My little buddy, Sebastian, just got his own bedroom. He loves superheroes, especially Spiderman. So I made him a pair of Spiderman curtains.
I invested in an inexpensive serger sewing machine. Boy what a wonderful investment. I can zip right through curtains, pillow cases and garment sewing in no time at all. Best $200 I've ever spent.
With the leftover fabric I made a matching pillow case.
Every Christmas season our local Department of Human Services asks for donations to help families in need. This year they requested pillow cases, pillows, books, socks and pjs for children.
Did I hear pillow cases? Pillow cases have been a thing for a few years and I've made plenty. I decided I would make six pillow cases - three for boys and three for girls. I included with each pillow case - a pillow, pjs and a book.
When choosing a book I went to Kohl's. Not only are they great children's books, but they're priced great - only $5. These same books would cost at least two to three times more in a book store. But there's more - the money goes to the Kohl's Cares program. Now I call this a win, win, win!
I'm sending a little warmth to a child.
November rolled around and again the AuSable Quilt Guild offered another great project - wool mittens.
Remember the song "These are a few of my favorite things"? Rain drops on roses and whiskers on kittens. Bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens. Brown paper package tied up with string. These are a few of my favorites things. Well, these mittens are one of my favorite things.
The lady teaching us prewashed/shrunk wool for our mittens. She also supplied fleece for the lining and an array of buttons for decoration. In return she asked we make a donation to the quilt guild.
After a couple hours I had a completed a pair of mittens. With only three pattern pieces assembly is quick - just have to make sure you cut and sew a right and left hand. All the participants had different wool to work with and added their own personal touch The finished mittens were all marvelous.
They are very warm. I will be searching for wool sweaters and jackets from thrift stores to make more. Let it snow!
As October comes around fall is in full swing. The smell of fall and the changing colors of leaves is always a highlight, but it ends with a fun holiday - Halloween. It's a time that adults have fun and turn into their inner child. I think everyone has fond memories of Halloween pasts.
So this is how my October played out. I joined another quilt guild this month - the AuSable Quilt Guild. It's a large group of ladies that meet once a month and boy are there lots of great ideas and support. One of the ladies offered to teach how to make warped clothesline baskets. This has been a project on my wish list, but I hadn't jumped into yet. So this was a great opportunity to try something new. We made Halloween themed baskets. Actually, they are simple to make and once you wrap your clothesline it goes pretty quickly.
It took a couple nights of watching television to wrap 50 feet of clothesline. Maybe a little longer than some people because I had two cats that just couldn't resist fighting with my clothesline. Here's my pile of clothesline all twisted up as I wrapped.
Our instructor offered clay molded embellishments to add to our baskets. My basket embellishment base was stitched to the beginning of my wrapped clothesline. Then the zig zag coiling began. As I came to the top I decided to add handles. When all done I added embellishments to the inside side.
It is a perfect size to hold my Halloween treats. I'm extremely happy with the final basket and I will certainly make more in the future with different themes or holidays.
Speaking of Halloween - I found a cute Pinterest post for skeleton treats. These treats were so easy to assemble that I let my little friends that are ages 3 and 5 put them together. They are made with large and small marshmallows, white chocolate covered pretzels and chocolate (for painting the faces). And they tasted good too!
Painting the faces on the skeleton heads with melted chocolate was the most challenging. I'm sure there's an easier way to do the faces and I will check out the baking sections at craft stores to see what they offer. For my display I added some faces without bodies as skulls.
