Finishes…

Over the weekend I finished this wool felt candle mat. I had purchased the kit a few years ago – using the birthday money I received from you Mary :) . While cleaning and sorting I came across it again and wondered “why didn’t I ever finish this”? I had cut out all the pieces and just never sewn it up. I soon realized why – I had cut the mat smaller than it should have been. I vaguely remember copying the pattern with my printer and not realizing it was on “reduce” and being frustrated. But – it is a time to use what I have and boy am I glad I did! I love how this turned out! Now I’ll pack it into the Christmas box and be surprised all over again next Christmas lol!

During the Super Bowl (that I watch for the commercials) I sorted out my beads into this suitcase. (I pulled this awesome suitcase out of a DUMPSTER!)

Everything fits in there really well! Because I have a hard time getting rid of anything I even kept my “ugly beads” – you never know when they can be used for something else…or covered with polymer clay…

I love those clear plastic boxes for sorting things. In “my jury-rigged life” I even use the broken ones…

This will sit in my drawer and keep my costume jewelry all nice and sorted. They stack nicely too. Look at these beauties – the first three pictures were rescued from a dumpster…so sad!

And these pins were given to me by my Great Grandmother Bestemor -

Back in the eighties we would button our shirts all the way up and wear a pin at the neck…so she gave me the purple one and the roadrunner to my sister…I wonder if she knows I’ve “kept it safe” for her these past 25 years…

Happy Crafting!!

Beeswax and honey soap

Here is one thing I did with the processed beeswax. I made some beeswax and honey glycerin soap. I poured the soap into a little honey hive candle mold I had – perfect! (Why I don’t get rid of things!) I packaged this little soap and a few others to give to the people who gave me the wax and the most beautiful honey you’ve ever seen. I used a recipe similar to one of these.

(Cell phone picture – my camera batteries are currently powering a wii controler!) Isn’t this little bag cute! I got a pack of 10 at Michael’s for a dollar! This is the easiest way to wrap something…I love using little bags.

I’ve also been mending. Darning. Here is one example. These are my husband’s boiled wool hunting pants. He’s HARD on them! I’ve spent about 2 hours darning various holes all over the darn things. And the holes aren’t in convenient places…not getting in there with the sewing machine! This hole is right under the pocket and along the (super bulky) seam and then goes a little further down. Argh! Well, I’ve done the best I can.

At least I have the proper tools. I keep all my darning supplies in an old treadle sewing machine drawer. I purchased the darning egg at a local antique store for about 10 dollars. It has a metal cuff that holds the socks in place. All the darning yarn I’ve picked up at thrift stores for pennies, and my Grandma has been giving me hers. It’s becoming quite a collection! I’ve also been darning socks. We all got new socks and then my dryer ate them! Brand new socks!!! The dryer tore holes in several pairs so I’ve been darning them up. It’s actually kind of fun.

Well, that’s it for now. I have a whole crafting palooza planned soon – I’m going to really make a mess around here and hopefully finish up some old projects and start some new ones. I plan to take a week and really tear into them.

Happy Crafting!!!

Pillowcases

 

I actually sewed last week! (Julie made some pouches and I realized it’s been a loooong time since I sewed…thanks for the encouragement Julie! I even used my serger…which made these go together SUPER FAST!) I made  these pillowcases. I’ve been hoarding thrifted sheets for a long time now and…not using them. Well, that’s enough of that. The sheets used to make the cases on the ends was sooooo soft and made wonderful pillowcases. The one in the middle is also soft but not quite as soft as the other. I love thrifted sheets because the quality is usually better than what I find in the stores. Also, I’ve noticed with newer sheets there is always a “chemical” smell in them. I can wash them ten different ways but they always smell “chemically”. It’s got to be some fire retardant something they put on them. Well, these smell like fresh sunshine!

Also, my dryer is eating my clothes so I’ve stopped using it. So this is how I’m keeping up with laundry now -

 

I have the clothesline you see the pillowcases hanging from, and a drying rack on my back deck and this clothes rack on the deck. If I hang the clothes on a hanger and leave a little room between each garment I can get a lot of clothes dried at once!! I match the socks before I clip them to that blue thing you can barely see on the end. So aside from having to hang the towels it’s not much different than when I did have a working dryer. The socks have to get matched anyways and the clothes have to get hung anyways. Then I bring them in at the end of the day and leave each kid’s pile on their kitchen chair. When the weather is bad I move the racks to the basement where I always have a dehumidifier always going in the summer and I turn on a fan. The only tricky part is blankets (if we have rainy weather) although I think they would dry just fine in the basement too, and there’s a Laundromat about 4 blocks from my house in case of emergency. I’m thinking about how to put a rail on the outside of my deck railing to hang clothes from – they could hang between the pickets…and it would be permanent. Or maybe something attached to the house that’s on a hinge and can fold down…well we’ll see. I’m still going to get a dryer but I’m not in a big hurry anymore. I can wait an find the right one at the right price. And I probably won’t use it as much as I used to!

Happy Crafting!!!

PS: I’m waiting for pictures from Grandma Mary before I blog about the Graduation party – it was an awesome day!!!

Score!!!

Well, it’s been another busy week. One day I had to go to Brainerd to open-enroll Abby for the next school year. More on that in another post. One day I had to take Abby to the doctor to have a sports-physical so she can participate in the Special Olympics next week. One day I had to take Abby to the water park where they were signing up for Girl Scouts again. (Our troop surprised Abby with a lifetime membership to Girl Scouts as a graduation gift!) I also had to go to our church and pick up some fleece panels and bring them home and tie them for a blanket that will be presented to her in church on Sunday (we are also coffee servers that day). Well, while at church I saw them setting up for a rummage sale! Everything was .50 cents! Here are some of my bargains!!!

I like to have some sort of candle holders out in the summer months because when severe weather hits you don’t have to worry about batteries…and our power goes out during storms a few times a year. I’ll put a “frog” in the bowl of this add some flowers and have a lovely way to display candles. I found it on ebay for 29.99 plus shipping. I paid .50 cents. It’s silver plate.

Boy the colors got all wonky in the photo but this is a knitted and felted bag!!! I got three!!!!! Triple score!!!!!!!! I’m so excited because the knitting shop where I teach needle felting classes wants to do a class on embellishing bags…and I didn’t have any. Well now I do! I already had some flowers made up and just threw them on to see if the colors matched and they do -

Here are the colors a little better. I can’t wait to see this finished.

Here are the other two black bags. The biggest problem I have now is trying to narrow down my ideas. I want to embellish these about 50 different ways…. We’ll have to wait and see. lol! It will be so much better to have samples to show!

Then I went to the dump last week and this basket was laying right on top. Nothing. Wrong. With. It! I’m keeping my roving in it for now…looks a lot better at the game table than the messy pile I had going on before. Oh – and that little wooden bowl the gnomes are in came from the church sale too.

I pulled this little beauty out of the garbage. I’ve found it on ebay for $45.00 plus shipping.

This beautiful vase came out of the garbage too. And the flowers were given to Abby at school the day after the mass band concert. They were given to her by her band instructor. She felt so bad about forgetting Abby. She called and sincerely apologized. It’s all mostly OK. And thank you all for your kind words and emails. It really helped!!!

If you want to see more of my thrifted finds you can check out my pinboard on Pinterest. I’m slowly compiling a list of things I’ve found and what I paid and what they are worth. I figure someday somebody in my family might be interested …

Happy Crafting and have a great weekend!!! Ours is going to be busy -

Craft Funny…

We will have to make do with some cruddy pictures…there is no sunshine to speak of here. I do however have a house, unlike many who lived through tornados over the weekend…God Bless you all!!!

I saw this idea for a succulent ball and really loved it. Had to try it. I picked up two mini hanging baskets with coconut liners at my local Dollar Store and was raring to go! Heck, I even thought they would make great Mother’s Day presents. Mothers, be glad I didn’t follow through…cause this is what you would have ended up with! Here is how it is supposed to look!

In my defense, I didn’t want to add any more Hen and Chicks until I knew they would root in the coconut liner. Cause that sucker is so thick the roots don’t even touch the dirt inside. The dirt that got everywhere when I tried to put the two halves of the baskets together…right before company was coming…in the kitchen…sheesh! It’s been a few days now and they haven’t blown off so maybe I’ll add some more…or maybe I’ll just plant them in the garden and try again next year! Click on the picture to be taken to the link if you are brave enough to make your own…

Over the weekend I got to go to a few garage sales. At one there was an awesome table of free stuff and I picked up:

and

I can’t wait for Valentine’s Day to set up the centerpiece, it looks as though it has never been used! And the bottom picture is an embroidery patterns that includes the fabric and floss. It is printed in another language so I’ve been trying to figure out which embroidery floss goes where…I think I have it. It will really brighten up my office when it is done…I love orange!

Happy Crafting!