Mother's Day Cross Stitch Done and Displayed!

Better late than never! The border is from the wonderful book Subversive Cross Stitch and I plotted the type.

And here it is all framed up!

And on the wall with an award my mom got in Law School and a collage of memorabilia from a trip to Catalina. Kind of a neat mix of stuff, hu?

But this cross stitch wasn't all, The Mom also wanted note cards with the cross stitch saying on them. So I used the photo I took and brought it into illustrator and laid it out two up on a page horizontally and printed out a bunch!

And for plotting out the letters I went to Incompetech.com for the graph paper, it is so cool you can make any size you need there and print it out!

I think it was a great idea to use a custom piece of art/craft to make a useful item that more can share in.
Now I have a tip for you, you already might do this but for some reason I hadn't up until this point. I had always cut the paper in half to separate the two cards, then folded them. This always then required some trimming of the cards. This time I folded the large piece of paper in half, then cut the two apart. No trimming up!!! Learn something new every day.

There was a second cross stitch that was requested for another person as part of this gift, but the recipient hasn't gotten it yet, but after they do I will post it!

And here is the cross stitch I did for the parents for Christmas all framed up:
And this is the post about the technique I use to plot my designs.

Crafty Bloggers Unite and some amazing orange plaid

Are these not the most amazing orange plaid shorts?
And don't you just love how his kickin' Nike's coordinate!!!!

That was the photo of the day I needed to share. And on the subject of sharing, a bunch of us crafty bloggers thought we'd get together and spread our crafty love with you all with the headlines of what's happening on our respective blogs:

Aileen's Musings
Aileen offers a groovy tutorial on altering a cabinet card using gauche paints.

Crafty Princess Diaries
What does Jane Austen have to do with craft trends? Tammy tells you what we can learn about crafting and following trends from Dear Jane.

Diary of a Crafty Chica - CONTEST!
Tell Kathy why you are a crafty chica too, and you may win a hecka of a lot of prizes!

Layers Upon Layers
Cyndi has compiled a list of her tutorials on mixing digital work into your mixed media!

The Impatient Blogger
Madge shares some photos and impressions from her recent trip to Tokyo for CHA to HAJ.

Polymer Clay @ Craft Gossip
Need the low down on making dozens of different polymer clay beads? Heather reviews a handy book that might just be your recipe to beadmaking success.

Craftside- A behind-the-scenes peek at a crafty world
Over at the Craftside blog there is a chance to win a copy of Retro knits and 1000 Artist Trading Cards, a beaded butterfly pattern, and more spring crafty goodness.

Well now that I'm inspired- off to make something!

Peep Jewelry Inspired by the great State of Texas

I love reading Jennifer Perkin's Blog Naughty Secretary Club and there was this post a while back .
I just love her style.
Well, shopping at the good old 99 cents store after Easter and I found these great Peep plastic decorations.

Well here at re-purposing central- I grabbed ye old scissors and cut them apart.
I popped a bead dangle in the bottom hole and a jump ring in the top hole.
I then grabbed a bead chain and voila!

Peep-tastic!

6 Degrees of Separation from Hanna Montana and Stefanie Girard

I bet your wondering, "What is up with that title?" Like I've said before, half the fun of blogging is coming up with the funky titles.
Hanna Montana AKA Miley Cyrus and her recent photo hubbub reminded me that I actually had some connection with her. Yes 6 degrees or maybe 6000, but none the less this is what I thought I'd share with ya'll today!
Crafting with Hanna Montana. To be honest I don't think I even new who she was until the fab people at Wrights e-mailed asking if I could work my crafty magic and whip up some samples to display in their booth at CHA winter 2008. These iron-ons were a dream to work with and perfect for the crafter who wants virtual instant satisfaction!


Flash back to CHA Winter 2008 and here I am being my goofy self:

Click on image to enlarge to get a better look at all the details.


I also got to incorporate their yummy trims in the designs. This camo sweatshirt rocked with the Hanna Montana iron-ons and olive/beaded trim.


I sooooo loved the little red dress on the left with the velvet Tinkerbell iron-ons.
Isn't this cute; they put my name on their tag!

Sweater Surgery Machine Gun Eyeglass Case

As usual when I need something I first ask myself, "Can I make it?"

I needed an eyeglass case because my sunglasses have gotten so big my old vintage case is just too small.

So off to the felted wool sweater stash and I grabbed a pretty pink medium weight one for the main part of the case and a scrap of charcoal gray for the embellishment.

I then surfed Google images and found a machine gun picture. Why a machine gun- to be honest not quite sure.

I sized the image and cut it out of the charcoal gray wool felt scrap and cut out the pink to make the case in a very scientific way-I wrapped the pink sweater around the glasses and added an extra bit.

I then needle felted the machine gun onto the pink piece.

Then folded the pink piece in half and blanket stitched the two together and around the top edge.

Crafting and cats......enough said.

I was reading Tammy Powley's post over at her blog at About.com and let's just say this picture and

this picture sum up everything she was talking about. Is it just me and her??????? And this isn't even my cat! It's my neighbor's but we looooooove him!

The second before I snapped this picture Pumpkin was all nestled in all snuggled down on the rubber stamps but he new as soon as I saw him-I was not loving his local......

Rock and Roll Sewing Sweater Surgery Style

I realized after I finished my last post that it wasn't the first time I had crafted with a rock.
Here is a photo of a very dusty and faded pin cushion rock.

Why in the world would I make a rock a pin cushion? Well, it didn't start out as the plan. I used to get a tone of catalogs when I worked as a set decorator because I was always shopping and buying stuff for sets.

I had seen in a catalog rock votive candle holders placed on a beach and thought they looked really cool. So I got a big-a** drill bit and went to town on a rock.

So I had a votive rock candle holder.

A crap load of good that does a person who doesn't burn candles because she's way to scared to set her house on fire with all the paper, fabric and yarn flying around it!

Well what's a crafty girl to do but to transform it into something useful for a fiber-fanatic....a pin cushion!
Here it is reupholstered with.....an old wool felted sweater (lest ye forget this is the Home of Sweater Surgery!)

Have any of you crafted with a rock? Leave a link in the comment section, we'd all love to see!

A Rock and A Square Place

Is it art or is it craft?

The eternal question.
Or is the eternal question Form over Function???
Well,
all I can say for sure is that I crafted this painted rock.

I used a piece sticky back paper and punched a square in it using the Marvy Uchida 1-3/8 inch square punch.

I then applied the sticky back paper stencil to the rock and spray painted it with black satin paint.

Are you asking yourself, "Why are you painting a rock with a black square Stefanie?"

I'll answer this question for you;
There is a commercial running that I believe is a paint commercial and there are "squares" missing from objects such as rocks and things.

The idea is that the colors in nature can be found in the company's paints.
But my brain first saw it as squares missing.
It really caught my eye.

Maybe its kind of the "square peg in a round hole" factor, I don't really know.
But subsequently, I felt the need to paint a black square on a rock.

There you have it.
If anyone knows exactly what the commercial was for/company please leave a comment.

But if you came here looking for some good old Sweater Surgery you can just pop on over to
Craftside and there is a tasty project of the Upcycled Wool Sweater variety!