Creative Giving Class #3

Oh my did we have fun! Well, I certainly had fun! Today's class was crayon rolls or a modified version for cars.  I'll add a few links at the end for places to look for tutorials.  I've made so many crayon rolls with my own variations that I didn't use a tutorial today.  And then we modified it to make it work for some Cars from the movie Cars (which tend to be a little bit bigger than matchbox cars - and still poor Mater had no where to park his big tow truck self!)

We go to work cutting out the pieces, and decided we had time to go ahead and make two car rolls - because Stephanie has two boys it only made sense!

Miss Maria over there in the sunlight brought a project that she has been meaning to finish, so she got to work on that while we worked on the rolls.  Stephanie sat down behind that machine and it was like she'd been sewing all along!  Great fun!

I did forget to take a picture of the final product... but if you look really carefully in that picture right above this, you'll see one of the car rolls laying on the table in the bottom right side.

And for some AWESOME news... we are up to $202 towards the sewing machine fund.  I nearly got all teary-eyed when we counted the money this afternoon!  Praising God for His goodness.  We had a sweet time together; and to top it off I got to hear an wonderful adoption story.  God sure knows how to send me the sweetest encouragement at just the right moment!

Tutorials to check out for crayon rolls...

THIS is the first tutorial I ever tried, but the ric rac almost made me lose my mind, so I never use the ric rac. It's a very well written tutorial by Skip To My Lou.
THIS has a button & elastic closure instead of ribbon ties. You'll find lots of other things to explore at The Pleated Poppy.
...also if you google "crayon roll tutorial,"  you'll be sure to find one you want to try!  I always make my crayon rolls hold 8 crayons.  The first ones I made were for the boys while Daddy was deployed, and I made them to keep in my purse for going places... the last thing I wanted to do was track down 36 crayons to put back in the rolls when we were leaving.  So you can basically pick any number of spaces you want and adjust your pattern to make it work for you.

I couldn't find a basic car roll tutorial that was as simple as the one we made.  We basically made an 8-pocket crayon roll into a 4-pocket car roll, and added 1/2 an inch to each pocket (2 inches overall).  But here is a link to a fancy-dancy car roll that I've made in the past, I know the tutorial is well written! homemade by jill is a lovely blog with lots of other goodies to explore!

Remember, if you decide to try one of these on your own you can always ask me questions about it if you get stuck!  Or, you can ask the blogger that wrote the lovely tutorials too. 

The next class is a no-sew one!  Should be a great time!

keeping {so} busy

...in a good way. Although, I did feel a good strong warning to be careful about taking on more than I can handle.  I had a custom order to make 3 dwarfs (out of the 7) and an Old Hag costume.  It was really quite fun... but also quite a bit of work.

I had a huge sense of accomplishment when I finished.  2 of the 3 dwarfs are the same ages/sizes as my boys so I had them try on Dopey & Sleepy's costumes.  I am hoping that Snow White loves them and that they exceed her expectations!

They are in the hands of the U.S. Postal Service now...

go green!

I just felt the need to make a little something for the boys after a few pillowcase dresses.  Its not always easy to find Michigan State merchandise around, so I thought I'd make the boys a couple t-shirts... I used one of Daddy's old green t-shirt for the applique material.  I don't know why, but I love applique.  And although cutting out all the little crevices of "STATE" is a bit slow-going... and then sewing it on through two layers of jersey is a tricky task; it just makes me smile!  My little guy liked his helmet shirt, but was a little mad that there was "a grey circle" on it because he "wanted it all green!"  I tried to tell him that all helmets have an ear hole...  I'm pretty sure he got over it, because he wore his shirt to school the day after I finished it!

I do enjoy making things, and have loved the custom orders.  But there's nothing sweeter than seeing the boys wearing something I've made!

helping out the scouts

I am the assistant den leader for a very adorable Cub Scout's den this year.  I more or less run crowd control! ;)  I did mention that I sew to the Den Leader so she asked if I could help out with a small den flag...  I happened to have some fabric leftover from a super hero cape, so we decided that it was the perfect shade of blue!

I googled for some clip art, sized it, and printed it out...  I then tried to make my own carbon paper for tracing it on to the paper backing of the fabric.  Sadly all that yielded was some pencil-covered hands!  So I had to cut out the design little by little...

And it did take a sweet forever to cut that bear face out of the paper and trace all the nooks & crannies onto the paper backing but I think it was worth it!  I was planning on just fusing it on with the wonder-under that I had on hand and leaving it at that.  But a few of the letters were peeling off by day two (not impressed with the wonder under I bought)!!  So I decided I'd have to sew around the edges of the letters.  I've stitched more than a few letters on, so I wasn't too concerned about it.  And then it occurred to me... if the letters were peeling off... maybe the bear would too!  Oh dear...  It'd be a bummer to have half a bear on the flag...

So I stitched around his face too.  I think it was good practice.  And I'm not positive, but I think the Bears thought the flag was pretty cool!  I know my little Cub did, which makes a momma heart happy!

monster

I like finding new ideas to try... which is part of why Pinterest has been so fun for me!  Its an easy way to keep track of all the ideas I find, and I benefit from seeing the ideas my friends and family are finding too!  I'll admit - at first I went a little pin-crazy and pinned tons of stuff.  I now try to refrain a bit and pin things I might actually try.  Last week my sister pinned something with the tagline "when life gives you holes, make monsters."  Here's a photo from the site with the tutorial...

I instantly thought this was a wonderful idea because the little man had hole sin 4 out 5 pairs of his jeans last year... which I forgot until last week when we had a brief bit of cool weather.  So I re-pinned it and looked up the original location for more details...  If you go there, you'll see why I was happy there were SO many pictures.  I decided to give it a whirl last night... and this guy decided it was cool enough for jeans today!

He's a happy little monster... hopefully its not too distracting for rug time in K!