Things You Should Know About: Free Pattern Fridays at Craftsy

A while back I blogged about how much I loved Craftsy. I still love it and it keeps getting better all the time.

They have a blog as well and they always have a post called "Free Pattern Friday" were, as you can guess you get FREE patterns on Friday! Yay!

These patterns can range from sewing to cooking and they are all free: the only downside is you MUST get them on Friday or say good-bye to free.

Check out this weeks Free Pattern Friday

Things You Should Know About: Daily Embroidery

This is a neat site that you need to know about! It is a site where you can get a FREE embroidery design everyday!  How awesome is that?

I love most of the designs that they put out. Plus, the designs come in a variety of formats and in multiple sizes so format and size aren't a problem!

You do need to have an embroidery machine however. But if you love sewing that shouldn't be too big of a problem. ;)

Get a FREE design today!

Crafty Time! Chairs

Today I wanted to share one of my projects with everybody. I was out walking our dog the other day. And I noticed a couple of red chairs. These types of chairs were those that are lawn chairs for children. I was praying for some new plastic chairs for my Sunday school class and I was really happy to find these. The looked a little worse for the wear but nothing that a little soap and paint couldn't fix.

 

 

Here are the before photos

 

Then we washed them

 

After they were washed we let them dry, then we spray painted. This is my sister helping me paint.

 

And the finished project, all it took was a little time and now I have brand-new looking chairs for my Sunday school classroom!

Like you need another craft!!!

Happy Thursday everyone!

I was reading one of my favorite blogs, Blue Eyed Beauty Blog, and she said that she is going to be posting for a new blog called Refashion Co-op!

The lady who writes Blue Eyed Beauty Blog often blogs about all the re-fashions she has done. So I thought that this would be great to show those of you out there that like to craft and be fashionable.

Basically re-fashion is when you take an old garment, say that shirt that has gotten to be too small, and make it into something new, like a fancy vest or something.

I know it isn't like you really need more crafts to do, because I certainty don't but hey, it can't hurt to look. Right? Well...anyway, it might not hurt some of you but I thought that taking a peek at both of these could get those creative juices flowing. Whether or not you like to re-fashion clothing!

I just hope I don't spend to many hours on these sites. ;)

Crafty Time: Swirly scarf and Craft Warehouse

So on Saturday I was shopping in Boise. It was a lot of fun, partly because I love to shop and partly because I got to go with my aunts.

First off, my parents, Aunt Jewel (who's going to have a baby. YAY!) and I went to the Youth Ranch Distribution Center and got to get stuff by the pound. Which at first I wasn't sure if I should pick anything up but I eventually got over it and found a bunch of cute things. Then we met up with my Aunt Priscilla and Uncle Tom to have lunch. Mom and Dad picked up Emily and Grace from the hotel since Emily had stayed since she still wasn't feeling great, and I went with Jewel. We had Idaho Pizza, which isn't my favorite, but this time it was really good. We ended up talking so long that Grace fell asleep at the table. Then after that Jewel, Priscilla, my Mom and I went to Craft Warehouse.

IT WAS AWESOME!!!!!

No seriously, it was epic. The are like a crack dealer for the crafty people. They have all sorts of crafty things, projects and a plethora of other things. Awesome. It was a lot of fun. They also have examples of neat crafts that other people have done. One of my favorites was the ones with melted crayons. Below is an example. I just thought that it looked really neat. All you have to do is have a canvas, crayons, glue (to hold the crayons), and a hairdryer (or, I have also heard that some people simply set them out in the sun.) But doesn't it look neat?

Anyway, there were a bunch of other crafty things. I also got this frog that "grows" in the water for my Sunday School kids. They're going to love it. It should grow to be about a foot tall or more. I have done some of the grow things before but they have generally been the tiny ones, so this one should be exciting.

One of the other project examples they had was one of those "swirly" scarfs (see picture below). I have been wanting one for a long time, and I heard that they are fairly easy to make so I grabbed two skeins of yarn and decided that I was going to make myself one. I will post a picture of it when I get it finished. Super excited about that and I got some help from Emma, my friend, and I have one half way done and I've only been working on it for about a day. YAY! I can finally have my own swirly scarf!

Anyway, I have finished 3 out of my 4 finals and so I will be done with school soon. Yay! Then I can post a lot more on my blog here and do a lot more crafts.

P.S. So can't you see why Craft Warehouse is addicting???

Up, up and away craftsters.

Great Deal at Michael's

My mother needed something from Michael's and I had two 50% off coupons from Joann's (they all take competitor coupons). So we went in and started shopping. Mom got a wall hangy thing that looks like a birdcage and some other things. I got a couple of poster board for some green screen effects that we are going to do in my multimedia production class and then I asked her if we could look at the clearance section just because you never know what you'll find.

They must of been having a huge sale or new inventory because most of the home decor stuff was 40% or 50% off. I saw a lot of things that I wanted. Not that I needed them, mind you but they sure were cute. Then I saw two little owls as salt and pepper shakers. They were originally $6 but they were 50% off so I got them for $3! How awesome is that?

I don't normally shop at Michael's a lot, just from the fact that it is kind-of out of the way but I was glad that I went today.

 

Awwww...aren't they cute??? (They aren't as bright as that but I think the color is a little off from the camera flash.)

What did you buy or wish you could buy recently? Leave a Comment!

Crafty napkin project!

The other day, I bought a bunch of napkins at the Youth Ranch (thrift store for those of you unlucky enough not to have one-I don't think that that is a lot of you though). I thought that they would be a nice cheap project since 4-8 napkins cost about a dollar and a half or so. And I also thought that they would be fairly easy to embroider on with my machine.

And they were, so here is a craft idea for all you crafty people out there.

First buy some napkins, I bought some that were bright green, off white, bright orange, and a few in pastel yellow.

Next put some stabilizer on the back of where you want to sew. I generally like my napkins and dish towels to have them angled into the corner. I also tend to use two layers of fuse and tear stabilizer on the napkins and other thin projects like them.

Next embroider your heart out!! 

Side note-I discovered the other day that I have over 80 embroider patterns! Wow, when did I get so many????

Anyway, here are a few pictures to give you the idea.

Here is a picture of the stabilizer

 

 

Sewing the pattern on

 

 

Finished Product

(Design from Embroidery Library: which by the way has a couple free designs every month and usually on holidays as well, here is the link http://www.emblibrary.com/EL/default.aspx)

 

So now I have a set of apples, elephants, and a chef type guy.

 

Questions? Comments? Leave them in the comment section!

 

 

 

 

 

Crafty Peacock Project

I have an embroidery machine. It is really awesome. I was very blessed and got one for a good price from a lady on Craigslist. It is a Babylock Sophia 2 and it is amazing. I usually get most of my designs that I use for free. Some of the great sites for designs that aren't free are at http://lynniepinnie.com/shop/index.php and at http://www.designsbyjuju.com/. They're great places to get you started.

I think that the best feature on both of these websites are the wishlist feature. Otherwise, I probably living in a cardboard box in City Park. Seriously, it's so easy to get carried away at these shops. I even have trouble at the Twin Falls Sewing Center. I am a craft addict so I would know. ;)

Anyway, back to my story. I love my embriodery machine, it is just that I have quite a back log of projects. My mother had asked me before Thanksgiving last year to embroider a design on her jacket. Well, being the deadline driven person that I am I put it off for a long time beacause it wasn't something that needed done right away. So there the jacket sat, alone and wrinkled in a basket on my sewing desk. I had asked mom if there was a certain thing that she wanted but she said that she didn't care, to "just make it look good".  Okayyyyyy...I thought, well.......hmmm... As you can tell, I knew immediatly what I was going to do and got it done shortly. Nope.

So the the last couple of weekends I have been slowly working on this project. I used the peacock design from Lynnie Pennie and then I added some hot-fix crystals. And finally I got it done.

My mother really loved it and I hope you like it as well.

The complete outfit

 

 

 A litte bling for the front two pockets

 

 

 A hair clip she owns that matches the jacket

A close up view of the finished project



FIRST BLINGY THINGY

I made my first bling project!! It was AWESOME!!! My sister has a long shirt-p.j. style that my mom wanted me to make an embriodery design on.

The shirt was red and it was around Christmas time (o.k., technically after Christmas, but hey! we had family dinners and all that going on.) so I decided to put a snowflake on the knee area in the front and three little snowflakes in the back.

So I finished the snowflake with my sewing machine and then I put the crystals on it and this is how it turned out.

 

Pretty good I think!