Month: April 2019

sew yeah.

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To commemorate Fashion Revolution Week (April 22-28), I’m excited to share two more sewing projects from Craftcation. In addition to espadrilles, I made a cardigan and a bias dress. I had a whole outfit; it didn’t match though. 😉 My cardigan class was taught by Kimberly Payne of Straight Stitch Designs. She creates her own patterns so it was really helpful to learn how to read the class pattern by the designer herself. This was my first time working with knit fabric; it wasn’t as scary and difficult as I thought it would be, but you really have to pay attention to the stretch direction or else it will be all sorts of wonky. Also, there were so many pieces; focus is key. I had to run off to teach a class mid-cardigan, so I finished my project in the sewing lab later in the week. My friend roomie Rebecca hosted (I told you she taught all the things, too!). My bias dress class was a shorter project, but also confusing. There was fabric origami …

all the crafts!

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There were so many classes to choose from at Craftcation – over 50 for each day! Most required pre-registration, but there were others that were drop-in and you could also get waitlisted for classes, too. Here are a few I got to take on a whim! Each day there were casual crafts set up poolside – what a lovely setting! They were less structured and more open play; you could stay for as little or as long as you wanted. I taught one of these casual sessions (my mini succulent terrarium craft) and attended two others: terrazzo jewelry (above) with Jennifer Perkins and fabric dye coloring pages (below) with friend roomie Rebecca! I don’t play with clay much so it was fun to learn a trendy technique – I would love to create some clay beads and charms to use in my pomtass crafts. For fabric coloring, we used rainbow patches and Jacquard liquid color. I’m thinking I’ll make a mini plushie with my rainbow patch. After teaching back-to-back classes, I still wanted to make …

ice dyeing.

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What’s fun about Craftcation is that they bring makers together from all over. That means crafty knowledge and expertise abounds and you get to take all kinds of crafty workshops. My super talented friend roomie Rebecca taught a number of dyeing workshops and I got to join her for one of her ice dyeing classes. Ice dyeing is so magical! Rebecca gave an overview of the chemistry and art of ice dyeing and provided a demo. She had lots of samples, too, for inspiration, and she even made recipe cards if you wanted to work with specific color combos. This was helpful in trying to narrow down what colors to use (because I wanted to use them all!). We each dyed a bandana and a pair of socks. Similar to shibori dyeing, you can manipulate your fabric with folds or ties; you can also simply crinkle your fabric or leave them flat. The ice does lots of magic as it melts. The water travels and moves the colors throughout the fabric. First, we prepared the …

i made shooz.

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I have so many more Craftcation stories to share with you! Instead of starting from the top, I’ll start from the bottom – I made shoes, espadrilles to be more precise.  This sewing class with Melissa Quaal of A Happy Stitch was my first class at Craftcation. After a road trip through Ojai, I checked into the Craftcation hotel, grabbed my conference badge, ran back and forth to the car and my hotel room to unload all the crafty goodies, and headed straight to class. Ready! Melissa made the cutest craft kits and goody bags for us. Even the tag with our shoe size was adorable. I had only worked with a sewing pattern once before so I was excited that I got into this sewing class to get more practice in (with adult supervision!). Melissa walked us through each step of the process, sharing all of her sewing secrets, too – like how to cut fabric with weights and a rotary cutter (I’m so impressed!). I was too scared to cut this way for …

sunny side up eggs.

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Ok, now this is just silly. Sunny side up eggs for an Easter morning breakfast egg hunt. How cute would these be as Easter brunch table scatter? All you need for this craft are yellow plastic eggs, white felt, and scissors. Glue is optional. Open up the plastic eggs and cut off a piece of felt to fit the “yolk.” Cut a squiggly circle-like shape for the egg white. Press the half egg onto the felt to “stamp” on the circle shape. Fold the felt in half to cut a slit in the felt. Cut out the middle circle using the impression as a guide. It doesn’t have to be a perfect circle, but try to stay within the circle outline (if you cut around the circle the egg white might not stay securely on the egg yolk). Insert the “egg yolk,” fill with treats, and close. Sunny side up! Happy early Easter! And happy Easter breakfasting/brunching!  More Easter egg ideas here, here, here, and here.

pineapple eggs.

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Here’s another Easter egg decor idea. You can use a similar concept as my cactus eggs to create pineapple eggs. Materials: Plastic eggs in shades of yellow (you can also spray paint your eggs) Permanent marker in brown or gold Felt in shades of green Hot glue Scissors How to: Create pineapple crowns with felt. Start with a rectangular piece of felt, ~2” tall by 4” long. A longer piece will result in more leaves. Cut out triangles from one side to form a zig zag pattern. Roll and glue to seal. Hot glue pineapple crowns to the tops of eggs. If you don’t like the positioning of the crown, allow the glue to cool completely, pull off the crown, reposition and re-glue. Draw ‘v’ shapes with marker to resemble a pineapple pattern. Allow to dry. Separate the crown leaves for more volume. Then fill with sweet treats and gift. Hurry, name the best pineapple you’ve ever had! Mine is Maui Gold ‘imported’ from Hawaii! Juuiiiicy…. There’s one more Easter egg post comin’ soon!

oh hi.

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En route to Craftcation I pit stopped in Ojai for total fangirl moments! This was only my second time ever driving from Northern to Southern California on my own and my first time taking the ‘back freeway’ to Ojai – what an adventure! I almost drove the whole way non-stop, except I saw a vista and stopped for a photo. 🙂 When I finally made it to Ojai, I had three stops on my list (besides gas and a potty break!). First stop: Summer Camp. This store is so fun! I love that it’s filled with wanderlust goods (gimme all the things) and items made locally, I love the mural out back and the cacti that surround the grounds, and I love that this spot used to be a gas station (it still has the structure). Oh, oh, and I love that Ojai pun “oh hi.” I picked up one of their oh hi sweaters, plus a card and a locally made rope basket. Eee! My second stop was the Farmer and the Cook for …

craftcation: teach all the things!

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This year was my first Craftcation experience. I had it on my wish list for a few years now, and finally made it happen. I knew I wanted to do more than just go and take it all in though. So my friend Rebecca of Oodlebadoodle put in a good word for me and viola, I got on the schedule to teach five classes! I taught all the felt things – felt flowers, felt succulents, felt airplants, and felt flair! Here are some photos from all the workshops. Felt flair. For the opening/welcome dinner, we all gathered at the Ventura Fairgrounds for an evening of food, friendship – and felt! I hosted a felt flair table. I heard there was also button and magnet making, a pom pom earrings station, and book signings, too. Everyone got to pick their own design. There were rainbows, pet portraits, pennants, name tags, avocados…. Himmeli, pom-tass, and felt air plants – oh my! I taught this class twice in one day (with a lunch break in between). It’s basically …

craftcation.

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Hiyee! I’m back from a whirlwind craft vacation ~ Craftcation! There is so much to share…so get ready because I’m flooding the interwebs with all the fun craft magic! Here are some Craftcation highlights. Craftcation is a conference for makers and creative business owners. It’s hosted by the awesome crew at Dear Handmade Life at the Ventura Marriott. I spent five days teaching and learning, and getting inspired! More on all the workshops I taught and took soon. (Oh, there are a lot of them!) Biznez. I took one business class with Marlo Miyashiro of The Handmade Showroom on how to develop wholesale line lists. There were so many other business classes, too (but I was busy with all the crafting!!). You could also schedule a one-on-one consult with experts to discuss your handmade business. Fabric wall. There were sewing classes, dyeing classes, textiles and embroidery…so many things to choose from. For all of the sewing classes, there was a fabric wall to select your class materials. For all other classes, all the materials were …

paint sesh.

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Hey universe, I want to be a surface designer. Just putting that out there as a life goal. In the meantime here are some watercolor doodles from recent painting sessions. I received a special request to create lantana-inspired watercolor paintings. I tried painting them from different angels. I also played around with painting succulent-like images. This was a fun color blending exercise. I love the portability of watercolor. I have a small pouch I carry with my Case for Making watercolor palette and brushes, plus a small jar for water. Unlike all my other crafty interests, watercolor doesn’t require electricity or a lot of space. It’s so convenient! On another watercolor outing, I used this cool postcard watercolor paper deck I got at Jenny Lemons. They are cut to postcard size and the backs are preprinted with postcard address lines (plus a spot for a stamp!). Brilliant! These paintings were inspired by the nearby plant life in the Elmwood neighborhood of Berkeley. Create on the go much? Share your favorite creative outings below!