wise craft

bermuda bag

I'm excited to finally share a project that I made last year for the folks at Stitch. I was asked by Tricia Waddell to contribute a project to her upcoming book, The Best of Stitch: Bags to Sew. I immediately said yes, and for once, I knew exactly what I wanted to make. One updated bermuda bag, coming up.

This bag has the same wooden handles of my preppy youth, but this time they are painted, which I think gives them a summery feel on this bag. Lotta's premiere fabric collection, new at the time, seemed like the perfect palette to create the patchwork squares. I set them on point to give it a bit of a retro feel.

Look for this book out and the end of April, there are gorgeous bags in there (Malka's cover model is on my list to make)

8 months into daily sketching

I am still sketching daily over at The Sketchbook Blog. I'm actually sticking with it people! This is not that painful!

The whole idea of taking the time to sketch daily has been full of starts and fits for me, but despite that it has slowly turned into a new, daily discipline. Reminder to you all- I DIDN'T KNOW I COULD SKETCH BEFORE I STARTED THIS! I find myself heading over to the family room table I sketch at instinctively every day, usually in the morning, to get my sketch done when I feel fresh and the light is good.

If I have no idea what to sketch, I usually can find something in the mail, like a page of necklaces from the latest JCrew catalog...

 

or maybe a pretty liquor bottle...

Eight months into daily sketching has made me realize that I have created a bit of muscle memory in my hands and brain, just the same way sketching out lines and swirls over and over again in preparation to try free motion quilting them creates muscle memory.

Without a doubt, I am getting more confident in my sketching ability, and I am also becoming more aware of what I can and just simply can't sketch in a short amount of time. Like, nice shading around anything takes time for me. Like, there are some things I simply can't sketch at this point. Like, I realize sketching everyday things is fun. Like, the more I sketch, the more I realize I have a style that is mine alone.

It takes less time for me to complete a daily sketch. When I started this year-long process back in August 2012, some of those early sketches took hours (and I reluctantly admit that, they were not that great). And they weren't "hours" great! These days, I don't struggle as much to fill each day's blank page, it doesn't scare me the way it did. Also, I am willing to post a sketch that I don't really love, understanding that the sketch process for that day yielded that particular image and it's all a part of learning to to tackle this with confidence.

Many of you expressed interest in the idea of doing something like this on your own when I first blogged about it and I can't recommend it enough. I tend to be a person obsessed with pushing my creative boundaries anyway, but it has been eye opening for me to expand this whole side of my creative life. My advice is to jump in and try any new daily challenge that expands and stretches you, everything will look differently because of it.

make lilly pulitzer pillows

I couldn't believe the irony yesterday, just as I was pulling out my few, coveted Lilly Pulitzer pieces, thinking about summer, a CNN breaking news alert popped up on my phone to say that Lilly had passed away.

A couple of years ago I did a tutorial for making quilted patchwork pillows and I made ours using a patchwork of Lilly fabrics. Today, I thought I would share the tutorial again in case it got lost in the archives.

Lilly Pulitzer's cheerful prints and dresses exemplified all that was ever summery and happy to me as a girl, and even now. People that wear Lilly always look happy to me, what a nice thing. The few pieces I own have incredible workmanship, beautiful details, and it is a joy to pull them out every year.

May you rest in peace Lilly.

 

recent instagrams and otherwise

Instagram is a pretty constant companion to our days. Here are some recent ones-

 

Rock doodling...

 

Coffee near Peter's new office...

 

When my dream of a light-filled studio was real for a moment...

 

Dinner table flowers...

 

Gracie, unable to find a lap, decides to rest on the back of the sofa...

 

Dinner on the beach (Ian is always the one who grabs a big stick)

 

Emma and I examining, well, everything...

 

dyeing...

 

walking...

 

and just being...

april 2013 desktop wallpaper

I have a new desktop wallpaper calendar for April, you might notice it was highly inspired by the garland I made over the weekend. Download your wallpaper here.

Hope everyone has a productive Tuesday (it's my most productive day of the week these days for some reason).

make a geometric garland out of vintage sheets

I was quite entranced with Spring this past weekend, Seattle truly outdid itself with beautiful weather! We had dinner on the beach (I, of course, brought home more rocks), we walked the neighborhood, dyed Easter eggs, and had Peep jousting wars in the microwave, and made our traditional Easter dinner of ham, carrots, asparagus, etc. I wanted to make the Easter table feel as Springy and came up with this garland after seeing a similar paper version in an old kid's crafting book from the 1960's. I love that it creates a really geometric shape and gives a new spin to everyone's favorite triangular bunting shape. I think these will stay up for a while, I smile every time I pass them.

Here's how I made them.

granny circle squares

As many of these granny squares as I have crocheted and I've never stuck to such a strict color palette. Fun change!

easy easter eggs

I think Easter decor looks prettiest when it's kept simple. These eggs began as those lightweight, pastel, speckled eggs used for all kinds of Easter decor, a box of them for $4.00.

A coat of white paint with a few accents with gray puff paint and neon acrylic, then some traditional and unexpected egg cups, and I have some simple and pretty Easter decorations to sprinkle around the house. I played around with easy to use rub-on letters on one of the egg cups, I think I'll be using these letters again.

I hope to dye some eggs with the kids this week, in the meantime, I have been adding to my Easter pinterest board (I have also created a pinterest board for all my project tutorials) My kids are getting older, but they still love an Easter basket filled with chicks and chocolate bunnies (so do I).

There is still time to enter the giveaway for Handmade Hostess!

friday favorites: handmade hostess and giveaway

Happy Friday! I have a treat for you today! Handmade Hostess: 12 Imaginative Party Ideas for Unforgettable Entertaining, is a brand new book, just out, written by fellow Seattlite Kelly Lee-Creel and Rebecca Soder. Fellow fabric lovers may be familiar with Kelly's fabric line, Storybook Lane, and now she has written a book for us in that same well-done, handmade style.

I just LOVE this book! It's full of page after page of fun, innovative party ideas and ways to create festive decor that doesn't involve buying tons of decorations, and instead offers many beautiful ideas to handmake your party decor. I have never been a fan of cheap, storebought party decorations. In fact, it's kept me from throwing a party more than once, it just all feels disposable and cheap. My alternative has always been to go plain white, but as I was looking through this book I got so many ideas of all kinds of ways to create a fun atmosphere I just may have mentioned I want to throw a party to some folks around here.

 

Santa's Sleigh Centerpiece and Gingerbread Placecards

 

Love Note Napkin embroidery project (which I want to do RIGHT NOW!)

 

Leprechaun Clothes Banner

 

Kelly, the author, offers thoughts and an example of how many of the projects can be used for different types of parties altogether-

"In writing this book, we wanted to include as many extra tips and decorating ideas as we could. It's been fun because even friends who don't sew (or who are just in a hurry!) can flip through the book and find a few quick projects. For example, in the Mad Hatter party, we made AstroTurf place mats. We drew a fancy shape onto construction paper and used that as a template.  (Most AstroTurf can be cut with regular scissors.) I love that someone can take the ideas from one chapter and adapt them for a totally different theme.  I'm dying to use my faux-grass place mats at Easter, for example."

 

Visit the Sew Mama Sew blog post Kelly wrote on making fabric feathers, another fun party decoration. I also heard that Kelly is possibly creating a class around one of the projects in the book that will be held at Seattle's own Drygoods Design in the Spring, so look for that. I will pass along more info as I hear.

We have one book to giveaway to a wise craft reader, just leave a comment on this post for a chance to win. And Kelly has opened this giveaway to US residents and international, so everyone has a chance! I will pick a winner next week.

Congratulations on a beautiful book Kelly and Rebecca! Good luck everyone! 

 

4/2/13- Giveaway is closed and winner has been chosen, thank you!

 

jewel boxes

I began this quilt, or should I say, I began the scrappy improvisation blocks for this quilt, during the first workshop I took with Denyse Schmidt. You can see my blocks from that weekend more in the second part of the write-up. In the class, we randomly grabbed and pieced small strips together using her paper bag piecing method. This is just what it sounds like, grabbing little bits of fabric from brown paper bags, with absolutely no thought as to what gets paired with what, or what color combinations result. (This is exactly why so many of the blocks you see from her classes have that beautifully random, "use what you have" homespun look.)