The World Surrounding Me

While I’ve been stuck at the house supervising construction workers on our bathroom, I’ve been sewing & crafting. I made two more ornaments yesterday: a star & a wreath. Wire wrapped star Tutorial found via pinterest. I didn’t have the weight of wire recommended in the tutorial, so I just used what I found around [...]

Inspired by this link I found on pinterest for swirled ornaments, I created these out of leftover acrylic paint, glitter-paint and plastic ornaments. Total cost for these 2 ornaments, plus 2 more not done yet: $4! (And, the cost would go down if I made more — $2 of that cost was the glitter-paint.) The [...]

You’ve got about 3 months until Christmas! If you (like me) are considering some hand-made Christmas gifts this year, here’s a list of free projects / tutorials you might consider, sorted by type. If I’ve made something from the tutorial, it is marked with * Any pictures included here are my finished projects. Purses, Bags [...]

If you, like me, have a blue & white color scheme on your Christmas tree and want some gift-tags to match, download this free printable PDF. Here’s a small preview of the front of the tags: Print just page 1 if you want single-sided tags, which could be used for other crafty purposes. Print both [...]

I’ve been working through my massive to-do list around the house. It had everything on it from “change light bulb in bedroom ceiling fan” to “landscape the backyard.” After reaching the milestone of having more work done than left to do (grand total will be about 135 hours of work), I’m taking a few days [...]

Matt got me a sweet birthday gift: a Kindle! He got one for his birthday, so I knew what to expect. It’s so lightweight! It’s amazing! I haven’t added many books yet, but I’m definitely looking at what I might get. I shopped around for a suitable cover for it, but most covers weighed more [...]

My friend Lisa works with the silent auction for Gateway’s women’s retreat each year. Last year, I made a few sock monsters and other goodies for the cause, which goes to pay for scholarships for those who can’t afford the retreat. This year, after I volunteered to help, Lisa suggested I make a few small [...]

I have several friends who are pregnant, so I think I can blog about this without giving away who it is for. At least I hope that the mom-to-be will act appropriately surprised when she opens it. I was too excited not to blog about it! I whipped up a matching set of various items [...]

I felt like sewing tonight. None of my many quilts & bags in-progress inspired me, so I whipped this up – a little felt ninja (inspired by some pics I found while browsing aimlessly at flickr). Clearly it’s a good ninja, since Matt is scared of it (or something, judging from his expression). See a [...]

It feels a bit like January today (at least by Austin standards) with cooler temperatures & rain. To celebrate, I finished off another scarf to send to some international students at SDSU (the one in South Dakota, of course, not the one in San Diego!). See a super-close-up here. I can picture a student wearing [...]