Where has the time gone . .

Wow . . two years . . . two years since I have written anything . .  and so much has happened in my life.  I have two more grandkids . . sold my home . . living with and taking care of my mom . . starting an Etsy page . . even thinking of doing the craft shows circuit.  My dream is to retire in 3 years and sew, knit, crochet, sew, knit, crochet . . and enjoy all my wonderful grandkids!  I have been doing alot of traveling lately - for work and for pleasure.  I have 4 trips already scheduled over the summer!

I presently have three projects going on . . one is kitchen items . . Gone to Pot . . . Holders!  is the name.  My girlfriend (in Florida) and I have been making all different kinds of potholders with a holiday theme.  We are also making accessories to go with them . . You can check them out at Etsy.com - at GrammaBeBes.



The second project is with another friend who lives in my neighborhood - Things for Dogs  . . I'm sure other animal item will be included as we go.  We both knit and sew so we are trying our hand in fashioning dog clothes and will be selling them real soon.  We haven't come up with a name yet . . .

And the third project will be with my daughter - Kid's . . Toddlers . . . Babies . . no name here either.  This one is just in the very beginning stages.

I figure . . kitchen, animal and baby handcrafted items will sell!  Look for all on Etsy real soon!

Going "Green!" . .Why not? . .. I'm Irish after all . .

Recycle . . . Oh Yeah . . I'm jumping on the recycle bandwagon and having a jolly old time doing it! There is so much out there and so many ideas! I'm sure if you think hard enough you could find a way to recycle just about anything! I love garage saleing . . flea marketing . . but where do you get your fix in the winter time? . . At your local thrift store! One of these Saturdays real soon, I plan on hitting all of them within a 20 mile radius of my house . . already got a friend signed up to go with me . . we are making a day of it . . with lunch in between.

My project for this blog entry is a sweatshirt . . this is my third one that I have "re-designed". This is one of the sweatshirts that are offered at Walgreens for 3 for $10! I was lucky to find this style (straight bottom and sleeves . . no ribbing) there isn't much work involved with this style.

First I cut the front of the sweatshirt right down the middle . . I decided I would like to make the front edges and around the neck, scalloped.

2. I got out my trusty old tracing roller and paper (I love this stuff . . have been using it for years . . I use it to trace patterns that have the multiple sizes on them)and made a line one inch from the edge all the way around. I chose one inch so I was sure I had enough material to cover the scallop.

3. I chose a scallop design on my sewing machine, put stabilizer in the back side and proceeded to sew my scallops all along the edge. After doing this, I'm not real crazy with the way the collar turned out. It is a bit flimsy . . I think if I do this again, I will just go straight up the front and leave the collar that was on the sweatshirt.

I used the line that I made from the tracing roller as my guide for the foot. I lined this up with the left edge of the scalloping so that it would be even all the way around.

4. After sewing the scalloping, I tore off the tear away stabilizer and cut as close as I could without cutting the threads around the scallops from my sweatshirt with embroidery scissors. These have a rounded tip and make cutting the scallop so much easier. If by chance you do cut into the threading, you can dap some liquid fabric glue on the spot, that will hold the threads so they won't raveling.

5. My sweatshirt still looked a bit plain so I chose an embroidery design to put on the shirt.

My finished sweatshirt . . now I have another "jacket" that is suitable enough to wear to work!

Now . .off to the thrift stores . . looking for a wine rack to keep my yarn in!

Dreams and A Dozen Roses . . .

A friend handed me $25 in instant lottery tickets . . wow! . . for me?! . . got excited til I realized they weren't for me . . *sigh . She wanted to do up a gift basket, (but she is a bit creatively challenged), for a fundraiser for a dear friend of hers that is suffering from cancer. So my "creative mind" started working overtime (my favorite part of a project!) and chugging and steaming like that darned ole train . . yes . . yes . . YES I can!

After going thru my stash, I found these red candle roses that my daughter made for favors for her wedding. They are rose shaped candles that I think she got from Oriental Trading Company - she wrapped a stick with floral tape, added two leaves and stuck the stick into the candle. These will work, I thought . . I will do six of them with three lottery ticket leaves on each and hang the remaining lottery tickets from a ribbon .. so got out my glue gun (what a wonderful invention this glue gun is!) and made leaves from the instant lottery tickets to put on the rose stem . . .

ummmm . . really don't like the looks of these . . . don't have much else I can use . . what can I do . . i have a dozen of these red rose candles . . ummmm . . I know . . I'll make a dozen long stemmed roses with some kind of greenery behind the roses! . . So . . put on the boots, grabbed the purse and off to the dollar store I went . . bought a vase, colored marbles to put in the vase and a fern bunch with 6 branches on it . .

Oh yes . . I like this much better! I cut off every other stem on the fern branch, folded the instant lottery ticket and hot glued the ticket on the stem. I used two fern branches and 9 tickets on each. You have to be careful NOT to get glue on the bar code on the back of the instant ticket! And do all your folding where it won't affect the scratch part. I use a hot glue gun because it dries right away and if you make a mistake or change your mind, you can just peel it right off without doing damage to the ticket.

I chose to put marbles in the vase as a weight . . as well as for looks . . as the candle roses are a bit top heavy and the marble did a wonderful job of holding the stems in place!

I then added a few sprigs of small white carnations within the red roses and the two fern lottery branches behind the the flower arrangement.

I then wrapped the vase in a clear plastic gift bag, adorned with gold curling ribbons, the extra instant lottery tickets and hot glued small pearl beads to the outside of the plastic gift bag.

This project took me about an hour and a half to complete. So if you need an idea for a shower, fundraiser, door prize, etc. and just don't have the time to make a lengthy craft, why not try something with instant lottery tickets! It's a gift that keeps on giving!

mw . . thanks for getting me to think outside of the box when it came to my crafts . . I miss you . . 2/22/99

Fidgety and Antsy . . .

and feeling like I'm in prison! Been off work and home for a week now . . asthma attack . . they tell me. Never had one before, and have no idea what to expect . . how long this will last . . ? So what do I do with myself . . there is just so much TV you can watch . . . . ?

So, here i sit with a problem . . can't do anything physical . . can't exert myself (or I go into a coughing fit and then . . ummm .. nah .. better not . .. not a pretty site) . . and yeah, believe it or not . . do NOT feel like sewing at all! .. (and I have a blazer downstairs that is almost finished! remember my spats idea?!). So what can I do without leaving the house to get supplies . . . ummmm . . have yarn . . and all kinds of time .. ummm .. learn to knit! . . so off I go . . I have always wanted . . well, not always . . but for a while now . hehe . .wanted hand warmers as I hate gloves . . mittens . . anything restricting . . (if your a smoker or an ex smoker, you will understand!). . . After starting, ripping out . . starting again . . ripping out again . . starting again . . ripping out again . . whew . . I would say .. about 25 times (and that's not exageratting!) .. I have finally come up with some hand warmers that I can actually use! I am so excited!

Now . . . where is that pattern for . . . .

what to do . .

While contemplating the coming year . . and what amazing things that will be happening (how's that for positive thinking!) . . i find myself searching alot of sewing/craft blogs looking for something new and different to concentrate my creative abilities on. Watched alot of utube's on weaving and making your own loom . . ummm maybe . . locker hooking and new patterns and projects related to it . . yeah . . crocheting . . thinking of making some cowls, I made one for my daughter for christmas and really like the looks of it . . I could . . but then today I came across a blog site, Brickhouse - a site for plus sized women that took me to an Etsy site . . Monjio Creations. This is what I found . .

SPATS! . . I love them! I bought some similar material from Fabric.com a while ago to make a blazer . . Can't you just picture the blazer with brown pants and these?! For some reason, I really like these . . something that you would think the younger hipper generation of today might wear . . not a 54 year old woman . . a 54 year old overweight woman! . . do I dare . . ? I can't seem to stop thinking of these with the blazer . . maybe that will be my project for this weekend! . . what do ya think?

The smiles make it all worth the work involved . . .

Well, the ribbons are cut . . the paper torn . . and the boxes put away til next year . . it's over . . where did the time go? . . I didn't have time to enjoy the Christmas build up this year . . had way too many projects to finish . . seams to mend . . and edges to serge. Sorry to say that I didn't even put up any decorations! But all in all, it was a wonderful christmas and a good time was had by all! This year we all met at my daughters brand new house in Erie PA. All my kids, their spouses and my grandkids were together this year . . I have alot of pictures of the festivities but not too many of the gifts that I made . . never thought to take pictures. But do have some . .

My grandaughter LOVES to dress up . . so I made her clothes fashioned after Hannah Montana from pics I got from the internet.

These are two of the outfits . . made some from new material and some from "recycled" material . .

You probably can't see it too well . . but on the second pic . . on the arm of the chair is an afghan I made for my daughter. It is crocheted in "boxes" and then I weaved strips of fleece through the boxes . . I am so pleased with the way it came out . . it is sooooo soft . . I think I just might make one for me.

I also had my embroidery machine running in high gear. I embroidered hand towels and washcloths for each of the holidays for my oldest daughter and embroidered a set of towels (bath, hand and wash) with christmas designs for my youngest daughter.

Well that is a bit of what I have been working on . . now on to other projects! . . My mind is already working overtime on new ideas! . . Til then . . If you do what you've always done, you'll get what you've ALWAYS gotten! . . time to think out of the box!

Sew much to do . . Sew little time . .

Took the day off yesterday from my full time job to sew sew and sew some more! I went from 7:30am to 7:30pm . . sewing and watching tearjerker Christmas movies all day . . . and enjoyed every minute of it! Seeing as this year is very tight for me - moneywise- . . umm and I guess in the waistband too! - I am making all my christmas presents this year, got alot of really good ideas from the internet (such a wonderful thing this internet) and even started a new hobby . . Locker Hooking . I enjoy it but it gets to my thumbs after a while.

My 5 year old granddaughter is into Hannah Montana this year and LOVES to dress up . . so I recycled some old clothes and made her 3 new outfits to play in . . I purposely didn't finish them (hems and facings) so she couldn't even think to wear them to school! I don't want her giving her mom a hard time . .

I got most everything done . . just have to pick up a few more things . . to stuff with . . to fasten with . . and to fill with . . now on to finding the perfect Christmas tree!