Stuffies Rock!

I love stuffies. They are quick, cool, and nearly free. And if you make them small enough, they can be made into functional art. At times I make something (like amigurumi, for instance) and think to myself, "It's cute, but what am I going to do with it?"

Little felt stuffies can be useful for anyone. I'll bet you could use the right stuffie to convert an anti-craft curmudgeon. Stuffies can be made into hair clips, brooches, refrigerator magnets, paperweights (with the right stuffing), Christmas ornaments, or even rear view mirror danglies. You know, if you are into that sort of thing. Which, um...I'm not. If I had something hanging from my rear view mirror I'd probably get distracted by it and run into a cactus. But I do like seeing danglie things sparkling in other peoples cars.

A while back I made my daughter a 1-up mushroom stuffie, hot glued it to a hair clip, and sent her off to school. She came home with a list of girls that needed their own 1-up mushroom hair clips.


This cute little bird stuffie has a pin sewn to the back so that it can be worn on a blouse or lapel. Or backpack. If you don't wear a lot of pins, here's a tip for you: string a silver chain through the pin and wear it as a necklace. (This trick also works with vintage clip-on earrings.)

I have noticed that when I receive things in the mail, the way they are packaged has some impact on how I view the items themselves. I decided to mail this stuffie pin out in a little square box from the recycling bin. The round box was $.99 at our local craft store. I painted it green, stuck on a few little metal scrap booking embellishments and filled it with some colorful notepaper that I had shredded with a pair of my kids' craft scissors. Nearly free, but a great way to improve the impact of this little stuffie pin.

Blankets for Breast Cancer

One of our Kindergarten teachers has cancer.

Teachers share more of their lives these days. They tell little anecdotes about their lives, stories about their pets, and encourage students to watch their favorite sports teams. It creates an environment where the kids trust their teachers enough to really learn from them. It is certainly a different model than learning through fear of authority--wooden ruler knuckle raps and silently threatening paddles leaning against the chalkboard. It also exposes the kids to aspects of life they might not be currently encountering at home.

And now one of the kindergarten teachers has breast cancer.

In the last five years, we've known teachers who have been pregnant during the school year, whose parents have died, who have taken time off to travel to see their college age children compete in national sports events, who have gotten divorced, who have gotten married, and who have sent their kids off to Kindergarten for the first time. And with the exception of the divorce, these events were celebrated (or mourned) openly with the students. Not in a way that took away from studying, but in a way that enhances it. One teacher gives a weekly written language correction test, and the sentences are specific to the children's lives as well as hers: "yesterday my dog goed to the vets offis", "joe is excited to selebrate his birthday nekst weak" Another teacher leads the school cheerleading team after school, and during the day she teaches her young students their most difficult spelling words by creating memorable cheers. Almost four years later, my daughter still chants A-P-P! R-E-C! I-A! T-E! each time she needs to use that word.

And now, one of the kindergarten teachers has breast cancer, and the whole school is rallying around her.

Every Friday, classes compete to see which has the most 'spirit' as evidenced by the most students wearing the school colors or PTO t-shirts. Once in a while, Friday Spirit Day is themed. On Hawaiian day, the students wear luau shirts. On Crazy Hat Day they sweat under the hats they are normally not allowed to wear. In addition to the usual assortment of spirit clothing this year, the PTO ordered pink t-shirts with breast cancer ribbons and the teacher's name printed across the front. And on the Spirit Day dedicated to the Kindergarten teacher, pink shirted boys and girls filled the playground. The principal and his assistant principal stood outside as they always do, directing traffic and manning the crosswalk. And that day, they proudly wore their bright pink shirts.

But while showing spirit in this way replenishes the spirit, teachers' salaries only go so far. And cancer can be expensive.

So this week there was fundraiser at school, and then a rally at a local fast food restaurant, organized by a couple of the room moms, and attended by nearly the whole school. The restaurant donated 20% of the receipts turned in that night. Outside, the parents had set up a raffle booth, face-painting and crafts.

My humble addition to the raffle was a baby tag blanket and a matching toddler blanket. I used a gorgeous embroidered polar fleece and shiny pink satin. (Is it really satin? Probably not, I'm not a consummate enough sewist to know what it's actually called--I'm talking about that silky shiny satiny stuff that looks like the inside of Superman's cape.)

I enjoyed making it--something straightforward, pretty, and simple enough that it didn't require a pattern. And best of all,  it helped raised money for a really great cause.

Today I got an email from one of the organizers. The little girl who won the blanket in the raffle fell asleep with it and her mother snapped a picture. Her mom says that her daughter named the blanket for the teacher and that she likes to sleep with it. I love that! Like a lot of giving, I gained a lot more than I gave with this small project.

Penny Passport: the socially acceptable way to collect good junk

As a young child, I resented the What Little Boys Are Made Of rhyme. "How come," I'd ask, "little boys get to be made of neat stuff like snips and snails and puppy dog tails, but little girls have to be made of dumb old sugar and spice?" Personally, I defied the stereotype. Not in any purposeful way; I was way too young for feminist politics. I just followed my interests. I hung out with the boys in the woods, where we caught salamanders and cut down saplings with contraband hatchets. We dug holes and made fishing poles out of branches and string. My pockets were always full of bits of this and that: fossils, bottle caps and acorns, small pieces of sandstone that were soft enough to use as chalk, interesting candy wrappers, rusty nails, and my pocketknife. There were also tiny twigs, twisty ties, snail shells, marbles, ribbons, wire and twine.

When I was in college, tomboy was no longer an innocuous label, and I tried to revise my antisocial behavior. But it was a process, and didn't change overnight. At that time, I lived in an apartment near the train tracks. I had no car, so I rode my bike to work, and then to class each day. I had to go over the train tracks. When I had time, and a handful of extra coins (not as often as you might think--I was on the Ramen Noodle Economic Plan), I used to park my bike and wander to the tracks. In the silent pre-dawn, the shadows were long and the rails stood out against the dark rocks. The air was so still that the metallic smell of the rails was noticeable, even on the days when the snow piled up. I would place my coins onto the smooth metal and leave them there. When I came back in the evening, the sun would be setting or have set and the pennies would have been smooshed by the passing trains. They lay glittery and bright in the rocks or the snow, waiting for me to pick them up. I kept them in my pockets as a sort of worry stone.

Nowadays, my pockets hold keys. Maybe a few receipts. Perhaps a Lego or a hair clip, just until I get a chance to put them away. But despite the possibility that I may have finally grown up, I love the smooshed pennies that you can make at touristy places like museums, zoos and amusement parks. Whenever I see a smooshing machine, I make sure to make one...or three. Logically, I can see that it is a total waste of the penny plus the fifty cents it costs to use the machine. But the sentimental part of me loves the thrill of an inexpensive souvenir. And the suppressed magpie inside still loves the shiny stuff. But smooshed pennies no longer inhabit my pockets, and you can only keep so many smooshed pennies in a little pouch before they get too jumbled to enjoy. So how can you display them?

How about a penny passport? You can buy a thick plastic penny passport at some museum gift shops, and they serve their function. But they are hard and pointy and, let's face it, they just aren't very pretty. I seem to have grown into that feminine desire for pretty things, so I wanted something larger and softer. And pretty.

A while back I posted about some tea wallets that I had made from an online tutorial. I brainstormed ways to adapt that process to a penny passport. This is the result.
 

     Left: Tea Wallet               Right: Penny Passport



Top: Tea Wallet     Bottom: Penny Passport


I did not take pictures during the process, but basically, I increased the length by a little more than double and replaced the tea pockets with small rectangles of vinyl sewn on in a grid. I really struggled with the vinyl, but in the end I was happy with the final product. Let me know in the comments if you would make a penny passport. If people have interest, I would be willing to attempt a tutorial, but that seems like a lot of effort to send it off into the ether if no one would use it!

Why I Started Making Stuff

My daughter was recently invited to a birthday party with a unique, fun theme. The girls dressed in their fancy clothing and arrived at the birthday girl's home. A limosine arrived and the girls got a ride to the mall to go window shopping. Afterwards they traveled back to the birthday girl's house for dinner and cake, and on their way out the door they received glittery purses bursting with lip gloss, nail polish and other little girly gifts. Cool, right? Yes.

The thing that has been bothering me about that day is the message behind the party-- how fabulous it is to consume. Not that that isn't fun. I like to go to the mall as much as the next girl...well, actually, maybe not as much as the next girl. But I do like to make the occasional shopping trip and covet all the cute outfits and fabulous accessories. It is satisfying to walk the wide halls, a heft on my arm from glossy bags filled with crinkly paper newness. But when I come out I always feel full and deprived at the same time. Fat and yet lusting for more. Overwhelmed and yet yearning for...something.

I've mentioned before that I believe children need to see the people they love creating things. We live in a culture where we value consumption, and devalue creation. This is something we've all heard before, so often that it becomes a cliche. But it is still true.

Last year my oldest began making sculptures out of her Babybel cheese wax, so I stopped buying those annoyingly overpriced little processed chunks. She wasn't eating her lunch at school because she was spending that time making cunning little red kitties and goldfish. The fact that she was creating things out of garbage made me do some hard thinking and I began to realize that our family was getting bogged down in the everyday consumption grind. It's another cliche, right? The mom has fun with the kids by taking them places and buying things. The parents drive the kids to soccer practice while the kids play on their electronic gaming systems. The family communicates through the internet even when they are sitting in the same room. We weren't quite to that point, but I thought we were getting close and I believed that we needed to search for something real. That could take the form of hiking and camping, concentrationg on religion, family meetings and game nights, community service, combinations and permutations of these things and more. There were so many options. I finally realized one day, as I was tossing into the garbage a tiny garden my daughter had planted in the found lid from a soda bottle, that I had lost my habit of creation. And I wanted it back.

In high school and college I used to make things. And write things. And create. My friends were all painters, photographers and poets. My husband's friends were all partiers--the fun, cool crowd, the consumers. When we first started dating he told me, "My friends destruct; your friends construct." I loved that comment. It sounded neat and tidy, a way to draw a line between the separate worlds the two of us seemed to inhabit. Looking back, and having drifted myself somewhat over the imaginary line, I believe that was a false line to draw. Everyone has the germ for construction and destruction within themselves.

I decided to take a page from my oldest's book and look at the world through less wasteful eyes. I bought a sewing machine, some crochet hooks, and yarn. (I started my efforts to consume less by buying? Ironic.) I called my sister and sisters-in-law and declared that all of our Christmas gifts would be homemade. Some agreed more readily than others. But they all agreed. And my kids and I went on a two month spree of crafting. We learned new techniques. I learned to crochet and made amigurumi dolls for the youngest nieces. My son taught himself origami, while his little sister practiced sewing on buttons and painting. My oldest changed her medium from cheese wax to felt. With the help of a fabulous book by Nellie Pailloux, called Felties, she created some of the cutest little felt creatures you can imagine. Including the one at the top of this post. We spent a lot of time together, not connected by the thin strand of a Zelda battle wi-fi connection, but on the same side of the room, threading needles and smoothing fabric.

The kids still send each other virtual gifts on Webkinz, and I still find myself throwing miniature scultures in the gabage. Afterall, I don't have much use for a tiny mobile made out of broken pencils, string pulled from a t-shirt hem, and magic markered pop tabs. But when I throw them away now, I am less likely to sigh with frustration. Instead, I take the time to look at them first, and enjoy for a moment the transient beauty of small creations.

Who, me?

Tweed Owl Purse

Whenever I see that Anne Frank quotation, you know, the one that says,  "I still believe, in spite of everything, that people are truly good at heart," I wonder at the mind that can be exposed to the worst in humankind and still see only the best.

We decide to believe, or doubt, every time we talk to someone. I tend to believe in everyone. Someone cuts in line, and looks to be in a hurry. I cut them some slack. Someone tells me that they are sick, or lost their job, or have a sick kid or a bad marriage so they can't do something that was promised. I always believe them. Someone is driving erratically. I say, "They must be taking their wife to the hospital to deliver a baby." My husband says, "There is no hospital around here."

In order to participate in swapping, I think you need to have some version of my Pollyanna world view. If you assume the worst, you won't want to trade with others for fear of receiving worse than what you got. But I have been trading books online for about two years and recently started trading a few crafts. I enjoy sending things to people. I like to imagine them opening the package and being surprised with the condition of the book or the quality of the craft. When I saw this owl purse on Craftster, I knew that it would be perfect for my partner in a crafting swap I had joined. My daughter and I stopped at a thrift store to pick up a wool jacket, then I washed it with lots of soap, in HOT water. I made a pattern for myself based on the original pictures, then I cut out the pieces and got to work sewing it together. I used a super stiff interfacing and was pleased with the results. But because the purse was so stiff, after the turning process I found that the lining had stretched, leaving extra material to deal with during the final top stitch. Once the project was completed, there was some bunching along the inside edge of the lining, so I included a little apology with the package.

When my partner received the purse, she sent me a generous response and said that she hadn't even seen the flaws. She thought that the bunching was on purpose. A sort of pleat, I suppose.

I choose to believe in people. It is a conscious choice; I am not stupid enough to believe that every crazy driver is on their way to become a new parent. But I always give people the benefit of the doubt. In my life, this kind of way of looking at life has led me to make new friends. It has helped me to stay optimistic during hard times. But it has also led me to trust people who perhaps do not deserve my trust. It has led me to forgive and forget things that would be best left remembered. And it has landed me in a tough situation or two. But here I am, nearly forty, fighting the prospect of becoming jaded. Seeking light is a worldview worth striving for; I want to be the kind of person who looks at bunched up top stitching and sees pleats instead of flaws.

Iylie's Birthday Eggs

My youngest niece turned one recently and her mom asked me to make her some kind of balls. "She loves to play with balls, and throw them. And chew on them." So with those directions in mind I came up with the idea to make her a carton of eggs. I had a Simplicity pattern for felt food, so I used that. I also decided to personalize the carton by adding a 'label'. And of course I could not resist adding some faces to the eggs. (I know, safety eyes are a choking hazard for a girl who likes to chew on things. I gave her mom a heads up and the baby will only play with the eggs while supervised.)  Each egg roughly represents one of her cousins or sisters. On one egg I left out a panel to make it super skinny; another got gorgeous thick lips; a third is always sleeping. Of course, when I asked the kids which egg they thought was them, they ALL said that they were the vampire egg. Go figure. I guess kids are as suggestible to vampire mania as the slightly disturbing Twilight Moms. Or maybe the vampire egg is just the cutest of the bunch.

Fabric Postcard

Today is one of those days that we look forward to and enjoy here in Arizona. This morning our usual expanse of blue sky was hung instead with marvelous, heavy, dark clouds. On the way to the kids' tennis lessons, humidity in the air pulled a sort of homesickness into my brain, so that while I knew I was driving in the Southwest, I was breathing the thick childhood air of my Midwest, inhaling the promise of rain. When we arrived, I heard a boy tell his mother "It smells like rain." It did. Arizona children learn to recognize the smell early on; it is so rare for them that it reeks of the exotic. Rain, when water falls from the sky! Imagine.

Later, as we drove home, a dust storm began to blow around us. A tumbleweed bounced across the road. As I pointed it out to the kids, an oncoming car struck the tumbleweed. We laughed as the car passed us with the massive tumbleweed stuck to its front end. A moment later, we nearly hit one ourselves. My daughter remarked, "I love when the sky looks like this. Everything looks prettier." I agree, although prettier is not the exact word I would use. In the light of an approaching dust storm, the sky changes and objects look grittier, and at the same time much clearer than usual. If you have ever experienced a solar eclipse, and the surreal light that shines at that time, you have an idea what dust storm light looks like.

Finally, this afternoon, the rainstorm began. In my family, we all love this rare desert rain, the kind that knocks the dirt and pollen out of the air. My son, with his plethora of allergies, gets a temporary reprieve. What marvelous air. Clean air! The humidity is gone, the water remains on the ground. In an hour or so it will be dry again and the sky blue. The evidence of the rain leaves so quickly it seems we've only dreamed it.

This fabric postcard was made for someone who is going through some big changes in her life, leaving her partner after many years together. She likes fabric postcards so I decided to make one for her. It seemed to me that the ones I saw online were symbolism heavy, so I went with that same theme. The postcard comes with a butterfly envelope, symbolizing metamorphosis. The postcard itself shows a figure performing the yoga tree pose. (The recipient practices yoga.) The figure is stretching, balanced  in the outdoors, to show liberation and fresh beginnings. I hope that when she looks at this postcard, she can feel the freedom of rain fresh air.

Tea for Two...or Three.

I have been making tea wallets lately. Like the chapstick cozy in my last post, tea wallets use up small scraps from my crafty stash. Only in this case they use up fabric scraps instead of yarn. There are lots of different patterns online for tea wallets, but the one I used is here. I really think that this tutorial is the best one out there--the author has included lots of pictures and very clear instructions. I experimented with some different closures with these wallets. The first one I made had the ribbon closure as in the tutorial. That one was nice; I didn't take a picture before I gifted it. Then I decided to try using hair bands. You can see how that turned out in the picture of the bunny tea wallet. Finally, I tried creating a flap out of matching fabric and putting a button hole in it. In the end, I did not like any of the closures more than the others. I know that I will make more of these, as they are quick and easy to make, and are great gifts, but I will decide which closure to use based on the fabric and button I am using.

Diapers for all...all little plastic people, that is.

I have an adorable little niece who carries her baby dolls around all day long. She loves to take their clothes off, but her little fingers aren't quite ready to put the clothes back on. And since she has a lot of aunts and uncles who encourage her baby habit by buying her more babies... Well, let's just say that is a lot of little bare plastic bums.

So when gift giving time rolled around again, her brilliant momma suggested that I make some diapers. I made some with Velcro and some with snaps so that those little fingers would get practice with both kinds of fasteners. I had a lot of fun sorting through my fabric stash for diaper fabrics, and several hours later I had ten diapers ready to be shipped off. (I almost didn't send the purple Tinkerbell diaper. Due to a miscalculation on my part she ended up upside down with her head twisted where no self-respecting fairy would want to be. I mean, we all know what diapers are used for, right?)

My sister reports that her girls had fun with the diapers and even tried to put them on each other and on their tiny baby sister. Nowadays the crowd of dolls are dressed, at least in diapers, most of the time. The new request is for girl-size diapers for dress up. I'm not sure if my sister was serious about that, though...