candy coated rose petals

When I stayed at my mom’s the other week for a childhood friend’s wedding that was out in the suburbs, I wanted to surprise my mom by finally making the bedroom valence she had been wanting. We had picked out the fabric ages ago, and I just need to dedicate a couple of hours to sewing it up.   [ Read more ]

I had a moment of genius craftiness tonight. I had bought this little bud vase from Crate & Barrel, unsure of what I was going to do with it exactly. I didn’t really need another vase; I was more looking for some kind of chotchke or decoration. Then it hit me: Fill the vase with itty bitty balls of sock yarn for a colorful, yet simple display. I have wanted to integrate my knitting obsession into my home decor before and this was the perfect solution. The stash afghan project lent itself well to contributing to this side project. I was able to find a home for the scraps that were too short for a row on the blanket.   [ Read more ]

My mom was jealous of the wreath I made in 2007 out of pine cones from the tree in the front yard, and requested that I make her one too. So she collected all the cones before the snow hit and as a Christmas bonding activity, we put it together. I say we, but my mom was really there for moral support. We laid out the pine cones and I really like the look of the layered cones. I then had to attach each cone to the metal ring frame. This took forever and resulted in sap covered hands. We then added these berries to give it a punch of color. I really like how it came out. Oh, and just a tip: If you have sap covered hands, use canola oil. It will break through the sap right away. Don’t try to scrub your hands to death because it just won’t work.

I updated my bulletin board by backing it with foamboard. The cardboard I originally used wasn’t thick enough to stabilize the bulletin board. So I backed it with this foamboard I had and cut it to fit.

Take a look at it all dolled up with accessories.

I rehabbed my coffee table, which was given to me by some family friends. There’s a lot of wood grain color in my living room and the competing tones was starting to drive me batty. So I painted the coffee table to go with the brown and sea foam green color scheme. Here’s a before shot:

And here’s the new and improved coffee table:

Check out these Ravelry logo earrings I was able to make. I saw someone had done this already so I figured I could do it too. Voila!

I whipped up a baby bib for a mommy-to-be at work. Isn’t it cute? ZOOOOOOM!!

Ethan also really enjoyed modeling the bib, since I don’t have a baby to try it on. I got a whole pack of these bibs from Babies R Us and I love them. It worked so great for embroidery because it has a double layer. So if you’re careful, you can work the “bad side” yarn in between the layers so you can hide it. I only messed up once.

I made a Valentine’s Day Wreath today. I wanted something for the holiday but I didn’t want to spend a lot or be limited to displaying it for a mere two weeks. I went to Joanns and found that they had their Christmas wreaths on sale for 90% off. That made it $2.99 a piece! Woohoo! I found a pretty plain wreath; all it had was some loosely attached pine cones that I cut off (and saved for a later use). Here’s the plain wreath.   [ Read more ]

I make earrings, have I told you that? Well I do. I end up liking most of what I make and feeling compelled to hold on to the pair using the argument that maybe eventually I’ll have the perfect outfit to match. Of course, eventually I’ll have the outfit to match. I’ll probably go out and buy it to justify why I’m keeping the earrings in the first place. OK, well maybe it doesn’t go that far, but it’s some what ridiculous.   [ Read more ]