An Oven Mitt is Born

I haven't made it very far on my sewing project.  I got sidetracked watching a movie, playing in my garden, cleaning, and baking cookies today.  If you haven't seen "Where The Wild Things Are", I would definitely recommend it.  I LOVED it!!  Anyway, I sat down to my apron/chef's hat/oven mitt project tonight and have the oven mitt completed.  It is SSSSOOOOO stinkin' cute!!  These pictures really don't do it justice.  I can't wait to get the chef's hat and apron completed now!  My back is yelling at me from sitting in the sewing room for too long, though, so I think I'm going to stop for today. Little Miss Em is going to look FANTABULOUS in her new kitchen attire!  She has the same shoe problem I have, so I'm sure she'll be wearing her apron, hat, and oven mitt along with a pair of high heel dress-up shoes, jewelry, and a purse.  As always, you can click on the photos to view larger images.

The front of the mitt:

The back of the mitt:

A side view:

Toodles,

Unfaithful Blogger

I haven't been very faithful in my blogging yet this year. I had good intentions! Once the holidays were over I started working on home improvement projects and tried to start spending more time with friends. So far I've made progress on the house and have IMMENSELY enjoyed my time with friends.

Around Christmas, I promised to post photos of the projects I had been working on. I'm finally getting around to that. Sometime in November, I started making quilts. Originally, I was going to make three of them measuring 48" X 60" as gifts for two of my nieces and a nephew. Somewhere in the middle of the first three, I decided that I wanted to make three more. I was stressing for a little while, but managed to have all six of them completed the week before Christmas. So... here they are...

All of the quilts turned out to be beautiful and they were well received at our family Christmas celebration. Hopefully, they're keeping their new owners warm this winter!!

...And this is one of my latest card creations. The Designer Series Paper is a retired Stampin' Up! paper called "Outlaw". The bear, from "Under The Stars" was stamped in Basic Black classic ink on Close to Cocoa and Creamy Caramel cardstock several times. The muzzle and belly were cut from the Creamy Caramel and the head and body from Close to Cocoa. The bear's arms and head were added to the front of the card using Stampin' Dimensionals for extra depth. I had to use a white Signo Gel Pen to get his teeth white and then used my Basic Black Stampin' Write marker to sketch the teeth back in. The sentiment was printed from my computer on Very Vanilla cardstock. I needed several masculine birthday cards and this one fit the bill!

Toodles!

A Onsie And A Tu-Tusie...

I saw this idea for a "onesie turned tu-tu" at a craft show not long ago and knew I wanted to try it (Click on image to enlarge). The very next week Hobby Lobby had tulle on sale for half price so I knew it must be a sign. I sewed three layers of tulle around the waist and only sewed the crotch into it two times. Thank goodness for seam rippers!! After adding all three layers of tulle, which was gathered, I sewed a piece of ribbon around the top layer to give it a more finished look. The little flower on the right side is a piece of wide white grosgrain ribbon that I gathered into a circle. I added a pink flower shaped button to the center of that and sewed it on the onesie. It turned out pretty "onesie tu-tu cutsie", but I'm not sure I'll do another one unless I have requests. Hope your Sunday is just splendiferous! Thanks for stopping by and toodles!

A New Card & An Old Card

This is the NEW card. This is a combination of this week's SCS color challenge (Blue Bayou, Soft Sky, & Real Red) and Kazan's Sketch 1. I used the new "Fresh Cuts" stamp set that will be coming out in the next SU! catalog. It doesn't show in the photo, but the bold images in the stamp are covered in Dazzling Diamonds, so this is MUCH prettier in real life. The half-pearls in the centers of the flowers are from the 'Pretties Kit'.










I talked to my mom last night and asked her if she had seen the card I made to match the black and white purses I made a little over a month ago. I was just SURE that I had already uploaded this photo to my blog but, apparently, I only uploaded the photos of the purses. Well, Mom... here it is. I AM going crazy. I guess that will be a short trip, huh?? My cousin, Leslie, had asked to buy a purse from me, which is just CRAZY. She's my cousin, for goodness sake!! Anyway, when I shipped the purse to her I wanted to include a card, too, so this is what I came up with. I thought it looked pretty snazzy with that purse! Leslie loved it and that's all that matters! Love you, Les!! (I'm just checking to see if she reads my blog! ;))

Ernie has been out to potty for the last time tonight and the cats are looking like they're ready for bed. Tripod (our new bunny... remember??) is asleep in the garage and I think I should be getting ready for bed, too. Hope you had a splendiferous day!! Toodles!

Handbag Question Answered

Beth asked if I sell my handbags. Yes! Please e-mail me (jen_barrett@sbcglobal.net) for complete details on the bag you're interested in. I'm working on getting a website up and running, but it's not quite complete yet. Once it's finished, I'll provide a link to it from this page! Thanks for all your great comments and encouragement!!

It's In The Bag!

I was hoping to get more done today, but it wasn't meant to be. I made three more handbags, all three identical to this one. Black and white patterns seem to really be "in", so I thought I'd give it a stab. I hope to get some cards completed tomorrow... we'll see!

Sew Fun!

I had started this quilt within the last couple of weeks and just finished it up yesterday morning. All of the rag quilts I've made have been pastels, so the bright colors were a nice change. All fabric was purchased at JoAnn's.











My next little project, which actually went very quickly, was this handbag. I had purchased part of the fabric (the starburst pattern and the brown that was used for lining) knowing that I wanted to make a purse. The next week when the JoAnn ad came out, it showed this handbag using the same colors I had already purchased along with three other prints. Luckily, I hadn't started making my purse yet. They referenced the book that was used for this particular bag (Bag Boutique: Making Fabulous Purses and Totes by Amy Barickman) in the ad, so I jumped on Amazon and ordered it. While I was waiting for my book to arrive, I went back to JoAnn's to get the rest of the fabric prints I needed to complete the bag. I started it yesterday afternoon around 3:30 pm and was finished shortly after 7 pm. It turned out SUPER-DUPER cute. It measures 7 inches tall, 11 inches wide, and 3 inches deep - the perfect size for all the stuff I tote around on a daily basis. I LOVED making it, so there may be many more to come! Toodles!

A Lot Of Catching Up To Do...

...And I don't know that I'll get it all done tonight. I have, finally, got all my pictures from Christmas downloaded to my PC, but don't have them uploaded to my Kodak Gallery for public viewing yet. I'll be working on that over the next several days while I'm home recuperating from my tonsillectomy. That's scheduled for tomorrow morning, by the way, and I'm getting more nervous as the time gets closer. Anyway, I have several photos to share of some of the projects I made just before Christmas. This is part of the reason I couldn't find time to post to my blog!


Here are the rest of my Christmas cards for this year. I think we counted about 85 of them that went out in the mail. I had a nice assortment from these three cards and all the Christmas cards you see in previous posts. The first two cards were made using the 'Holiday Tag Team' stamp set and the third card used the 'Perfect Presentation' and 'Many Merry Messages' sets. I'll try to post more details, later, about all the colors and accessories used on these cards.









The next four photos are gifts that I made for co-workers. The first two are made by using 5 X 7 acrylic photo frames and each one accomodates a calendar and a small Post-It note pad. The ink pens were purchased at the dollar store and I just rolled a pieced of DSP and placed inside each one.


The Post-It note holders in these photos use 4 X 6 acrylic photo frames. The calendars are made from chipboard coasters and the clip boards were purchased at CVS Pharmacy. The first set uses the Fall Flowers DSP and the second uses the Outlaw DSP.


If you'd like to view any of these pictures a little more closely, you should be able to see an enlarged version by clicking on the pictures. The next three photos are the dry erase/cork boards that I made for the kids in our family this year. There were a total of six of them, but the girls' boards were all the same as were the boys'. These are made using the old wooden window frames that we had taken out of our house earlier this year. The frames were painted with a base coat of magnetic paint, so the kids can use magnets around the outside of the board. I put dry erase board (purchased in a 4' X 8' sheet at Lowe's) in the top pane and corkboard in the bottom. I stamped each of their names, using the Big Deal alphabet, on white tissue paper. The girls' names were heat embossed using Irridescent Ice embossing powder. I adhered the names to the boards using Crystal Effects. I used the 'Bold Butterfly' (retired) stamp set to stamp images around the frame in Jet Black StazOn. I then colored the images with acrylic paints. I found some cute drawer pulls at Target that I attached to the bottom of the frame. A wire mesh pencil cup, with a ribbon handle, hangs from one of the drawer pulls to hold an eraser, markers, and spare magnets. The boards for the boys were stamped using the sports themed stamp sets from SU.












The next two images are the handbags I sewed for Curt's Mom and his sister. Curt's parents spent 28 years in Taiwan as Baptist missionaries, hence the reason for the Oriental themed gifts. His sister spent her entire childhood there, so I thought they'd enjoy these.



The next set of photos is a gift box and a blank set of notecards made using the Symbols of Solicitude stamp set and some stamps I picked up at Hobby Lobby. It is near impossible to find any oriental themed designer paper, so I had to make my own. The gift box contained 12 cards, 4 each of the designs below.




I have more pictures to share of our celebrations with family this Christmas, but won't be able to get them all uploaded this evening. I'll get that done soon, though, because I know we have family members who are very anxious to see those. TTFN!

Busy, Busy, Busy...

I've been busy with projects that I haven't been able to post. My brother and his girlfriend are expecting a baby girl and his girlfriend was induced this morning. We still don't have a baby, but are expecting her anytime now. Since Tammy is confined to the hospital I know, for sure, that she isn't reading my blog so it's safe to post pictures now. These are my first sewing projects other than rag quilts or simple skirts with no zippers or buttons (just elastic in the waist). I'm VERY proud of how the diaper bag and the little accessory bag turned out. I wasn't as worried about the quilt since I've made several of those before.

The other projects I've been working on are still TOP SECRET. I will be able to show those pictures to you, hopefully, as soon as Thursday. Check back for updates!