#21-27 jolene's hats

It's been a while since my last post, but please don't think that's been because I had no new projects to work on. I've been up to my eyeballs in yarn, crocheting my little heart out for friends and family . . . and myself, even! . . . and now that I've finished up some things I can post photos for all to see. My darling friend Jolene asked me to make some beanies for her to give to her neices and nephews for Christmas and I was thrilled to comply! Here's their finished photos:

And I'm counting them in my 31 Projects count . . . just because I can! . . . so now I'm up to 27. Four to go before March -- I think I just might make it!

Stay tuned for another batch of hats and some other fun baby gift things!

#20 Headbands

We are so blessed to have friends who believe in hand-me-downing clothes to us for both of our kids! Every school year we go to our "too-big-still" closet and sort thru the bags to see what will fit now. Because of such generosity, we didn't have to buy Gennie any school clothes this year - yay for saving money! But I did want to make something special for her for the beginning of school . . . so I made her some fabric headbands. She loves the wide 1950's-style headbands but refuses to keep the plastic ones on because of the inevitable Headband Headache by the end of the day. So I let her pick out some fat quarters and got to work.I made a whole set of these for her and she loves them so much that I have to encourage her to do other things with her hair for variety - she'd wear them all together every day if I let her.

Each fat quarter made 4 headbands so I had a few left over to post on etsy (see the sidebar on here for their listings). I tapered the part that rests behind the ears so they would lay flat and not make the hair stick out all wonky. And I tried hers on to see what headsizes they'd fit . . . they were comfy for me, too, and held back my hair securely.

And no sign of the Headband Headache!

#19 paper dolls

My daughter's friend had a birthday last weekend so I made her this set of paper dolls! I decorated a blank tin with paper, etc, from my stash, then used the Cricut cartridge called Paper Doll Dress Up! to make the dolls and clothes. I was a little disappointed with the setting called "Tabs" that is supposed to make the dolls dress-able . . . the tabs were crazy small and hard to work with . . . so I attached all the clothes and accessories and hair. I made around 20 different dolls, complete with pirates and cowboys and cute little girls and a prince and princess. Then I made a few extras, like the horse and the unicorn, for the dolls to play with.

After I convinced my daughter that yes, this set was for her friend and yes, maybe someday I would make one for her, we gave the tin to her friend and she loved it! Happy birthday, Dessa!

31 projects

Since I turned 31 this year, I decided to set a goal for myself to complete 31 projects before my next birthday, aside from my regular scrapbooking layouts and cards. These projects were originally supposed to be to finish up stuff I'd started already . . . since I suck at finishing things . . . but now that I'm 4 months into this I've realized it's been a lot about gifts for other people. I guess I'll get around to those "started" projects one of these days.

Here's my list so far, with the most recent ones first (their descriptions are below the photos):

18. Thank-you's for my son's birthday gifts - they're being printed as we speak so they'll soon be on their way.

17. French toast and sausage throw pillows for my husband on our anniversary (these are his favorite breakfast foods in the whole wide world)

16. Bridal Shower-In-A-Box for a friend. It included the invitations and envelopes, games, a couple of the Mocktail Recipe Books (see below) for the prizes, thank-you cards and envelopes, and a flippy book with stamped cards for the guests to fill out. All the host had to provide was the food!Every guest at the party was to fill out one of the stamped cards with a word of encouragement or advice for the bride to flip through in the days to come.

15. Burp/Washrags for a friend's baby

14. Blanket for a friend's new baby

13. Burp/Washrags for my new nephew. 12. A Fat-Bottom Purse for my sister's birthday. It's straight from the book Stitch 'n' Bitch Nation: The Happy Hooker by Debbie Stroller and I love it. Now I want one! I love the bamboo handles.
11. Recipe binder bridal shower gift. It has fun tabs organized a little differently - quick & easy, around the world, sweet tooth, comfort foods, etc. All the recipes are ones my family has passed down and taste-tested so there's not a loser in the bunch.

10. Thank-you apron for my daughter's kindergarten teacher

9. Mocktail book, round 2
8. Mock-tail recipe books attached to plastic party glasses

7. Paper quilt hanging for my mom-in-law 6. Blanket for my new nephew
5. Giant granny square purse 4. Blue and purple granny square purse
3. All-digital layout (my second attempt ever) 2. "Paper quilt" wall hanging 1. Teddy-Go-Round blanket

lego birthday minibook

I have a never-ending love for mini books! I have piles of them all over my living room, waiting for guests (or my kids) to pick them up and thumb through. Among all the other topics available, I've made a mini book for each of my kids' birthdays each year so they have a special book all about how we celebrated each birthday.

My son and his best friend had a joint birthday party when they turned 1 . . . they are 3 days apart in age . . . so his mom and I chose Legos for the theme.

I bought the box at Pamida for cheap and painted it then added the "studs" by cutting cardboard circles and gluing 2 together for each stud.

For the cover of the book I covered cardboard with patterned paper. The little lego accents on each page are just cardstock strips with eyelets set in. And I bound the whole thing on my Bind-It-All machine.

Love me some mini books!

andy's bed & aliens

For my son's 3rd birthday this year he wanted Toy Story stuff . . . he got to meet Buzz and Woody at Disneyland this summer and has spoken of nothing else since . . . so I started with the cake. We had a bunch of kids coming to his party - and we invited their parents to stay - so we needed a good amount of cake.

Buzz and Woody are laying on top of Andy's bed which was a regular 2-layer 9 inch yellow cake and the aliens surrounding them are Funfetti cupcakes with butter-cream frosting and M&M's for the eyes. To get the quilted effect for Andy's bedspread I ran my pasta edging wheel across the fondant . . . but I got a little carried away and cut the fondant so I put the wording over the cut.

J loved his cake . . . and when it was done I was pretty happy with it.

spaghetti & meatballs ... or is it?

For my husband's birthday this year, I tried my hand at decorating cupcakes. He LOVES pasta so I made him this platter, from the book Hello, Cupcake! by Karen Tack and Alan Richardson. I love this book!!

The noodles are plain white frosting . . . with a little yellow food coloring to make them pasta-colored.
The meatballs are hazelnut Ferrero Rocher candies and the sauce is strawberry preserves.

And yes, they tasted as good as they look!

welcome to spicy tuesday crafts!

Hi! This is my brand new crafting blog. I used to post my creations on our family blog but I decided it was time to separate them for two reasons: some people who want to read about my family stuff don't necessarily want to hear/see my crafty stuff and the people who want to see my craftiness don't necessarily need to hear all about our family.

So, here's my new venue! I'll try to post often with tons of photos of each project . . . I'm also a professional photographer in my "spare" time so I usually have a camera within arm's reach . . . and I'll even throw in some tutorials now and again. If there's anything you see and would like to know how I did it, please feel free to comment (or email me) and ask!

Thanks for stopping by!