Pyramidal Pincushion PDF Tutorial in The Shop!

 

Hi.

Is it Thursday today? I believe so.

Well, this is as good a day as any to update the little Shop, I reckon. Today's offering is one that's been around a spell and that several people have asked me about over the last few years. And, I am nothing if not accommodating. After a while... eventually... when I'm good and ready, that is.

It is the downloadable "Pyramidal Pincushion PDF Tutorial" in all its colourful glory. Notice the cover page screenshot below...

In this tutorial, I show you how to put together this scrappy, felty, pyramidal pincushion. The supplies are decidedly simple. You'll need some felt and felt scraps, cotton string, embroidery thread, scissors, a few pins and needles, and of course the handy-dandy tutorial. With that, you'll be on your way!

The project is probably best suited for the intermediate crafter. You'll do well to posses some basic embroidery skills. And if you're one of those crafters with an artist's heart, you'll find you'll be able to make your very own customized version of the pincushion, if you so desire.

The 9-page PDF covers the step-by-step pincushion-making process and includes detailed photos, a full colour template, live links to some wonderful on-line embroidery instructions, and a convenient black-and-white printable version of the tutorial. 

Here's a screenshot of the last page with two versions of the completed pincushion.

I had a fun time creating and assembling the whole she-bang, and I think you'll have an equally fun time making it.  Henceforth, find the downloadable "Pyramidal Pincushion PDF Tutorial" in the Shop!

♥M

I Felt It Was Time + A Giveaway Winner

Excitement of excitement, I've been busily working on a new Shop tutorial! Hard to believe, I know. It's been way too long, months and months, since I've updated the ol' Shop. The poor thing is no doubt feeling forlorn from neglect. Probably thinks I don't love it anymore. Not the case, I can assure you.  Anyway I'm "knot" going to say much more about it at this time, except that I "felt" it was time. (Ya, that's a clue alright... along with the above pic.)

Now, on to more pressing matters... that Giveaway Winner I mentioned?

Yes, well... as chosen by my very own personal random number generator -The Boy - the winner of Quilting Happiness is...  Commenter #26: TRACEY who said: Looks like a great book, thank you for the review and chance to win. 

Congratulations Tracey, you're most welcome, and I think you'll enjoy this book! Wahoot! I will email you forthwith to arrange delivery.

♥M

You Guest It: The Bushcrafter

Today's "You Guest It" features one of those crafts that makes you go: "That's AWE-SOME!" In fact, I believe those exact words fell out of my mouth when I first laid eyes on it. So let us not dilly dally. Let us get to it, shall we? Coming to you all the way from Sweden, welcome the talented Jenny a.k.a. The Bushcrafter!

***

Hi!

My name is Jenny. I'm so glad to be a part of this wonderful "You Guest It" series that Michele has set up for us all to enjoy. I am a textile crafter and I call myself "The Bushcrafter". I am a soul-centered creator and also an artist and teacher. In me, I have some sort of fabric spirit who wants, pretty much, nothing else but to create. So I let it.

You know. Let spirit be what spirit is.

I would say we are all crafters. In one way, or another. When I'm faced with a problem, I try to solve it by using what I have. That's crafting for me. I enjoy melding crafting and recycling together, making the ordinary into beauty. Today I'm sharing how to embellish your egg carton with cross stitch. In this project we are using the whole egg carton and adding the sparkle with threads and colour.

With a few easy steps you can create your own beautiful box. Embroidering on an egg carton is easy-peasy, just follow these instructions.

For this project you will need:

1. An egg carton

2. Needle

3. Thread

Peel off any stickers from the egg carton. If you have print on the carton, you could try to painting the top.

Draw a pattern on a piece of paper. Place the paper on the box and push the pin all the way through in all corners.

Start sewing the first colour:

Until it looks like this:

You can embroider the sides of the carton too if you want.

Voila! You are done. You can now use it to keep your favorite things safe.

Here I store my pastel threads. You might want to use it for your jewelery or your buttons. It´s your choice!

***

You must admit that this is great, right? I mean the combination of recycling and crafting alone makes me want to do a jig. But the embroidery? On an egg carton? Well, that sends me head-long into a cha cha cha!

Other creations by Jenny "The Bushcrafter" that I recommend you not miss:

• The "We Are Stardust" Embroidery and Patchwork Pillow
• How to Weave a Strawberry
• The Guardian Angel of Winter

And while you're at it, pop into her shop because some of these beauties are actually available for purchase there.

Thank you Jenny for letting me showcase your beautiful work on the blog today. What a true pleasure this has been for me!

♥M

P.S. Have an idea for an eco-craft? Submit a guest-post idea to Michele Made Me's "You Guest It"! Find those details HERE.

The Flock Block

Hi there.

How are things with you? Well, I hope.

Guess what?

I have returned.

I had such a great August Break. Oh so nice... And I will tell you about it later but for today I'm easing back into work with a short little post.

My blog friend Amy is having a cool contest called "Texting While Sewing" and I'm squeaking in at the veeeerrry last minute with this wee quilt block I designed. The goal of the contest is, in Amy's words, to use text fabric creatively in a 12" quilt block. This idea sounded like such a hoot to me, I could NOT not take part. My only issue? I didn't own a single stitch of texted fabric. This meant of course that I HAD to go out shopping. Woe is me, eh?

Despite the apparent popularity of texted fabrics (and there are some really beautiful ones out there) my little hick town fabric stores are mostly allergic to them from what I can gather. Hrmph. Among the stores I travelled to, I found a grand total of four texted fabrics. Four! And two of those were too ugly for words. No pun. Anyway, so I bought the other two.

Truth: You know your life is pretty darn sweet when all you're complaining about is the lack of texted fabric. 

So here's my block. I call it The Flock Block. See? It is puzzle of pieced birds with some playful word embroidery for good measure. The birdies fly blissfully round and round one another.  An ornithological merry-go-round, if you will.

I still have some work to do on the design. However my hope is to, one day, make it available as a pattern in the shop. I'm thinking it would be cute in a baby quilt and all solid colours... Comments, suggestions?

♥M

Maple Leaf Messenger Bag for The Boy

School's out for summer, and The Boy has successfully made it through Grade 2! Wahooot! I made him a denim messenger bag to celebrate his accomplishment. Tonight we may even have cake... CAKE I tell you. Wouldn't that be totally clever yet atypical of me? Especially if it turns out?

Yes... so the instructions I used to make the messenger bag can be found right HERE at Sew Grown. It is a really great step-by-step tutorial. Super-easy to follow! I pretty much did as I was told mostly sort of. Since I was re-using old jeans, I incorporated some aspects of the original jeans in the bag. For example, the back pocket on the bag is actually a back pocket. Yuh-huh. And the strap is just the cut off waistband with belt loops left in place. Tricky.

The recipe called for D-rings, but incredibly I couldn't find any in the stash so I had to improvise. I cut off the opening of a shampoo bottle twice which yielded two tough plastic rings ideal for the job. They resemble eyes, don't you think? Look, they're sizing you up I think.

The Boy has a thing for all things red and patriotic, and as it happens Canada Day is coming up on July 1st, so I thought an embroidered maple leaf might be a cute and appreciated detail on the front flap there. I certainly hope he likes it. One can never tell.

Oh, by the way, today is link-up day for June's Patriotic Point of View...

And I'm playing along here!  Have you ever made anything with a patriotic theme? Well, head on over there and link that baby up!

♥M

Fabric Heart Garland

Tell me the truth... Did you suspect, at any moment, that some sort of heartish garland would materialize upon these pages? Did you know in your heart of hearts that I, like so many others, would fall prey to the ebb and flow of those yearly calendar events around which crafters build their crafts. Of course you did. And you were 100% correct. I've become predictable, haven't I?

Could you perhaps, forgive me just this once? For I sincerely heart this tiny garland. I heart the sweet row of blanket stitches holding together each hearty sandwich of fabric and felt. I heart the play of single crochet and chain stitches entwined around some of their heartish borders. I heart how I've woven this latest garland through my new crochet-edge curtains. Little did you know it, but that was my crafty plan you see, hee hee.

The garland brings a sweet blush of colour to our wintery room.

I heart it very much. I hope you heart it too.

♥M

Handmade Gift - Embroidered Grooming Kit

This year, when it comes to gifts made by me, small is the operative word. Because, to be honest, small = whips up in a flash, if you catch my drift. 

The handy grooming kit above (like for nail clippers, cuticle scissors and such) is a small, useful and sweet item that can be made quickly and customized for pretty much anyone. The simple pattern has been in my head for a while and finally popped out the other day just in time for Christmas. I made these for some special people (who don't read this blog as far as I can make out...) and they came together swiftly and painlessly.

Aside from speediness, a secondary bonus of making these is that I had everything on hand right here. The solid grey fabric is from an old pair of cotton pants, the lovely prints are from my bottomless scrap bin, and the buttons I rediscovered in my button stash.  I haven't quite stuffed them with all the groomy goodies yet, but once I do, I think they'll make handsome gifts. 

I'll be sharing the tutorial for a slight variation of these on Wednesday when I do my part in Gwenny Penny's "Haul Out The Holly" so you'll be able to make them too if you ever get a hankering!

Have a great day. I'll be back on Wednesday then. ♥M

Leftovers

As a rule, I always have leftovers.

As a rule, I like to eat 'em up the very next day.

With these leftovers (from here), I made something small and pretty... and inedible.

And then I sent the inedible somethings far away over land and sea to some very special people where I just know they will be loved.

What do you like to do with your leftovers?

Drop-Dead Denim: One Tough Pouf

And just like that... we're here! At the end of our Drop-Dead Denim road... Wow! My heartfelt thanks to my amazing guest-blogger-friends, to the Flickr group contributors, to the generous giveaway sponsors, to all commenters and readers, to all those denim artists out there, and of course, to denim itself. You've made this month a real highlight for me! I just have one last little post left for you... Enjoy!

♥ M

I hadn't made any denimy goodness for the boy this September, bad me, and I felt I needed to rectify that. What fun thing could I make him? I decided to go with a pouf for his room. I've been planning one of these for, like, ever. And you know what? It has been a HUGE hit. I didn't have the slightest clue that he would love it the way he does. He lugs it about. He rolls it around. He hugs it. He jumps on it. He beats it. And I let him. It is one tough pouf!

Tutorial: One Tough Pouf

I kinda made this up as I went along. Here's my attempt to explain my process.

You will need:

• Denim scraps in different shades
• 18" round template (I used a large plastic platter rescued from the recycling bin.)
• 5" round template
• paper templates as drawn out in #2 below
• Pair of scissors
• Sewing machine
• Ruler and pencil
• straight pins
• needle and thread
• stuffing (I used the stuffing from 2 large cushions that we rarely used)
• Optional: embroidery thread and dimensional fabric paint

1. On a large piece of paper, draw out a circle using your 18 inch circle template. Find the center of your circle. You want to figure out how big a 1/12th wedge of the circle is. The angle of the resulting wedge will measure: 360°/12 = 30°.

2. So from your circle, you will pick out one 30° wedge and then add a 10 inch long rectangle to the bottom of this wedge. Divide the wedge from the bottom rectangle with a straight line. Now divide the wedge into two sections as in #2. Cut off about 1 inch of the uppermost apex of the wedge. On a separate sheet of paper draw out the individual resulting shapes. Add 1/4 inch seam allowance to every side of each shape. Cut out your shapes. These are your pouf templates.

3. For each pouf template, cut out 4 each of 3 different shades of denim. I did light, medium and dark as best I could.

4. To prepare for sewing, pin top wedge pieces right-sides together as shown in Photo #4, mixing shades of denim as you go.

5. To ensure that the edges of your wedge pieces line up, intersect the pieces as shown in #5. Sew the pieces together with a 1/4 inch seam allowance.

6. Once you unfold the wedge at the seam, the edges of the two pieces should match.

7. Sew the wedge to the rectangle right-sides together using a 1/4 inch seam allowance.

8. When unfolded, this will give you a house shape as shown in #8. You need 12 house shapes to make the pouf. Repeat steps 4 through 8 until you have all 12 house shapes.

9. Pin two house shapes right sides together. When pinning the house shapes together it is IMPERATIVE to align the joint between the wedges and rectangle pieces. Otherwise the whole pouf will be askew. Stitch along one side of the house shape with a 1/4 inch seam allowance.

10. Press the seams once sewn. Notice that the two house shapes sewn together no longer lie flat. That's good. Add the next house shape to the set of two as in #9.

11. Repeat Steps #9 and #10 until you have sewn all the house shapes together. Join the two end house shapes, pinning and then stitching them right sides together. Press all seams.

12. To finish the top of the pouf, cut out two 5 inch circles, one out of denim and one out of another fabric scrap.

13. Pin the circles right sides together.

14. Stitch circles together with a 1/2 inch seam allowance leaving a few inches open for turning. Cut tiny wedges out of the circle's seam allowance avoiding the opening. Turn the circle inside out. Press.

15. Pin the circle, denim side up, to the center top of the pouf. Stitch in place.

16. Adding a 1/2 inch seam allowance prior to cutting, cut out a denim circle with the help of the 18 inch circle template.

17. Using pins, mark the location of 12 evenly-spaced points along the edge of the denim circle. To do this, start by folding the circle in half. Mark the halves with pins at the edges.

18. Fold the half circle into sixths. Use a ruler to get matching measurements. Mark the sixths with pins on the top and bottom.

19. Fold the sixths in half to find the twelfths. Mark with pins along the edges.

20. Join the denim circle to the pouf right sides together.

21. The pins of the circle should meet the joints of the pouf.

22. Once all of these points are joined, add several pins to the outer edge. Stitch with a 1/2 inch seam allowance. Leave an opening for turning.

23. Snip the seam allowance all the way around except at the opening.

24. Stuff your pouf. I used the stuffing from two large cushions to stuff it. This makes a relatively firm pouf.

25. Sew the opening shut.

26. Optional: Add decorative stitching or dimensional paint to make your pouf one-of-a-kind. I added red embroidery details and little dots of red fabric paint to our pouf because that's the boy's favourite-most colour.

And we are there. We have made one tough pouf, yay and yippee!

Thank you again for joining me this September. A great time was had by me, I can tell you!

And I think we now have definitive proof.

Creativity IS in your jeans.

Now go have yourself a fantastic weekend. I'll see you in October!

P.S. The lucky giveaway winners were announced in the previous post!

A Thousand Thanks Celebration and Giveaway!

This Giveaway is NOW CLOSED. Thank you to all who entered!

Happy Monday!

I'm so glad you could make it! Today I'm celebrating a truly nifty milestone: this blog's amassing of 1000 Google Friend Connect followers. Happy happy joy joy!!! It seems impossible, but there it is in black and white down there in the foot of the blog. See? I'm not even making this stuff up. I'm so chuffed about it I can't even say...

And speaking of following, I also want to acknowledge my lovely email and RSS subscribers. I want you to know that I haven't forgotten you. One day you'll get your very own celebration, never fear. You too are important to me! And needless to say, you are most welcome to stay and play today, as is everyone.

So what are we doing? We're sharing. Sweet eh? I'm going to tell you a little bit about me. And, eventually, you'll do the same. But I'll get it started. Here are some things I've never told you before.

Ready? Okay... here goes nothing:

• I'm very shy. People don't believe me when I tell them this, but it's true. I'm afraid of you. You scare me.
• I don't do the dishes every day. Sometimes I skip a day and just let the pile grow for another day. And oddly, I really hate doing 2 days worth of dishes but sometimes I really hate doing ONE day of dishes. It's a circle.
• I'm ambidextrous. I use my left hand for eating, writing, and cutting. My right hand I use for handling a computer mouse, playing sports like hockey and baseball, and weeding. And despite cutting with my left hand, I cannot abide left-handed scissors. They're just awful.
• I'm not colour blind, but sometimes red is green and green is red. Unexplainable.

• I'm modest to the extreme. Sometimes I wish it was winter all year round. That way I wouldn't ever have to wear small clothes. I've literally gone years without swimming to avoid wearing my bathing suit. Canada with its long winters is the place for me.
• I have a temper; I've been known to get angry much much.
• I used to do a lot of acting. I co-starred in a local children's television series in the 1990's. We recorded only one season.
• Frequently my brain itches, and I can't reach in to scratch because it's inside my brain.
• Warm scarves are crucial, essential, necessitous to my existence. My first few inches are permafrost so I'm cold, always cold... I'm cold right now.

Hey, that went pretty smoothly...

Okeedoke. Now it's your turn. Wanna know what you're playing for? Alrighty then!

The giveaway prize includes:

1. A small spiral bound notebook for sketching or recording your precious ideas.
2. A set of 8 fine-point sharpies including a twin-tip black.
3. 10 squares of felt (4-1/2" x 4-1/2" each)
4. 3 (10 g) spools of DMC cotton perle
5. All of the above neatly packaged in a pretty Michele-designed reversible fabric gift box. (Note: See my tutorial and template HERE to make your own, if you just can't wait.)

The rules of giveaway-play are:

• Anyone, anywhere can enter.
• Have a solid email address.
• Leave a comment on this post telling me one little-known fact about yourself, anything you like.
• If you are a follower, you get a second entry!

The winner will be chosen ever so randomly on Friday June 17th, 6 am EST, and divulged in Friday's post.

Finally I'd like to say that the blogosphere is a big overwhelming place sometimes. Yet you, my friend, have allowed me to stake my claim on a tiny piece of it, call it my own, and share in it with you. I am so tickled by the lovely comments you leave, your thoughtful remarks, and your genuine support of the work I do. I thank you for being part of this with me.

So now it's your turn. Is there anything you're just itching to get off your chest? Come on, don't be shy now...

This Giveaway is NOW CLOSED. Thank you to all who entered!