You know about this? Handmade Parade’s Vintage Pillowcase Challenge? I saw it a while back and had forgot all about it, until I was reminded by this amazing entry(!!!) and I became totally distracted with this challenge. I knew right away that I was making a sun hat (you have to have a good one if you are going to live in Southern AZ!) only, I didn’t have a pattern. I searched the web, and couldn’t find anything I liked. So, I spent the entire day, messing around with circles, bandwidths, circumferences, diameters and pi!!! Boy did I ever flex that mathematical brain muscle!! Ouch!!

After I got, what I thought was the perfect pattern, I cut out my pieces only to find out that they weren’t sewing up perfectly like my mock pieces had!!! I have no clue how that happened, but I re-worked it a bit (actually a lot) and am pleased. It’ll be good for our morning hikes and for keeping the glaring sun at bay. I also dipped my pillowcase in tea to tone it down a bit. It was a bright white before.

I’m totally going to wear it too! It’s loads better than the ill-fitting one that I’ve been wearing for the last several years.

I used a standard size, thrifted, vintage pillowcase for the outside and lining, a double layer of interfacing for the brim, tea for a tea soak, and a wee bit of thrifted lace.

Remember all those neckties a bought a while back? I made this out of one. Well, I’m still working on other things to do with these ties and came up with these flower brooches. I took a few apart and used the fabric to make them. They are even prettier in person and are in my shop now, in case you are interested.

I’m still working on other things to make with all my neckties and I’ll be showing you that this week (hopefully). I’m thinking I can make 3-4 things with just one tie, you’ll see. That is how handy an old tie can be. Who’da thunk!

Many of you requested a tutorial for my pillowcase grocery bags. They are super easy and quick to make, involving only straight line sewing. The straps actually take a bit more time than the bag itself, but still easy enough. Hopefully these instructions are easy to follow.

Here is what you will need:

–Cutting mat or nice large space to work on
–scissors (rotary cutter optional)
–Thrifted pillow case (any size), washed and ironed
–Sewing machine, thread, pins and sewing needles(optional)
–hot iron
–About one hour of time and some good music.

1. Turn pillowcase inside-out and fold in half long-ways.
2. Cut a 3-4 inch strip off of one side. Save the long strip for the straps.
3. Open and lay flat. Pin together the open sides. You will be sewing this together in the following manner, leaving a 6 inch (15cm) gap in the center.
4. Cut a 2 inch square (a) off of all four corners (b) making sure to measure from the folded edge and and seam, not the rough edge.
5. Following THESE instructions, you are going to square off each corner (c).
6. When all four corners are sewn, flip the bag right side out through the open gap and sew the gap closed (hand or machine– I used my machine for this). Now you will have a completely sewn shut, empty pillowcase with squared off corners.
7. Now the fun (and kinda hard to explain) part… Fold the pillowcase into itself by stuffing the just sewn together gap-end into the bottom of the opposite end. The sewn together gap-end will be the inside bottom of your bag(d) and the squared-off corners will meet together on each side(e). Does this make any sense at all?
8. Once all the corners meet(f), iron and then sew around the top edge. Now you are ready for the straps

There are many ways to make straps, this is just how I do it. I just don’t like sewing all around the edges of a skinny strap and then try to turn it right side out of a little hole on the end.

1. Cut off the big hemmed end off of the remaining strip. Fold the strip in half long-ways and cut again. These will be your two straps. They should be 12-16inches long each.
2. With the right sides facing in, sew together the short ends of each strap, leaving one long side open.
3. Trim the corners(g) and turn right-side out.
4. Following the picture above, fold the ends towards the inside so that the raw edges are tucked inside(h-j). Once it is straight and flat(k), press with an iron and sew together(l-m).
5. Lastly, sew one strap to each side of your bag with big criss-cross squares(n) and you are done!!!

Now, my editor (Mr Creative Kismet, who really isn’t very creative as far as sewing is concerned, but did major in english lit) said “um, this sounds good and seems to make sense?”. What he was really trying to say was that he hasn’t a clue if this sounds right. SO, if any of you sewing buddies of mine out there in blog land think I need to tweek anything on this, please shout out, because I did use some of my own terminology which may, or may not, be helpful in this tutorial. Thanks!

Here is a bony skull vase with paper flowers. Just a regular, run-of-the-mill flower vase that someone was throwing away, decoupaged and painted. Any household jar would work too. I had planned on using an empty Green Goddess dressing bottle, but it made its way into the recycling before I could grab it. (Man, my husband’s good!!) I just used thinned out white glue to stick on the newspaper strips.

Looked kinda cool after each step which makes the possibilites endless. I thought it would be fun to make a set of these to group together with different shapes and sizes. A really fun way to use up household recycled items as well.

Today is my two year anniversary for this here blog. Has it really been two years? I love coming to this place I call Creative Kismet, a space all my own. I can’t imagine life without it. It’s become so much a part of everything I do. I do it for the kick in the butt it provides to get me creating on a regular basis. But also for the inspiration, the shared creative vision, and the hearts and hands of everyone that allows me to peek into their daily creative lives. Thank you to those who have hung around to see what I’m up to and for the millions of tons of inspiration that you provide to keep me going. Amazing isn’t it, the creativity, friendship and generosity of this blogland community of crafters and artist? I am forever grateful!

Today is also Blog Action Day. Fifteen thousand bloggers around the web have joined together to put a single important issue on everyone’s mind - the environment.

Now, if you knew me in person, you’d know how important this is to me. I’ve tried, several times, to convey this in my blog and I do what i can on a daily basis. I am in no way saying that I am perfect in this aspect. I just choose to be concerned and try to make conscious choices. Here are some of the things I do to try and make a difference.

***Buy thrifted and handmade. Make my own clothing and refashion what I already have.
***Stay away from disposable utensils, plates and napkins. We no longer buy paper towel or napkins. Cloth napkins has been working out great for us.

***No plastic bottles of anything! Especially water. It seems to me, one of the biggest waste of energy and materials. Plus, water right out of the tap, can be just as good or better, and it cost nothing. I love my stainless steel water bottles. We each have one and use them all the time! With water bottle carriers, they are perfect for carrying around everywhere!
***We still drive our grease car. It saves us having to buy gas and it’s better for the environment. We use our other car as little as possible.
***We save energy by using CFL’s and turning things off and unplugging when not in use. All of our appliances are Energy star.
***We recycle everything that we can. Hopefully we will start composting soon.
***Paper or plastic? Neither. We try to only use reusable bags. Occasionally we forget to bring our bags, but I’m collecting those plastics and am making one of these.

We do more, but this is it in a nutshell. I hope this will inspire you to do at least one thing for the environment. To help you out a bit, and in honor of my 2 year blogiversary, I’m going to give away 2 grocery totes made from thrifted pillow cases. Just leave a comment and tell me what you do or would like to do for the environment. I’ll pick two names on Friday.

They are double layered for strength and have mismatched straps. Almost all of the pillow case was used, just a small handful of fabric bits remain.

I bought these ties a while back.  A huge bag (50+) for $3.  I just couldn’t resist the bright colors and funky patterns.  I don’t know what I’m going to do with all of them, but a few ideas came to me in the middle of the night (don’t you love when that happens?).  Anyway, I thought I’d better share them since I am officially (as of June 11) on a fabric diet.  I cannot buy any more fabric (thrifted or new) until July 30th.  So no more hitting the breaks when I see a garage sale, fabric store or thrift store.  A good thing for the local drivers.

 
This idea is from Last Minute Fabric Gifts. I thought it was cute and easy. Chop off the bottom of a tie, turn it inside out, sew, flip right side out, and add a closing bit & straps.  In it are all those dang cards they make you get at the grocery store to buy your food for normal prices.  The girlie card was just thrown in cuz it’s cute. Other ideas for ties: straps for bags, eye-glass case, belt.  Maybe I can think up more.  Any other ideas out there?  I’ve got a lot of ties here!

Okay, now about the fabric diet or “Use What You Have Challenge”.  It’s being hosted by Trail Mix Designs and Sew Katie Sew.  You can read more about it on both of their websites.  There are prizes involved, so go check it out and join!

These are the caps to many different liquid medication vials that I use at work.  I’ve seen them every day that I’ve worked for the past 8 years of my nursing career but for some reason I’ve never actually read them. While looking at a cap yesterday, I chuckled to myself, finding them highly amusing. And feeling a bit cynical, I decidedly needed to do something with them.

I think they’re funky, colorful and extremely funny. Now, will I ever wear them to work?  Probably not a good idea.

Here it is, finally.  I’ve been working on making some kind of recycled craft for the last month and this is all that I could come up with.  Many tries, many failed attempts at one thing or another.  Thank goodness, all of my failed attempts can go right back into the recycle bin.  I was a little dissappointed with it at first, but it’s starting to grow on me.  Imagine this:  sun setting, friends coming over,  wine and appetizers on the patio table and several of these hung here and there creating a soft festive glow.

It’s made using a hanger, soda pop cans, tin can, and magazine paper.   Fortunately, I had family visiting who obliged me in some soda drinking.

You can see some of my other recycled crafting efforts from the past HERE.

Every year I make my sweetie a handmade Valentine. Last year I made this. This year, I wanted to make something that would keep in line with my desire to tread more lightly on the earth-something both my sweetie and I care a lot about. So, without buying anything for this project, I set out to make a token of my love with only recycled items. This was given today, a little early, but who needs to wait to say I love you? Not me.

I used these items:

Cereal box, plastic bag, CD, bottle cap, single earring charm, magazines and lots of glue. I try not to buy magazines- only ones that I plan on keeping forever, like my Veggie Times and Martha Stewarts. The magazines that I used have been laying around at work for months. I figured I’d snag them and put them to use before they were trashed. It’s amazing all of the different words and images you can find in magazines. Who needs prepackaged words and images for scrapbooking when you have magazines!

One of the little gifts that I gave to my husband was a small cloth wallet made out of recycled hemp fabric.  He had been saying that he wanted something smaller and less bulky that would fit a couple of cards, his license and a few dollars.  This is what I came up with.

 

I had bought some Earth shoes a while back and they came in little protective hemp bags.  There were two bags, but the first wallet I attempted making didn’t turn out so great.  He loves it.  Now he can sit comfortably without a big bulky back pocket.
A few more gifts that I made for others.

 

A monster pillow and pajamas.  The pajama pants are made from New Look pattern #6446 and the tees are store bought and decorated with freezer paper stencils of course!

I believe this is the last of my looking back at gifts of 2006.