February 23, 2011
I made a second hat in order to do this tutorial. I made the gray hat from a wool blazer and the second hat (shown above), I fashioned from a pair of wool pants.
Felting Wool
To make the hat, you first have to felt the wool. Start with a 100% wool. If you use a blend, it may not shrink evenly. Check the label for a I remove all the buttons and such before felting.
Felting is easy. Toss the clothing into your washer with hot water and a bit of soap. Allow it to run through a heavy duty wash cycle. Check on it every now and again to see how it’s shrinking. Sometimes I need to let it run through the wash cycle to let it agitate longer. Once you take it out of the wash, toss it in the dryer and dry it on high.
When you take it out of the dryer, it will look like it may fit a 3 year old! Wool will shrink that much. It will also be all fuzzy looking.
Cutting and Sewing the Hat
Now that you have your felted wool, it’s time to cut out some pattern pieces.
Cloche Hat Pattern
Open the pattern and print the pieces. The pattern will fit a 21 inch head. If you want the hat bigger, add a slight bit to the seam allowance on the triangular pieces, but keep in mind that the you need to multiply the amount you add by 12 to figure out the final size. For example, if you want the hat to fit a 24 inch head circumference, you only need to add 1/4 inch to the seam allowance on the triangular pieces. If you need a smaller hat, stitch the seam allowance a bit larger, but also keep in mind a bit off 12 sides equals a lot! I left about 2 inches of extra space in the brim to allow for expansion, if you need more, add a bit to the end labeled “back” on the brim pattern piece.
Cut 6 hat pieces and 1 brim piece from your felted wool.
Take 2 of the triangular hat pieces and place them with right sides together. Stitch from the top point to the base on one side using a 1/4 inch seam allowance.
Take a 3rd triangular piece and stitch it to the other two so you have half of the hat completed.
Repeat the process with the other three triangular pieces so now you have two halves of the hat. Place right sides together and stitch the two halves together. Turn right side out.
Figure out what you want you to be the front of the hat and pin the brim along the bottom edge. I usually make the front fall evenly between seam lines. Stitch the back seam.
If you have any remaining area from the end of the brim, just press it flat before stitching the brim to the hat.
Stitch the brim using a 1/4 inch seam allowance.
Finishing the Hat
After sewing on the brim, wet the hat in hot water. Take a stiff brush to scrub a bit at the seams on the hat to help blend them better. I like to squeeze the hat and remove the water so it’s no longer dripping and place it on your head to help form the rest of the shape. The cloche hat is pretty form fitting.
Place the hat on something to allow it to dry.
Embellish the hat and it’s ready to wear. I put a ribbon and fabric flower on one and a fabric band and clipped a flower on the other. The trim only needs to be tacked down in a few places. Wearing the hat can help determine the size of the trim. The trim may make the hat too tight otherwise.
Let me know if you have any questions on this tutorial. I realize that sometimes my directions only make sense to me and my quirky brain.
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February 20, 2011
Last week on the SYTYC competition, the theme was wall decor. I decided to make a burlap clock and a jute wreath to fill the empty space above our tv. I made it to the final 3 with this entry and I”m so excited about that.
Below is my entry for last week, so you can see the pictures, in case you missed it.
This was one of the toughest weeks for me yet. Wall decor is such a personal thing and in my efforts to keep my crafting for this competition aligned with making things we actually need, I wasn’t sure where to start.
When watching tv, we are always getting up to look at a clock in the kitchen and we had a big naked area of wall space over the tv. So I finally settled on the idea to make a clock and a wreath for wall decor week.
I covered the clock in burlap because I love the texture and look of the stuff. To balance out the burlap, I used jute to make the wreath. I made a sailboat for our clock, but you can put anything you love on the clock to make it totally yours. Although it’s difficult to tell the size in the picture, the clock is a large 18 inch square.
Now when I sit down to relax and watch tv, I can also enjoy the decor on the wall. It’s pretty handy to know the time too.
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February 18, 2011
This project is a basic sewing project that doesn’t take long, so you can be outside relaxing as quickly as possible.
Things you need:
6×9 foot canvas drop cloth
heavy duty thread and needle for your sewing machine
19 feet of clothesline
1 piece of 1x4x6 wood (cut in half to make two 3 foot pieces)
Optional Supplies
Freezer paper
Craft paint and foam brush
Instructions
1 . Remove the drop cloth from the package and iron it really well. Using a lot of water may help get out the creases from being packaged. After I finished ironing the drop cloth, my mom said she’s heard mixing water and vinegar to spray on fabric will help release wrinkles, so you may want to try that too.
2. Fold the drop cloth in half, lengthwise so it is now 3 feet by 9 feet. Crease the fold with an iron.
3. Cut a stencil out of freezer paper. I decided to use the word relax. I traced the letters onto the freezer paper and cut out the letters. Keep any small pieces you need to replace in the stencil before painting (like in the e and a). Iron the freezer paper to the drop cloth.
4. Use a foam brush to apply paint to the stencil. Brush away from the edges to minimize bleeding under the freezer paper. Be sure to open up the drop cloth and place a protective barrier under the side you plan to paint. The paint may bleed a bit through the top layer.
5. Wait until the paint dries and apply a second coat, if necessary. After all coats fully dry, remove the freezer paper. Or, if you are impatient like me, go ahead and pull off the freezer paper while it is still wet, just know you will end up with a lot of paint on your hands.
6. Fold the drop cloth lengthwise with the right sides together (if you didn’t wait for the paint to dry in the previous step…wait for that before moving to this one).
7. Stitch along the long side from the top to the bottom. Sew as close to the finished seem as possible.
8. Turn the drop cloth back so the right sides face out again.
9. Run clothesline along the inside of the drop cloth. You will need one 10 foot piece for each side, but doing one at a time is easiest. Line the clothesline with the sides of the drop cloth and tie a knot where the clothesline comes out of the top and bottom. This will help anchor it for you while you sew.
10. Stitch as close to the clothesline as possible, from one end of the drop cloth to the other. Repeat on the other long side of the drop cloth. This stitch forms the casing for the clothesline that runs up and down the sides of the hammock.
11. Cut the knots from the ends of the clothesline to make the next step easier to stitch.
12. Turn the short ends of the drop cloth back 4 inches to form a casing for the wood. Since the drop cloth already has a finished seam, you don’t have to worry about turning the end under.
13. Stitch all the way across, from one side to the other and sew through the clothesline and all. Be prepared to break some needles at this point. I used a pretty heavy one and broke a couple making this hammock. Go slow and hand turn the wheel if you need to when you get to the thick edges.
14. Measure about an inch from the end of the wood and cut out a notch so the rope does not slide. Cut a notch at each end of both pieces of wood so you have 4 notches total. This was easy to do using a hand saw and the split in my kitchen table as a makeshift sawhorse. Shhh…don’t tell my husband…I had all the sawdust cleaned up by the time he got home and he doesn’t really want to know that’s how I use his tools and the table.
15. Slide the wood into the casings at the top and bottom and string your rope. Be sure to use rope that will support the weight you plan to put on the hammock. The rope I used was good up to 90 lbs and since it is Katelyn’s hammock, she has some time before reaching that limit. Hang the hammock between two trees. We screwed eye hooks into these trees in our back yard and they work great with a hook to connect the hammocks.
16. Now go take a nap in your new hammock.
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February 15, 2011
It’s wall decor week over at So You Think You’re Crafty and I’ve made it to the final 4! Go on over and vote for your favorite project.
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February 14, 2011
This Valentine’s Day, we plan to celebrate by having dinner at home and having a family movie night. I rented Despicable Me and I hope the girls enjoy it. Jon always brings the girls an me home flowers and I will normally bake something for dessert. So in addition to the usual hugs and kisses, this is what we have planned to show the girls how much we love them.
In return, the girls show us their love in many ways too. This weekend, they decided that it painting the laundry room was a great idea. After grabbing a can of black spray paint (I left it in the kitchen after a recent project), they went to work on the washer, the walls, Emily’s coat and backpack, the floor, a pair of my flip flops, a step stool and my favorite boots. I forgot about the cabinet in the kitchen too. It was all over. I just kept finding more spots.
Emily wasn’t around when this was happening, so I’m guessing that’s why her stuff got hit and the other two spared their own stuff.
I hope one day our girls have children of their own that express their love in a similar manner.
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February 13, 2011
I made it through another week on SYTYC! Thank you all for your votes! It was Red Week for the theme and went along with the American Heart Association’s Go Red for Women campaign to raise awareness about the risk of heart disease and stroke in women.
So my craft for Red Week was a relaxing hammock. Below is how my entry appeared for the contest. This week I will post the tutorial so you can make your own hammock.
An important part of preventing heart disease is controlling stress. When coming up with a project for this week’s Go Red for Women theme, I wanted to create a project that helps women relax.
Is there a better way to unwind than stretching out on a hammock? A fun part of this hammock is how easily it is to personalize it. You can even claim it as yours and yours alone by putting your name across it. Kids would get a kick out of seeing their name too.
Make a coordinating pillow to complete the relaxation process and add a splash of color to your backyard.
This project is easy enough for a beginning sewer, so it won’t stress you out to make one!
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February 11, 2011
This week on So You Think You’re Crafty, it was red week. Red week goes along with the American Heart Associations Go Red for Women campaign. There’s still a few hours left to go vote for this week. So if you haven’t checked out the entries yet this week, head over cast your vote.
Have a great weekend!
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February 5, 2011
So who’s ready to make a lamp?
For this tutorial, I’ll show you how I made my lamp, but you may need to alter the directions a bit depending on the size of the lamp you have.
Things You Need
I started with a buffet lamp.
4 candle holders from the Dollar Tree (pretend you see 4 of them here). I bought 5, so we could practice with one, but I only needed 4 for my lamp. If your lamp is shorter, you may only need 3. Be sure that the stack nicely together.
And a diamond drill bit to make the holes in the glass. I used a 1/2 inch bit.
You will also need spray paint for the base and candle holders as well as some glue appropriate for glass.
Taking the Lamp Apart
Begin by disassembling your lamp. Disconnect the wires and from the socket part by loosening the screw on the sides and slipping off the wire. I marked the wire letting me know which wire went to which screw, but that may not be necessary. I’m not electrician, so I just try to reconnect stuff the way I found it. Leave only the base and the pole holding the electrical wires. The socket just screws onto the post and is easy to remove.
I didn’t take a picture of the naked lamp. Sorry!
Painting the Lamp
Take the naked lamp outside and spray paint it. I decided to use a glossy black.
It will take several coats. Use light layers and let it dry well in between coats. Just spray the base and don’t worry about the pole. You won’t see the pole in the end anyway.
I found that propping the small parts with a dowel helps you get paint on all sides easily.
I ended up needing to go back and paint another piece the lamp needed, but I didn’t know it until the end, so you may want to spray extra pieces to save time in the end. It was difficult to know how many filler pieces you need since you don’t assemble until the end. I don’t like taking the glass globes on and off more than necessary.
Drilling the Holes
Next, you need to make a hole in the bottom of each piece of glass. This part is a little tricky, but totally doable.
Take a piece of paper and trace around the bottom of your candle holder. Fold the paper in half from side to side. Form a crease. Open the paper and fold in half again, from top to bottom. Where the two sections intersect, you have the center of your circle. Mark the center with a dot.
Place the paper under the candle holder so you can see the center mark. Mark the inside of the glass with a Sharpie. It is important to place the mark on the inside because you will be using water in the next step and you don’t want to wash your mark off.
Drilling the holes is easiest if you have two people. I purchased an extra candle holder so we could practice cutting the hole on it.
To drill a hole in glass, you need a diamond drill bit. Measure the diameter of the center pole staying in the lamp. I bought a 1/2 inch bit because was big enough to slide the pole through, but not so big that the lamp would wiggle around. You can find these bits at any major hardware store.
My husband helped me with this part. For some reason he didn’t seem to trust me with combining water and power tools! That was probably a pretty smart move. I would have had a hard time taking pictures at the same time too. So I accepted his help.
Place a towel in the bottom of your sink to help secure the candle holder while drilling the bottom. Place the candle holder on the towel with the bottom turned up towards you. Use a towel you plan to throw away in the end. When we finished, we had lots of tiny shards of glass on the towel and decide it wasn’t worth the risk of getting hurt later by a hidden piece of glass, so we threw the towel away. Just keep that in mind when choosing what to use.
When drilling through glass, you need lots of water to help keep the glass and bit cool. It also helps decrease the glass dust produced by the drill. So as my husband drilled, I used the sprayer from the sink and kept a low flow of water hitting the surface the whole time.
He had to apply a decent bit of pressure as he drilled. Do your best to keep the drill centered. Once you get started, it will form a groove and that makes it easier to keep the bit from sliding as you drill. As you get close to breaking through, the sound changes just a bit and you know that just a few more seconds you will have the hole. You need to let up some pressure at that point or you risk chipping or cracking the glass because the weight of the drill may hit the glass.
Repeat on all the glass candle holders until you have the holes finished. Sorry about the bad photos. I was working on a crafting deadline and had to take pictures at night.
Painting the Glass
I tried 3 different ways of painting these. I tried craft paint. I tried acrylic paint and finally, I got out my trusty, rusty can of spray paint. Painting it with craft paint and acrylic paint didn’t work well because it was so thick, took forever to dry and then peeled right off like it was never there. I started off with rolling paint around in the glass and it covered well, but like I said, it just didn’t hold up like I wanted. So her’s what I did.
Wipe the inside of the candle holders with white vinegar. Apparently this helps condition the glass so the paint sticks better. I didn’t do this until I tried the spray paint, so I don’t know if it would have helped the other paints, but it was a cheap and easy thing to try before my third attempt and since the final try worked, I’m also passing on that bit of info.
Hold the spray paint in one hand and the candle holder in the other. Using quick spurts, spray the INSIDE of the glass. Spraying the inside helps keep the shiny milk glass look to the lamp.
It will take several layers of spray paint before it’s fully covered. Be careful to not overspray and cause the paint to run.
Once the paint is dry, if you got some paint on the outside of the glass, you can wipe it off with acetone.
Assembling the Lamp
Once all the paint is dry, start assembling the lamp. Place the first globe over the pole and let it rest on the base. Continue stacking until all of the candle holders are on the lamp.
To help secure the lamp, you need to glue each of the candle holders together. I used E-6000, but using a glass epoxy will probably hold better in the long run.
Run a bit of glue along the bottom rim of the candle holder. I stacked mine one at a time and applied the glue once I got it on the post. There was enough room to lift up and run the glue under the candle holder. I took the top candle holder off to see how that would work and I managed to get glue everywhere when I tried to thread it over the lamp post.
Can you see the glue here?
Continue stacking and gluing the candle holders until they are all on the lamp post.
Place the remaining pieces on the top of the lamp. When I first assembled the lamp, I didn’t realize I needed the larger piece. So I took the original pictures without is since it was still waiting for a couple coats of paint. Replace the socket and place the wires over the correct screws before adding to top of the light socket.
I glued a circular piece of fabric to the bottom of the lamp to make it cute too…not that anyone ever sees it.
Now your lamp is complete!
Recovering the Lampshade
I’ll share how to recover a lampshade. It’s nothing new or different, but I figured I’d add it since it was part of the new lamp.
Since I used a buffet lamp, the shade that was with it was not the size I needed for my new lamp. So I found a black lampshade to use instead. That shade worked, but was a bit boring and I couldn’t find anything else I liked.
So I headed over to the fabric store and purchased 1/2 yard of fabric.
To recover the shade, iron the fabric to remove the center crease.
Place the shade in the center of the fabric and begin to draw a line approximately 1 inch above and below the lamp.
Roll the lampshade to the right and continue to draw the line above and below the shade. The lines will begin to curve upward as you roll the lamp. Be sure you have enough fabric to overlap the short ends slightly.
Cut the fabric on the lines and run a line of glue along the inside bottom of the lampshade. Take one of the short sides and fold the fabric back a small amount and glue it. This will give you a finished edge to the back of the shade. I didn’t take a picture of that part, but I can if someone need a visual.
Turn the edge of the fabric up and press into place.
Run glue along the inside portion of the lampshade at the top and press the fabric down along the top too. Run one more strip of glue where the ends overlap in the back and glue that down.
Place your new lampshade onto your new lamp and enjoy!
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February 5, 2011
For Game Week, I made a stadium seat cushion. Here’s the entry for the contest, in case you missed it.
For game week, I decided to make a stadium seat. Nothing worse than sitting on some cold (or hot!), hard bleachers to watch your child’s game. Going to a college or professional game can be just as bad with the hard plastic stadium seats. Taking along your own cushion can help you focus on the game and off your sore bum.
The handy pocket on the back can hold whatever you need, well probably not everything, but you can put a player roster, your keys and various items like that. If you are in a giving mood, you can lay the cushion out flat and share the seat with someone else.
One the way to and from the game, the seat slips over your shoulder to keep your hands free. You can customize this to suit your style and needs.
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February 5, 2011
If you missed the first part of the picnic blanket tutorial, click here to head that way first.
Time to make the picnic blanket fun! I decided to add a checkers game, Bingo cards and tic tac toe grids to the top, but if you have other games your family loves, you can add them instead.
To make the checker board, you need 2 fabric colors. Using the lighter color, cut a square that measures 16 x 16 inches. Iron a piece of Heat’n Bond Lite to the wrong side of the fabric.
Out of the darker fabric, cut a rectangle measuring 16 x 8 inches. Apply Heat’n Bond Lite to the wrong side of the fabric.
Cut 32 squares measuring 2 x 2 inches out of the darker fabric.
Remove the paper from the squares and place them on the large square in a checkerboard pattern. Iron the squares in place.
Remove the Heat’n Bond Lite paper from the back of the checkerboard. Place the checkerboard on the center of the picnic blanket. Turn the board so the sides of the board align with the corners of the blanket. This gives you more space to sit when playing the games. See photo below for placement of the checkerboard.
Iron the board down to help it stay in place when you stitch. Use a zigzag stitch to sew the squares together and secure them to the top of the picnic blanket.
Time for the Bingo cards. Using a piece of fabric measuring 16 x 40, iron Heat’n Bond Lite to the wrong side of the fabric. Cut 4 rectangles measuring 2 x 10 inches. Remove the paper backing and iron the rectangle to the picnic blanket along the sides of the checkerboard. Refer to the picture above for placement.
Using a fabric marker, write BINGO on the fabric. Space the letters evenly.
To complete the Bingo cards, use the fabric marker to write the numbers under the letters. You can randomly select numbers for each section following the rules below:
Column B contains numbers 1 – 15
Column I contains numbers 16 – 30
Column N contains numbers 31 – 45
Column G contains numbers 46 – 60
Column O contains numbers 61 – 75
You can also use an online Bingo card generator and just copy the supplied cards.
Draw the tic tac toe games between the Bingo cards.
Time to make the game pieces. I used unfinished wood pieces from Michael’s. I used round discs for the checkers, Bingo markers and tic tac toe pieces. They were the 1.5 inch size. Katelyn painted them for me.
I used small heart shaped wooden pieces to make the calling pieces for the Bingo game.
The games are complete. Now it’s time to attach the top and the bottom of the blanket.
Take the top of the blanket and the vinyl tablecloth and place the wrong sides together. Now it’s almost ready! Round the corners slightly to help soften the edges and make it easy to sew the binding.
You can either make bias tape or use store bought tape. Place the bias tape around the perimeter of the blanket and stitch the edge of the blanket all the way around. Stitch carefully to be sure you catch everything as you go. If your stitching is off around the corners, your game pieces can slip through the spaces. If that happens, just restitch the area you missed.
Place your game pieces and other small games (like cards) into the corner pockets.
Roll up or fold the picnic blanket and you’re ready to head out for a bit of fresh air and entertainment.
If you have any questions or something doesn’t make sense, please let me know!
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