Weekend Projects

I started one long craft project this weekend and finished a quick reconstruction project. Heather, a fellow Mafia member, helped me begin to crochet this weekend. I want to make a tote out of plastic grocery bags, but I don't even know how to crochet. So Heather thought it would be a good idea to start with some easy yarn. Sounds good. Crocheting is certainly easier than my foray into knitting last winter. I haven't given up on knitting, but I have taken a break. In anycase, I need some practice before I can start in on the plastic grocery bag "yarn." Thanks Heather! I will be asking for more help soon!

I also did a quick project this weekend. It feels so good to do a quick project that works out well. Here's the before:

I got this shows from Payless awhile ago. They hac cute little flowers on them but Mr. Pink chewed them up, he's so dog-like. So I cut the flowers off and that's the stump you see. I thought they would be cute with some vintage buttons on them, so I sorted through my newly organized buttons and came up with some good looking ones and just used embroidery floss to stitch them on. Wah-la!


I love black flats. I don't think a girl can have too many.

I'm so vain, I think this blog is about me

Debutante Clothing is an online vintage shop and blog which was kind enough to do a spotlight on little old me. Thanks!
There are a couple of really cute vintage dresses if you are into the look.

Oh yeah, and I forgot to mention the clearance sale going on in the Bake Sale Designs shop. Get it while you can. I'm discontinuing some styles of bags. And all my "new" items will be made from primarily vintage and recycled material (I can't use everything vintage like thread and zippers without damaging the integrity of the products after all.) so if you want something, snap it up and use the rebate for free shipping. Just type in "BSDclearance" in the Paypal comments area and I'll refund you're shipping--sorry, for US customers only. ** Offer good until July 31st!

ArtScape 2007

I have survived another ArtScape. It's not as bad as when I lived in my old neighborhood and we couldn't leave or else we'd lose our parking spot. In our new place, I still got to go out to my serger class and come back to my own parking spot. Ahhh. It was gorgeous weather for an outdoor festival and I did spend some money, mostly on ice cream.
No, really though, I got a marvelous deal on two bags from Range of Emotion. Check out the photos below. I looooove the bags. Yum. Inside there's another pattern of vintage fabric.



Quite frankly, I was more impressed by most of the vendors in the fashion area than in the "art" area. Two Baltimoreans with Etsy shops were there with the cute goods. I tried on some sunhats but they just didn't quite work. They had lots of cute pillow and aprons. They went by Peas and Carrots, but they are Tricia and Jen respectively. I fell in love with lots of the clothing made by the talented Dennya Company. All the jersey looks so comfy and the color combos are bright and sophisticated.


I also couldn't hold out anymore against Rachel's (Red Prairie Press) very popular shirt. I had to get it.

What I've been up to lately

Let's see, lately I've been:

-Going to estate sales
It so hit or miss. One day George and drove to a bunch in the DC/Virginia area. I got a few pieces of fabric here and there like old cloth napkins. And I picked up some sweaters for felting. Gotta get ready for the winter and scarf making! Some of the houses made me kinda sad--they were just left as the people had left them all their little personal things and food still in the kitchen. Some of the houses also made me want to make sure I never have so much junk. Time to make a pile to go to the Goodwill. At a sale outside of Baltimore someone scored a haul of fabric, I just know it. There were all these old sewing machine and buttons and lots of homemade clothes. I made off with a bunch of buttons and some scraps of fabric. But I know there was more there. I saw even more buttons in jars going out to someone else's car--boo, not mine. But I was still happy with my score.

-Organizing my buttons.
Sicne I got even more buttons at the sale mentioned above, I had to really go through them--sort them, clean them, etc, jab myself in the finger with a seam ripper and bleed profusely. Owww! I still don't have a great system, but I've got the colors I use most sorted, black, brown and white and then blue, greens and purples are together and red and pinks are together. I don't have many yellow so they just hang out with the whites. But I also have tons of buttons that I'm not going to use. I'm trying to figure out if I can just sell them, put them in cute little bottles or sell them with a little kit or booklet of button craft ideas. Hmm, maybe that's a plan.

-Getting acquainted with my serger
I got a brand new serger for Christmas--thanks Dad! But with shows and life and the free classes not being held on days that I was free, I didn't get familiar with it until now. I took my first class yesterday. Threading the serger isn't nearly as hard as I thought it would be. The bottom threads are the most difficult. But I'm feeling good about it. I came home with some serger thread too and I'm hoping to whip up a skirt from recycled t-shirts before my class next week.

-Cutting patterns and testing new ones
I'm getting my fall fabrics ready. So there's lots of cutting and more cutting. And I still have to cut more interfacing. Plus I'm working on a new clutch. I felted a bunch of sweaters and got them all cut into pieces so I'm ready for the fall and winter styles.

-Reading
Last week I took some time off to celebrate my birthday and got through a whole book in about two days. I have piles of books to keep me going all summer. I got some through Titletrader.com, this oneline swap. It's worked well for me. And a friend just turned me onto Goodreads.com so I can see what other people are reading and get some ideas for new books--as well as warn poeple away from some books I've read.



Baking a cake
-I love baking, but normally I don't do big chocolate cakes. I love chocolate, but I prefer brownies. And when I do make cakes it's more like peach upside-down cake or blueberry tea cake, things like that. I saw a recipe in the Washington Post that looked too delicious not to try and I had a BBQ to go to so I thought it was a perfect time to try it. I was a little disappointed, it was just chocolate cake. And the icing was a pain. I have the hardest time with icing. It's always too runny. I had to add and extra cup of confectioner's sugar to this stuff just to get it thick enough. Not really as thick as I'd like it. And then it was just so sugary. So I need to perfect an icing that I really like.