Angry Bird Ornaments

I was looking online for Angry Bird ideas a few months ago, and one of the blogs I found has a lot of Angry Birds tutorials!  Obsessively Stitching has made everything from blanket appliques to plushies (I made one but forgot to take a picture before we gave it as a gift - but I'm going to make more, so you'll see them then.) to ornaments!  And these ornaments are billed as a Dollar Store Craft.  The ornaments can be found at Dollar Tree for, you guessed it, a dollar.  The paints are cheap - I actually had to buy a small tube of black paint, because apparently despite all of our weird color combinations for painting ornaments, we've never used black.  You need one sheet of red felt and one of white, and some white pom-poms for the Santa hats.

And voila!

I have admittedly no artistic skill, but I think these are still recognizable.  And quite hilarious!  I bought a tube of plastic Christmas ornaments, and I think there were fifteen in it, so I have five sets in progress.  We're definitely sharing these with friends!

Christmas is coming....

....which means that I need more tree ornaments! My friend was in town this weekend, and we love to paint ornaments, so consequently, Hobby Lobby got more of our money. (The ornaments were 40% off, too!) This time, we got some of the frosted and iridescent ones to try. The top picture (mini size - comes 20 in a box) are the iridescent finish. I wasn't sure about those, but I really like how they turned out. I do think that the more pastel or muted colors look best in these, however.

This picture shows the frosted finish (regular size). I wasn't sure about these, either, but I think they look nice. The frosted finish makes the colors look more muted. However, I'd say that this is probably my least favorite of the three. There's just something about glossy glass ornaments that seems "correct."
And then the usual - regular size, clear glass.

We tried out some shades of brown in these batches, and I have to say that I really like it. The brown seems to go well with greens and yellows/oranges. Very cool! I think that by the time we're done, we'll probably have tried out all the colors available! (Except maybe the bright pinks....I'm not big on pink, especially not on my tree...)

Thing 1 loves to "help" with these - he'll pick out the ornament to be painted next, and he'll pick out colors to try together. He gets more excited than we do about painting the ornaments! This is good, though, as I foresee sets of ornaments working well as teacher presents. Not only are these just cool in and of themselves, I think that they'll be even more special for the teachers when he says that he helped make them. Guess I'll have to find some pretty boxes or bags to package them.

More Christmas in April!

I think that these turned out rather nice! The top picture shows the large ornaments, and the bottom one shows the mini ornaments. We had a lot of fun painting these, and we plan to do more the next time my friend comes to visit. (The mini ornament that is second from the right in the bottom row was Thing 1's doing - but the color combination really grew on me.) The tutorial at StacySews is very good, and I would only offer a couple of additions to it. The first is that after cleaning out the ornaments with vinegar, you can make sure that they are dry by putting them in the oven at 180 or 200 F for about 10-15 minutes before getting ready to paint. (Even after I've had them draining for a day or two, I sometimes still have a drop or so of moisture inside. This takes care of it.) The second can be inferred by the photos - use muffin tins to hold your ornaments! My mini ornaments fit great in mini muffin tins, and the large one fit great in the regular muffin tins. I set them in these to bake out the moisture as mentioned above and also when I think they're about done drying after painting (I'll leave them like this for a few days before I put the tops back on).

Cross Stitched Ornaments!

A few months back, I found a delightful cross-stitch shop on Etsy - Canadian Stitchery! They have wooden blanks that you cross stitch designs onto. Most of the ones I bought were ugly Christmas sweaters, but I also found a few other cute ones.

This one made its way into The Husband's stocking this year - seemed the most fitting for him.

The sheep was a birthday gift for a friend, so that it would be there in time to put on her tree. She loves sheep, so it was perfect. (This was actually in the Easter ornament section, but who cares?)

My grandma is a quilter, so I figured she'd appreciate the quilted star.

This dinosaur was for ME! I just thought it was hilarious.

For Thing 1, who loves penguins.

 And for Thing 2, because it was just funny. Everyone seemed to enjoy the ornaments in their stockings.

Christmas in April?

I have a friend in town for the weekend, and we are having fun painting Christmas ornaments. (Talk about ridiculously early, I know!) I was inspired around New Year's by StacySews, and I made these at the time:




This weekend we're having fun experimenting with more non-traditional colors, like shades of blue, purple, and yellow. But we're still having fun! And we'll display these proudly on our trees. Thing 1 enjoys helping, too - he chooses colors for each ornament and provides the proper "oohs" and "ahhs" - always important, right?

I'll post pictures of the new ornaments when they're dry.

Nothing has been happening....

at least not on the sewing front. Bummer! But all is not lost! Thing 1 helped me to create some very interesting glass ornaments last week - pictures will be forthcoming soon. (These are definitely not traditional colors!) And I am taking Friday off to sew. Yep, that's right. Taking a day off work to work on stuff at home! I'll probably take breaks through the day to clean the bathrooms, but I'm planning to get lots of stuff done. For starters, I plan to cut out ten scrub shirts. All but two can be made with black thread in the serger. (The last two can wait until a bit later.) I also have 7 pairs of boxers, 4 pairs of PJ pants, and maybe 3 pairs of sweatpants to cut - all of these can also be made with the black thread. And I have another pillowcase to cut out - I'll have to doublecheck, but I think I can use the black there, too.

No, I don't expect to get anywhere near all of this done on Friday, but I'd like to get it all cut and get a good chunk of the scrub shirts sewn. In fact, I'd really be happy to just cut all the scrub shirts and maybe even get the 8 completely sewn. But I'm not sure that's possible. However, I do have the weekend, too, since I'm not on call. Things 1&2 will be at daycare Friday, so that I can get more done, but of course they'll be home all weekend, so that will slow down the sewing. But we'll see! Realistically, the scrubs need to be finished first (and before Christmas) so that they can be given out on Friday the 21st - our last regular work day before Christmas. After that, deadlines are more relaxed. I'm not expecting to get much out in the mail before Christmas, so I can finish things up during Christmas and let people prolong the joy of the season. :)

Some UFOs finally done!

Thing 1 loves sharks. He has been obsessed for the last two years - ever since we watched an old (we're talking 20 years or so) National Geographic special on sharks. So when I saw this fabric at JAF last summer, I thought it would be perfect for him for some pants and shorts. I bought it in June and cut the pieces out in October, I think. (It may have been even earlier!) Well, this past weekend, I finally sewed them up. How embarrassing! But Thing 1 is thrilled and has worn the pants twice now - which also means that they need to be washed. :) I did not insert the waist elastic into the shorts. I'm waiting on those until we hit late spring/summer, and I can evaluate 1). whether they'll still fit Thing 1 and 2). what length elastic he'll need. In the meantime, I'm still counting them both as done!

I also painted more Christmas ornaments, but they aren't dry yet, so no pictures. Thing 1 got very excited when he saw me get the paints out - he left his toys and ran right over to "help." :) I do think that, despite the unique color combinations, people like them even better when I tell them that Thing 1 did them with me.

Also working on another UFO - this one from August - an Amy Butler swing bag. I hope to post a picture by this weekend. I serge-finished all the pieces except the straps - figured that might be too bulky. Now I need to start putting the lining and outer pieces together. I don't think it'll take too long once I get to it, but I keep getting emergency calls.

Stockings!

It's time to be decorating for Christmas - some would say past time! - and I had the sudden realization that we'll be at our own home this Christmas, and that stockings should be hung over the fireplace. And then I remembered that my boys do not have their own Christmas stockings! Fortunately, I had requested the Burlap Christmas Stocking pattern from StudioCherie as my prize for entering the ThinkPink contest at PatternReview. So I got to work on new stockings for the entire family!

The pattern, as you may have guessed, calls for the front to be made from burlap. The "cuff" on the front, as well as the entire back, is made from the fashion fabric, and the lining is from a broadcloth to match the burlap. I want to be able to wash these through the years (we live with a cat and a dog), so I chose a linen blend instead of the burlap. And I ended up with a tan muslin instead of broadcloth, just because it coordinated better and was on sale. And I love the results!

The pattern describes how to do appliques on the stocking fronts, though it doesn't contain any applique patterns. The ornaments on the stocking on the far right are from the fabric used for the cuff and back. The two snowmen are from a wall hanging pattern in McCalls Quick Quilts (Dec/Jan 2012). And the penguin on the left was adapted from the fashion fabric - I scanned the fabric in, cropped out the penguin, and then blew up the image large enough for my purposes. My boys are going to be very excited when they see these!

Silly me!

Who was I to think that I could get all that much done yesterday, even with a day off? I should know better! I did get a lot done - just no sewing. :( I ran some errands in the morning, including a visit to Hobby Lobby for more glass ornaments (they were 50% off this week!). And I finally made it to the crisis pregnancy center to drop off a bag of maternity clothes that have been in my trunk for at least a month. Yay!

However, what it really boiled down to is this: I needed to have a prep day before a giant sewing day. So I did get a lot accomplished in terms of pressing and cutting fabric. I have two pairs of PJ pants (and I'm still debating on washing another piece and cutting another pair), five pairs of boxers, and nine scrub shirts cut. One of the PJ pants, two or three of the boxers, and all but one of the scrub shirts will be made using black serger thread. Once I'm through all that, I'll switch to white. Hopefully I can get a good start sewing today!

Portable Rink Projects

When you spend hours upon hours at the hockey rink on a weekly basis, you need a portable project to work on. First it was the cross stitched ornaments. Then I got cold, so I started doing fleece blankets. These are pretty simple - 2 yards of 56-60" wide fleece for adults, 1.5 yards for kids. I wash the fleece, straighten the edges, and curve the corners using a dinner plate as a template. Then I serge the edges to make it look more finished. And then I use my rotary blade that makes perforations in the fabric - about 3/4" from the edge. I mark the corners (basically where I feel the curve starts and ends ) with stitch markers (you can just eyeball it, but I'm obsessive). And then I do a row of sc around the entire blanket, folding the hem over as I go and doing (2 sc in first hole, sc in next) between the stitch markers. My second row is straight sc. After that, it's whatever stitch pattern I want. 

This is my rink blanket. It's the two rows of sc, then a row of V-stitch, then a row of (3 dc, ch 1) in every V.

 

This is for my niece - a shell pattern. Two rows of sc as described, then one row of shell stitch with ch 1 between each dc of the shell, then one row of sc into each stitch around.

This is her blanket laid out on a queen sized bed.

A blanket for our sports room - I found this NHL Original Six fleece on clearance. This one got the V-stitch edging.

A housewarming gift for a friend. This one also got the shell stitch treatment.

 I'm up to 20+ blankets so far this hockey season! They're easy and so much fun to make. And I don't have to count or pay much attention, so perfect while watching a hockey game! A lot of them became Christmas gifts this year. Obviously I didn't take pictures of many - just kept churning them out.