Funny ad I found on Craigs List under the "yard sale" category

I know this has nothing to do with crafts, but I had a good laugh after I came across this ad:

THIS IS A 75 GALLON TANK IN AN ATTRACTIVE CHERRY FINISH CABINET...THERE IS A THREE STAGE FILTER UNDERNEATH...I KNOW VERY LITTLE ABOUT THE FILTER, ONLY THAT IT KEEPS THE TANK CLEAN...AND IT IS IDEAL FOR SALTWATER TANK SETUPS...I AM MOVING ON 9/2 AND NEED TO SELL THIS TANK...THE FISH...AN INDESTRUCTABLE AGRESSIVE RED DEVIL, COMES WITH (IF YOU WANT HIM) HE EATS EVERYTHING I PUT IN THE TANK...HENCE THE LONLINESS OF HIS EXISTENCE...HE ENJOYS FEEDERS AND PELLETS WITH EQUAL GUSTO...THIS TANK WAS ORIGINALLY FULL OF CICHLIDS AND THIER MANY BABIES...THE RED DEVIL GOT THEM ALL AS HE GREW UP...WE PAID ABOUT 1300.00 FOR THE TANK AND FILTER...I'D LIKE $500.00 FOR IT...AND/OR I'LL PAY YOU $20 TO TAKE THE FISH.

I have a usable craft room, yay!

Here's my sister modeling the bag I helped her make a couple weeks ago. I can't show the one I made yet, because I want it to be a surprise for one of my friends who checks my blog sometimes. I bought the pattern book at JoAnn's- "Gooseberry Patch: Sew Simple, Thoughtful Gifts & Easy Accessories." It took us the bulk of a day to make both bags, which wasn't too bad. After I finish writing this, I am going to start on another because it was a fun bag to make.
The biggest reason why I haven't been posting lately is because I have been really busy cleaning up this:


Can you believe how bad this is? It was really out of control. I have to admit, and you can tell from many of my previous posts, that I've dome more accumulation of crafts than actually doing the crafts and this mess is the end result (combined with trying to cope with a crazy, stress-filled full-time job). But with the gracious help of my hubby, we were able to do this:


The wooden shelving unit is actually on wheels! We got it at a yard sale from a lady who had used it in her yoga studio. It is PERFECT. The shelves behind it are those wire kind that clip together all cube-like. Like this: (the fabric is somewhat color coordinated, ooh, aahhh!)
This is my favorite decorating touch, displaying thread in a little trinket shelf.
And last but not least, I decided to use one of my favorite cats Cheetos (that lives at my parent's house) to show what I won from a quilt shop right after the quilt festival. Emily and I searched out Candelite Quilts (Chelmsford, MA) to find fabric for her bag. Amazingly, I didn't buy anything there, but Emily had the chance to enter a drawing because she purchased her fabric there. And I won! 10 Fat quarters in a yellow/orange/red theme and some snazzy new scissors. I am thrilled and am seriously wanting to sign up fo some of their fall classes.

I think this picture is hysterical, but my husband doesn't get the humor. If you agree with me, you'll really get a kick out of this website: http://www.stuffonmycat.com/

Lowell Quilt Festival

On Thursday of last week, my sister and I went to the Lowell Quilt Festival. Apparently it's held every year and sponsored by the New England Quilt Museum. We had a good time looking at all the artistic creations in the Tsongas arena. I was thrilled to get some fabric I had had an eye on from a website that had sold out. We were also able to go to the Quilt museum and see a portion of Gerald Roy's quilt collections! I thought it was pretty cool that when we got there, we got to join a group that he was leading around. He is quite famous in the quilting world and I found what he had to say about each quilt to be quite interesting.

Here's me in front of a quilted car right in front of the arena.

A lot of the quilts had a "ode to textiles" theme, given that Lowell is famous for it's textile production and history. I was quite amazed at this quilt, if you look closely- you can see that it's made up of clothing tags! Such intricate, detailed work. This photo doesn't do the quilt justice, but I loved the design and "feeling" of this quilt.

They had many "journal" quilts and I thought this one was very cute, and possibly something I could maybe do sometime.
This one was done by a lady inspired by a picture of her grandchild.

I was just amazed at the intricate piecework of this rooster.
We had a great time! I can't wait to go again next year.

My vacation: Part I

I just took a few days off to spend some time with my sister, who is usually out West. We saw Coldplay in Boston on Monday night. It was AWESOME, but I have to say that I think the Foo Fighters give a better show.

More to come on my crafty endeavors over the last few days...........

And..... I'm Back!

Okay so my sewing machine is finally fixed. The stupidest thing was the problem: apparently I was using the wrong kind of bobbin; I needed to get some Janome bobbins...... I was happy to have a non-existent repair bill, but a little peeved that such a simple thing stopped me sewing for so long. So it's only been about a week since I've had it back in action. Last night I got crackin' on that baby quilt I started several weeks ago. I gave up in frustration when the quilting foot wigged out on me (first time I've tried it). I didn't have the heart to try it again tonight- maybe I will try to learn hand quilting.... hmmm. I get really frustrated easily when the sewing maching malfunctions- I don't know what I am going to do one day when I achieve my dream of getting a long-arm quilter. Those babies are much more complicated than my little Quilter's Companion.....

So, bear with me as I show off some recent craft store/yard sale finds. To celebrate my birthday I went with my former young women's leader, and very good friend, to a discount store in Maine: Marden's. It is the best place in the world because it sells quilt shop quality fabric for no more than $3 a yard! I had to go in there with a budget to limit myself from going crazy. Here's a few of the cute things I found:

I found that I was often driven to Michael Miller fabrics:

I think this piece could make a really cool purse:

Here's a really cool beginning of an awesome knitted blanket. I have the pattern and am thinking of trying to learn how to finish it because it's gorgeous and it's rainbow!

Look at this vintage unfinished quilt top I got for only $2! I also got a whole bunch of vintage fabric pieces at the same sale that will help me to finish it. It's hard to tell from the picture, but the big rectangle in the middle is all pieced with little pink rectangles.

And finally, I almost died when I saw the following bolt at Joann's in the red-tag section. I had some of this ages ago when it was $9 a yard and they only had a little left. I looked at several local Joann's for the same stuff, but no one had it in stock! This time, when I saw it in the Nashua store, there was almost 3 yards left and it was on sale for $2 a yard!

I think it will go great with a fabric I want from Reprodepot.com (that went out of stock the day after I found it, but hopefully it will be re-stocked).

Treasures

My sewing machine is truly broken. I am going insane because I have been too busy to get it to a shop to be fixed. Hopefully sometime next week I will be able to figure it out.

In the meantime, here's a sampling of my latest crafty yard sale finds:

I noticed a guy was selling a sewing machine, so I went ahead and asked him if he had any sewing stuff. He proceeded to find these two old sewing baskets filled with notions- most notably thread and buttons! I was thrilled. He also had a brand new Vera Bradley purse and coin purse - which he threw in with the sewing stuff, all for only $5! (The extra bonus is that I am selling the purse on eBay right now- hoping to make a profit.)I am drowning in thread now- but I can't stop hoarding it when I see it at yard sales for such cheap prices!!!!!!! I got these little cases for $3. Aren't they pretty?

One of the last sales of the day was when I hit paydirt. The person doing the sale was a retired Armenian tailor lady- very nice, but not too willing to bargain. Nevertheless, I got some awesome stuff. When I asked her about all of her thread, she informed me it was 4 for $1 - which honestly is not very great at all. BUT, I was able to convince her to sell all of it for $20! I wanted to count all of it to give an exact number of how many spools there are, but I got tired of counting after I reached 100. I would be willing to bet there is about 200 spools!

I noticed that she had a few things of fabric lying around, so I asked her about it. She led me into her garage where there was a pretty sizable stack, each piece being only $1. Most of it was not the kind of cotton blend I prefer to work with, but I was able to find some really cute things. It's all vintage stuff, which is kind of hard to find right now- so I am thrilled!

This one is my favorite!!!!!!!!!!! I love it! The houses are my favorite. Today was like Christmas! I am so spoiled to be able to get all this stuff! Now I want to go and sew! I guess I will have to settle for working on my cross-stitch.

My sewing machine is not working!

This is what I was working on when my sewing machine broke. It's the beginnings of a baby quilt for a good friend of mine..... The last time my machine stopped working, the solution was cleaning out 3 years of lint in the bobbin case area. This time, I picked up a "can of air" (the kind you buy to clean out a computer keyboard or something) this time, hopefully it will work. In the meantime, as I gear up the patience to deal with the problem, I have been reading lame-o chick lit books, working on another African-themed cross-stitch, and thinking about the next projects I want to do..... One project I need to do ASAP is clean up my craft room, 75% of my supplies are litterly on the floor right now. I am keeping my eye out for deep, tall, and narrow bookcases at yard sales- as my ideas of using large tupperware containers and my old bureau have not been terribly effective (evidenced by the current disarray of my supplies).

More Fabric Finds

Okay, so I know I need to stop shopping for fabric and actually make something out of it. But shopping for it is part of the whole fun of crafting. Nick and I had our second anniversary this past weekend- we celebrated by taking a quick trip up to Bar Harbor, ME. We had a rainy day that ended up helping us to discover: Marden's. A department store that buys out the stock of stores which have gone out of business. They have a HUGE fabric department that is filled with quilt shop leftovers - nothing was over $3 a yard! I was in heaven! Here are a few of my finds:

It's rather bright, but that is what appeals to me the most. I got a lot more there, but it wasn't photographing well. Later I will post the "creations" I make with it all.

Right before we left on our trip, I made a stop at my nearby Joann's. I picked out 3 things and was ready to have it cut, when the lady in front of me at the cutting table ended up taking 25 minutes! (And she didn't even end up buying ANYTHING!..... I guess I should also blame the fact that Joann's is always understaffed.) While that lady was harping about the price of some sort of upholstery foam, I found this: and this:and this:
This is not even counting the few things I had intended to buy at first. But who can live without red polka-dot whale fabric (this will have to be the theme of the first quilt I make for if and whenever I have a baby boy).....? And I almost died when I saw this Muppett fleece- I've only seen it on eBay- going for at least $15 a yard (I got it for $5, thank you very much). And I just loved this Oriental theme pack of 5 fat quarters- it might make a cute wall hanging, or maybe a patchwork purse or two...........

Weekend Finds

I am in love with thread. I don't think I can have too much. A lot of these threads are "vintage" e.g. wooden spools.

These fabrics were found at Woburn's "That Fabric Place." I wish I could afford to shop there regularly - but nothing is cheaper than $10 per yard. But sometimes it's worth it to splurge- I get tired of the selections at Wal Mart and Joann's.

Sock Zebra

I had a hard time letting this little guy go- I was very pleased with the way it came out. Enjoy it Missy!

One-Hour Bag

I had a lot of fun making this purse. You can find the tutorial here. I am kicking myself for not looking into doing such a pattern sooner because following someone's directions, rather than trying to wing it on your own, is very easy!

I decided to spice this bag up by doing some bead work:

I just got ahold of a long beading needle, some seed beeds, and I set to work. It was fun and quite addicting.

I also learned how to make fabric covered buttons:

The process was very easy- you can get a kit to make buttons at any craft store.

Here's the inside of the bag, it has a little pocket.

This bag definitely took me longer than one hour to make, but it wasn't too time consuming. The fabric I used is from Uganda- one of the many pieces I bought while there last summer. If I had to do the whole thing over again I probably would have made the bag deeper and chose a lining that matched the outer fabric better. But overall, I am quite happy with it!

Mother's Day Present

I made this little guy for my mom. It's got the coloring of the Cheshire cat, don't you think? His legs look like they have muscles.... but I have to say that getting the stuffing to stay smooth is not an easy task.

Baby quilt

Here's a baby quilt I made for Ian, the son of my BYU freshman roommate, Melinda. I found the pattern in the 2008 Fons and Porter EasyQuilts Spring magazine. Congratulations Melinda!

Odds and Ends

Nick helped me make this sock dog for his mom for her birthday. He stuffed, I sewed. I was pretty pleased with the way it came out.
Finally! A cute pattern that is boy-oriented. I had to get a bunch of this cute astronaut-flanel from Joann's a couple weeks ago. I made burp rags for one of my visiting teachee's who just had a baby boy.
Last night I did something I rarely do: I actually bought a book at a store instead of getting it at the library or a yard sale. Of course, I had a 40% off coupon, so it was pretty reasonably priced. I am really excited about this book- it's quite popular on all of the crafty websites/blogs out there. Hopefully I will be able to use it soon and learn how to make some new things.