

 

I wanted to make handmade Christmas gifts for my best friend's children, so I had to come up with what I could make for two boys (ages 8 and 6) and two girls (ages 4 and almost 2).  The idea for the boys ended up being easier than I thought- marshmallow shooters!  Seriously, if you have kids (boys or girls) aged 5 and up, they'll love 'em!  Check out Pinterest.  There are tutorials everywhere!

 

As for the girls, I knew I wanted to make something girly that both would like, and something I could do some hand sewing on.  That was the itch I needed to scratch.  I wanted to stitch by hand.

 

The thought of making a couple of dolls for them made me so happy!  I browsed the Internet until I decided on the look I liked, then made up some paper patterns.  This took a little trial and error, then I had fun choosing fabrics. 

 

This little gal was my first attempt.  And yes, I made her with red hair and blue eyes on purpose.  :)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Since this was my first doll, I hadn't gotten the assembly really figured out.  I stuffed the head and limbs, stuffed the dress, then pinned everything in place and hand stitched them closed.  I didn't mind that, but I didn't like how floppy this made her head. 

 

A friend of mine asked if I'd be willing to make her two little girls a pair of dollies, so when I started on those I changed my approach.  This time the assembly took more thought and there was far less hand stitching.  I struggled quite a bit on a few parts and realized that my pattern pieces weren't quite working this time (i.e. adding pig tails made it almost impossible to turn the head right side out through that skinny neck!)  Ugh.

 

They did turn out pretty cute, though. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

These two gals are the ones I ended up sending to my best buddy's girlies (as a surprise).  Again, LOTS of struggles on these.  I think I made the redheaded doll twice and she still didn't turn out quite right.  Oh well.

 

 

 

Clearly I'm new to this.  The dolls are all a bit wonky, and I still haven't worked out the kinks in my pattern pieces, but the particular itch I had has been sufficiently scratched.  And now both of my sweet friends' sweet girls have little look-alike dollies made by me.  That sure makes me happy!

A little more Valentine's Day decor

In my last pillows post, I promised to share one last Valentine's Day-themed pillow cover that I was working on. I actually finished it up last week but just now got around to snapping some photos of it.

Again, I used some dollar store napkins for the cover itself, then sewed up a few red and white polka dot yo yos to adorn the front. (You can tell that's a heart, right?) I didn't even sew them down, just stuck them on there with some good fabric glue. The open side is simply tied shut with a few twill ribbons.

While this design wasn't my original plan, it was much simpler and less complicated than what I'd previously come up with. And when is simpler and less complicated ever a bad thing?

One last little item that I put together one night is this simple wooden "love" sign. When my "North Pole" sign came down it left the space above my vintage window looking bare.

With some scrap wood and paint, I now have a sweet little sign that can fill in that space. I may even leave it there after Valentine's Day!

pillows, pillows, pillows

I don't know about you, but I have a hard time decorating for Valentine's Day. I just don't go in for all the sparkly hearts and pink and fluff. Yes, I'll use red and hearts here and there, but sparingly and in an understated way.

However, in an attempt to make my house somewhat festive for the upcoming holiday (and because I couldn't keep my Christmas pillows around until spring), I decided to sew up some new pillow covers for my couch.

This lumbar pillow cover was made using a red and cream ticking stripe and a piece of drop cloth that I had. I bought the wood buttons on Etsy like 3 years ago or so, but waited to use them for just the right project.

I'm sure you've seen doily pillows popping up everywhere, so how could I resist making my own? I found half a dozen of these nice big doilies at my local thrift store and used dollar store cotton napkins for the cover. These are pretty easy to make. Just dot the back of the doily with some fabric glue to adhere it to the fabric, then once that's dry stitch around the edge and a couple of places in the middle to keep it secure. I think they look kind of romantic in a way.

This afternoon while my littlest one napped I whipped up this last cover from scraps in my stash. Once again the red ticking appears, along with some more taupe napkin fabric.

I really like how this one turned out, and it's definitely got more of a Valentine's Day vibe than the others.

The letters are just appliqued on with a small zig-zag stitch on the top layer and a straight stitch for the bottom layer. That taupe fabric is going to fray some over time, which is what I want.
Although... now that I'm looking at it from a distance, I wish I'd tipped the "o" the other direction. Dangit!

I've got one more chair needing a new pillow cover, which is in the works. But I'm afraid it's going to take a little while to finish. Hopefully before Valentine's Day actually arrives! I'll be sure and share as soon as it's done.