Other Craft Projects

Handmade Sensory Blanket

on July 25, 2011

Now that my sewing machine has its own table, and hence a little home of its own in the craft room, i’ve been getting fabric-happy.

During an internet perusing session i spotted a blog post on someone who had made a sensory blanket for their little one. I wish i remembered where I had seen it so i could link to it, but to be honest at the time i just clicked onto the next thing, not really giving it another thought. It was only about a fortnight later that i suddenly remembered that post.

Piper had started to be more playful, and when feeding she would look up at me with her steel blue eyes and reach up with her hands. First it started by gripping my top, then she would run her fingers over my chest and neck. She even started to reach up to touch my lips, at which stage i would give them a little kiss. These wandering hands gave me the idea that perhaps Piper would like something interactive to fondle when feeding.

All you need to make this blanket is two scraps of fabric (I made mine about 8 inches square) and a bunch of ribbons. Now, where, oh where would I find ribbon!?! {hide bashfully at the thought of my ribbon wall}

The most important thing is to make sure those ribbons are secured firmly, so i sewed the ribbons onto one square, then sewed both squares together right sides facing one another, leaving a gap to turn the right way round. Once I had turned it the right way, i sewed around the edges again, so the ribbons have three layers of stitching securing them in place.

I used different types of ribbon – satin, grosgrain etc to get different textures and I tied a knot in one or two of the ribbons too. I also added a piece of cord, which Piper particularly likes.

She loves the blanket. Sliding her fingers inside the loops, and we also sing a song called ‘Peepo’ with it. The song is sung to a similar tune as ‘London Bridge is falling down’ and the lyrics are..

“can you play at peepo,
peepo, peepo
can you play at peepo,
play a game with me.
peep in (cover face with blanket, muslin, hands etc)
peep out (remove blanket)
peep in (cover)
peep out (remove)
can you play at peepo,
play again with me”

Thanks for stopping by.

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Printing iPhone photos

on July 22, 2011

As scrapbookers, I am sure you would agree that we have a tendency to take a lot of photos, probably more than the average Joe. With the marvellous invention of the camera phone, it has become even easier to take snapshots of our daily life, not just those special events or one-off occasions when you remembered to take your handheld camera.

Last week I was flicking through my Aperture library, smiling at the many photos of our darling 4 month old, and the many Hungry Heffy Crafts projects for the website, all taken with my DSLR. Suddenly I realised that the photos in my Aperture library were so very different to the ones on my iPhone. Due to its convenience, my iPhone library is packed full of sweet photos, snapped in the moment, which all tell a story about my every day life. Not just that, but because i have the Hipstamatic app for my iPhone, there are loads of really funky, stylised photos on my phone that i love.

I wanted to print some of these photos, but i hit a glitch. My iPhone is synced with my hubby’s account on the computer without Aperture and without photoshop. So i started thinking about an easy way to print the photos rather than spend countless hours uploading, transferring, editing, printing…. swapping from one application to the next!

First i thought i would just get them all printed through an online printer. So I spent time looking around, looking for competitive pricing, discount codes etc, but it turns out i have over 1200 iPhoto photos, and this was going to be pricey….maybe not.

Then, i found a fantastic solution.

I downloaded the Flickr app onto my iPhone, which enabled me to quickly and easily upload photos from my library to flickr. I did this over the course of two days, during the ad breaks when watching a show, or lying in bed, even whilst feeding the little one. It was quick and easy. It was perfect. I would recommend that you do this over wifi, for speed.

Next, i hopped over to snapfish (on the computer this time, rather than the phone). Snapfish works with flickr seamlessly, so i was able to click a button and my flickr set was transferred over to my snapfish account in a matter of minutes. woohoo!

Then i found the magic button that allows you to print the photos at home. The interface works really well, as you can choose the size of photos you want, and if you want to print multiples of one photo on a page, or fit a number of different photos onto the one page.

I wanted to keep my photos small rather than print them 4×6, and this method allowed me to do that (printing 8cm x 6cm), and they also let me print with a white border which was exactly the look i wanted.

Before long I had forty photos printed in a size i wanted, all the same size, on A4 printer photo paper, right there in my hands.

So tonight, i’m going to steal my hubby’s iPhone, download the flickr app, and print off some snapshots of his every day life.

I have no idea what I am going to do with the photos. Maybe some will make it onto a scrapbook page, maybe some will become a mini-book, and perhaps some will end up sitting in a drawer, but I am okay with that. After all, i firmly believe that although we take loads and loads of photos, we really don’t print enough. When was the last time you leafed through some photographs that didn’t involve scrolling with your mouse?

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Too loved to throw away – repurpose old jeans for storage

on July 18, 2011

Why do I never remember to take ‘before’ photos?

🙂

Earlier this week Craig threw a pair of trousers on the ground (his usual filing system) and proclaimed that they were for the bin. Realising that they were his fav jeans, I questioned him. “Really? are you sure?”

Craig had decided that they were beyond repair. They had been worn so much that the backs of the legs were about 5 inches shorter than the front, and there were holes in the pockets and a few ‘air holes’ as well.

I just didn’t want to throw them away. They are just a pair of jeans after all, so I don’t know why I felt an attachment to them? i must be a little crazy on some level… But give this girl a few pins, a good pair of scissors and my trusty sewing machine…Voila!

I got so excited I added the pockets and the label just for a little pazzazz!

I didn’t have a lot of the pink pattern fabric so I made the base of the inside lining with plain white fabric, and in honesty the whole lining is about 2-3 inches shorter than the height of the denim, but i’m going to pretend that i planned it that way because the result is that the denim looks slouchy and really cool. LOL

Thanks for stopping by!

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