Ribbon placemats!

Started on the placemats project to use up part of the ribbon stash. So far, I've made 7 placemats and a very small dent in the stash. Here are the first two that I made yesterday:

I still haven't figured out a good way to finish the edges. For now, I have just taped the edges together. I was thinking of trying to gently iron together with that no-sew hem tape. On previous placemats, I had tried to sew a ribbon hem around the placemat but it was frustrating and didn't come out the way I wanted. Boooo.

Flower Power

My tie-dye flower barrette is now up on etsy! I happened to have this pretty wooden cigar box laying around on the floor because I was cleaning out my crafts stash...I like the way it looks as a background. :)

Coming soon--ribbon placemat projects! I am determined to use up some of my truly ridiculous ribbon stash, pictured below.

Yeah you can really only see the top layer...and that's one drawer of ribbon. Out of THREE. What was I thinking?

Yesterday's crafty...and today's inspiration

Had a great Sunday afternoon crafty with Brie yesterday! I was mildly productive and finished 6 watermelon pins (they had been sitting around half-completed for months) as well as a flower pin and a flower barrette. Love the way the tie-dye flower barrette came out--great colors!

Definitely will be making more in that color combo...and posting it to etsy soon.

I spent this morning reading pretty blogs and here are just a few of my favorites for inspiration:

Decor8: so awesome! I could spend days at this blog just looking at pretty things. And today's lovely post made me miss living in Europe immensely... 

Geninne's Art Blog: she always has such beautiful artwork! Love all her paintings of birdies :)

Cake Wrecks: great way to start the day with a laugh!

Sock Monkey Photo Shoot!

Yesterday Vicky and I worked on a sock monkey from this questionable kit she had purchased on amazon. Sadly, she purchased it thinking it was a finished sock monkey--imagine her disappointment when it arrived in pieces!

The outside of the kit totally neglects to mention that you need a sewing machine to complete it. The directions were kind of poor, and some of the materials were not so hot, but we had a good time!

Here's Vicky working on "Peejay" (the kit is very careful to always refer to him by his first name, as if it would be impolite to do otherwise).

Now we're getting ready to sew on his arms...

Here he is with one arm!

Here's Mr. Sock Monkey before he had any clothes.

The ears were definitely the hardest part to attach.

He's a pretty handsome monkey I guess?

Portrait.

Chillin with the bear.

What is this next picture of, you may ask. Yeah, that's a broken needle! It SNAPPED while I was trying to sew through the bear felt, which was apparently made from fibers of lead or something. I've never broken a needle before.

That's a tough lookin' sock monkey!

 

Projects in progress!

As usual, I am working on multiple projects simultaneously and keep switching back and forth.

1) Felt fruit coasters--I originally made a set of 4 of these for Brie's birthday present (an orange, an apple, 2 pears) and they turned out so cute I decided to make some more.

The pieces are all sewn on by hand, not machine. After all the pieces are sewn to the black circle, I attach a backing made of black sticky felt.

2) Wooden boxes covered with book pages. I made some good progress on these last night and also on Friday crafty. These take forever because I do cover every surface of each little drawer.



3) Three more scarves!
I was looking through my (fairly ridiculous) yarn stash and realizing that I'm running low on the chenille I usually use for my warp yarns. This made me start thinking of alternatives, like using two threads together of a skinnier yarn, or trying some slightly thicker yarns I have on hand.  I charted out a few ideas...

Spent a while calculating the number of warp ends needed for each project...

And decided on the warp for my final three designs:

A) Windowpane scarf: I'm using an off-white chenille for most of the warp, alternating every 10 with 4 warp ends of a variegated blue fun fur doubled up.

B) Valentine's scarf: Using Moda-Dea Dream yarn in a hot pink color...it feels similar to a chenille, but with extra fuzziness on top. Weft will be pinks, reds, and maybe a little purple.

C)  Striped variegated scarf: Will be using graduated stripes of in both directions. I'm alternating Lion Brand Suede yarn in "seacrest" (haha), a blue variegated, with "moonshadow," a dark gray variegated.

Here are the warp ends I wound for A and C. So pretty!

And now for something completely different...

Ok, maybe just slightly different. I was thinking of maybe taking a break from weaving for a bit to focus on other projects. I love weaving but feel the urge to do something else.

Top contenders:

1) More text collage
2) New felt projects: flower garland, tags, pansy barrettes, fruit pins, purse
3) Finish random halfway completed projects around house (mending/hemming, old collage repair, ribbon placemats, etc.)
4) Cover wooden boxes. I cut up cheap and/or crappy books for this--generally those poorly abridged versions of classics you find in Michael's or JoAnn's. Here are some that I've completed and love too much to part with:

I use this letterbox to hold my bookmarks at craft fairs.

And here's my personal favorite...

I don't keep anything in this mini dresser but it is pretty darn cute!

Purple scarf photos!

Completed the purple scarf in like record time once I sat down to do it. I'm at least getting faster at the finishing process. Love how it turned out, it's super bright!

One side...

The other side...

Detail...

I'm hoping to get one of my friends to model the last few scarves, as I don't suppose Gleb will fly back from CA to do it. Jyoti agreed to give it a try and she's pretty photogenic, so stay posted for our next Supermodel Photo Shoot soon! 

Some outdoor inspiration

Yesterday I took a long walk around Lake Artemesia, not far from my house. I walked around it 4 times...the first time around without music to just enjoy the sounds of the birds and insects and the lake. It was really peaceful.  I saw a variety of moths, butterflies, geese, swallows, turtles sunning themselves, and of course fellow humans enjoying the outdoors :)

Also wanted to share a few of my favorite pictures from my trip to San Francisco. These first few are from our bike ride across the Golden Gate Bridge to Sausalito.

These are from our drive down the coast to Monterey, past Pigeon Point Lighthouse.