I'm OBSESSED with making cute little things. OBSESSED. Not even an understatement. 

It all started with a few things to sell at a spring market ... now the little bits of cuteness are my biggest sellers at markets. 

 

I'll share the Christmas holiday trees and ornaments very soon, but I finished these Valentine hearts recently and couldn't help but post about them. And they're mostly red, so definitely could be coordinated with Christmasy things.

The mini pillows are about 6.5" wide and 4.5" tall, crafted from a linen-look cotton and finished with raw edges, so they'll fray wonderfully.  

 

The two heart pillow has two appliqued hearts and is finished with an htv vinyl black running stitch and bows.

The single heart pillow is a quilted red plaid heart appliqued to the small pillow.

The bowl filler hearts are also finished with raw edges for perfect vintage-inspired yumminess. They'll fray wonderfully and can be trimmed or not. They're great bowl or centerpiece fillers and come in either small (4" tall) or large (4.75" tall).

Both the quilt heart and 2-hearts mini pillows and the hearts are available in the Jude Harbor Etsy shop. The pillows are $7 and the hearts are $3 and $4. Honestly, the shipping is enough (thanks USPS) that I highly recommend spending $35 (can be on anything in the shop) and getting free shipping.

 

 

Two years is a really long time not to post. I had the best of intentions too! 

 

I do have an excuse though, I really do, aside from blogging no longer being an in thing. As my kids have grown up and gotten older (they range in age from 15 to 30 now ... I have no idea how that happened) they've started moving out and being all adulty. I love it, I really do, I'm amazed at the awesome people they've all become and I love interacting with them on a whole different level (they're all really, really cool and each is so unique).  As they've left the nest the house has started to feel big, I've had empty bedrooms in this house that raised six children. I turned one bedroom into my sewing room. 

 

As I looked at the remaining empty bedroom I realized it was finally time to embark on a new adventure - foster parenting. It had always been in the back of my mind as something I wanted to do but the timing was never right. Until now. 2 1/2 years ago I began the process to become a foster parent and two years ago, right after my last post, I accepted my first foster child, a wonderful energetic 15 month old boy named Aaron. About a month later I accepted a 5 week old little girl, Annie. My foster son stayed with me for about 10 months and my little girl was with me for almost 23 months, she headed home just over 2 weeks ago the day after she turned two. 

 

I'm now taking a break from fostering, I'm not sure for how long - it's going to be a while before the hurt of Annie's departure heals. I'm staying busy now sewing and trying to catch up on everything (yard work, yikes!) that I didn't stay on top of the last two years.

The stars have been listed in the Jude Harbor Etsy shop. There are more new listings to come. I've been doing local and not-too-far-away markets with so, so much new stuff - now it's time to get it online too.

A few works in progress to share!

First, two quilts that just need to be photographed. They are both super cute and, unintentionally, share a lot of similar colors.

This one is ready to be quilted on the long-arm quilter. I'm waiting for sewing machine oil to arrive before getting started on it, in the meantime it's loaded and waiting.

I started quilting it a few days ago and ran into some tension issues. Not a big deal, but then the bobbin got wonky and the machine stopped working completely - the motor ran but nothing else happened. In reading the manual I came across a blurb that said to look at what you were last doing to find the source of your problem - so I surmised this was a bobbin issue. The bobbin came out and got fixed, but still nothing. I played around with the bobbin housing for a bit and got some tweezers out and found a little stuck thread. Worked on that and still nothing. Hmm. Googled and googled and googled some more and finally found a video that dealt with the issue. Sure enough, there was a tiny piece, maybe 1/2" long, of thread stuck in the bobbin. My son Adam and I worked at it for about 2 seconds and that pesky thread came out and the machine worked again. Seriously, the tiniest little piece of thread!

I finished this top last night and, once I find a great background fabric, it'll be ready to be quilted too. 

My mother has been supplying me with quilts to practice long-arm stitching on. These two are the next to be played with. She donates these quilts to a local hospital and they are perfect for learning new techniques on. After seeing Instagram videos of the amazing work long-arm quilters do I am excited to keep learning (and there's so much to learn and practice!).

Lastly, this sweet charm square pack is next in line to be made into a quilt. I know Christmas is a long way away and even Hobby Lobby doesn't have their Christmas stuff out yet, but I can't wait, this one is just way too cute.

 What projects are you working on this month?

 

Another version of the personalized arrow room sign.

The hearts at the ends of the name are an option. And a very sweet one.

Check out the arrows in the Jude Harbor shop.

 

 

This is Finley, my newest grand-dog. He was adopted by Ian and his girlfriend and this was his first Easter with them. Finley gets out and about a lot because his family lives in a downtown area - so looking dapper matters. It seemed right to send him an Easter card with a little gift - two doggie bandanas that attach to his collar. And I must say he looks quite dashingly handsome.

I found a pattern on the Spoonflower website. It took about five minutes, maybe less, to make the bandanas and another minute or two with the Cricut to add his name and initial.

There's a good chance Finley will be getting a few more of these.

 

 

Over the last several (really long) months three of my kids have developed an interest in plants and gardening. Cassie has a house full of the healthiest, lushest plants I've ever seen, Ian has a new home with floor to ceiling windows along one side and an ample sized balcony - leading to lots of plantings along the window edges and a vegetable and large plant garden on the lanai, And River took a merit badge class for Boy Scouts where he was given bags of seeds which he planted in little cups all over our lanai - and because he failed to mark the cups with what he planted we're both waiting with bated breath to see what the heck he's going to grow and harvest.

I, personally, do not have a green thumb. At all. But for some reason our citrus trees and banana plants have gone nuts this year and have a record amount of fruit (that's our fruit in the picture above). Many years ago we got four free citrus trees from our local Lowe's. I can't recall the details of how we got them - something to do with a gardening club but how they told me about them is beyond me - but we had these tiny little trees, which we happily planted. Over the years we lost one and one bore a few oranges a few years in a row (very sour oranges, but still!). This year all three remaining trees have fruit - sour oranges, pink lemons(!), and we're not yet sure what the last tree is but the fruits have a super thick skin and take longer to ripen. The banana tree grew out of control and turned into many, many stalks some of which were as tall as our two story house. Unfortunately, we didn't brace the stalks that had bananas this year and they all fell over and died. :( The thing about banana trees is that they aren't the prettiest thing - lots of dead leaves mixed in with the live ones and they do expand as new shoots grow. So we decided to chop them all down about a month ago ... and within days they were growing back, and within a month many of the stalks were 4' tall. Almost creepy! I've given a bunch of the stalks away and am going to let the remaining ones regrow ... we'll see what we end up with next summer.

But back to the obsession ... somehow my children's love of greenery and gardening led me to deciding to play with molds and concrete, and to try my hand at making little concrete planters. They looked so fun! And they are! I've had a blast creating these and I can't wait to make more! Even more fun than making is them is taking pictures of them - so different from taking quilt pictures (love those too, but a change is nice).

All the little pots (and they are little with most less than 2" tall) are sealed with concrete sealer and some come with options for finishing.

To support my habit I must sell some of these and they're all available in the Jude Harbor shop here.

And just for fun, here's my very enthusiastically growing banana plants one month after chopping them all down (with a machete, but that's another long story ... but to make it short - banana plants are super easy to chop and one pass with the machete fell 20' tall plants) ...

 

Salad and a craft. What a win!

When Chick-Fil-A asked me and some other moms to try their new Spicy Southwest Salad and create something from the container I got pretty excited.

First of all, the salad. It's really good. That "spicy" word at the beginning of the name? Yeah, they mean it. It's spicy. Like, "have a drink handy and plan to refill it" spicy. But it's oh so good that I couldn't stop enjoying it even as I guzzled my water. The chicken is delicious and the little chili lime pepitas are a real treat.


And then the craft. We have a little girl in our care during the weekdays. She's going on 9 months old and is a non-stop bundle of energy! I thought the container would make a great drum for her, since banging stuff is the best and playing with "real" stuff, not baby toys is the way to go (her favorite toys at my house are a set of measuring cups and a tin cup).


I began by spray painting the inside of the container a metallic silver that I had on hand from a home project. Then I filled the container with dried beans and a variety of pretty little things, so that as she moves the container she'll be able to spy new items. A little glue and tape and she's got a new drum.

Of course, right now she uses it more to bang than drum, but that works too.

Total cost: $0.00 because I was able to use materials I had in the house and the upcycled Chick-Fil-A container. The containers stack really nicely so I'm planning to add a few more to the collection to use to store her littler toys, and for use to use as a stacking toy.


Isn't she cute? She's crewing on a frozen cloth because she got 7, yes 7, teeth at once!

Our awesome Cub Scout pack recently enjoyed it's annual Blue and Gold Celebration. I have no pictures of the event, or at least very few as I was running around in circles most of the day (Committee Chair side effect). But trust me, it was fun.

We opted to have our party at a huge park during the day, with the awards and Arrow of Light ceremonies first and then lunch. After lunch the kids got to experience a really neat climbing wall that the pack rented for the event. The climbing wall was an ideal activity - the kids loved it and they felt really good for accomplishing a skill they may not have mastered before.

In addition to all the awards the scouts earn every year we give leaders year pins, designating how many years they've been with the pack, to wear on their uniform. This year we decided to also recognize our three den chiefs and our other volunteers who do important jobs but don't wear "tan shirts". In total 27 leaders and volunteers were recognized. 27! That's pretty darn amazing and makes me so happy to be a part of our pack.


Instead of just handing them their pins I decided to give them mason jars with a few pieces of candy in them. The pins were the real gift, the jars were really just a slightly fancier way to package them - plus mason jars are pretty "in" these days.


Please understand that I'm not a paper crafter. I could be, easily, but I'd be more broke than I am as just a fabric addict. In an effort to keep a little money in the grocery fund I stick to only hoarding fabric. I had to work with what I had for these, with my limited knowledge of the art, so they could certainly have been fancier but they were fun to make.


I created Cub Scout logo circles for the lids and printed them on heavy paper, then cut them into circles and inserted them. Simple card stock, in blue and gold, form the bases for the cards. The pin acknowledgement and "thank you" were printed on mailing labels, then cut, peeled off their backing paper, and attached to the labels. The tags did end up being a little wider than I'd have liked them to be, but I think they worked alright.


In the jars are various candies, individual packages picked up at a 90% off after-Valentine's clearance sale at Target. The blue striped bags were on clearance in the stationary section of Target.

The cost per jar was less than $1. 

Proud Mama ... my guy with his awards:

Our Cub Scout Pack began the new school year with a Family Orientation meeting, to help the new folks feel more at home and to clarify a few details for the "older" families.

Midway through the meeting the scouts and their den leaders were excused to meet up in their dens while the meeting continued, because they honestly, truly, 110% couldn't care less about the business and financial stuff of the pack.

I wanted the newer boys to meet all the kids in their den and to get a chance to meet their den leaders, to see what the pack was like. I also wanted them to make something ... keeping their hands busy would help them feel less nervous and less crazy active, and having something to take home would help them feel a bond with the pack.

The challenge lay in finding a craft that would work for six year olds, but also work for 10 year olds, would take about 15-20 minutes, wouldn't be super expensive, and would be something they'd like to have.

After much Pinterest and Google searching I found a pony bead alligator. We're in Florida, so that's cool, but no way was that easy enough or quick enough. The bead alligator led to think of making a keychain, a much simpler alternative that the boys could actually use if they wanted to.

I opted for cobalt blue and yellow/gold pony beads because they are colors that symbolize Cub Scouting.


Each of our dens contain about 8-12 boys and we had no idea how many new or visiting boys and siblings would want to participate. All in all, these seemed like a daunting task for a den leader to teach solo. I was lucky enough to enlist the help of our Boy Scout troop (who also spoke to the boys about Boy Scouting early in the Family Orientation meeting), almost all of the troop came and helped, which made an awesome impression on the boys and their families and led to a few older siblings joining Boy Scouts. The Boy Scouts were divided among the dens, with the oldest scouts working with the Webelos dens.

And then the crafting began. This was the moment I learned of my big error. Not enough people had an idea of how the craft worked, in fact, I'd only showed two of the Boy Scouts. What I thought was self-explanatory wasn't in the time allotted. Fortunately, those two Boy Scouts and I were able to quickly teach the rest of the Boy Scouts and the den leaders. Totally my fault.

Most of the boys were able to finish their key rings before the end of the meeting and seemed to like them. Clean up was super easy, as it was just picking up a few stray beads.

I filled Ziploc bags, each with enough beads, 3' long sections of jute, and key rings for 15 boys as well as a sample completed key ring. Each Ziploc bag was placed on a separate table, with a sign for which den was meeting at that table.

To make the key ring:


Supplies needed:
3' section of twine, jute, whatever you can find that will work and will not fray super easily
1 key ring
17 plastic pony beads, in your choice of colors


Attach center of jute to key ring using a Lark's Head knot (create a loop in the center of the jute, wrap the loop around the key ring, run the two strands through it and tighten).


Slide one bead onto both strands of jute and bring that bead up to the top.


Slide three beads onto one strand of jute.


Run the other strand of jute through the same three beads, starting at the opposite end of the first strand.



Repeat the last step four more times, tightening the jute as you add each row of beads. Don't worry if it won't lay flat, we got our wet at the end and it fixed it perfectly. Also, if the jute isn't perfectly tight don't worry, you'll be able to tighten it more in a second.



Add one more bead onto both strands at the same time, in the same way the first bead was added.


Tighten the jute throughout the key ring as much as you can and tie an overhand knot using both strands of jute. If your overhand knot doesn't hold the last bead on tie another on top of the first.

That's it! Enjoy your key ring.

Of course, this isn't exclusively a Cub Scout craft, change the colors and have fun!

River lost his neckerchief slide at that pack meeting so I took his key ring apart and made him a ring neckerchief slide out of it. Works great.

I'm not a paper crafter. I've always been interested in the art, but avoided it like the plague for one very simple reason: All my extra money goes to fabric, if I picked up paper crafting or even knitting/crocheting I'd be beyond broke.


That said, when I was given the opportunity to review some products from Richard Garay's Spellbinders line Celebra'tions I let my curiosity get the best of me and said, "yes."

Celebra'tions is a complete collection of dies, stamps, papers, inks and accessories that are all coordinated to work together.


About the collection:

• the collection of stamps, dies, paper, and accessories include a range of designs from whimsical to fresh and modern
• all stamps are made of photopolymer and feature cling technology so they can effortlessly adhere to clear blocks
• True Color Fusion Stamp Pads are unique hybrid inks that provide the benefits of dye and pigment ink all in one. The inks dry quickly, have no chalky residue, and don't fade. They can be used on all materials and become permanent when heat set on non-paper materials (yes folks, that includes fabric (be still my heart))
• the entire product line is coordinated to work together

I was given a few "make and take" kits to try, to sample some of the Celebra'tions products and I have to say they were a pleasure to work with. It was a lot of fun making the two products I was given and I can easily see falling in love with paper crafting.


I was impressed with the paper quality and really liked the embossed papers, created with some of the collections dies. Spellbinders offers an extensive Idea Gallery filled with great projects from the Celebra'tions collection.

And now for the giveaway - I have one Spellbinders Celebra'tions by Richard Gerey clear polymer stamp set titled Many Words to give to one reader. The set includes words like "Thank You", "Happy Birthday", "Love", and so many more. The set is valued at $12.99.


This will be a short giveaway, ending late evening on this Thursday, July 17th, and is open to US mailing addresses only.

Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

The Spellbinders brand provided me with a sample of Spellbinders Celebra'tions Collection in exchange for a product review. However, all the opinions expressed here are my own.