Art, Craft, Needlework - August, 2008

[Harriet]

This is the place to report on the fun stuff!

What has your creative juices flowing this month? Do you have a new technique you're mastering? Is there a new project that you're planning? Or are you delighted to be completing some UnFinished Objects and feeling virtuous?

If you've gotten any compliments on your art, here's the place to brag! We really want to hear. If you've taken a picture you'd like to share, check out the Tips Hints forum to find the different ways to do that, and let us see. There you'll find Kathryn's "Posting Pictures" and Indiana's "Sizing Pictures Using MS Paint".

[Sadie]

I've been making oval shaped rugs out of t-shirts.

There's always a lot of well worn t-shirts around this house.

I cut the shirts into strips. I found I can just start at the bottom and go round and round making it into one very long strip which I wind up into a ball.

I have a large rug sized crochet hook which I use to crochet the strip into a rug. I handsew the next strip on and just keep crocheting. Great to do while watching TV.

So far I have made one to put in front of my tub, I'm making one for Dmom's bathroom now. Mine was the first and was a combination of colors. I have different shades of green for Dmom's.

I plan on making some more to place in areas where it is cold through the winter. Think it will be a rough winter this year.

[SuzLew]

I brought home a wood desk with cupboards and pull out boards which will be perfect in my craft room as a sewing table and scrapebook desk! It is now sitting in my livingroom and I need to figure how I can move furniture to other rooms temporarily until ds/34 eventually moves out with his girlfriend. A lot of the furniture that is to eventuallly to go in a guest room is in my craft/sewing room. Might have to store a couple pieces in my bedroom to make room! all this will be my focus today- with company coming in 9 days must get figured out!

[Twins' Mom]

This is the card I made this afternoon for the ddaughter of dfriends who is expecting her second baby. I posted in PWYC that my dkids were the ring bearer and flower girl when she got married several years ago.

IMG_1886 compressed.jpg

[sherinjoy]

Hi Twins, Your card is beautiful - I make homemade cards too but have never attempted anything so elaborate. Thanks for posting the picture. I have three birthday cards to make soon and I may get more courageous since viewing yours. I have stamping supplies also, but haven't used them much. I use scrapbooking materials mostly and stickers. Do you know about Mrs. Grossman's stickers? Her factory is nearby and I go to the warehouse sale once a year to stock up. She also sells scrapbooking materials, and the prices are very cheap at the sales.

[Twins' Mom]

Sher, thanks for the compliment! I hang out at Splitcoast Stampers a lot to get card ideas although I enjoy taking the stamp and colors I want to use and figuring out how to make it look as good as possible, lol.

I used to scrapbook a lot - was a Creative Memories Consultant way, way, back and still have a bunch of their supplies. I really need to get some scrapping mojo going and get caught up on our family photos sometime.

I've very familiar with Mrs. Grossman's because CM originally sold them before they started manufacturing their own. When my dkids were in the 8th grade, I finally gave away most of my stickers to a teacher at their school who had asked for them for a student project....I was glad that she could use them and I really wasn't "loving" them enough anymore.

I like to remind my dh that making cards is cheaper than therapy!

[Harriet]

I love crocheted rugs but have never made one. Makes my toes feel warm to think of them. Sadie are you trying to keep with color schemes with them or just having fun letting them come together as they will? Some of the prettiest I've seen are sort of haphazard looking.

OOooooo! Thank you for the lovely card picture, Twins Mom! I love getting to see other's creativity. Makes me want to get busy on my projects! Yes, therapy for sure - good for us! Mental stability through FUN!

Is LurkyLou wetting down sand yet I wonder? (Sand sculpture competition)

Is the room coming together, SuzLew?

bittersweet have you had a chance to get with your friend and pick up those supplies yet? You will have so much fun. How I love my rotary ruler.

Glad that Lisa B is back with us after technical troubles so we can hear about her quilt adventures. Lisa, as I hand-bind this quilt I think of my advice to you about hand-binding being worth it, and wonder if I knew what I was talking about! LOL! It is a little tedious but also pretty so a trade-off!

In the past few days I've machine-sewn 3rd side's binding to the quilt for baby neice, hand stitched it to the back getting the corners done neatly, and made the 4th side's binding. I have had to piece all 4 of these binding strips - the quilt was just a little too large to trust one length of 44-inch fabric even on the short sides. I did the piecing diagonally and pressed the seams open for the least bulk.

Dbil has been over here so often lately as he nervously awaits baby and wants someone to hang out with when dsil's at work (he and HRH are very close - were bachelor housemates with dstepson for many years, like "2 and a Half Men" sitcom only much less scandalous!).

I do my handwork in the living room so when I see dbil I have to keep running and hiding the quilt! LOL!

[blessedw2]

twins I LOVED your card!!! I do love seeing other peoples creative spirit too! great work

[Lisa B.]

Hi All,

Love the card Twins.

WTG on the baby quilt Harriet.

Heres a link for you with a lovely poem regarding a quilter - it made me smile:

http://www.saquilting.iblog.co.za/

[Harriet]

Oh, I am holding my sides! Absolutely ROFLOL at "Fanatic", which I have never read before.
“I spend time doing other things too. One night last week I cooked dinner.”

And "Reasons to Buy Fabric", which I may have seen some small part of once - not sure - but certainly not the whole hysterical thing. It goes right along with the treat-yourself-Tuesday title I happened to post in PWYC today.
“It is less expensive and more fun than psychiatric care.”
“It keeps without refrigeration, and you don’t have to cook it to enjoy it. Also, you never have to feed it, change it, wipe its nose, or walk it.”
”I need extra weight in the trunk of my car for traction”

Oh, me!

Here, I'm trying to follow SuzLew and get my creative space in order. We've had musical-closet-space as ds23 was able to accept some stored things and free up more space in his old walk-in closet, now dd10's, and therefore she was able to accept more stuff from her old regular closet, now my quiltmaking studio's. I had the idea that this would make a big difference for me but not so. Only the bottom of the closet was freed up (from the height of a pant-rail on down) and the upper rail is still full of clothes that belong to dd28 and dd10 both. So just two rolling storage-drawer pieces have been moved in there, and it didn't make too much difference. I'll keep working on it!