Just a little check in

Are you getting so busy that things are starting to slide? My shop is picking up and it seems like there are just not enough hours in the day to do much of anything on the personal side since I've been sleeping extra to try to get back to good health. Tuesdays are my day off and I spent most of the day today doing things for the shop, but I finally stopped to take a little time for me.

After running a few errands, I came home to get started on the outdoor Halloween decor. I've never done outside stuff before so it was a ton of fun! Those spiderweb thingies are tough to work with and it took forever, but I think its cute along with a giant furry spider, a couple of tombstones and a black cat garden stake that I bought from my very own shop. It got dark while I was finishing up the spiderwebs, so all you get to see is my very tired buddy.

Does everyone think their dog is adorable while they're sleeping?  Katie sure is!

Black Cat Pillow for Halloween

I've seen some really cute, I mean scary black cats out there in Halloween decor this season and I decided I could make an applique pillow to add to my own stash of Halloween decs.  I love the black cats with arched backs but I didn't want it too spooky.  I found a cute drawing online in a children's printable coloring page and used that as my template.  One evening of applique for the cat and the next day I added black borders to my square and a fun orange black cat print for the pillow back.  I found an easy tutorial with a great idea for sewing the back at a blog called Sparkle Power - you might want to check out her tutorial here.  She overlaps flaps so that its very simple to remove it. Love it!

Isn't she cute?  I'm not quite happy with her tail, but its been a couple years since I did any applique so I thought this actually turned out pretty well all things considered.

The pillow back is a Debbie Mumm fabric from Joanns.  My camera has mysteriously died so I am subjecting you to sad cell phone pictures.

I'm linking to these great parties - please visit them - there are some seriously crafty ladies here!

The Gambler Adds to Her Stash

I do love Kenny Rodgers but I don't love it when the cards don't fall my way.  My favorite pink peonies fabric Peonies from Pop Garden by Heather Bailey was on sale at the Hancock's of Paducah website so I ordered 2 yards.  I'm planning on using it in the front room somehow, probably a slip cover for my sewing chair and maybe a matching cover for the machine. I also got a yummy yard of Pineapple Brocade, because who can resist $4.98 a yard?  Its so pretty in person - sunny and cheerful and it almost glows.

I also bought a Moda Scrap Bag for a steal.  Half a pound of Moda fabrics for $7.  I've been eyeing these for some time and finally took the plunge.  Its a crazy roll of the dice to order a small stash of fabric without knowing what you'll get.  What would it be?  Pretty muted tones from Fig Tree Quilts, Sweetwater or 3 Sister.  Geometrics or flourishes from Kate Spain, or great prints from Sandy Gervais or Lila Tueller. Maybe Bliss or Pure or a collection of the rich tones of their many Christmas lines?  I love lots of Moda lines and I thought what the heck - lets see what I get!  My collection is 30 strips of 3 inches wide by about 33 inches long of fly fishing, bears, log cabins and pine cones.  Its Holly Taylor Classics.  Insert big sigh here.

So not my taste.  Or anyone I'd make a quilt or other project for.  Maybe I'll use these for a charity quilt?  Its a cute line and its Moda so the fabric is wonderful, its just not a theme that works for me.  Maybe I'll list them on Etsy and let some one else love them.

So to turn this frown upside down, I'll also share some charm packs I bought recently on Etsy.  Evening Mist and Rue Saint Germain charm packs plus a stack of Amy Butler charms.  So pretty.  I think when I'm done with today's project, I'll do a pin cushion in some of the Amy Butler fabrics. 

Did I say something about today's project?  Why yes, yes I did.  Stay tuned for a Halloween project!

The Week of the Halloween Banner

I've been admiring all the fun pennant type banners on the web for a while now and thought I'd whip up one for Halloween.  Are you laughing hysterically?  In retrospect, I am now laughing hysterically at the thought that I'd 'whip it up.'  This is taking forever!

First I made a pennant template from quilting template plastic.  I decided how many little pennants I needed to spell out EEK - SPOOKY - BOO along with the spacers.  I cut out an assortment from a fun Halloween paper pad from Joanns and came up with a combination I liked.  Then I cut out pennants that are 1/4 inch larger all around, out of black cardstock.  I glued all those together and I wondered where my evening went!  I think it took about 2 hours in front of the telly including cutting a couple of mistake pennants that came out upside down.  The glass of wine might have made the cutting take a little longer than it should have, but I wouldn't confess to that in a court of law.

Then I had to decide how to put them together.  I thought it would be cute to use eyelets because I am hoping it will allow for greater flexibility in the swag of the banner.  I just bought 3 new lovely black bookcases for my living room and got them all put together, and the banner will hang across these.

To install (is that the right word?) the eyelets, I finally got to use my Crop-A-Dile!  It was a Christmas gift a few years ago from my dad but I've never used it.  Of course I didn't have the eyelets I wanted so that delayed the project a couple more days until I could get to a store.  Then I took the pennant pieces, eyelets and tool to work with me thinking that I could work on the banner in between customers.  I didn't take the directions, so I was clueless as how to use the Crop-A-Dile.  Took me a few hours to have the You Tube lightbulb moment, but I found a good tutorial and was able to start inserting the eyelets.  Of course the Murphy's Law of retail is that as soon as you get involved in a project requiring your complete attention, customers will come in the shop.  No finishing the banner that day.  So I finished the eyelet installation last night after work and started in with the letters.  I didn't have the orange glittery cardstock at work yesterday, so I printed up some letters on copy paper and took them home.  So I cut them out, traced them onto the orange cardstock and then cut them out again.  I decided they were too boring just applied that way, so I got out a black inkpad and tried to ink the edges.  The inkpad is somewhat dried out, so that didn't turn out how I expected either.  For the love of Pete!

Anyway, here's the EEK part and its spacers.  I don't want to quit, but I am pretty sick of this banner already so I might just string these 5 pieces together and move on to another project.  I think the two big lessons learned here are that
     A. I need a Silhouette or Cricut for cutting out letters and
     B. its best to have all your materials and tools in one place to help the project move smoothly. 

Ah well, all's well that end's well and I have had fun squeezing in time to do a little papercrafting project.

A peek at the life of a shopkeeper

Being a shopkeeper is a very rewarding job.  It's also exhausting and often doesn't allow for much free time.  Its been another busy week at the shop so I have nothing crafty to report, but I wanted to wish everyone a lovely weekend.  I do take a few minutes when I get up in the morning to check in on my favorite blogs and see what everyone else is up to and dream of future projects but that's about it for me time.

So I thought I'd give you a peek at what I've been up to all week.  Welcome to the shop...

We had a special pink ribbon event in town last night to benefit the local hospital's breast cancer programs so I did some extra pink ribbon items this year. I normally have a few things in the shop and I always donate a portion of the sales to the Susan G Komen Foundation, but I ramped it up this year.  I couldn't get a nice photo so you'll just have to believe me.  This is my door last night.

The display for my fall and Halloween items filled up this week too.  I love decorating for Halloween so I have a great time ordering things for the shop.  Here are some of the hanging signs and bouncing decor.  The 'bouncies' are so cute - they hang from a 12 inch spring and they bounce up & down in the wind.  My favorite is the ghost, but the witch and the pumpkin are cute too.

And of course my trusty sidekick Katie is always near me.  Sleepy, but near me.  Isn't she precious when she's trying so hard to keep her eyes open?

 Here's hoping you have a lovely weekend full of family and fun!

Candy Corn Love

It's October, it's officially Fall and the countdown to Halloween has begun!  As much as I love the spooky black and purples that have become popular for Halloween decorations, now that I am in Florida and its still hot, hot, hot I am finding myself more drawn to the sunshine colors of candy corn.  It doesn't feel like Fall here at all, let alone October. 

Look at some of these super sweet projects from all over the blog-o-sphere

A candy corn bunting tutorial from Tatertots and Jello

How about a wreath?  Lots of patience that paid off here!  This is from The Heaps

Some candy corn goodie baskets from Country Living Spooky Decorations article

And if you need a treat to eat, check out these Candy Corn Caramel Apples from I Heart Naptime.  I just found her blog recently & love it! 



Things have been crazy at work again, so I've been living vicarously through all the fun crafty blogs this week.  Hope to finish a project for myself soon!

Paper Pumpkin Tutorial For Fall Decorating

My niece and nephew are coming for a sleepover tonight & I thought we should do a fun Halloween craft. I recently saw some adorable pumpkins made with simple strips of scrapbooking paper on a crafty blog and thought I'd make something similar. I can't find the blog post though, so if you've done these in the past 10 days give me a shout and I'll give you the credit you are due!  I did a quick google search and there are several websites with variations out there using pipe cleaners, empty toilet paper rolls and all kinds of clever materials.

***ETA: I found her!  These were taught by Kat from Everybody Loves Raymond ... and Kat!  She has a tutorial up so click on the link and go over and give her some props.  Her's are very classy in black and white, but since I'll be making these with a 6 year old I stuck with the traditional pumpkin orange.  I don't know what blog etiquette is on making something you saw somewhere else, so if I should dump the tutorial part here and just leave up the pictures with her link, someone let me know!

For this project, you will need
- halloweenish scrapbooking paper (double sided looks the best, but its not necessary)
- small scraps of green paper
- two paper brads in a coordinating color
- a pencil
- scissors or a fancy cutting tool
- hole punch

They are super simple. Cut 8x8 halloween orange scrapbooking paper into 1 inch strips. You could use any size paper and you may want to create several different sizes to do a vignette or put in a basket or bowl.   Shorter strips will make a shorter pumpkin with a smaller diameter. 

For this pumpkin, I decided to use two sheets of 8x8 paper, and obviously got 16 strips.  I used craft scissors to make a fun edge on half the strips.  If I were doing it again with 8x8 paper, I'd make about 4 more strips to make it more full.  I wish I had double sided paper because I don't really care for the white showing through, but I didn't have any at work.  (Gasp - yes, I am at work!  Luckily I work for myself so I won't get fired!)  The paper I used for the leaves is double sided, and it just looks better.

Punch a hole into the center of each end of each strip. Try really hard to get the hole in the same place on each strip or you'll end up with a wonky sphere. Since I was using striped paper, I punched at the end of the first stripe, and was able to punch 3 strips at a time with my punch. Stack them up neatly.  Hopefully you can see through the holes with no trouble.

Cut out a leaf shape or two and punch a hole, then stack this right on top at one end.  To create the leaf, take a small square of green paper and fold it in half.  Trace and cut half a leaf shape in such a way that the folded edge becomes the center line of the leaf.  I did it this way so even if it was a goofy looking leaf, at least both sides were even.  I cut two sizes of leaves.  Having the fold line down the center of the leaf adds a lifelike dimension to it also.  Punch a hole in the center of the base of your leaves.  Cut a narrow strip about 6 inches long & punch a hole in one end.  Then cut down the center (almost all the way to the hole) to create 2 curlies.  Stack this strip in between the two leaves and place the three pieces on top of one end of your orange strips.  Put a brad into the holes at each end of the paper strips. You can curl the leaf tentacles around a pencil at any time.

Once your two brads are inserted, begin to fan out the strips.  As you work, they will start to create a ball. Its quite ingenious!

I wanted to do a test run before we make some tonight to be sure I know what I'm doing.  I'm not quite sure how to make them sit flat.  This guy is a little topsy turvy but I think he's terribly cute.  I'll be back later to show you what else we make tonight!

A linking I will go .... Check out the cute projects at some of these link parties!