Spring CRAFTS

Oh, Heeeeey!!!  Is it me, or has it been forever since I have made a serious craft post?  I know, you are thinking, "Walking through your neighborhood is awesome.  I love trees, nature, bushes... but when can I see what you are working on?  What are you making?"  I understand fully.  I went through a dry spell that lasted about two weeks.  I didn't know what to do. 

I couldn't think of what to make and when I came up with ideas, I didn't know HOW to make it.  So then I went to Pinterest.  Oh goodness!  Pinterest is the Holy Land of Procrastinating, Bullshit, and complete Wasted Time. In the past week or so, I must have made 400 new pins, gotten 100+ new followers, and found hoards of ideas.  But did I make any of the awesome things I found?  Uh, no.  Not really.  Not at first!

Thankfully, I snapped out of it and went back to doing WHAT MAKES ME HAPPY!  I love to be creative. I can pour a day's worth of drama, confusion, exhaustion, disappointment, and unregulated energy into a project.... or projects.

So without further ado, this is what I have been making. Wait!! Please be advised that this is photo-heavy.  If your PC is old, rickety, and slow, come back when you have time for the pictures to load.  If you are impatient and not craft-passionate, you may not want to continue because you will get bored.  If you are extremely craft-passionate, RUN AWAY because this post is loaded with pictures AND links to the tutorials so you can make these things too. BOOM!  That just happened!  Have fun......

I found these bunnies here on Pinterest.  The link to the picture does not work, so there was no pattern.  I put a piece of tracing paper up to the computer screen and used that as a guide.  These are magnets for my Little Darling and Kiki to play with for Easter.  But I forgot that I made them, so they're just getting them today. Ha!  Still cute.  Still loads of fun.  And it gave me a great idea for some games to make in the future.

I saw this awesome tutorial on how to make lace crowns here on Pinterest.  The link is to a great tutorial in a blog, and it's so easy to follow!  So I decided to have a go.  I have to make some adjustments, but it was a quick and fun project.  I will likely make more for my Little Darling and Kiki to play dress up.

 

I beaded the flowers in the middle.  That's my first time trying to "bead" anything.  I'm content with the way it turned out.  As for adhering all the other bling and whatnot: HOT GLUUUEEE!!!  Yes.  Glue.  My Little Darling was such a Pretty Princess in her crown today.

 

I have been completely obsessed with making flowers!!  I found several tutorials on Pinterest.  I will share them one by one, I guess.  The flowers on the crown can be found in this tutorial here. Straight forward.  Easy.  I made the shape of the petal on a scrap piece of paper and it worked fine :-)

I made these for my Little Darling's Easter headband, which turned out AMAZING!  I was really happy with it, considering I had never made a cloth flower before.

The tutorial for the large flower can be found here. The smaller one was just a ribbon that I made into a flower and put an embellishment on. That was purely instinctual.  I had no idea it wouldn't look crazy. 

These are some flowers that I made from this tutorial. They are so easy!  I am going to try my hand at making my own buttons so that I have something to put in the centers of these flowers, so stay tuned for that.  Then, I am putting them on headbands. My Little Darling loves to accessorize with headbands!

And what would life be if I weren't HOOKING??  So, you know I had to try my hand at making a a crochet flower.  This tutorial was so easy.  The yellow flower is the first I made.  I used a fine, baby yarn and an H-8 hook.  I didn't realize that 39 petals would be that huuuuge! It's almost as big as my hand.  I have big man-hands!  The purple one is made with 24 petals and an H-8 hook, but the yarn isn't as fine.  It's not quite worsted weight, but heading in that direction.  The green one is 24 petals, G-7 hook and fine baby yarn.  That was so much information.  I just want to give you an idea of what to expect when you begin to create a flower that looks reasonably small from the pictures in the tutorials. 

As you can see, the flower lies better with more petals.  I am going to try this again this weekend with different hooks and yarns.  It's such  an easy pattern and really quick to make!

I have several other flower tutorials on my board.  I am not sure how it works, when you follow someone on Pinterest, but I think this is the link to my Pinterest profile.  You can follow the crafts board here with some flowers and other fun Makes. Flowers can also be found on my "Hair", and "Crochet Ideas" boards.  I know.  Spread out, but once you learn to make one, the concept is the same for all the projects.  Cut a circle, fold it, sew it.   Or you can just stop by to see what you might like and repin at your leisure.  I hope everyone gets out and tries at least one of these projects!  I love to see different spins on the same ideas, personally.

And what about a blanket??  Yea!  I got one of those going too!  Hahahaha!

I started this two years ago.  I made a handful of squares, with the plan of turning it into a twin-sized quilt for my Little Darling's bed.  I quickly realized that building a blanket that large out of these 4 inch squares wasn't something I would be able to do.  Last spring, I picked the project back up and started again, making more squares with plans to make a baby blanket for a friend.  I got distracted and forgot about it.  In the past few weeks, I have finished all the squares I need for a cute baby blanket.  I need to assemble it and throw a boarder on there.  Wish me luck!  I am in the home stretch.  Just need to cross the finish line.  Do you ever do that?  Start something, lose interest, repurpose, lose interest, finish it?! Now, I have NO purpose for finishing this blanket, other than it's full of spring colors and it brings me happiness to have all this color in my life.

In keeping with the Spring Spirit, I made some spring envies for my pen pals.  Ok, I LOVE LOVE LOVE snail mail!  I love it!  There is nothing better than getting a hand written note in the mail from someone far away.  It makes me feel special and loved.  I love meeting new people and sharing with them.  I also really get tired of seeing bills all the time.  Like, I get it, I owe you all money!  Jeez! 

If you ever find yourself wanting a template for an envelop, leave me a comment.  I have several templates that I can scan and email to you.  And if you want me to MAKE some for you, leave me a comment :-)  I just might!

And lastly, I just have to add an update on my adventure with transitioning from paper towels to cloth napkins.

Our spring colored set came in about two weeks ago.  I LOVE THEM!  First, I was disappointed about the grey, but then I looked outside this morning.  Although it's a perfectly sunshiney spring day right now, this morning it was gloomy and grey.  So I guess this napkin fits!

The transition has been simple.  I haven't bought paper towels in a month.  We have kitchen towels and rags for cleaning.  We have these for eating and small table spills during dinner.  We saved money and helped the environment.  And it was all so easy to do!!!  I highly recommend it!

Well, I have to get some dinner cooked.  I hope everyone has had a great week and has something fun planned for the weekend.  I love being lazy on the weekends, personally!  Let's find out just how lazy I can be!