Make and Takes » Home Crafts

Recycled Thanksgiving Napkin Rings

Marie — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 15:43:12 +0000

I’m contributing over at Alpha Mom’s – Once Upon a Holiday again today. Come see how I’m dressing up the Thanksgiving table with these recycled napkin rings.

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Thankful Leaf Place Settings

Marie — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 10:00:35 +0000

I’ve loved this post from Quince and Quire on Leaf Drawing. Even though I don’t have her artistic touch, I decided I had to make some myself anyway, taking a Thanksgiving spin on it. I wrote the names of people who will be at our dinner table, making each leaf a place setting.

You’ll first want to collect, press, and sort your leaves. Then find a fancy pen (I love the silver ink), or you could even paint on your leaves like Geninnie’s Art, where Quince and Quire was inspired. Have fun being creative this Fall!

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Meet Some Creative “Designing Moms”

Marie — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 10:06:04 +0000

Guest Post by Cat of Designing Moms

Inspired would be one word to describe the way I feel about the company I keep at Designing Moms. There’s always a lot of crafty goodness emerging from either their studios or homes and I thought it’d be fun to share some of their recent Halloween creations.

The studio of Designing Mom Shinmin of I Dream of Cake was designed like an art gallery because her cakes are just that…artful, dreamy, and too good to be true! I have also been lucky enough to sample some of her cakes and they are as mouth-watering delicious as they look.

The festive Haunted House and Spider cakes (above) were created for the Halloween party of a client who wanted something children friendly. And the Jack-o-lantern cake was created for a Halloween wedding with a “Night of the Living Dead” theme! Some of the challenges Shinmin faced with the Jack-o-lantern cake were having to put a thin layer of black chocolate on the cakes and cutting a pattern from the outside layer of icing. “We had to do this quickly before the icing dried and then carefully place over the black chocolate in order to avoid cracking of icing.” In addition, Shinmin created a mini Jack-o-lantern cake for the bride because she was allergic to gluten. And if you’re wondering about those little berries or the stems on the pumpkins… the answer is yes, everything on those wonderful cakes are edible!

Amy is one of the three talented designers at February 13 Creative. Together with Betsy and Pamela, their collaboration in past projects inspired them to unite and become a true triple threat! Some of their designs will be featured on Robert Kaufman fabrics soon and I can’t wait to see them. On Designing Moms they are our “Make” contributors and have wowed us with “Treasure Cards” and even a “Where the Wild Things Are” Halloween costume. Above are some Halloween paper garlands that Amy fashioned with her daughter. They were inspired by the traditional paper doll chains, except that Amy chose fun motifs like bats, ghosts and candy corn.

I happen to design a stationery and custom wedding line called Cat Seto. My design assistant is passionate about the environment and so we used that as inspiration in creating our eco-friendly desk calendar. I won’t lie, trying to find 100% PCW, chlorine free papers that held the ink vividly was a bit of a challenge. It also took a lot of experimenting to find enough reclaimed lumber with the right shade and texture (our first test batches came back with so many splits and stains we must have been quite the sight standing out on the sidewalk trying to sand them down!). With some persistence we finally got it right and are so pleased we took the extra time to make sure the product remained eco-friendly.

I have a stationery and custom wedding line called Cat Seto that features my illustrations and watercolor designs. Our studios and boutique are located in San Francisco (just around the corner where the Crooked Sreet is!). I also write the blog Designing Moms which is a collective of creative moms who design for a living. The blog features daily projects, cool design finds and snippets of our lives juggling both mom and career.

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Having a Handmade Halloween?

Marie — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 10:17:05 +0000

As I’ve been scouring the internet for a Mummified costume for my son, I came up with a lot of other really great handmade costumes. My favorite are these Pippi braids, she was my favorite growing up. I think I’ll be sporting these on Saturday!

Pippi Longstocking Braids by Craftzine (pictured above)
Little Chick Costume by Little Birdie Secrets
Quick Baby Costumes by PBS Parents
DIY Superhero Cape Pattern by Floating World
Halloween Costume Round Up by Colorfly Studio

What are your kids going to be for Halloween? Do you make or buy your costumes?

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Light Up the Halloween Night

Marie — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 18:18:12 +0000

I’m contributing over at Craftzine today with a fun crafty project for lighting up Halloween night. These Paper Bag Luminaries lead the path to some scary tricks and yummy treats!

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How to Video: Crocheting a Fancy Flower

Marie — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 10:20:43 +0000

I was recently interviewed over at Todays Mama and talked about how yarn crafts are something I wish I was better at! So I’m sharing this easy to follow tutorial that I love from the Little Birdie Secrets for Crocheting a Flower. I’ve got all my supplies, some yarn and a crochet hook, and now I’m set to follow along. You will need to have a basic understanding of crocheting for this technique, but they do a great job with the video that I’m hoping my meager crocheting skills will get me through.

Aren’t these crochet flowers just to die for? Image via Little Birdie Secrets

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Little Apple Yarn Favors

Interview & Giveaway by Patricia Zapata

Marie — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 10:08:39 +0000

This giveaway is now closed. Thanks for entering. The winners of the 3 books are: Christy D, Maureen, and Ashley F. I’ll email you paper crafting winners and get you your books! Congrats!

Patricia Zapata from A Little Hut has just come out with a fabulous new craft book called, Home, Paper, Scissors: Decorative Paper Accessories for the Home. It’s full of creative paper craft tutorials to help decorate your home. This book shares ideas from paper tubes to shredded paper, all to make your house more beautiful. She has a fabulous blog where she shares even more great ideas with paper like these alphabet flash cards, recycled yarn gift tags, and tea light decorations. What Patricia can do with a toilet paper roll is ingenious. She has such simple and original ideas for crafts, she’s an inspiration to me!

I was able to ask Patricia a few questions about her love of paper and how she finds inspiration. Here’s what she had to say:

MT: When did you find you had a passion for paper?
PT: It sounds cliché but I’ve loved working with paper since I was a child. I got away from it for a while but my relatively recent crafty endeavors guided me back towards it.

MT: What materials, other than paper, are you creative with?
PT: Not many people may know this but I do enjoy knitting and crocheting. Embroidery is something that comes and goes. I don’t really sew but I enjoy using fabric for some of my projects too.

MT: Do your children craft with you? What kinds of fun things are your children coming up with?
PT: Our family crafting time comes about in a spontaneous way. Our kids enjoy drawing a lot. I make sure to carry a tote bag with drawing supplies whenever we leave the house for an extended period of time. The kids also like turning any box they come across into a house, building, car, or whatever strikes their fancy at that particular moment. My paper stash is a prime target too. (See Packaging Turned Toys!)

MT: What motivates you to craft?
PT: Working with my hands relaxes me. I get antsy if I haven’t made anything in a few days. Crafting also gives me time away from my graphic design and computer related work which further enhances my two-dimensional projects.

MT: What blogs do you go to find inspiration?
PT: There are so many! It’s really impossible to list any without thinking others should be included. The one that comes to mind right now is Inside Out. I think the variety of work that is featured, that still speaks to me in creativity and style, is what keeps me going back for more.

Thanks, Patricia, for sharing your love of crafts with us. Now on to the good part… We’re giving away 3 copies of this fabulous paper craft book! 3 books = 3 winners, wahoo! So get out your scissors and glue, as you’ll need them for all the amazing projects loaded in this crafty book.

________________________________________________________

Giveaway Entries: For your chance to win one of three Home, Paper, Scissors books, leave a comment on this post by Monday October 19th @ midnight, telling which material is your favorite to craft with! I’ll announce the winner chosen from random on Tuesday morning October 20th. Good Luck!

Extra Entries – enter a new comment for each extra telling me what you did:
- Became a facebook fan of Make and Takes
- Tweet this giveaway
- Join the Make and Takes Flickr Group
- Subscribe to Make and Takes RSS feed

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Piddix Clip Art for Crafts

Marie — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 15:38:24 +0000

I’m excited to share with you one of Make and Takes sponsors, Piddix. This fun etsy shop sells clip art images with many designs to buy, perfect for your crafting needs.

Whether you’re making a scrabble tile pendant, bottle cap art, or glass marbles, these images are the perfect size and shape. They offer sheets and CDs of images, and even postcard size designs. With one of a kind original designs, these images are ready to print out and add to your craft. They’re “high quality, royalty free images”!

Many of Piddix’s designs are given a vintage feel to make your crafts look timeless. I love these vintage Santas above, and those classic Wizard of Oz images bring back childhood memories.

So head on over to Piddix’s etsy shop and see what other fabulous designs they have to offer for your crafting needs!

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Simple Scarves to Keep you Cozy this Fall

Little Birdies — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 18:34:13 +0000

Scarves are not only functional, but super stylish. If you don’t have time (or inclination) to knit or crochet one, cut one instead. Seriously–it’s that easy.

Find a rayon/cotton knit or jersey knit–something that is soft and has a little stretch. If you find 60″ width fabric you can get four single-layer scarves out of one 2-yard piece. Fold it a couple of times length-wise so it will fit your cutting mat, then use a quilting ruler and rotary cutter to cut it in four equal pieces. The raw edges curl slightly, which gives it a finished look. WOW– four fabulous gifts in about 3 minutes–no sewing required!

For a little thicker version, cut your 2-yard length of knit fabric in half lengthwise. Then take each piece, fold it in half lengthwise, and sew it in a big rectangle, leaving a small opening to turn inside-out. You can quickly hand sew the opening closed.

For more texture, wet the scarf and twist it, securing it with rubber bands and leaving it twisted until it dried. This just gives it a wrinkled texture, which relaxes the jersey knit fabric nicely (and covers up your not-so-straight sewing!).

Little Birdie Secrets is a regular contributor to Make and Takes and was born from the crafting obsession of three friends living in the Pacific Northwest. Our mission is to share the wealth of fun projects and helpful tips we find in books, on the Internet, and sometimes in our own imaginations. Visit us at www.littlebirdiesecrets.com

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