Cat-Themed Bookmarks

 These magnetic bookmarks are from a cute pattern from Craftapalooza. 

I used interfacing scraps which were a bit stiffer than what was called for, which added  to the bulk a bit. I plan on making more with a lighter interfacing, maybe fall-themed. They'd make a good gift, too!

Phew!

Last Sunday I had a little table at my village's Arts Festival, selling jewelry; as a result, for the last few weeks all of my non-school, non-family, non-internship time was used preparing for the show. It was fun, and I even made a tiny profit, but it was a lot of work (especially for Mr. Beadgirl, who was responsible for handling the two Beadboys hopped up on cookies and bouncy-houses).

My wares:
My Halloween/Day of the Dead wares. I got the idea for the spiderweb earrings from Beadwork, which regularly runs articles on different stitches; this stitch is built from five spokes of ndebele stitching connected with strung seed beads. It didn't take much at all to see all the resulting web was missing was a little spider in the center. Every pair I've ever made has sold almost immediately. The skull earrings, calaveritas, were inspired by Mexican Day of the Dead sugar skulls covered in brightly colored frosting. The first few pairs I made I embellished with fringe in seven colors, but for this show I decided to try a new look -- beaded daisy chain flowers in yellow and orange, to represent the marigolds often used in Day of the Dead celebrations. These are my favorite, and had they not sold I'd've kept them for myself. During the show I made another pair, this time with skull beads with a vertical hole, which took some time to work out the construction (I eventually tied the thread ends into two knots, threaded the headpin between the knots, and buried the knots in the hole). The skulls look like little flower pots:
But I think I need more flowers (I ran out of orange beads). The skull necklaces were an obvious pairing.

Milagros necklaces. Not much to say except I love these, and have one I wear often.

Birthstone earrings, with swarovski crystals and tiny ear wires suitable for women and little girls. These were very popular when I sold them through my cousin's store.

Funky fiber beads. I wrap strips of fabric around a length of straw and tie some fancy thread or yarn around them; sometimes I also wrap colored craft wire strung with beads.

Some other pretty necklaces (I didn't get pictures of all of them).

Button earrings. I layered two to three buttons and strung craft wire through the holes, twisted the ends of the wire together, and then formed the twist into the loop for the ear wires.

Felt ball earrings. I got the idea from the felt necklace I made. The larger felt balls didn't have holes, so I sewed the findings on. The colors are not my favorite, but they were the only ones I had in pairs.

Bookmarks, which I threw in for variety. The two embroidered ones are left over from the bookmark swap. The others are cut from the paper cloth I made, and sewn onto felt backing.

At the last minute I realized I needed bags, but I didn't want to spend any more money, so I used some pretty wrapping paper. I cut out long rectangles and folded the long edges in a quarter of an inch, put glue on the edges, and folded them up. It's not a major achievement, but I was pretty proud of myself.

Over the next few days, I'll be listing in my etsy store the leftover jewelry.

Bookmark Swap 2

I finally finished the last of the bookmarks last night, just in time to hand them in tonight (they are actually due next month, but I won't be able to make that class). For the most part I am pleased with the results, though I think some are better than others.
I like these three a lot. The first consists of cross stitch variations, and it is the most "regular" of the bunch, though that is fitting given the nature of the stitch. The middle one is the chain stitch one I discussed earlier. I really did not like the blue thread, so I ended up removing it and replacing it with more of the dark pink (what a pain that was). Had I more time, I would have gone in search of a different pink (ideally a purply one). The last is two related stitches -- the whipped spider web and the woven rose (both are built around an odd number of spokes. I really enjoyed this one, experimenting with different thread thicknesses and tensions.
Next up: 5 or 6 different leaf stitches. At this point I had to abandon my idea of only using one kind of stitch (and its variations) per bookmark, but at least the shapes offered a theme. I learned quite a few nifty stitches for this one, including the Vandyke stitch (the big orange leaf in the middle). The middle bookmark is just the stem stitch. By itself it looks nice, kind of minimalist, but here with the others it looks unfinished. The last is the running stitch one. As I said below, the only change I'd make is to get a better green thread.
The last trio: the first is also the first one I did, the feather stitch one, which I really like. The middle one was the last one, and having exhausted all the major stitch families I opted for laid stitch variations. It would look better if I had had the discipline to pencil in the grid before stitching. the last one is the blanket or buttonhole stitch. The way the different threads and stitches are layered over each other is the look I had originally wanted for all of the bookmarks, and I think this is my favorite. Also, I learned that a loosely and irregularly done blanket stitch on its side looks a lot like a feather stitch.

Even More Bookmarks

It's that time of year again -- end of school (sort of, Beadboy1 is eligible for 12 month schooling) -- which means I have to come up with small gifts for his teacher, aides, para, therapists, and social worker. That's 8 total, which is a lot. We thought of doing gift cards to Barnes and Noble, but they will have to be small. I also want to include something a little nicer, handmade by me, to thank them for everything they have done. So, probably because of the swap I'm working on, I came up with the idea of bookmarks, which have the advantage of being small, easy to make, and appropriate with the gift cards.

For this set I used the "tissue fabric" technique from Fabric Art Collage, which the leader of my Crazy Fridays "made" me buy. It was a great technique -- fast and fun. I ironed torn pieces of tissue paper onto double-sided fusible webbing, added on top another layer of webbing, fused Angelina fibers to it, painted it (which you can barely tell; next time I won't dilute the paint as much), fused the entire thing to muslin, added a band of plastic mesh to the top, and sewed the entire thing all over with variegated thread. Finally I fused felt to the back, cut the piece into bookmark sized strips, and zigzagged around the edges.

Now that I write that all out, it seems like a lot of work, but the whole thing took only three hours (not including the zigzagging, which was the only time-intensive part). I'm really pleased with the way it came out:
especially because I had never tried this layering technique before, thinking it would be too hard. I even did a pretty good job on my first attempt at zigzagging edges, if I do say so myself. Generally I can't really do anything on the sewing machine except sew a somewhat straight line. I also threw in the two decorative stitches my non-computerized machine has:
(well, only one is visible here). One sheet roughly 8.5 by 11 produced enough to make nine bookmarks (meaning I get to keep one, yay) and three little 1.5 inch squares to save for another project.
I have to do this again. Also, I highly recommend the book. It clearly explains how to do a lot of different mixed media techniques, and provides inspiration with all of the gorgeous finished projects it features.

More Bookmarks

I finished the running stitch bookmark on Saturday. I'm pleased with the way it came out, although I wish I had used a darker, yellowier green.
So I moved on to the buttonhole/blanket stitch. I've only just begun it, but I want to build up lots of imperfect layers.

Bookmark Swap

For a few years now I have been taking a monthly quilt class at the City Quilter in Manhattan. Originally a crazy quilt class, because of the high proportion of regulars it has become more of a art quilt/mixed media studio, where we all work on a variety of projects (sometimes even an actual crazy quilt). Recently we've started doing challenges, such as making small quilts totally from recycled materials or trash, or finding innovative or unusual ways of "quilting" three layers of something together, and so on. This time around, the instructor decided to do a bookmark swap. There aren't really any rules, just that it, you know, be bookmark-shaped and flat enough to go in a book, and that in contain something recycled.

I played around with several ideas. I thought of incorporating beading of some kind, since that is my specialty (if I can be said to have one); I could only use seed beads, though, to keep the bookmarks functional. I thought of making charms out of the little colorful plastic caps I've been collecting from juice cartons -- drilling a hole, filling them up with beads and thread and charms, and sealing them, then having them dangle from the bottom of the book. The charms, though, I thought would be too big. I thought of experimenting with various mixed media techniques I've been meaning to try, but that seemed daunting. And then I realized I would be missing the August class and would have to turn them in a month earlier in the beginning of July. So for the sake of my sanity I decided to embroider wool felt. Here are the first three:
(Ignore the scarred and beaten, I mean distressed, table.) I've opted for bright colors for the felt and perle cotton (sizes 3 and 5, with a little 8). What I wanted was to devote each bookmark to a particular stitch and its variations, and to get a layered, not-very-organized look.

The top one is feather stitch. Turns out, there are not a whole lot of variations, but because it is so airy it layered nicely. I still might fill in a couple of spots. Detail:
The stitch family for the bottom one was the chain stitch. There are all sorts of pretty variations, but I'm not thrilled with the way it ended up so linear. I guess I should have meandered more. I do really like the laced cable stitch, though -- that's the 3 pink columns of chain with two strands of red weaving them together.
The middle one is just a simple running stitch. I really like how the stitching came out, and the colors are growing on me. I've since added some teal and purple, but I don't have a photo yet.