Iron Craft: April Showers in December- sure why not?

My daughter and I had some fun over this past weekend making these pins and barettes.  I had saved some really cheapo hair bands that had these cute little flowers on them with ladybugs as well.  The hair band became very stretched out really fast.  I could not part with those cute little buttons that were on there so I have been saving them.  And since the order of the day since last January is to use up what I have or get rid of it.... it was the perfect time to use them.  Didnt they come out cute.  So glad I saved them.

Since it is bring back one of your favorite Iron Challenges or do one you missed I figured I'd better get an Iron Craft post on my blog.  I chose April Showers- flowers!  Thank you for doing the Iron Craft.  Ladies I apologize for missing so many weeks but I will do better in 2012.  I am so joining Iron Craft again.

Secret Santa Was Very Good To Me

Our Quilting Bee had a Secret Santa gift exchange for those who wanted to participate.  I joined in.  These things always makes me nervous because I always worry the person will not like my gift.  I will share what I gave on the next post.  I did receive an amazing gift from someone in the Bee that I happen to be friends with.  That girl, M, knows what I like.  She knows I adore Kaffe Fasset's fabric.  She knows I love scraps and she heard me talking about my desire to do Mariners Compass Star.  Dang, she is good.

She made this adorable little duffel, that I totally need to get the pattern for.  Is she amazing or what?  Perfectly sewn!  You rock M!

And being the smart and wonderful person she is, she added chocolate.  Love it!  Mint chocolate happens to be my all time favorite chocolate combination!

Then she cut 10 inch strips down the length of her fabric and rolled them all together.  Layer cake?  Is that right?  I am still new to these terms. Aren't they luscious?

10 inch square cuts of fabrics.  Totally delicious as well.  I am so loving these.  I will have to just sit back and admire all this stuff for a while.

And finally this great pattern which I hope to work together with M on.  She has a pattern as well.  I like that M- one for you, one for me.

And let's not forget that really cute gift basket.  It's a drum shape.  Don't you love it?  I do!

O Christmas Tree

 

I made a few of these at the beginning of the month.  I wanted to post them for one of the Iron Craft challenges but I was afraid the people I was giving them to would see them.  

The original pattern called for a smaller border around and the tree ended up touching the sides. (See picture below). I did not like that so I made the border a bit bigger.  Other than that it was an extremely fun tree to put together.  This is my first time with an applique pattern and really I was surprised at how much I enjoyed it.  

Here is the other one I made.  The pattern is from Patch Abilities.  MM312 Funky Tree

Photography by Cynthia Starr

A couple months ago my husbands cousin and his girlfriend came to our house for a visit.  Cynthia Starr, the girlfriend, is a professional photographer.  She does weddings, school pictures, family photos, the whole gambit.  I wanted to share with you a couple of her photos as they related to my blog.  They are so crisp and vibrant.  I just love the thread one.  The pop of color is so attractive. 

If you live around the area of Kingston, NY and are in need of a photographer she is your girl!  You can click on the link above to go to her home page or you can click here for her blog.  (If you are curious about the pin cushion/caddy, click here for the link of how I made it).

Here are some photos of my kids.  She took some really nice shots but I do not like to show my kids pictures on my blog. Believe me there are times when I really want to post photos of them.

A Bird in the Hand

A bird or two or three or four ( I am so addicted there probably will be more).  I can't stop making these pretty little birds.  I saw them on DIY with Kim and Chris, printed out the instructions (you can find it here) and have been goin' crazy with scraps.  I think I sew more with my scraps then I do with my collection of fabrics.  Well, no, I know I sew more with my scraps.

So here are some of my little chickadees.

Tomato Cage Christmas Tree

Saw this great idea for tomato cage trees on Pinterest.  It's P. Allen Smiths idea.  Check out his video.

It was such a great idea, I just had to do it.  He suggests using what you have lay around.  I did not have most of this stuff laying around unfortunately but in a series of good twists of fate, I managed to find stuff and do it rather cheaply.  I made these for a total of 34 dollars.  17.50 per tree.  Not too shabby.

On my way to Walmart, where I thought I'd find some good prices.  Um, not so much.  I did buy to 16.5 inch large pots for 15 dollars per pot.  Yup.  I thought this was going to rack up the dollars since I was starting here.  On the way home, swear to God, there, on the side of the road, someone was throwing away two large, stone colored pots.  They are a bit weathered but I figured who was going to notice after I got all the decorations on them.  I returned the pots that I had bought from Walmart.  Cha ching! So far zero.

Then I thought I'd check out the local Garden Factory, who tend to be a bit pricey but I needed to get dirt anyhow.  Just so happened that there pretty fancy garland was on sale for a dollar- and to think they wanted 5.99 and that other store.

The pine garland was the most expensive part of this whole deal- 12 dollars per strand.

See the phone there.  That my moment of "oh my goodness, I think I may have to go back and buy more pine garland".  I wrapped the tree tighter and everything worked out.

I still want to hang some lights on it and some decorations but this is what I have so far.

Iron Craft Challenge: Conquer Your Fear

Here is something that I have been wanting to try and was somewhat ambivalent about because of my fear.   Fabric Dying.  I have seen it before with lots of cool ideas... snow dying salt dying, etc.  Over the weekend I went to a retreat.  One of the ladies in our group gave a class on fabric dying. I joined to give it a go as it is much easier to jump into something you are afraid about with someone holding your hand- is it not?

I still wasn't quite sure about it.  Silly me.  I LOVED it.  While I do not have tons of money to jump right out and buy some dyes, I will be open to classes in the future.  I think I may do some natural dying- beets and all and see what I came up with.

We used a cotton that is prepared or shall I say not prepared for dying (called PFD).  It is natural cotton fabric without dyes or sizing or anything like that.  If you use a Kona cotton for example, you will have to scour it to get any chemicals off of it that might be present.