Tiny project – no idea what to do with it

I had a bit of leftover felt the other day and decided to try and make an owl inside of a tree. The idea was to make a puppet, though it ended up too small for a hand puppet and too large for a finger puppet. So now it’s cute, but I have no idea what to do with it. Add to a pillow? A blanket? A larger puppet/stuffed animal/softie?

Any ideas, dear readers?

Tiny owl

Super easy craft, great baby gift

I completed a new project this weekend and have loads of photos to show with you – but alas, it must wait a few days as it’s part of a Valentine’s gift for someone who reads this blog. 🙂

So, in the meantime, more photos from the vault of easy craft projects.

This quick project will take you about an hour to make 3, is a great way to use up scraps of your favorite fabrics, and makes a sweet, thoughtful gift for any newborn babies in your life. Plus, they’re cute enough in grown up fabrics that you could use them to decorate your home.

For these handmade baby blocks, I cut out 5 inch squares of fabric (6 per block) in a lot of my favorite fabrics that I had only bits and pieces left in. This is also a great fat quarter project. I just figured this out as I went, but this is a great tutorial if you need some extra help.

Sew all of the sides together, and leave about a 1.5 inch opening to flip the blocks right side out through. Then, fill with polyfill and, if you wish, a noisemaker. I used leftover jinglebells from a Christmas-time project. Handsew the remaining seam closed. You’re done!

If you would like to make your project a bit more complicated, add some satin ribbon “taggies” to your blocks to give babies a way to grab them with little fingers, and to give them something to suck on.

So squishy

Love the chicken and owl fabrics especially

And they all fall down

Monster mittens

Ever since I saw this on Martha Stewart’s Web site, I have been dying to make them. I bookmarked them on my computer and waited for the perfect occasion.

Enter my cousin Riley’s 4th birthday party, coming up at the end of the month. This will likely only be part of his gift, but what a fun little homemade trinket to throw in the mix.

Finished!

This was a super easy project and would take someone who is good at hand sewing about 15 minutes. I found the mittens at KMart – they were actually Superman mittens but had a removable tag. It’s surprisingly difficult to find plain mittens nowadays. I freehand cut spikes for the monsters’ backs out of two pieces of felt, used red embroidery floss to sew on the spikes and button eyes, and make little nostrils. Simple and so cute.

Completing a craft project in our house is not easy with three out of control dogs. To give you an idea of what I was working with, our giant goldendoodle, Rufus, was quite offended to not be the center of my attention.

Can I eat those monsters?

How about if I bark at you?

Oh, hi. Were you trying to sew? How about giving me a haircut?

Tomatoes in the winter

My favorite thing to do in the spring and summer is spend almost every waking minute I can in my garden. I love to be covered in mud, surrounded by beautiful things in bloom. In the mornings, I always run out to check new growth before heading to work. As soon as I get home in the evenings I dive right in to weed, water, check progress and harvest fruits and veggies. Most of the time, I don’t even take the time to change and am weeding in high heels and dress pants.

Winter is a rough time for most anyone in the frozen midwest, but it’s especially rough for us gardeners. No light, no garden therapy … we’re left to peruse pictures of the past year’s gardens and buy seeds in hope for an unseasonably warm early spring.

Thus in fall and winter I turn to sewing projects and crochet, and all things indoors. Enter the perfect, oldfashioned, quick sewing project that brings minds to the warm summer ahead.

See inspiration here. I love Martha Stewart’s section of homemade gift ideas, and this one is especially fitting. What can be sweeter than handy-dandy tomato pincushions cheering up the house on snowy days? They are super easy to make, taking less than 20 minutes a piece to sew, and can be made in front of the TV or fireplace. As usual, I went a bit overboard – and made 12 one evening while we were watching a movie. It’s the perfect use of scrap fabric and has kept any dogs in this family from stepping on a sewing pin in quite some time.