waxy pin

at work

I just wanted to give a big shout out and thank you to Nancy over at Owen's Olivia for featuring my navy Paisley Waves #4 border print!

If you haven't been over to Owen's Olivia, then scoot over there and check out Nancy's fabulous tutorials below.

Olivia's Felt Acorns

{Painted} Faux Ombre Chevron Curtains

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 A little news from here:

While neglecting my blog and the internet in general, I have been hard at work on small things which will be appearing here and in my shop shortly, I hope.

A big hello to everyone and to all of the Veterans and military who serve this country.  Thank you.

Gingerbread Cameo Ornament Tutorial

 

Another tutorial as promised in this post.

I know it seems way too early to be posting tutorials for Christmas ornaments, but I happen to have some especially joyful Gingerbread People running around in my shop who would love to be at your house decorating your tree.

I am really happy with how they turned out.  The ornaments ended up having the kind of vintage feel I was after.

Gingerbread Cameo Ornaments are super easy to make, and would be very fun to craft with children.  I wish die cutting machines had been around when I was small because I would have been cranking the handle to cut anything that machine could die cut.

The instructions below are for the ornaments you see in the pictures above.

{PLEASE NOTE}

I used a Cuttlebug Die Cutter to make the Gingerbread Cameo ornaments, but you don't have to use a Cuttlebug.  Spellbinders Dies are made to be compatible with many die cutting machines, click here for a compatibility chart.  

Hand cutting directions using freezer paper for the pattern:

You don't have to use a die cutting machine to make the felt oval frames for the ornaments.  You can measure and cut felt ovals by laying freezer paper over a Gingerbread Cameo (the shiny side of the freezer paper needs to be face down) and tracing the oval edge of the cameo where the pink stripes meet the black fabric.  Draw a second oval around the first traced oval on the freezer paper so that is 5/8" wider on all sides.  You should end up with the larger oval being about 5" tall, and the smallest oval should be about 3 3/4" tall (centered inside the 5" oval).  Use the freezer paper as a cutting template for the two felt oval frames.  Iron the freezer paper onto felt (shiny side down), cut along the oval lines, remove the freezer paper without tearing it, and iron the freezer paper oval frame onto felt again to cut out your second felt oval frame.

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You will need:

*two Gingerbread Cameo's (you can find them in my tiny shop)

*black felt

*5" x 8" piece of Pellon #805 Wonder Under 

*5/8" Rick Rack trim

*5/8" grosgrain ribbon

*white fabric marker or fabric pencil (removable) 

*freezer paper - to use if you are cutting the ovals out by hand instead of using a die cutting machine

*fabric glue (I prefer Fabri-Tac by Beacon Adhesives)  

*5 1/2" x 8" piece of chipboard or the side of a cereal box  

*5" oval die cutter (Spellbinders Nestabilities Petite Ovals Set)  

*3 3/4" or 3 7/8" oval die cutter (Spellbinders Nestabilites Petite Ovals Set)

*One Spellbinders Enlarged Embossing Pad

*fabric scissors

 

If you are using a Cuttlebug Die Cutting Machine here is the sandwich recipe for cutting fabric or felt:

1. Spacer A on the bottom

2. Spellbinders Enlarged Embossing Pad

3. Chipboard on top of the Embossing Pad

4. Cutting Pad B on top of Chipboard

5. Place felt or fabric on top of Cutting Pad B

6. Place Spellbinders Die on top of Felt or Fabric

7. Place another Cutting Pad B on top of Die 

Feed the sandwich through the die machine.  If the machine does not want to accept your sandwich stack do not force it through.  Check your chipboard layer and make a substitution there with a thinner piece of cardboard.  Try again and see if this was the problem.  

Cut two Gingerbread Cameo's with the 5" oval die making sure to center the cameo image within the oval die.

I usually use two small pieces of two sided tape mounted on the Cutting Pad B on the top of the sandwich to hold the oval dies in place.  You can see the tape in the photo below.

Cut out two felt oval frames as shown using the 5" oval die and the 3 3/4" oval die

(or 3 7/8" oval die).

To assemble the Gingerbread Cameo ornament you will need:

2 - Gingerbread Cameo's cut into 5" ovals as shown

1 - piece of Pellon #805 Wonder Under cut into a 4 7/8" oval as shown

2 - oval Felt frames die cut as shown or hand-cut following the directions for using freezer paper to cut the felt ovals 

Press the Pellon Wonder Under paper to the back of the Gingerbread Cameo fabric (as shown above) following manufacturer's directions.  Make sure the Pellon is centered on the image.  Once the Pellon paper has cooled down from the pressing, peel the backing paper off.

Place the second Gingerbread Cameo fabric oval on top of the first so that wrong sides are together and edges match.  Steam press following the Pellon directions for the Wonder Under so that the two Gingerbread Cameo's are fused together back to back.

Mark a line 1/8" in from the outside edge of the fused cameo oval fabric using a white marker or white fabric marking pencil.   

Cut along the line you have marked to trim away about 1/8" of fabric along the edge of the oval all the way around.

Center one Felt oval frame over the Gingerbread Cameo and glue in place.
 

Flip the Gingerbread Cameo over so that the felt edge is facing down and the side without a felt edge is facing up.  Glue rick rack along the outside edge of the oval so that the curves of the rick rack stick out just a little beyond the felt frame.

Glue the second felt oval frame on top of the rick rack as shown.  The rick rack should be sandwiched between the two layers of felt.

Cut a 4 1/4" long piece of 5/8" wide grosgrain ribbon.  Fold the cut edges of the grosgrain ribbon under and glue down.  Fold the entire ribbon in half and glue each folded end to one side of the oval ornament at the center top as shown.  Add an ornament hanger and you are done!

Little Hungry Bear Child Size Book Bag Tutorial

Finally, here is the book bag tutorial promised long ago.  

{click on photo's to enlarge}

Cut a 8" x 9" rectangle of fabric for the pocket.  Fold over 1/2" of the top of the pocket and steam press, fold over again and press again.  Topstitch 1/16" away from the edge of the folded pressed hem at the top of the pocket.  Topstitch another row of stitching 1/2" away from the edge.

Fold over and steam press 1/2" of fabric on the bottom and sides of the pocket.  Topstitch two rows of stitches along the edge of the pocket on the sides and bottom of the pocket.  Stitch the first row 1/16" away from the edge of the pocket and the second row of stitches 1/4" away from the first line of topstitching.

Trim away the extra fabric of the little hungry bear iron-on applique close to the edges of the image.  Iron on the applique onto the front of the pocket.

Press a 16" long piece of 1" wide bias trim in half lengthwise.  Fold and pin the pressed bias trim around the hungry bear applique as shown above.  Press the pinned bias trim at the folded corners.  Start topstitching 1" away from the top where the ends of the bias trim fold one behind the other, so that the bias trim remains loose there.  Topstitch along the outer edge of the bias trim.  As you are stitching you will be able to fold the end neatly behind the beginning of the bias trim and sew over it.  See photo below.

I ended up gluing rick rack around the edges.  You can sew rick rack on if you prefer.

 

Cut a 16" x 28 1/2" rectangle of fabric for the body of the bag.

Fold the bag fabric in half, and place the topstitched pocket on the bag so that it is 3 1/2" away from the fold and 3" away from the top edge of the bag.  Pin the pocket in place.  Open the bag fabric up and topstitch the pocket in place following the topstitching you have already made on the pocket.

Once the pocket is sewn on, fold the bag with the right sides of the fabric together and stitch a 1/2" wide sideseam and bottom seam with a small stitch using heavy duty thread.  Finish the seam edges with a zig-zag stitch or overlock stitch.

 

Make the gusset at the bottom corners of the bag by first matching the sideseam to the bottom seam so that the corner makes a triangle as shown below.  Sew through the fabric while the seams are matched so that the stitching side of the triangle is 3" long.  Stitch over the new stitching again and then follow with a line of zig-zag or overlock stitching.

Repeat making a gusset at the other bottom corner of the bag.  There will not be a sideseam to help you match the center of the side of the bag to the bottom seam.  In this case place the bag flat on the ironing board and press both sideseams flat.  Use the ironed crease made on the side of the bag where there is no sideseam to help you match the side of the bag to the bottom seam to make the gusset.

This is how the gusset looks on the outside of the bag.

Cut two 17 1/2" long web strap handles.  Pin along the top edge of bag on the right side of the fabric.  Make sure the handles are centered and are not twisted (I always end up with my handles pinned wrong).  Stitch the handles in place.  Zig-zag or overlock stitch the unfinished top edge of the bag.

Turn 1 1//4" of the top edge of the bag to the inside, make sure the handles are lying flat against the fabric.  Topstitch 1/16" away from the folded edge through the fabric and the handles.  Follow with another row of topstitching 1" away from the folded edge.  

You are done!  

Hand the bag off to the closest child along with a small stack of books. 

Plum & Almond Torte

 

This was a huge hit over at our friend's house about an hour ago.  It is based on the recipe I made up some time ago for butter and almond cake with chocolate glaze.  Instead of using chocolate glaze as a topping I baked fresh sliced plums into the batter and used whole wheat flour instead of all purpose.

The original almond cake with chocolate recipe turned out really good, but it was crazy rich and heavy.  I also was not totally wild about how the chocolate tasted with the almond cake, the bitterness in the chocolate brought out the slight bitterness from the almond in the cake.

So, I have been thinking about ways to improve it since then.  Fresh fruit seemed like a good companion to the almond cake, and I love how plums look and taste when they are baked into a cake.  I have been hoarding a little pile of plums dedicated just to making this new version of the almond cake.  I was a little sad that I had to use all of them, but I lucked into some really good nectarines today, so the next almond torte will have nectarine slices on top.

 It should be a no brainer to me by now, but I am always really surprised by how good baked goods taste when they are made with whole wheat flour, so don't be tempted to substitute a different flour.  The 10" springform turned out to be a really good size for this cake.  The torte turns out just tall enough to make very nice slices for company.

I can imagine fresh nectarines or cherries on top would bake up very nicely too.  

 

Plum & Almond Tart

yield: 1 - 10" cake

1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted over low heat, cooled to room temperature

1 cup sugar (organic sugar tastes great here)

1 - 8 ounce can Almond Paste

2   Eggs, at room temperature

1/2 teaspoon Vanilla Extract

3/4 cup Whole Wheat Flour (do not substitute regular flour here) (we like this flour)

3 Large Plums, sliced thinly

Apricot Jam to be used as fruit glaze. 

Additional softened butter & graham cracker crumbs for preparing the baking pan.

Preheat oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit.

Butter the 10" springform pan generously and line with a parchment paper circle.  Butter the parchment and dust the bottom and sides of the pan with graham cracker crumbs.

Put the almond paste and sugar in a food processor and process until the almond paste is cut into very fine crumbs.  Add the eggs one by one, running the processor on low speed between the addition of each egg.  With the motor running, add the melted butter in a slow stream.  Add the flour 1/4 cup at a time, pulsing after each addition.  Make sure the flour is completely incorporated into the batter before scraping the batter out of the food processor into the prepared springform pan.  Smooth the top of the batter and arrange the slices of plum in two circles, one circle inside the other.

Place the cake pan on the middle rack in the preheated oven.  Bake at 325 degrees for 1 hour 15 minutes.  The torte is done when a toothpick test has a moist crumb clinging to it and the crust and fruit are a deep golden brown.  Heat the apricot jam in a small saucepan until it is bubbling.  Time the heating of the jam so that it is hot shortly before the torte will be removed from the oven.  As soon as the torte is out of the oven, quickly brush the top of the fruit and cake with a thin layer of the bubbling apricot jam.   

Slide a knife carefully between the side of the torte and the side of the pan all the way around the sides.  Open the springform and remove the form.  Allow the torte to cool for about 10 minutes.  Once the torte is cool, carefully remove from the bottom of the pan by sliding a serving knife underneath the cake and moving it onto a serving plate.  Cut into 16 slices and serve with creme fraiche or a small spoonful of whipped cream.

For a recipe for whole wheat biscuits with orange icing click here. 

A flying whale, a bear with a bowtie and a bird with a crown

Sea Bird   15 1/4" x 15 1/2"  

Cotton fabrics & canvas, cotton string, grosgrain & bias ribbons  

Whew - I just finished this fabric painting that got started last week.  A lot of handstitching and love went into making my own humpback whale, a subject which has been on my mind for a few years now.  Two falls ago I did a fair amount of reading up on humpback whales and made several drawings, but could not figure out what to make.  It is weird that at certain times of the year the same subjects and images return, as if they are waiting there.

I still need to press it, back it with linen and find the right frame.  Then it will be going into the shop.  (Still working on getting the correct frame for this). I may be opening a separate shop just for dolls and artwork, in which case this fabric painting will be headed there.

Bear with a Yellow Bowtie  acrylic on cotton canvas

Or Bear-Cat?  This is a fluffy strange one, I was thinking bear while painting but somehow cat ears got painted on.

These two paintings showed up at the end of my brush a few weeks ago.  I have no idea what to do with them.  Any suggestions? 

Crowned Bird  acrylic on cotton canvas

little miss houndstooth

This is who I have been working on lately.  She is a first cousin once removed of the little boots crew.  But somehow she looks a bit like the Piglet.

The back of her head turned out too flat, so the next one is going to have more rounded side head pieces.

I'm pretty happy with the faceted oval vintage glass buttons I ended up using for her eyes.  The next one will have her clothes sewn into her body, no more fiddling with fitting super tiny clothes.  She told me that she wants a pair of good shoes though, nothing sewn into her feet.  I can't blame her, it would drive me wild not to be able to get my shoes off too.

Deep Sea Diver Cat

William Beebe on an expedition to Guiana in 1917. Source: Descent: The Heroic Discovery of the Abyss by Brad Matsen Author:  New York Zoological Society (now known as the Wildlife Conservation Society) you can find the original Wikipedia entry containing this image here

I got hooked on reading about Dr. William Beebe last spring.  Dr. William Beebe was a well known naturalist and adventurer who wrote very engaging and entertaining accounts of animals and his adventures trying to get to see them in the wild.  Deep Sea Diver Cat is based on William Beebe (he even looks a little bit like him) during the time that Dr. B was walking around the ocean floor in a Divinhood.  (If you scroll down on the Divinhood link you will find a picture of William Beebe wearing the Divinhood).  I did not make his diving helmet look exactly like the real Divinhood he actually wore, because Deep Sea Diver Cat is actually a prototype for a sewing pattern.  I wanted to use techniques and materials that are readily available to the home sewer, so I had to eliminate many details that would have made it difficult to turn into an easy to use pattern.

I spent a fair amount of time digging through the online blog of the History of Diving Museum, it is such an amazing place that we are definitely going to visit next time we are in Florida.  Many thanks to the folks at the museum for writing and creating such a thorough and educational site!

 

His boots have straps and working buckles.  I wanted them to look as much as possible like the real thing.

 Yes, all these years later Dr. Beebe led an intrepid hermit pattern maker around the internet, the back rooms of a library and a popular Coney Island destination on some thrilling adventures in historical digging.  More on that later.

 

Biscuits, Pants and Fashion

A whole wheat biscuit I made last night.  Buttery and delicate, they fall apart into delicious crumbles.

At 10pm last night all I wanted to do was get my hands on a can of Pillsbury cinnamon rolls.  It was pretty late to go to the store, so I decided to heavily tweak the Better Homes and Gardens Biscuits Supreme recipe instead and add an icing topping.  The only flour we had in the house was whole wheat, otherwise I would have used all purpose, but they turned out so good that I would definitely make them again with only whole wheat flour.

My biscuits were pretty messy looking.  I didn't want to bother with the biscuit cutter, so I just evened the dough out and cut triangular sections which were moved apart to different stations on the cookie sheet.

Whole Wheat Butter Biscuits with Orange Icing

1 cup            Whole Wheat Flour

1 1/2 tsp.     Baking Powder

1 tsp.            Sugar

1/4 tsp.        Cream of Tartar

dash             Salt

tiny pinch of Cardamom and Nutmeg

1/4 cup        Butter, salted (1/2 stick)

1/3 cup        Milk (whole milk would taste good here)

2 Tblsp.        Melted Salted Butter, for brushing over the biscuits once they are done baking.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees Fahrenheit.  Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

Put the whole wheat flour in a medium bowl and sift in the baking powder, sugar, cream of tartar, salt, cardamom and nutmeg.  Stir together well.  Cut the butter into small dice, dump into the bowl with the flour mixture and continue cutting the butter into the flour until the lumps of butter are the size of small to medium peas.  Add the milk all at once and stir just until the dough holds together.  Turn the dough out of the bowl onto the parchment paper lined baking sheet.  Pat the dough gently to press it to an even 1/2" thickness.  Cut the dough with a round biscuit cutter and set each biscuit slightly apart on the parchment lined sheet.  Bake 450 degrees Fahrenheit, for 10-12 minutes or until lightly browned on the bottom with only a slight color to the top.  When done, remove from oven, brush a little melted salted butter on top of each biscuit and put a spoonful of orange icing on top.  Makes about 6 large biscuits.  Serve warm.  Enjoy!

Orange Icing

1 1/4 cup        Powdered Sugar

1/8 tsp.           Orange Extract

1 Tblsp.           Orange Juice

1 Tblsp.           Milk

1/4 tsp.           Vanilla Extract

Stir all ingredients together while the biscuits are baking.  The icing should be a little thicker than a thin glaze.  Add more milk as needed to adjust the consistency.  Once the biscuits are out of the oven, spread a dollop of icing on each while they are still warm.  Eat immediately.

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Don't laugh at me but I got some new pants from here.  I figured since they know how to make bras (which are incredibly technically difficult to make - I have tried to make my own many times, bags of bra making flops are hiding in my studio) they ought to be able to do a good job of making pants or at least sourcing good fitting pants.  The pants showed up yesterday, in a very plain bag with just the store initials on the outside, and yaay they fit very well.

Alan and I are addicted to Project Runway, so we limp along between new episodes by watching reruns of previous seasons.  It has definitely been interesting this season.  I am rooting for my four favorites:  Kimberly, Viktor, Olivier and Anya.  While waiting for the biscuits last night I noticed Megan and Scott are having their own fantasy Project Runway competition, which I have been giggling about ever since, especially because Alan had suggested a few weeks ago that he should make an apron entry for Amy's new Tie One On theme.  He might be getting cold feet now, I'll have to figure out how to get him to play along, it would be so much fun to both have aprons entered.

 

Flower Trees

 
I made several of these as tabletop decorations for the Coburg Quilt Show.  I didn't end up needing them, and had them tucked off to the side of one of the trunks on the table.  I really loved how they turned out, they were super easy to make.

You can see the 7" foam Christmas tree form off to the right that was used as a base.  The foam tree was covered with polar fleece in the same color as the silk flowers.  Even the bottom of the foam tree has a layer of polar fleece on it so that it stands up nicely.

I had a ton of the same silk flowers around that I had bought on sale.  Each tree has roughly 20+ flowers on it.  I cut each flower stem with pliars so that each flower had about a 1 1/2" stem at it's base.  Then all of the flowers were pushed through the polar fleece and into the foam until it felt secure.  Some of the flowers needed a little bit of glue around the stem to stay put.  The flowers should be a loose bloom so that they can be crowded together around the foam tree form.  The only place where it got tricky was near the top of the tree form where there just wasn't a whole lot of room anymore.  I ended up using glue there and angling the stems downward so that as each flower was pushed into the foam it didn't end up interfering with another flower that was already there.

I like how you could make flower trees in completely different color schemes, depending on what silk flowers you end up buying.

And yes, we had a big anniversary around here yesterday.  We are very smug about it, patting each other's backs.  

Alan gave me two plants I have been admiring, and the night before he gave me the plants I made the drawing for his card while thinking about the same plant.

For our 20 year victory lap we ate a delicious meal at a restaurant we reserve for special occasions since it costs a small fortune to eat there.  At the end we realized we had eaten pretty much the same meal we ate on the first night of our honeymoon.