After only 6 years....

After only six years I've completed this dress. I originally started it to wear to my cousin's wedding. I picked up the fabric at a little store in Austria while visiting my dad. I think it was a store that caters to Indian and Muslim women's fashions. I'm surprised that it even fits me after six years and a baby. It's a little snugger than I'd like but it's wearable.



The pattern is #6586 from Butterick. It was a super simple pattern so I am off to make another dress with more fabric that's been sitting around my office for far too long.

Yay for Spring!

My newest book.....

Through Craftster.com I found a new (or new to me) way to sew up a handbound book. It's called Swedish Binding. Here is my completed handsewn book.

For the covers I used an old pillowcase and the inside is covered with some scrap swiss dot fabric. I had much better luck with the glue this time.



The book is large, about 9x11, but it is going to be my "possibilities" book so I needed it to be large.



The book is sewn together with orange embroidery floss.

I made some mistakes with this book so it's good I was only planning on using it for myself. But, now I know how to do this technique so I'll be trying it again (and getting it right) for a new book soon!

Valentine Giveaway Winner

Using the List Randomizer from Random.org I have a winner for my Valentines.......Princess Golden Hair, Congratulations!

Thank you to all who entered.

Happy Valentines Day!

Need a great but cheap picture mat?

I have a GREAT tip for anyone who hates to pay for mat boards and they don't know how to cut mats:

I had my daughter's pictures done at a major dept. store and they wanted 30 bucks for a collage picture and another 20 for an ugly frame (on sale!) so I figured I'd just do it myself. When I went to find a collage frame and mat board the over-the-counter frames and mats didn't fit the size of the dept. store pictures (how convenient). But, I found my way around that!

Buy a sheet of art paper and cut out areas for the pictures. It looks just like a mat and it cost a heck of a lot less than a custom mat! $2.49 instead of $22.00! I bought an 11x14 frame from Micheal's for around $9.00 (55% off) so that's a huge savings! (I'd do the math for you but I suck at math :)

And the bonus? There was some left over room on the "mat" for a little scrap booking detail that reads: Ada 6 months (you know, to distinguish these pics from ALL the other pics around the house)



I can not take all the credit for this grand idea, however. The nice employee behind the Micheal's custom framing counter gave me the idea. Naughty her for saving me so much money!

My newest books.....

I was feeling burned out from the internet yesterday so instead I was productive! Imagine that!

I made three books using a different technique than the last book. This technique is much faster and I like the way these turned out. They are awful cute I think.

Each book uses pages from a 2005 Children's Book calendar.

The first book has a wrap around cover and a tab closure on the back. The cover is made from Martha Stewart peach cardstock. There is a picture on the front from the book A Baby Sister for Francis. On the inside I made a "second" cover from the calendar page of A Baby Sister for Francis. The text pages are made from standard copy paper - white and smooth. To see the listing and more pictures click here.





The second book is a simple little folded book with Good Night Moon for the cover. The text pages are made from resume paper so it has a little bit of grit to it. I used blue embroidery thread to sew this one up. Click here to see the listing and more pics.



The third book I did a little differently. I used the calendar page from the book Fireboat - isn't it a pretty cover? The text pages are made with the resume paper and I sewed up the spine with two colors of embroidery thread and then knotted them together to wrap around the book. The ends are secured closed with a vintage orange button. I had leftover paper from the cover and it's so pretty that I couldn't just throw it out so I made a matching matchbook to go with it. Click here to see more pics and the listing.



I had fun making these and I will surely make some more. I still have several pages left from that cute calendar.

Poor little Spider

It was so cold yesterday morning - my car said 29'! I was leaving to go visit my family and I had the baby in the car all ready to go. I started scraping at the windshield and the frost would not scrape off! So, I had to go back inside to get some water to melt the ice (there is no way I was going to freeze in my car waiting for the heater to melt the windows). On my way back to the front door I noticed this.....



Neato, huh? Poor little spider.

Ta-Da! It's finally finished!

My latest project, a Craftster.com challenge, is complete (as of Friday). It was pretty time consuming, cutting out all the paper. And it took me, I think, 7 tries to figure out how to sew the binding up (even with the diagram Theresa drew up for me). But, I completed it and I can now say that I am in love with bookbinding.

For my first book binding project I think it turned out not too bad. I had some issues with the glues so I'll have to ask around about that. But all in all not too bad. The best part is that I didn't have to spend a dime to make this. I used found objects from around my house and craft room for the materials.



The front cover of the book was made from old plastic bags that I melted into a sheet (see previous blog posts for pictures of the project in action). The plastic was mounted onto card stock and then I stitched around the edges with a decorative stitch using orange thread.


The inside cover was lined with a map of the United States, which I found in a travel brochure. The inside pages were made from brown paper lunch bags and an old scrapbook I was no longer using (and looking to get rid of). The pages alternate between paper bag and scrapbook page. Each paper bag page has a picture of a random place around the world (found from travel junk mail and magazines). The last paper bag page in each signature is for any other notes about your travels and has a saying cut from old magazines, ie: survival guide, It's a small world, dear diary and Walk On!.



There are 8 pages in each signature, 4 paper bag and 4 scrapbook, with a total of 32 pages.



The back cover is made from dark brown card stock. The book is sewn together using linen thread with the sewing technique Theresa taught me (we can't remember the name of it).

I like the way it turned out, for my first book. I'm already thinking of new books to make! Now if only we could travel so I could use it. I guess it could be my "reminiscing travel" book!