Saturday's Artist

Yesterday I was reading one of my most favoritest blogs, one that incorperates unschooling and crafting, Ordinary Life Magic. Stephanie mentioned that she wanted to start doing a link party so that her readers could link to the past weeks favorite creative moment. She has titled it Saturday's Artist.

I don't normal do link parties because, well, they tend to be pretty specific and I have to think ahead about it and stuff.

I am not so great at the thinking ahead/ planning thing.

What I like about Saturday's Artist is that I can link to a post about any creative thing Emma and/or I have done during the past week.

Well yesterday, when I was reading Stephanie's post about Saturday's Artist, I knew immediately what I wanted to blog about.

It was this:

I was attempting to make a little felted wool pillow with a flower (both from recycled wool sweaters). The sweater had other plans though. After sewing up the three sides, I turned it right-side-out so that I could get ready to stuff it. I tossed the flower on the not-yet-stuffed pillow to make sure it would still fit and stopped. I could almost hear the sweater telling me, "I want to be a purse, not a boring old pillow, a PURSE!!"

I aim to please. 

I lined it with purple jersey fabric (that I kinda did backwards), tossed in a little pocket, added some store bought handles that I covered with more recycled wool, stitched on the flower and added a magnetic button closure. 

I aim to please, and boy was I pleased. This purse is my new favorite :)

Anyway, like I said, yesterday I knew exactly what I wanted to link to for the Saturday's Artist. Then today, I made this:

The above purse was made using the sleeves of a wool sweater. After I cut the bottom portion of the sleeves, I had two somewhat "V" shaped pieces left. I kept glancing at them yesterday, thinking I would like to make a hat out of them, but not really sure how it would turn out. 

Today I mustered up the courage to give it a try. I am so glad I did. I tried the hat on myself and loved how it fit (how it looked was all together a different story, but living in a cold region has made me care less about how a hat looks, and more about how warm it is). The sides came down nice and low so my ears would be covered, while the front curved up a bit so that I could still see. Jared and I decided it needed some dangling pom-pom things. I wanted to continue to use wool if possible, but I didn't really have any scraps that would work, and I didn't want to cut up a new sweater just to make pom-poms and strings. 

I also realized I was a little tired of the white color scheme. I needed more color. 

Enter some beautiful Autumn colored roving from Prarieland Herbs. It seemed like just the thing, so I grabbed my needle felting tools and the roving and got busy making some abstract art on a felt hat. 

It turned out so awesome, that Emma decided she wanted it. 

I was ok with that, it looks way better on her anyway.

(Emma wanted everyone to know she is 5)

(in this picture, Emma, wanted everyone to see what the hat looked liked with the pom-poms behind her shoulders)

I decided to make a scarf that would go with the hat, but realized doing abstract on the scarf would be difficult because there was already a pattern on that part of the sweater. 

Oh well, you win some, you loose some. 

 Emma and I created a lot of fun things this week, but this hat is my favorite. 

(edited 13Feb11- I am not sure if I added it correctly, but I wanted to have the fun little Saturday's Artist logo.) 

Wordless Wednesday

Instant Feltification - Tissue Holders

Ok, I am a big fan of little effort and big reward. Call me lazy, I am ok with that. My favorite form of crafts are the ones that take just a few minutes and end up cute and functional. This tutorial from Kris at Resweater, is the perfect example.

I bet your are thinking, "Tissue holders. What am I suppose to do with those?"

Well, my answer would be, "Put tissues in them."

Of course, if you are not someone who carries around little packs of tissues, then this won't really appeal to you. I don't typically carry them around, but these cute tissue holders might make me change my mind. I also know some other people who carry tissues around and it would be a fun little gift to surprise them with.

I mean, who wouldn't get a kick out of this fun little thing?


For the nature lovers out there, the combination of recycled wool and this fun design would be just right.


All of them a pretty fun, and they are easy to make. The star, squares, and circle ones? Emma (my 4yo) did all the needle felting on those. We had a blast! I cut the rectangles, she needle felted, I sewed them up. She loves to be able to help and she loves to use the adult tools. I figure by the end of this year she will be using my sewing machine...

Anyway, here are the individual shots of the rest I made. Already excited to make more!!






If you want to make some of these for yourself (or someone else), Kris has been nice enough to make a tutorial on her site, Resweater.

Happy Felting!!

Quick Crafty Update

I just finished updating my Ready, Set, J.E.T. blog with all the fun things we are doing here in Tucson, but I didn't want to leave out the fun and cool crafting that has been happening.

A little background; Emma and I came out to watch Livy and Myra in October. I had just taught myself to crochet and I managed to get Yvonne hooked (ha ha, pun intended as it is late and I am tired:) on crocheting. This time I was all about felting and managed to spread my excitement. Yvonne got a hold of one of my felting books, The Sweater Chop Shop, and decided she wanted to make some Ragamuffins. I think they came out awesome! I made the dinosaur and the RM with his legs crossed, Yvonne made the black and blue one. It took us a few starts and stops to get the little guys done, but we managed to finish them today (Yvonne is not as craft obsessed as I am so she felt that feeding and keeping an eye on our children was a priority :)



Yesterday I helped pack up some of the girls out grown clothes up to be shipped to their cousin. While going through the pile of clothes I found this cute little jean skirt. A little fabric liner and a fabric strap and we have a new bag.


And as promised, here are a few more pictures of the little flowers I made then added to the girls hats. Ok, so after looking at the picture again I realize that the flowers are hard to see, but the girls sure are cute!


Well, I better get to bed if I want to be rested up for tomorrows crafting!

Goodnight all!

Edited 2-16-2010 I forgot to add pictures of my first attempts at needle felting, here they are!