embroidery thread

Whoops, life kind of got in the way of any type of crafting for a couple days there...

One supply that's really easy to accumulate is embroidery thread. It's so cheap! And comes in so many fun colors! But it's not like I do all that much embroidery...

 (Sadly, that is pretty much what my stash looks like, stored 

in a Ziploc bag. Need to work on organization for that one!)

Luckily there are friendship bracelet tutorials going around, a great way to use some of that thread. And give your hands something to do while you're watching TV.

I followed this tutorial, which just leaves the ends long so the bracelets can be tied on. But doing that by yourself is nigh unto impossible, so I tried a couple solutions. I braided the ends of one and added some ribbon clasps I had left over from another project. On another I added a bead to one end and made a loop with the other.

 
Still not super easy to put on without assistance (or elegant looking), but that's just how bracelets go sometimes... Any other brilliant solutions out there?

hand-made christmas

Now that I've given all my gifts, I can finally share what I've been up to! Here are the hand-made presents I did this year:

For Peter's brother and sister-in-law, monogrammed napkins for each family member. The napkins come in 4-packs, so I did cute little fruits on the remaining ones, which can be used by guests or any particularly messy family member who has soiled his own (and I say "his" because with 4 of the 5 family members being male, and 3 of those males being little boys, it's bound to happen...).

For Peter's sister, a fun bracelet:

For my Grandma Judy, a poinsettia pillow cover:

For Ginger the puppy, embellished microfiber cloths. She loves to go out in any weather, so she's been coming back inside a bit wet lately with all the snow romping. These will be handy to keep by the door for some quick wipe-downs:

And for all the ladies in my life (grandmas, aunts, moms, cousins, sisters), I made felt flower pins (tutorial examples here and here). I printed "merry christmas from anne" on 5X7 cardstock and cut them in half; then I punched 2 small holes to thread the pin through. There were a variety of flower pin colors so the ladies could choose their favorite color or the one that would look best with their coat...

valentine's day craft: felt hearts

Since moving into the new house, I've been busy with lots of decorating and organizing and have yet to establish a little craft-making area. Because I'm not making much of anything new at the moment, I thought I'd reproduce a few projects I've showed in the past on my personal blog - edited slightly for relevant content...

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Even though Peter and I don't really do anything for Valentine's Day (especially now that our anniversary is on February 4th), I still like to use it as an excuse to make cards or decorated cookies or something for friends and co-workers. When I saw the following picture online, I HAD to make these adorable hearts - despite not having a single one of the supplies in my possession, especially not any pinking shears.

Luckily, they're quite cheap and very easy to make. The idea, instructions, and photos are all at the crafty blog The Purl Bee. They sell the felt and the embroidery thread in their fabric/yarn shop in NYC, so their supplies are pretty fancy and a bit pricey. I did mine on the Hobby Lobby budget instead: a total of $6 for my little project! This bought me enough felt to make 30-35 hearts, and enough filling to stuff a couple hundred of them. (Oh, and I also had to buy some pinking shears, but they were a good tool to add to my supply anyway.)

To make, basically all you do is print out the little heart template, cut out pairs of hearts with pinking shears, sew them most of the way together with a contrasting color of thread, stuff them, and sew shut. Quite a satisfying project to make, as you can whip out several of these in about 10 minutes.

The original instructions were to sew little safety pins to the back to make them into Valentine's pin gifts. But I did 2 other variations. First, in a middle-of-the-night inspiration, I decided to make some of them into magnets by hiding the magnet inside with the stuffing, so you can't even tell they're magnets until you stick 'em on the fridge.

Then, I poked a very thin ribbon through some of the hearts to make them into decorations for some little gifts.