Gourds go Crazy and Crafty Links from Crafty Bloggers

Aren't these some wild gourds or what?

Vickie Howell-Craft.Rock.Love

Make cool, graphic wall art using Ed Roth's Stencil Decor kit and a little imagination!

The Impatient Crafter
Madge makes a festive Patchwork Paper decoupaged letter for your teen's bedroom door in this week's post for iLoveToCreate

The Artful Crafter

Eileen shares directions for some lovely polymer clay Thanksgiving napkin rings. You have a choice of one embellished with a cute clay turkey or a more formal looking ring stamped with a fall motif.

Craftside-A behind-the-scenes peek at a crafty world
Over on the Craftside blog there are how-to ideas for casting and making a silver metal clay wing necklace and a recycled wool sweater Christmas needle book. There’s an Mail Art Call Out to commemorate the 20th Anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, tips for making a vintage rosary style necklace and a little Jimi Hendrix thrown in.

Mixed Media Artist
Would you ever do an art show where you knew you wouldn't sell anything?

Farm Girl Roots, City Girl Style
How did you get introduced to your hobby? Linda shares the story on how she learned to quilt and where those skills have gotten her.

Crafty Princess Diaries
Tammy reviews a new book full of unique and earth-friendly ways to wrap your gifts this holiday season using scarves.

Cathie Filian
Cathie shows you how to make a kids felt book. The book are perfect for airplane trips, car rides and rainy days. They make great gifts!

Aileen's Musings
Aileen's on a mission to win a trip to NYC and to see the Martha Stewart show! Check out her under $20.00 Christmas project on Michael's craft site and rate it to help her win!

About.com Cross Stitch
Connie's added a new pattern collection - Four Ways to Say Peace. These designs will make great holiday ornaments.

About Family Crafts
Come play along with this Make-It-Over craft challenge! What can you make out of candy? This is a great way to use up any left over Halloween candy.

Sweater Surgery Light up Christmas tree inspired by The Lampshade Lady's Guide to Lighting Up Your Life

Two of my favorite things, making decorations and lighting. Well, I was flipping though The Lampshade Lady's Guide to Lighting Up Your Life and there were all sorts of cool lampshade and lamp base projects. I just got my front Christmas lights up (yup I did, and I'm not the first one in the hood either) so I have holiday lighting on the brain. I had just scored (aka garbage picked) a whole bunch of tomato cages that I planed on making yard Christmas trees out of and they look a lot like lamp shade frames. So you see where this is going?
My first question was what can I cover the framework with?

(insert Final Jeopardy music here)

A recycled sweater of course, that's what I cover everything with!

Off to the stash and I landed on one of the remnants of a sweater from one of the projects from Sweater Surgery. Oh and I should mention it's going into it's third printing! Whoo hoo!


I used just the sleeves to make this lace up the back shrug so I had the main body of the sweater left, perfect.
I stitched up the top (neck opening) and the sleeves.
I taped the top points of the tomato cage together and loosely taped the Christmas lights onto the tomato cage.
Then I slipped the sweater over the cage and poked the lights through the sweater.
A bow (plaid of course) was added to the top.

DISCLAIMER! If you try this- don't leave it on unattended, I will be watching mine closely as I am not sure how the lights will be with the sweater. I think these little lights should be totally safe but I have not safety tested all fiber contents of sweaters with tiny Christmas lights!

So do you want to light up your life and looking to craft of some shades and bases? Check out this idea and technique filled book:
The Lampshade Lady's Guide to Lighting Up Your Life: 50 Custom Lampshades and Lamps
By
Judy Lake

From the Publisher:

They Call Her The Lampshade Lady When Judy Lake turns on a lamp, she doesn’t just light up a room, she brings it to life. And with her help, you can too. Turn those boring old lampshades into perfect accents for your home decor. If you can cut and glue, you can renew and revive old shades, dress up flea market fabrics, and transform inexpensive basic frames into inspired designs that complement your home, style, and personality. From nightlights to table and floor lamps, sconces, and even chandeliers, The Lampshade Lady's Guide to Lighting Up Your Life will forever change the way you look at lampshades. The Lampshade Lady shows you the basics of construction and gives you the skills and confidence necessary to let your imagination run wild. Materials like vintage postcards, classic children’s books, baseball cards, heirloom photos, fabric, trim, and even simple embroidery thread produce surprising and delightful opportunities for creativity. From the stately Antique Map Shade to the charming Mama’s Pretty Apron Shade to the To-Die-For French Fabric Shade, these fifty projects are sure to make you look at every lampshade in your home as a chance to create and re-create–all without breaking your budget. Plus, you’ll learn how to make your own lamps out of even more thrifty finds like candlesticks, kerosene lamps, cowboy boots, and just about anything you can run a wire through. Discover how the Lampshade Lady’s designs and ideas really will light up your life.

It did mine!

My scissors relaxing with a beer and some Nice November Crafty Links

Call me crazy but I carry an old pair of big scissors around and photograph them in fun places. Here they are in a funky bar relaxing with a beer. And yes those are bottle caps nailed to the edge of the tables. I did say funky bar , right?

About Family Crafts
Sign up for Sherri's 12 Days of Christmas... Crafts email newsletter and you will receive a variety of Christmas related craft ideas delivered top your email box every day for 12 days - everything from advent calendars to Santa Claus crafts!

Cathie Filian
It is apple craft time! Cathie is stamping up napkins and a simple apron. She also has a delicious recipe for apple crisp.

Crafty Princess Diaries
Tammy is super busy and "somethings gotta give!"

Craftside-A behind-the-scenes peek at a crafty world
Over at Craftside there is a free Japanese wave print and a how-to make pocket ATC with it, Latte Art, a sneak peek into Pam Sussman's studio from Lynne Perrella's new book, a call for entries for a cake decorating book, and good questions to ask yourself to help for a business/design plan.

Farm Girl Roots, City Girl Style
Two very different quilts from the same pattern and Linda shares the story of them both along with a story on getting one of the quilts published in McCall's Quick Quilts.

Mixed Media Artist
Have you ever wanted to learn how to weave? Cyndi's got a book giveaway going on that could help you out!

The Artful Crafter
Make some sweet, goofy, felt and feather Tom Turkey Place Card holders for your Thanksgiving table.

The Impatient Crafter
Madge shares a sneak peek of the ad campaign she shot with her lovely daughter AND the instructions to the Cupcake Glitter Shirt Avalon is wearing in the ad in this post for iLoveToCreate!

Faux Scrimshaw polymer clay technique from the book Enchanted Adornments by Cynthia Thornton

Did you know that "live" backwards is "evil"? Well if you didn't now you do. Mixing things up is what mixed media is all about. The above necklace that I call "Evil bunny on the move" and the one below "Shot like a bat outta h*ll" are the necklaces I made combining the cool technique from the book Enchanted Adornments: Creating Mixed-Media Jewelry with Metal, Clay, Wire, Resin & More, new beads and charms from Blue Moon Beads and a few recycled bits from the stash.
Click on the images to enlarge if you need a closer look.

So with the book open to my inspiration technique I decided to get my texture with rubber stamps, the directions suggest drawing in the clay but I'm not the best at that so rubber stamps it was. To get my outside shape I used cookie cutters.

I did a whole bunch because I figured that would give me lots to play with. I really didn't have a clear plan as I was trying this cool technique of filling in baked polymer clay with a second round of clay so the more I had to work with the better.

Here is the bunny filled in but before sanded down.
Now that I had a cool polymer clay charm I gathered up a bunch of bits and things to make a necklace with it.
I liked working with in two different color pallets simultaneously. It was really an efficient way to work because it saved time in the supply gathering.

There you have it, make a new cool element and then incorporate into a new necklace, all in a day's crafting in the Plaidbunny test kitchen.

Well if like your craft books to cover a wide variety of techniques and materials, then you will really like this book it is truly packed full of mixed-media, I know I do!
Enchanted Adornments: Creating Mixed-Media Jewelry with Metal, Clay, Wire, Resin & More
By
Cynthia Thornton

From the publisher:

Presented in the style of an artist’s journal, this remarkable handbook uses an informal, conversational approach to teach a wide variety of innovative mixed-media jewelry techniques.

Accompanied by fairytale introductions and augmented by watercolor illustrations and design sketches, the 20 unique projects featured, ranging from the delightfully simple to the exquisitely ornate, are infused with personal meaning. Projects make use of various newly popular techniques in mixed-media jewelry, including the creation of resin pendants, PMC clasps, polymer clay beads, and more. All basic techniques are made clear by step-by-step photography.

Cynthia Thornton is the designer for the popular bead-making and jewelry studio, Green Girl Studios. She lives in Asheville, North Carolina.

Halloween Came and Went Onto the first crafty blogger links of November

The cutest little bug in a rug!

And there he goes.

Mixed Media Artist

Cyndi has started another small quilt, this time featuring pears!

The Artful Crafter
Make some romantic mood light candles with decorative tissue paper and decoupage medium.

Craftside-A behind-the-scenes peek at a crafty world
On the Craftside of things there is a free Japanese bunnies and moon piece of clip art, a cool video full of tips on altering a pattern, a how-to on folding paper ricrac, a cool source for vintage style findings and using research magazine pictures as ATC canvases in an altered book.

The Impatient Crafter
This is a story of a refugee who found her strength in creativity. Though she recently died, her story lives on. Please read and share the story of Haiffaa Ali.

Vickie Howell-Craft.Rock.Love
Vickie shows how to customize photo mats to go with your favorite photos!

About Family Crafts
Sherri gives you an excuse to craft every day during the month of November using this calendar of events.

Aileen's Musings
Aileen offers, just barely in time for Day of the Dead or Halloween, an easy peasy earring's tutorial!

Crafty Princess Diaries
Tammy found out crocheting chemo hats is trickier than she thought, but she found success.