Angry Birds Part 2 and 3

Obsessively Stitching posted the tutorial and patterns for the green pig and the blue bird.  Here's my blue bird. . . 

I didn't have any green fleece, so I opted to make my own pattern/design for the black bomb bird.  I think he turned out good.  Though I may end up moving the black dot in the middle of his eyes, he looks more surprised than angry.  The black bird is bigger than the red one in the game, so hopefully I made him bigger.  (The red one is wrapped up for Christmas already so I can't compare it.)

Here's the red one I made a while back.

2x4 Snowman

My new favorite blog is Under My Umbrella.  My "to-do" craft list pretty much doubled.  :)

Once I saw this 2x4 snowman, I knew it was destined to make it to the top of my list.  I don't have MDF for the hats like she used in the tutorial, but I have an awesome friend from church who gave me their leftover scrap wood.  So I was able to make the hats out of 2x2's and other scrap pieces.  I had the same polka dot paper she used for the hat, so that was cool.

I had enough 2x4's to make 2 of them, but then I realized I could cut them in half (so they weren't as deep) and end up with 4.  Now the tough part is deciding which one I want to keep and who to give the other 3 to.

But 4 sets of snowmen means lots of blocks to sand and paint.  And when you have a 2 year-old, they aren't snowmen  . . . they're blocks for a wall or tower to build and destroy.

Knee High Socks turned Arm Warmers

My hands are always cold, and these have been great while driving or just wearing around the house.  I've seen this idea floating around for the last couple years, but I did it a little different than I've seen them so far.  It's hard to take a picture of your own arm :)

I took an old pair of knee high socks that I've had for about 12-13 years - they got too tight after highschool/college but I couldn't part with them.  And I made this pair right before Halloween, so the colors went great for my wardrobe choice.  I cut off the foot part like so . . .

Most examples I've seen have the finished stretchy top of the sock as the part by your elbow, but I made that the part on my hand and used the unfinished edge as the upper arm side - much more forgiving of non-skinny arms :)

I also made a "button hole" of sorts as the thumb hole - this was tricky, and I swore I'd never do it again, but I just made 3 more sets today :).  I did two lines of tight zigzag stitches where I wanted the thumb and then a wider stitch to keep the ends together.  It's tricky sewing in a small sock opening. (you could try an actual button hole on a scrap, but my machine wouldn't make it big enough and the sock kept stretching and it didn't work that way for me.

The ones I made today had a little something extra on them.  I had plain knee high socks and felt they needed a bit more to them, so I cut up the foot part (cut off the heel and the toe pieces) and sewed them to the alternating sock (grey went to black and black went to grey) as a cuff.  Here is a picture of how I cut them.

To get the rolled edge look, stretch the edge of the sock like my little helper is and then roll it down a little.

Here they are with the new cuff (that went by the elbow.)

Different way to display the Seasonal Blocks

Back in September, I made a set of the Seasonal Word Blocks.  There are 16 different words to spell with the 7 block set, and the Christmas ones are "snow" or "winter."  But I went to someone's house who had them stacked vertically to spell "snow," and it looked adorable. 

But her's were different colors of letters and paint, and mine didn't look so festive like her's did.  So I added ribbon (which also helped cover up the side letters).  I think mine would look more Christmas-y if the letters where white, oh well.

Turning ONE (with cupcake template download)

My daughter turned ONE last week.  And on the day of her party, I woke up at 3:30 in the morning with the realization that I hadn't made her a special birthday shirt to wear at her party!!!!!  Any prepared crafty momma would have already done this - but I guess I like to wait till the last minute.  So here's what I came up with in the wee hours of the morning.

I used wonder under to adhere the appliques to the shirt and added a pink button as the "cherry" on the cupcake.  Doesn't she look adorable?  I also had previously made the korker bow and headband - which matched perfectly!

My birthday wish for her was some hair - I wonder what she wished for?

I drew the cupcake myself, so if anyone wants the template, download it here!  I used the same template as I did for her denim picture book . . .

Angry Birds Plush

My husband LOVES Angry Birds (played on his phone)...and to be honest, I love it too.  I'm almost as far as him in the levels.  And this game is one of my 2 year old's favorite ones to play when I need to keep him quiet - like in the doctor office yesterday.  Basically, you slingshot the birds to destroy structures and the pigs (who stole the bird's eggs - that's why they're angry).

After seeing this idea on Obsessively Stitching a few days ago, I knew I needed to make one for my husband for Christmas.  She's working on patterns for the other variations of birds and pigs as well, so I'm looking forward to those!

It was really easy to make.  My only struggle was sewing on the beak - I had a hard time getting the needle in and out.  If I make more, I might try sewing on the beak before stuffing the ball part - but then it might get distorted if I do it that way, but it's worth a try since I just couldn't get it to work good.  I love how it turned out though.

Super Hero Cape

My son doesn't check my blog - so it's safe to post his Christmas presents on here.  But I'm getting antsy for Christmas to be over so that I can show you all what I've been making.  Everyone else checks my blog, so it's not safe till Christmas is over.

I started this cape about 9-10 months ago (made the pattern and cut out the fabric).  And then I finally got around to sewing it in the last month or so.  I just wasn't excited to sew on the plasticy pleather fabric.  I tinkered with different designs - starting out with a bunch of papers taped together to get the length and width and then made about a dozen different designs for the neck/closure section before I got something I liked and that fit him good.  It has a velcro closure at the neck and the length just brushes the ground - I figured it was a good length to start with so that it would grow with him and last longer.

Then I found a mask template online- and knew that needed to be an addition to the outfit.  I can't remember where I found the template, but I just google'd "superhero mask pattern" and looked through the options till I found one I liked.  This was my second attempt.  The first one was a horrible mess - I don't have a teflon foot for my machine and the stitching was horrible and the fabric stuck to the foot and wouldn't move.  Then I remembered reading a blog that suggested using baby powder on vinyl to help the sewing process.  I figured if it works on vinyl, it should work on this.  And it DID!  It's just really messy and I had to wait till the kiddos were asleep to do this.

I backed the mask in black felt since that gave it more stability - but after my first horrible mask, I realized it was better not to cut out the black felt in the mask shape before sewing it.  The red pleather stretched and it was better to cut after it was top stitched.

Christmas Soap Dispenser

Once I saw this idea on Brown Paper Packages a while back, I knew it was going on my ever growing "to-do list"

Christmas Hair Clips

I made a few Christmas hair clips a few weeks back . . .

Korker Bow - a great tutorial found on Pink Tea

Candy Cane - I drew and cut out a candy cane from red felt and then used embroidery floss to add the white stripes.  Then I used red thread to stitch a 2nd red felt candy cane around the edges to the back to give some stability.  And then I glued it to an alligator clip I had covered in ribbon.

Toddler Friendly Christmas Advent

I'm nervous to let my 2 year old have access to the advent calendar I made him last year - since it's not indestructible.  So, I went searching for an advent that he could participate in.  And I found this one.  It's the paper chain idea - but out of fabric/velcro so that you can reuse it from year to year. 

I had a hard time finding Christmas fabrics that had small enough print and matched eachother (but I did buy them in September to make as a possible Super Saturday project - so there was less of a selection then).  Surprisingly, I don't have pinking shears, so I had to borrow my Grandma's.  This was an easy craft to make, but very time consuming - measuring, cutting, ironing the pieces together . . .but the worst was sewing all the velcro on.  24 strips of fabric means 2 pieces of velcro per strip = 48 little squares to sew on.

But my son loves it.  He un-velcros them and then connects them as a long string instead of loops.

A Late Turkey

. . . but I DID have him made in time for Thanksgiving - just not posted on the blog.

I've seen this idea from Craft Goodies  posted on tons of blogs, but in case you missed it, you can find the tutorial here.  I didn't notice until I was writing this post that the example has the turkey feathers a lot shorter - thus avoiding the large spacing between the feathers - So I think if I made this again, I would shorten the sticks so that they wouldn't show a large gap next time.

I don't know about anyone else, but sometimes I find great crafts for a holiday after the holiday is past.  So I don't forget about it, I make it and put it straight into the box.  It makes the holiday next year fun to pull out new decorations I didn't use last year and had forgotten I made.

The fun part was that I already had everything - a scrap piece of 2x4, a paint stick, and the giant popsicle sticks (if you buy the Provo Craft vinyl for your Cricut, it comes with a stick to rub the vinyl on - just save those and you'll have a ton of sticks to use on projects!)

Mirror Coat Hook

I've wanted one of these for a while, but they were always so expensive.  And then I realized I can make it!  I didn't have to spend the huge money when I already had the supplies.  I made this about 4 months ago but forgot I hadn't posted it yet.

It was hard to get a picture of the shelf, but there is a shelf between the mirror and the board with the hooks. 

I had a nice hanging mirror that went over a door, but i didn't need it anymore since my closet doors are mirrors.  And we had scrap wood from working on remodeling the house to use as the shelf and hook board.

The only thing I had to buy was coat hooks.  But those are expensive at Lowes or Home Depot.  So I looked around for a while and found them at WalMart.

We painted and screwed the 2 boards together, then added the coat hooks.  The shelf/hook boards are actually not connected to the mirror.  We didn't want so much weight on the mirror when the coats are hung up . . . just in case it pulled it down and broke the mirror.  So they are attached to the wall seperately to make them a bit more stable.

But that made it tricky to try and hide the screws on the hook board.  So my husband came up with the idea of screwing it to the wall first, then adding the coat hooks - and have the hooks cover the screws.  It worked great!

Turkey Placemat

I've been on a felt kick lately. . . hair clips galore, turkeys, and some more I don't remember right now.  When I saw this idea last week on Punkin Patterns, I knew it would be my next project (even though I have at least a dozen projects I'm already in the middle of.  But what crafter isn't in the middle of several projects at the same time?

Anyway, I made this for my son since he's enjoying turkey's lately.  My hope is to make at least one more for my daughter, but I would love to have 3 so that the kids can use them at Thanksgiving this year.  I just need to dig through my felt drawer to find more brown felt.

Thankful Jar - Thanksgiving Countdown

I saw this idea last year on Somewhat Simple.  And we made these at this year's Super Saturday (a craft day at chuch).

I altered the word strips a bit for my family.  Some wouldn't work due to my children's age, and then I also added some more - but the link above has the original word strips so you don't have to think of 28 or so on your own.  My kids are still too young for this,  but I'm hoping next year might be easier to get them to understand a little about giving thanks.

The letters on the jar were cut on my Cricut, and I used the "pharmacy" font.

We found these jars at the dollar store, but there are twist lid jars at Walmart that would look good for this too.  Once all the white strips of paper were in there, it seemed a bit bland, so I cut up some different shades of brown cardstock and folded them up to add a little color (and fill some space).

Turkey Hair Clip

I found this idea on Nancy's Couture - featured on several different blogs already.  So chances are, you've already seen this project.

I was making mine for an infant, so I wanted it smaller.  I cut my ribbons shorter to 2" and still ended up cutting more off when I got them positioned on the turkey body.  My turkey body measured 1.25" instead of the 2" in the tutorial.  Plus, I wanted it to not overwhelm her head - especially since she has no hair to add cuteness to.  So the clip would be the only focus on her bald little head.

And changing the headband changes the look altogether.  I think I like the yellow or brown headband the best.  The white just makes it seem a bit plain and boring.  But the ruffle or lace gives it a girly touch.

Since my turkey is smaller, I didn't have small enough googly eyes to use . . . so I had to paint the eyes on. 

2x4 pumpkins

On The Creative Crate, I saw these pumpkins featured.  So I dug through our scrap wood from remodeling projects and made myself a set.

She didn't say the sizes she cut them at, but here were mine . . . 3.5", 4.5", and 7".  And the brown stems were random scrapsthat are about 1" tall.  My picture doesn't do them justice, so be sure to check out her pumpkins on the link above.

And does anyone know where to find green rafia?  All I can find is the tan, but I like it better with the green. . .