Baby Boy Nursery

This week I made some time to work on the baby's nursery.  The space is small, and it will only be a temporary space, so I didn't want to spend a lot of money decorating it.  The decorations also needed to be temporary, so no painting was involved. I tossed around a lot of different ideas, and finally settled on paper airplanes.  Sweet, simple, and easy to work with. I actually woke up one morning thinking of a paper airplane mobile made out of fabric.  I don't know if that project will ever see the light of day, but it served as a jumping off point.  You can find more of my paper airplane inspiration on my nursery board on pinterest.

A few months back I picked up a killer deal on some indoor vinyl from Pick Your Plum, and it has been waiting in my craft closet for the perfect project.  These little paper airplane decals were super easy to make, even without any sort of craft cutter to speak of.  I designed the airplanes, and then printed out a template.  I then transferred the image to the paper backing side of the vinyl, and used an x-acto knife to cut them out.  The white pieces were cut out first, and then spaced slightly apart on darker pieces. The dash marks are all the same width and length, and I just made up the design as I went.

It was a fun, inexpensive, and easy way to update the space. At least now I feel like some effort has been made to prepare our home for this little guy.

The I Am A Child of God printable I found on Pinterest, but you can access it on Mommy Mormon Blogs if you are interested.  It is available in several colors.  This shade of blue just happened to match my vinyl and the blue stripe in the striped crocheted afghan.

Read more about the refinished bassinet.

Apologies for the low lit photo....the room is in the basement.

Baby Shoes

Not baby shoes for my baby.  My husband wouldn't approve of ruffles and bows for baby boy number three.  I have taken a break from sewing baby shoes, as they take quite a bit of work, but something came over me, and I decided to restock baby shoes at the local gift bazaar.

Satin with ruffles.  What could be more fun.

I have some sort of need to make things for the baby, unfortunately there isn't much more to make for this little guy.  Instead, I get to focus on dressing other people's babies. Even people that know how to make baby girls! What a treat.

Jack and Jill

We have a Jack and Jill bathroom in our home.  It was a great way to maximize the usable space in our small home.  One door connects to my boys' room, and the other to my office/sewing space.

Jill

I picked up some vinyl a few weeks ago from Pick Your Plum, and I thought it would be a fun (non permanent) way to add some details to the rooms.

I created some templates in Photoshop, and then cut my vinyl by hand.  You see, I'm still living in the crafting dark ages.  No fancy shmancy cutter here.  Me and my x-acto knife went to town, and in a matter of minutes, cut out our little couple.

The orange man fits in nicely with the decor in the boys' rocket ship room, but I kind of think that I need to make him a space helmet.  The pink doesn't work quite as well with my office decor, which is decorated much like my blog.  Blue and green.  I figured I'd use up the pink vinyl, seeing that I can't see any immediate need for it.

Anywho, should you be interested in the templates, you can download them here.

Thanks for reading.

Tips Tricks and Techniques: Version 2- Reusable Patterns

I've shared ideas before on creating reusable patterns, but I'm really excited about this next idea. I made up some christmas stockings for our new family of four.  I wanted to make sure that I saved the pattern so that I could use it in the future (should our family grow even more). The pattern needed to be durable and easy to store.

I found a scrap piece of clear vinyl that I had laying around from past projects (see: magnetic bibs, paper and plastic card wallets, and wipeable changing pads). The clear vinyl is perfect because you can write on it with permanent marker, you can pin through it, and it folds up nicely.  My favorite part about using the clear vinyl is that you can see through it.  Because it is transparent you can easily transfer an existing pattern to the vinyl. You can also see the fabric beneath, perfect for matching patterns or centering designs.

 I am always jotting notes onto the patterns that I make.  For this one I wrote down the seam allowance along with the year-that way I won't confuse it with any other versions.

I'm still hoping to share a little tutorial for the Christmas stockings. I just need to get my buns in gear.

Faux Leather Poopy Clutch

I decided to whip up a diaper and wipes clutch prior to babies arrival.  Melissa of I Still Love You, offers several free variations of her Poopy Clutch.  I decided to try out the scalloped edge poopy clutch, using some faux leather/vinyl that I had on hand. 

Source

I wanted to use only the supplies that I had on hand (saving for baby bills), so I decided to use a heavy duty  snap in place of the fastener that she used.

I also added a flower detail that I cut out using my Go! Baby fabric cutter.  I used the Rose of Sharon die, and cut out one of each of the three biggest flowers.

I stitched around all sides of the piece of vinyl, using an elongated stitch in contrasting thread. I then used some Fabri-Tac glue to secure the three bottom corners (a variation from Melissa's tutorial).  After the glue was fully dry I attached the bottom snap.

I punched a small hole in the center of my flowers, though I only ended up being able to use two of them.

Due to the thickness of the vinyl, I was only able to secure two layers of flower with the top flap of the clutch.  I attached my snap through the three thicknesses of material.

I then used my leather punch and hammer to punch a few holes along each scalloped edge.

 It accommodates several diapers nicely. Now I need to go hunt through my boxes of baby supplies to find my travel size wipes container.  The travel size pampers container was a bit too large for this clutch, but I think that the huggies container will be just about perfect.

Personalized Diaper Changing Pad

You  may remember my Wipeable Diaper Changing Pad, from last summer, if you don't, you can find the link to the tutorial on my side bar.

I really do love these diaper changing pads, and use it whenever I can with Clark (oh how I wish he was potty trained...or at all interested in being potty trained). It wipes clean, and is very convenient for when I'm on the go.  I stuff a partially emptied package of wipes, and a couple of diapers inside the changing pad, and I'm off.

I recently made this personalized changing pad for my niece that is due to arrive in early spring.

My new sewing machine has the ability to stitch a few basic fonts.  The letters aren't very large, but it has been a lot of fun to play around with.

Brother SA114-Non Stick Foot

Now, working with vinyl is not the easiest thing to do. Because this particular project has two sides of vinyl, it becomes even more complicated. Often times the vinyl will stick to either the presser foot, the strike plate, or both.  To make the sewing process go a bit smoother, I like to use a non-stick presser foot.  It allows the vinyl, leather, or other hard to sew material, to slide beneath the presser foot without as much "stick".

To prevent the vinyl from sticking to the strike plate or sewing machine, I like to pull the material, by gently lifting the bottom layer of vinyl away from the sewing machine (rather than pushing the material through the machine with my hand on top of the material).  You can also place a layer of gift wrapping tissue paper under the bottom piece of vinyl.  It will allow the material to move with greater ease as well.
Hope that helps.

Thanks for reading.

Quick and Easy Vinyl and Paper Card Wallet

 Today I thought that I'd share a tutorial with you.  This particular tutorial is for a paper and vinyl card wallet.  It is perfect for storing business cards, or debit and credit cards.  I whipped up several of these this past weekend (before my sewing machine decided to quit on me).  They are really quick and easy to make, and they are super inexpensive.

I plan on giving these to a few of the girls that I work with at church for their birthday presents.   I figure that it will be a nice place for the girls to keep their lunch money, student ID's, and their drivers licenses.

They would make fantastic stocking stuffers as well. You could tuck in a gift card to someone's favorite restaurant or store.

For the full tutorial click read more below.

Vinyl Gift Card Sleeve for Father's Day...or any occasion for that matter

This is a super quick project, and a really fun way to present a gift card to someone.  The great thing about making a gift card sleeve is that it can be used after the gift card is spent.  The Gift Card sleeve can be repurposed and used as a bookmark, a business card holder, an ID card holder, ect.  I also love the idea of modifying the pattern to create a sleeve for concert tickets or game tickets, or adding some outdoorsy paper for storage of a hunting or fishing license.

The Gift Card Sleeve is made from vinyl (scraps from the bibs) and paper of your choice.  This really is a very customizable project. You could use old maps, magazine pages, pages from a damaged picture book, ect.

This pattern is pretty easy to figure out on your own, but if you want some help you can download the template and instructions here.