My Friend Felt

Yesterday I had a really cool opportunity.  The school I attended from K-12 had a craft fair and I got to set up!! It was kind of a slow day, but I did MUCH better at this craft fair than I did at the one I set up at last summer.  That made me happy.  So I took all the stuff I had stockpiled, including all those super cute felt headbands, AND I made some pins and keychains to go along with them.  I'm bummed because I never took a picture of the keychains, so I can't show you those right now.  I do have one of them left, but I'll wait to show you pictures until I have a few more to go with it.  Here are the pins I made.

I started with the mushroom.

Then I did the heart.

Then the star.

And finally, the flower.

Of the four, only the heart sold this weekend, but that's okay.  They're all going to go into my Etsy shop hopefully this week, if it ever stops raining!  It's tough to take pictures without the sun!  I'm also hoping my Mom will send me the pictures she took of my booth so that I can do an entry with them.  I was very worried that my booth wouldn't look cute because I couldn't bring a lot of the props I wanted to use.  It's tough to cart all of your stuff, two dogs (one being an Irish Wolfhound), clothes for the weekend, AND still have room for props.  Despite all of that, I think my booth looked really cute and I got a lot of compliments on my stuff.  My ego is definitely feeling it today.  Now I can't wait until the next time I can set up somewhere!!

I've Been At It Again!

I went kind of crazy making headbands this week.  Playing with all the colors is just too much fun, and I keep getting more ideas for different creatures and things to put on them.  

Here they are, all lined up and read to go!

I LOVE this one.  I've had the flower in the center for ages and could never decide what to use it on.  Found it!!

It's just so darn pretty.  Then I made another star headband, as promised.

I think I might like it even better than the last star I did.

The gold star button is sparkly.  I really appreciate that!

Another heart!  This one in purples and pinks.

With yet another sparkly button!!  The white button is one of my vintage buttons, so I'm excited about that.  Then I did two different bird headbands because I was loving the green/blue color combination.

This time I really played around with the colors of buttons and thread.

Yet another vintage button!  Can you tell which one it is?  I need to thank my Mom now because she let me raid her button stash to find some super bright buttons.  Then we went shopping so I could get even more buttons.  

I love this guy a lot.  Can you spot the vintage button here?  This one is also sporting some of the aforementioned "new" buttons.

His coloring just makes me happy.  That brings me to my favorite of this batch....my hedgehog.

Isn't she awesome??  Oh my gosh, I just love her to pieces.  Seriously, I am in love.

She was a LOT more work than any of the others, but she was definitely worth it.  Now I just hope that they sell at the craft fair!!

What do you think??  Do you love them?  Like them?  Hate them?  Indifferent to them?  

Oh Headbands, How I've Missed You

Sunday afternoon I was supposed to do a craft fair, but it got cancelled.  Bummer right?  Well, I took the extra time to make some really cute headbands.  The headbands themselves are re-purposed t-shirt sleeves.  Then I cut out, and embellished, some felt shapes.  

This is the first one I did.  Originally I wasn't going to put stuffing inside the heart, but once I got into the project I changed my mind.  

Man am I glad that I have a pretty decent button stash!!!    These are all newer buttons, but I love mixing the vintage with the new.

This is the second one I cranked out.  (I say cranked out as if it only took me a few minutes.  HA)  I decided to try some veins on the leaves and I'm very glad I did.  They are so cute!

My favorite thing about this, besides the leaves and that turquoise is in my favorite color group, is that I finally got to use my turquoise and orange buttons!!

This one I think I would like better if I'd had a more yellow piece of felt for the wing.  Don't get me wrong, I still really love it, but the wing is just a tad bit more orange than I would have liked.

You can see it a little better in this picture.  Note to self: invest in more colors of felt.

This is the last one I finished this weekend/Monday morning.  I'm not typically a big red, white, and blue kind of person, but I really love how this one turned out.  

I'm going to do another one with a red star and blue headband.  Who knows, maybe I'll make a bunch of them in different red, white, and blue combinations.  I'm working on another flower headband, so the answer to that query is: most likely I will.  

What do you think?  Cute??  

87? Way to go Grandma!!

My grandma "TuTu" turned 87 at the beginning of February.  She's a pretty awesome lady and we all love her tons.  For her birthday party everyone came to my parents house.  We had pizza, wings, pickles & olives, and cake with tons of ice cream.  My mom got one of those little helium tanks so that we could do balloons and she FINALLY got her Cricut Expression out to make an enormous Happy Birthday banner.  

The sign also has all of Tutu's different names.  That's my goofy sister Kira back there making faces at me and that's my Mom carrying the can of Scrubbing Bubbles around.  She was doing some last minute cleaning.

There's my grandma!  She was in rare form that night.  She's a sassy lady and can be VERY sarcastic sometimes.  Huh, wonder where we all get it from?

That card WAS hilarious!!  For the last few years I've been trying to make more of my gifts for people, especially my grandmas, because I think it means more to give a gift that you had your grubby meat grabbers all over.  This is what I put together this year:

Some pretty rosette magnets.  They were simple to make and Tutu really liked them.  Plus they're functional.  She has many, many, many grandkids and great-grandkids, so she always has lots of stuff to hang on her fridge!  I even made a bunch more because they were so fun to do!

Cool New Rugs!!

A couple of weeks ago I decided to try out a new rug pattern for my t-shirt rugs.  I made a bunch of small rugs that turned out great.  Last week I decided to try my hand at a bigger rug.  I chose the colors I had the most of in my stash: pink, dark blue, white, and black.  I ended up running out of black, so I "yarned" a few more shirts.  

This rug is about 32 inches.  This pattern is great because I had no issues with curling or wrinkling.  It increases very nicely.

Another thing that really helps is that I worked it on a flat surface and my stiches have gotten more consistent.

This one took me about 3 hours to do and that includes cutting the extra shirts into yarn.  I actually finished it on Saturday after my parents and niece left.  (They came down to bring us a new dryer!!!!)  When I was done with it I decided to start a new one.  This one I did in all blues and turquoises.  

This one needs to be stretched out a little or something because it's looking kind of pointed on the outside round where the increases are.  

These are some of my favorite colors.  I wish I'd had a bigger stash of yarn!!!

This one took me about 2 hours or so, but it's a bit smaller than the other one.  I think it's 26 or 27 inches if I remember right.  Stitching these two rugs severely depleted my stash of t-shirt yarn.  No problem though, it just gives me an excuse to go to the Salvation Army and do some shopping!!!

Feathery Yarn Wreath--Take 2

Back in September, I decided to try my hand at making a yarn wreath.  It went SO well that I gave the wreath to my Mom for her birthday...without taking a picture of it first.  Oops.  It was gorgeous and I'm still mad that I forgot to take a picture.  Mom loves it, and she has it hanging in her cubicle at work now.  I had so much fun making the wreath that I started another one right away.  Then I promptly forgot about it, adding it to the pile of unfinished projects.  


Last week, as my morning sickness was on vacation, I finished a couple of projects from that pile.  The yarn wreath was one of them.

It felt amazing to finish things that have been hanging around my craft room (and brain) for months.  I really like the way this one turned out, but the one I made for Mom really is better.  Hmmm, maybe I should get her to take a picture of it for me.  


You know, the idea of a "pile" of unfinished projects is actually very misleading.  I have an entire room full of stuff that is awaiting my attention.  This weekend we had some family visiting and a munchkin photographer managed to capture some photographic evidence...

Scraps waiting to be made into flowers. Frames waiting to be made into something!

T-shirts waiting to be cut into t-shirt yarn, headbands, and scraps for flowers

Spray paint waiting to be, well, sprayed.  More t-shirts and scraps.

And one of my favorite unfinished projects of all....the hubs!  He's a very proud and excited Daddy-to-be.

Seriously though, this is what I'm working on right now, or I will be as soon as I finish this post!

Hopefully it's going to work out.  It's another t-shirt rug, but this one will be a series of connected circles of various colors.  Tonight I'll be working on the blue circle.  It's a different pattern than the one I used when I crocheted the rugs for my nieces at Christmas.  I'm not sure whether I like it yet or not.  The finishing off is bothering me.  I don't like the bump it leaves, but I can't seem to figure out how to make it disappear.  Anyone have any tips??

It's a Pretty Big Deal...

that I am finally blogging again!!!  I've been feeling horrible, and haven't been crafting since just before Christmas, because....I'm pregnant!!!!  Today I am 13 weeks and am finally starting to feel good on a consistent basis.  Hopefully that means you'll be seeing more of me.  Want to hear the story of how we found out?  It's actually kind of funny, but long.


Two days before Thanksgiving I was supposed to start my period.  I've ALWAYS been very on-time for that event, which is crazy since I'm late for everything else.  I felt horrible that week, so I figured that I must have recorded the my start date wrong for last month's cycle.  The night before Thanksgiving, I was at work, and I kept thinking "Okay, if it doesn't start tonight I'll buy a test in the morning."  Well, morning came and I'd talked myself out of it.  Then, the hubs was late meeting me to head to my parents' house.  I was annoyed and had to use the bathroom, so I headed over to the grocery store.  I went to the bathroom and walked around for awhile.  The entire time I was arguing with myself about whether to buy a test or not.  (I've made that mistake before.  You know, I was a little late and bought a test out of excitement only to have my period start an hour later.)  Finally, I couldn't take it anymore and bought the test.  Then I spent 10 minutes in the bathroom trying to decide whether to take it right then or to wait.  I ended up taking it and got this result...

I almost passed out right there in the grocery store bathroom!!!  My husband and I have been trying to get pregnant for almost 8 years with no luck.  None.  Then this!!  Well, needless to say, I forgot all about being annoyed with him for being late!!  When he showed up I showed him the test and he was speechless.  He was shaking, he was so excited!  The hour and a half drive to my parents' house was a killer.  We couldn't WAIT to show someone!!!  As soon as we got there I took another test, you know, just because.  That one looked like this....

Just a little bit darker!!  Then, I showed my Mom and said "So, um, what would you think if you saw these?  Do you think they would be positives?"  Her response?  "Well, it seems like it.  Are they yours?"  HA HA HA.  She thought maybe they belonged to one of my girls at work or something.  When I told her they were mine she was in shock.  Then the hugging began.  This was THE best Thanksgiving EVER.  We told both of my parents and all of my siblings, and then the hubs told his family when he called them out West later that day.  There was NO keeping it a secret.  It would have been impossible for us.


Not too long after that, the morning sickness set in and my desire to do ANYTHING went away!  Now though, I'm feeling pretty good and have started crafting again!  I even have a post coming up on a wreath I just finished.  Thanks to everyone for sticking around.  I can't WAIT to get started on the nursery.  There are tons of projects floating around in my head for that one!!!