Cashmere Wrap

A couple of months ago I bought a large, purple, cashmere, turtleneck sweater at a garage sale for $1. Living in Florida, I knew I'd never wear the sweater even if it did fit, but it was only $1 and I knew I'd eventually find a use for it.
Last week while reading through other craft blogs, I came across this awesome project, turn a sweater into a fashionable wrap!
I followed the tutorial, and am thrilled with the results!





To make your own wrap, go over to My Mama Made It for easy to follow, step by step directions.

Crafty Cakestand

This is so easy and inexpensive to create, and makes a great Christmas present.

Take an old tarnished candlestick, (these are easy to find in thrift stores as nobody likes to polish silver or brass,) and spray paint it.



Find a pretty plate, also easy to find while thrifting, and get some silicone glue, or e6000 glue. DO NOT use hot glue, it won't hold.
Put a ring of glue around the top of the candlestick then center it on the face down plate. Let it dry 24 hours before moving.

Viola! A pretty cake stand to hold all manner of treats!

Thank You Apartment Therapy

For featuring my book page wreath.

Lanvin Inspired Bracelet

Barneys is selling this necklace, (and no those are not real pearls,) for $890.



Seriously? $890 for some ribbon and faux pearls?
I made this bracelet in about 30 minutes using supplies I had lying around.



I'm sure I could replicate the necklace completely with a trip to the craft store.
Here are the basic instructions.

I used some satin ribbon, a broken pearl necklace and thread. Next time I will use grosgrain ribbon and a strand of embroidery thread, as I think they would be better suited to the project.



I started about 12 inches from the end of the ribbon sewing the pearls on with a basic running stitch, leaving a space the size of a pearl between each bead.



back view



For my bracelet I used eight pearls



Once my pearls were on I started pulling the thread, just like you would if you were gathering fabric.



This is what it looks like all gathered



I tied a simple knot by the last pearl, at each end of the bracelet





Thats it. If I make these for gifts I will buy some jewelry findings and put a proper clasp on, but I did this on the fly, and it worked out pretty well.

Not a Craft but Creative...

My wonderfully talented daughter Megan is featured on the front page of Saveur magazine today!

Halloween Fun

I've been a bit under the weather and unable to do crafting, so I thought I'd share some of these fabulous Halloween crafts that I've found .

The first is a Halloween countdown calender from the talented, "Just a Girl." This is a great idea for a Christmas advent calender.

Photo by "Just a Girl"

Look at this adorable ghost from ArtMind. I love its happy little face. What a fun project to do with kids.

Photo by ArtMind

Check out Claudine Hellmuths' Halloween Village. So cute! (sorry no pic. her images are copyrighted.)

I'm Shaking Things Up

A lot of my crafty endeavors happen outside the craft room, and I've decided to start sharing them here. In honor of that I give you my signature drink, The Raspberry Lemon Drop Martini.




The Raspberry Lemon Drop

Ingredients:
(Makes 2 drinks)

Juice of 2-3 large lemons
4 shots Stoli raspberry vodka
1 TBS sugar + extra for the rim

Rub a little lemon juice along the edge of the martini glasses then dip onto a plate lightly coated with sugar. Shake together the ingredients with lots of ice and serve with a spear of berries.

Snap Swivel Bracelet

I know, I know, What's a snap swivel you ask. I had no idea that's what these little brass things were called. They are used on a fishing line and you can buy them in the sporting goods section of any store...and they're cheap.
I used to make these bracelets in the 80's. They were all the rage with high school kids. I like wearing them in multiples, and whats really nice, is that because they're made of brass, you can shower in them, swim in them and leave them on forever, and they still look good.

These are the swivel snaps; they come in different sizes. I'm using a size 5 which is the largest I could find. (It photographs better.)



Here is what the snap looks like.



Open the back of the snap just like a safety pin.



Hook it to the ring part of another snap. You can make a bracelet just by hooking a bunch of snaps together, but I like to add seed beads.




Here I've added seed beads and closed the snap.



Continue until you get a bracelet that fits around your wrist. Pretty isn't it?



I decided to take it a step further and add some larger beads.



The end product looked like this. (I hadn't attached all the large beads yet, but my light was fading.)



You can use the snap as your bracelet closure, but you'll probably need someones help closing it. I would suggest adding a regular clasp to make things easier on yourself.

Felted Wool Flowers

Here is a photo of the headband being worn by daughter, who was not so keen on having her picture taken...so I snuck up on her. Its the best I could do. Sadly, my photographic skills lack compared to hers. She took the amazing photo, and made my new banner. Check out her other work here.



The inspiration for these roses came from two different sites. the first was Creature Comforts and her tutorial for a paper flower. I made some from paper, and then saw that Betz White had used the same technique on felted wool. The first step is to cut a circle out of your wool.


Starting on the outside edge, start cutting towards the center, making a spiral.



Beginning at the outside of the spiral, start rolling the wool up forming your flower.





I always end up with a tail on the bottom of my flower and I just snip it off with my scissors.


I had been sewing the layers of wool together with neat little stitches, but now just glue them together using a hot glue gun. I all so used the glue gun to attach the flowers to my headband.



Tada! Thats it, you've made a flower!

Felted Sweater Headband.

While I don't wear headbands myself, (I have very short hair,) my daughters do wear them and I wanted to make a fall-ish headband for Megan.


The first step was to cut a strip of wool from the bottom of one of my felted sweaters.


Then I trimmed it to 16 1/2" long by 1 1/2" wide. I then tapered the ends by folding the wool in half and measuring down an inch I cut the corners off. (Please excuse my ragged crafters cuticles.)



I then cut 5" of elastic to make the stretchy part of the headband.


With matching thread I made two little rows of stitches to attach the elastic to the ends of the wool.


Then came the fun part. Embellishing. I made a bunch of felted wool flowers and attached them with a glue gun. I stuck a few pearly buttons in too, to brighten things up.


I did a little embroidery on the band as well.


And here we have the finished product. Honestly, the purple flowers looked better in my head than they do in reality, but my Megan deemed it cute, so I'm happy. More importantly, she loves how soft and comfortable the headband is to wear.