Vintage Garland Tutorial And Giveaway

Turn your fabric scraps into beautiful garland

This garland was born from a scrappy scarf,  that a friend gave me. I've made them in all kinds of colors, but this color combination is my favorite. My second favorite is a mixture of bright colored fabric and ribbon. Each garland is 6 feet long, but you can easily tie them end to end, for any length you need. I had so much fun with my last giveaway, that I wanted to have another.  I would love to give away 2 six foot garlands to one lucky winner. To get your name in the drawing. Leave a comment, join as a new follower,  post about the project, or put it on your sidebar. Leave a comment for each one, so I can add you multiple times. I will draw a name on the 22nd of December. Luckily this garland looks nice year around, but I'll get it in the mail asap. I had to stop this giveaway a few days early, but checkout my 100 follower giveaway going on Dec 20-Jan 10th.
Congrats to Meghan at LOVEPETUNIA, you are the winner!

Twenty five finished garlands, part of a Christmas order for a local store. Click on pictures for larger view.

Garland displayed in my entryway at recent holiday show.

Garland on white Christmas tree.

The first step in making the garland, is cutting squares, lots and lots of squares. I cut 1 1/2 inch to 2 inch, they don't have to perfectly square. Lots of mine are more rectangle than square. The bigger they are however, the faster the construction of the garland is. I use burlap, muslin, fabric from sample books, old tea towels, wool, lace, any neutral colored fabric, even old clothes.

Cut a 6 foot piece if seam binding. Lay your first fabric square face down. Sandwich the seam binding between the first square and the next one that is face up. Mix up your squares, layer smaller ones on larger.Anything goes with this project.

Continue to sew your squares to your seam binding. I like to use sheet music, book pages, ribbon, wool, anything that adds texture and interest.

Layer shear ribbon here and there.

When you get to the end of your seam binding, you are finished with the first step of your garland.

Don't worry if you have spaces between some of your squares. You will be tying various ribbons and fabric between them that will hide the seam binding gap.

Cut 4-5 inch strips of fabric, lace, ribbon, yarn, seam binding or anything you think fits into the color theme.

I usually tie in between every three squares.

Ready for hanging

Happy Birthday Baby

Well, my angel girl is growing up. That old saying, "How time fly's when your having fun!" sure hits home today. Life with this sweet little girl has been pure joy, well almost. There have been a few yelling matches with her brother that I could have lived without. But for the most part, it has been a blast. I've always said that Annie was born a 30 year old woman, those that know her would have to agree. She's definitely the most mature and logical one in the family. She is kind, thoughtful, and self motivated. She is quiet and serious, but her sense of humor has really developed this year. She is not silly ha ha, like Austin, but when Annie says something funny, it's usually well thought out and hilarious. Annie I'm very proud of you, and even if you are now 12 years old, you will always be my baby girl. Love, Mom

Cloth Paper Scissors Gift 2011 Fabric Tree and Magazine Giveaway

Gift 2011 Giveaway

Red and Green Tree Giveaway

If you haven't seen it yet, this years CPS Gifts is available at your local craft and book stores. It's a great magazine, chalk full of creative holiday ideas, and guess what? I'm in it! I wrote one of the "how to" articles on my fabric trees. I'm pretty excited, this is my first article, and I think I've shown it to everyone I know. If I haven't, my husband has, he's very proud. I also love the black and white ornament challenge featured on the front cover. Laurie Mika, one of my favorite artists has some really pretty polymer clay ornaments I look forward to making. There are also some great ideas on wire flower wreaths, blue jean pocket decorations, and some paper ornaments that my daughter has had fun making. Needless to say, I am pretty happy to be a part of this magazine. I love CPS, it's been my favorite publication for sometime now. I would love to giveaway the green and red tree from the article. I will also send a copy of the magazine along with it. If you leave a  comment, you will be put into the drawing once. If you join as a new follower, or post on your blog about the giveaway, you will be entered twice. I will post the winner on December 1st. Check back on that date. Now go out buy that magazine and start creating.   PS:  Thanks for all the phone calls and emails from all over the country about the article. Thanks also to those of you that wrote about the article on your blog. We now share the addiction of cutting circles together. Congrats to Jennifer of Vintage Gwen, you won!

Open Studio 2011

Open Studio 2011 is coming to a close. I'm writing this post in between visitors. It's been a blast as usual, meeting new people, seeing long time friends, and sharing what I love. Throw in good snacks, what more could you want? Thanks to you that stopped by to take a look around. I hope those of you that signed up for workshops are looking forward to them, I know that I am. If you weren't able to stop by, contact me for the workshop schedule. I will be teaching the tempered glass class several times in 2012, along with new polymer clay classes. I also plan on posting some fun tutorials in the near future. The first one will be a vintage pumpkin, adorned with paper leaves and polymer roses. It's really cute and super easy to make, the perfect hostess gift for the fall holidays. I recently had my first article published in Cloth Paper Scissors Gifts magazine. If you have a bag of scraps and love to cut out circles, you should check it out. But I warn you that I've been getting emails from people, that say they may need a six step program, as circle cutting can be very addicting. I've found that in my busy life, it is sometimes relaxing to do a repetitive project that you don't have to put a lot of brain power into. It keeps your hands busy while you ponder your next project. If you're like me, you always have several creative projects brewing in your head.  It's no wonder I forget the important things, like when to take the dog out, when to pick up the kids, and when to go to bed. Oh well nobodies perfect. Thanks again for making open studio a great success.

Open Studio 2011 Preview

 Well, it's only a week away:  Open Studio 2011. I look forward to this event all year, but as it approaches, I always stand in the middle of my studio and yell, "One more week, I just need one more extra week!"  This year I was so sure that I would be ready on time,  I committed to a Friday night reception, as an early bird customer appreciation. I hope this is well attended.  If you get my card, you will have the info, if not, it is from 6-8 pm.  My address is in the catalog.  As usual, I have a little of this and a lot of that.  Something old, something new, something borrowed and lots of blue.  If anything else, you have to come by and see the walkway I made from broken concrete, it's really cool.  I also will be more organized with my workshop signups.  Last year I just took names and tried to put together classes on the phone.  Now I know that this is very time consuming, and nearly impossible to work around everyone's schedule.  Sorry to those that were disappointed. Come by and please give me another chance.  I have some great new classes in mind, and I will definitely teach the tempered glass and polymer clay workshops.  Well, I need to get back to work, I have a zillion things to do, and only one more week to do them in.

Sew Sari

 I love, love, love, recycled sari silk. If I had a talk show and I was giving away my favorite things. I would be throwing rolls of sari silk into the audience and shouting, I loovvee sarrrri Sillk!!!! The crowd would be jumping up and down, hugging their neighbors, and with tears streaming down their faces they would be  dreaming of all the creative things they would make with this magical product.  Ok I've gotten a bit carried away, but it really is dreamy stuff. The first time I saw sari silk was a year ago at the Long Beach Quilt Show.  I loved the rolled up rainbows of color. Every time I pasted the booth displaying it, I spotted another color combo I just couldn't live without. I ended up with about 20 rolls before the weekend was over. It took me about a year to get to the bottom of my basket of sari silk. It was a very sad day indeed. But happy days are here again, because I found Nicole at Darn Good Yarn. Nicole is a doll, and  helped me mix and match colors to put together the perfect combination. She didn't even mind my phone calls as I impatiently waited for my package to arrive clear from Maine. It was well worth the wait.  The first thing I made were these flower pins, that will be available at my Open Studio Tour this month. More info on that to come in a few days. So I'm happy that my sari silk basket is once more full, and that I have a great source when I run out again. Check out Darn Good Yarn and read their story about how they help women in Naple support their families with this business.