Poking my head up...

I've been trying to post for like a week now, but I'm sick, and it just seems like by the time I finish all the necessary tasks like feeding the kids and putting on pants, I have nothing left in me. It's nothing terribly serious, just a sore throat, but I'm on antibiotics now, so hopefully it's on its way out.

So here's what's happening. We have a contract on the house. Yay us! Actually, we had a contract before this one, but the buyer backed out because the inspection turned up some foundation damage. Boo! BUT, we are getting it fixed in 10 days, with a lifetime transferable warranty, so it shouldn't be an issue. Even with that, the first buyer didn't want to stay on board. Fortunately, he'd been in a bit of a bidding war with another buyer, and they were happy to take his place with the assurance that the foundation work is being done.

So now the race is on to find our next house. We found one that we really liked, but it sold the day before the contract went on ours. And we've since found one that we really love, but there are some issues with it that would have to be resolved for it to be an actual option for us. It's all very much up in the air from our viewpoint, but God has definitely been moving and providing, so we will see what happens.

So as far as crafting goes, there's been a little bit. Not much, but a little. And I don't have any tutorials for you right now, but here are a few things I've made.

Back in July a little girl at our church had a birthday, and I made her this fun candy colored paracord bracelet and earrings set. The bracelet actually ended up being a little small for her, so I made her a bigger one and she sent this one back to Lily.

My friend Melissa just had her gorgeous baby girl MacKenzie. Her nursery is done in gray and yellow with accents of teal in an elephant motif. So back in August for her baby shower I made her a few gifts. First was this paper banner with bows made using my Sizzix Bow Die.

I found this yellow and gray photo box at Hobby Lobby to put it in for gifting, and she can use the box in baby girl's room.

I made her a couple of curved burp cloths out of white terry cloth and this super soft cuddle minky.

And I also made her a faux chenille blanket. I'll be honest, I wasn't entirely happy with how the blanket turned out. The blue looked more teal in the store, and I should have used it as the one of the chenille layers and not the base fabric on the back. I should have sewn the lines half as far apart so the chenille strips would have been more even and stuck out less from the blanket. But it's still super cuddly, and she said she loves it.

My mother-in-law Brenda's birthday was also in August, and I made her this card.

It's very simple, but I like it. I'd really like to get into making cards on a more regular basis. I've got stamps, stamp pads, and embossing folders for days, but not much of a place to do it right now. And most of my stamps and ink pads are in storage right now anyway. When I get a craft room one of these days I plan on making up a bunch of different elements and having my girlfriends/sisters in law over for a card making party.

I also made Brenda this pretty patchwork zipper pouch.

The mint fabric was a duck cloth remnant from Hobby Lobby I think, and the coral polka dot fabric was from a pair of pants in the giveaway pile. I made my Mom a very similar one for her birthday in July.

Inside the pouch for Brenda I included this simple bead and chain set I made with these awesome metal filigree beads I got on clearance at Hobby Lobby.

We also had another Walridge Baptist Church Ladies Craft Meeting last month, but that one deserves a post of its own.

We could really use your prayers that God will show us to the house He has for us and that everything will go smoothly with the sale/closing on our own house. It looks like the timing may end up pretty tight on it - for us to close on the new home the same day as we close on the old home we will have to find the right house and have an offer accepted in the next week or so. Exciting times, people!

Embossed Leather Cuffs

You guys, I can't get enough of this embossing powder stuff! I'm embossing everything in sight! So naturally, when my bag of leather remnants caught my eye, I knew I just had to give it a try. Thus came about these awesome leather cuffs!

These are so crazy simple. First grab a leather remnant and cut it to your desired cuff shape/size.

 I shaped mine using my trusty Westcott aluminum ruler. This is not an affiliate link - I just wanted to point out how handy this thing is. I use it when cutting and sealing ribbon with my wood burning tool, and the rounded end works great for things like shaping the ends of this cuff. An easy way to mark leather for cutting without leaving ink or pencil markings is to trace around your pattern shape onto the leather with the point of a seam ripper.

Source

For a fastener I used a ball hitch fastener. These were by Spare Parts, but I know that at least at one time Tim Holtz offered them too.

You just unscrew the bottom like this.

Mark where you want your fastener to be.

Then punch a 1/8" hole for the post to go through. I used a Crop-A-Dile that I got from the same girl who had the embossing materials.

 Insert the post and screw the bottom back on.

 On the opposite end, punch a 3/8" hole for the ball to slip through, then use an Exacto knife or other sharp blade to cut a small slit on either side of the hole. Don't cut them too big or your fastener won't stay put.

Next stamp with pigment ink directly onto the leather.

Quickly cover the stamped area with embossing powder. Here I went with metallic gold.

Shake off the excess and funnel it back into the bottle.

Now fire up your heat gun and watch the magic happen!

 Bright and shiny now!

I just love it!

I liked it so much that I cut out the piece I tested this project on and made a key ring out of it!

I also had some gold leather that I tried it on, and the results were fabulous!

A couple of tips though: First of all, that lovely gold cuff will not be the most durable. The leather will last just fine, but because of the smooth surface, the embossing powder may scratch off. I tried sealing it with clear nail polish, but it just caused the embossing powder to bleed. You may have better luck with another type of sealer.

The best leather for this is going to be a very smooth suede, or a very soft, pliable kid or calfskin leather. These will provide a surface smooth enough to not distort your embossed image while porous enough to give the embossing powder something to bond to. Rough suedes will be too fibrous for the stamp to transfer cleanly too, and it will be nearly impossible to shake all the excess embossing powder off without also removing some from the stamped area.

Posting around here will be a little sparse for the next few days. We've got church camp coming up, so I'm going to be buried making corn bags for the cornhole tournament, as well as doing some summer sewing for Lily and editing a couple of photo shoots.

Have a great weekend!

Embossed Mini Canvas Magnets

We're going to take a break from the Presser Foot Series because I've not had a chance to do some of the projects I need to do to show you how some of the feet work, but we will pick it back up in the near future.

But I do have a project for you all, and I looooove this one! Okay, you guys - embossing powder. I had never used it, although it always looked interesting to me. But I'm not much of a scrapbooker, and I'm more of a use-what-you've-got occasional card maker, so I never really had a good reason to justify buying the supplies.

But THEN...

an old friend asked me to make some cute travel pillow cases for her girls, and when I went to her house to drop them off she was doing a major pare down on her scrapbooking supplies. And right there in the middle of it all was a heat gun and several jars of embossing powder! So I came home with a new toy, and ever since then it's been EMBOSS ALL THE THINGS!

Well, I had these little canvases left over from Taylor's birthday party. And Hobby Lobby had a bunch more in black on crazy low clearance, so I grabbed a few packs. Last night I sat down with my embossing powders, heat gun, embossing pen, stamps, and pigment ink pads and made these awesome little canvas magnets!

Oh my goodness, SO CUTE! I love them! Taylor did some too. The one that says love is hers.

These are super easy. Just load up the stamp of your choice with pigment ink. It does need to be pigment ink, because otherwise it will dry before you can get the embossing powder to stick. I didn't know that beforehand, but fortunately I had several pads on hand already. It doesn't matter what color ink they are, because your embossing powder will cover them, unless you use clear powder, in which case you will want to use ink in the color you want the end result to be. That sentence felt awkward, but you get what I mean.

Anyway, stamp your design onto the canvas. If your canvas is stretched over a frame (some of mine were and some were just wrapped around a little board), you may want to rub the canvas from behind to make sure the stamp design fully transfers.

Once your design is on the canvas, lay the canvas on a sheet of paper, then sprinkle on your embossing powder, making sure to cover the whole design. Then shake the excess off onto the paper, and use the paper to funnel the excess back into the jar to use next time. You can gently tap the canvas on the table if there are clumps, and you can brush off any extra that didn't fall off with a small paintbrush. It will also help the powder to only stick to the ink if you rub your canvas ahead of time with a dryer sheet.

Now comes the magic. Turn your heat gun on and aim it at your design, a few inches away. Pretty soon you'll see the embossing powder start to melt, and when you do, start moving the gun over the whole design. You just want to leave it on there long enough to melt the powder. So much fun!

Look how shiny it turned!

You can even go back and add a second layer of embossing just so long as you're careful not to burn the design.

Just stick a magnet or two on the back using E6000 or even your glue gun and you're done!

I love these so much!

Next time I have any sort of crafty get together we are definitely doing these. Happy embossing!