Earth Day 2012

This weekend was Earth Day.  It is a weekend filled with festivities for our Environmental Group.  We had two different events this year.  A small festival at a local manufacturing plant and a booth at the big Earth Day event downtown. 

 We had beautiful weather for the small event.  It was sunny, a light breeze and just warm enough to enjoy being outside.  Instead of taking the sunpainting to this event, we took a small upcycle project where the kids could make bracelets out beads and old t-shirts.  All of the kids there participated including this wee one who knew all her colors.  She is working with one of our board members and her adult in this picture. 

We took the whole shebang sunpainting gear downtown for the main event.  We had a full roster of volunteers for the entire day and all three spuds plus one rolled out to help set up and paint.  This picture gives you an idea of what we encountered most of the day. 

The rain woke me up when it started pouring about 3 am.  It rained intermittently until some time afternoon.  It was too cold and too wet to even try getting the sunpaint out.  Fortunately we brought some of our macroinvertebrate friends along with us.  That is what is fascinating everyone in this photo.  Unfortunately, we didn't bring the bracelet materials. 

It actually turned out to be a pretty good day.  We were all frozen, but the crowds turned out.  The good thing was that the folks who turned up at Earth Day in the cold rain were serious about the environment.  They were looking for concrete ideas and solutions.  They wanted volunteer opportunities.  They wanted to participate.  The more dilettante folks who are quick to join a cause but slower to heed a call to action stayed home.  The festival was less colorful but in many ways far more productive than usual. 

*As a side note, given how busy this month is between stream cleaning projects and Earth Day Events, I had planned to use our sunpainting project, public art, as my iron craft entry.  Not so much to show for it.  But that is how it goes. 

Iron Craft 6: Peeps

I think I'm late posting my Iron Craft entry this week because it is soooo lame. I saw this absolutely adorable peeps bunting on Craft Gossip by Dana of Made on VandCo. (Whew! Hope I got that all right.) Of course I made it smaller than the pattern, reducing it by hand so they are totally lumpy to start with. I decided to use some scraps of fleece instead of pretty, well behaved felt. I made them as one layer rather than stitching them or stuffing them. I used a hole punch to kinda, sorta, punch holes in the generally right spot on their ears. And I made little tiny sharpie dots for their faces. I strung them all together on rat tail. LAME! The poor things are so embarrassed they all slide together as if to hide behind each other when I hung them up. In fact, one escaped. I swear I cut out 11 little bunnies, but only 10 made it on to the bunting. I don't know where he went. He is probably running around free someplace celebrating the fact that he wasn't strung up by his lumpy ears to be on public display for all to see. Or perhaps he is just making faces at the others from his hiding place in the WIP stack. (An awful lot of things have been able to hide in that pile!)

At any rate, here is my peeps bunting, made in response to this week's challenge on Iron craft. Head on over to Just Crafty Enough to see the absolutely amazing project created by all of the real Iron Crafters!



I should have stuck with my original project and submitted the sugar crusted chickens badges I've been making, but what is Iron Craft for, if not to stretch yourself and try something different?

Iron Craft 5: Buddy Can You Spare a Dollar?

The Iron Craft challenge for this week is to make a craft entirely from supplies found at the dollar store. Funny thing is, two weeks ago when Kat and Susi issued the challenge I know exactly what I was going to make. So who is waiting in the parking lot at the dollar store equivalent at 9 am this morning hoping they will unlock the doors early? Yep! Me!

Here are my treasures... 2 glass salad plates, 2 short, flat-topped glass candlesticks, one tall glass votive holder and one glass vase. The E6000 is part of my craft supply stash. (The newspaper that they used to wrap the glass happens to have an article on using books in art and furniture!)




The steps are pretty simple. Clean the glass to remove stickers and any residue that might interfere with the glue. Apply the glue to top rim of the candlestick. Center it on the plate or vase and let it set up. (When I made a large tiered stand for a wedding using beautiful thrifted glass, I carefully drew lines across the platters to find the centers. Placed the candlestick on the center and made small marks around the outside of the candlestick. I then cleaned off the marks that would end up under the candlestick before gluing. A better plan would be to make your centering marks on the top of the plate so you can wash them off after you are done! For this project, since the plates and vase are pretty small, I just eyeballed it.)

TA DA! A set of cupcake stands and a tall hurricane glass or jar for holding whimseys on the mantle!

Catalog Inspired Iron Craft

This is definitely my week for not finishing. First it was the barn quilt and now it is my Iron Craft projects. This round we were to make something inspired by a catalog. Etsy's a catalog isn't it?

The quilted piece is the start of a chess board. The spuds all received a set of chess pieces made out of bolts from their dad for Christmas. It was my job to make the boards. I am finally getting started.

The green jacket is a request from spud 2. He showed me a picture of a very elaborate dragon hoodie. However, all he really wants is a recreation of the green and yellow dragon raincoat he had as a toddler. I had this all finished but for the zipper and the hems when I discovered that my "little boy" didn't fit into the men's size Medium pattern I used. My wonderful mother ripped out all of the necessary seams (carefully stitched using a stretch stitch) so that I can make some gussets and insert a row of dragon spikes down the back to make it fit. But... that did not get finished before todays IC deadline. Oh well.

Iron Craft 3: Something Warm

I almost missed the deadline for this episode of Iron Craft. This week we are to make something warm. I've been quilting. I have some small pieces completed, including the test piece for my New Beginnings mini quilt. Consider this another bit of sneak peak. I need to get better pictures.


The rest of the pile include the mug rugs I've been working on, almost all of the stacked coin quilt I showed you a while ago and the start of a baby quilt.

Paper Picks

Paper topped

On occasion I have been known to spend and inordinate amount of time on details no one else will notice. I do it because it makes me happy and because I enjoy the reactions of the very few who do notice. Today was an example of that.

This is the first anniversary of Iron Craft over at Just Crafty Enough. In honor of that momentous occasion the first challenge is to craft something in paper. Kat and Susi have been gracious enough to let me sporadically play in their sandbox. I wanted to make something festive to mark the date.

I was looking around my crafty supplies and realized that I'd have to do some serious organizing to get to my paper. Part of that organizing would require recycling or filing a pile of junk mail. Aha! Paper beads. What would be more festive for a first anniversary than jewelry made of paper beads?

Firs I assembled my supplies: Scissors, white school glue, wooden skewers and junk mail.

Then I cut strips from the junk mail. These vary in size but they all taper at one end. I'd like to say that is because the tapered strip gives the most esthetically pleasing bead (which it does) but the real reason is that I could never cut straight strips or roll them evenly.


Hold the wide end of the strip against the wooden skewer and start to roll it up.


When you get to the end. Apply a small amount of glue. I used the end of another skewer to just cover the end. Continue rolling it up and spin it around a few times. If you have a bit too much glue, the spinning just coats the outside of the bead and keeps everything in place.

There you have it. paper beads. Wait for them to dry, shellac or varnish if you like. String and wear.

Except that I really don't want any more paper beads or party necklaces and the first bead I made stuck onto the end of the skewer. I couldn't get it off. It looked pretty cool there. Hmmmm...

What if I glue the paper strip onto the end on purpose? Then roll and glue the bead. They would all be attached just like pretty beads on fancy party picks.


And this is where the obsessive attention to random details comes in. Lets decorate wooden party picks that will be used once and then thrown away! But what a great way to celebrate a first anniversary.

Not terribly obvious but fun and colorful never the less. Cheers Iron Crafters!

Check out the flickr page for more paper crafts in Iron Craft Season 2 Challenge 1.

Stuff and things

I have lots of things to write about and no time to do so. I missed the Iron Craft Challenge to make a wreath this week, a project I actually need to do. You should head over to Just Crafty Enough to see the absolutely amazing stuff the Iron Crafters have come up with.

Upcycling: Scarves and Necklaces Made from T-shirts

 Update:  If you are looking for instructions on how to make these necklaces, you can start here!

The Iron Craft Challenge this week is to make something for the holidays, including gifts. I've been making scarves by upcycling old t-shirts. This one is a ruffle scarf made from a sunprint misprint. Crazy thing took 36 hours to dry and didn't leave any impressions.
 

This one is a string or infinity scarf with a t-shirt flower. It is the one I made as a gift for some one who reads the blog. The cool thing about these scarves is that you just cut strips out of the t-shirt and stretch them until they curl up. Once you have enough, you tie them together with another strip of t-shirt and you have a necklace or light scarf to wear. It can be worn long or wrapped around depending upon the size of the t-shirt you started with. I cut strips from the sleeves to make matching necklaces.

I do have to find a better way to photograph these. It is a gloomy day so the light isn't as good as I would like but it is also hard to find a way to display them. I tried doing the picture in the mirror. You would have laughed histerically to see me trying to take pictures of me wearing them! I'll have to work on that.

Iron Craft 43: Wooden Doll Matching Game

The challenge for Iron Craft last week was to do something that scares you, try something new. I didn't have to think too much about this one. I always buy unfinished wooden things from the craft stores. In the store I can envision them all painted and pretty.


It is an entirely different story when I get home. I quickly decide that the natural wood is so beautiful that it would be a shame to mar it with paint. Really just an excuse because I am too intimidated to paint it. I do not have a steady hand when it comes to painting or even drawing. I can usually get half of the lines to look good and the other half has smears and lumps and bumps. The more I try to repair it, the worse it gets. So painting wooden things scares me.

Now, I've been reading a wide variety of blogs. I usually start by chasing down an interesting quilt or holiday idea and end up staying to poke around and see what else the blogger does. I came across a blogger at Gluesticks who intrigued me and I started going back in her archives. She had made the cutest little matching game for her daughter out of.... unpainted wooden parts! Perfect. It was cute. It would be a great addition to the toy basket for the little girls who visit on Friday mornings. It was scary. I had my project.

Amazingly enough it was pretty straight forward. I painted them with only a few lumps on the neckline. The smudges in their hair actually look like I intended them to mimic the hair. I got some funky bubbles on their faces when I sprayed on the glossy sealer. I don't know if that was temperature, poor spray technique or a reaction to the pigment pen I used to draw on the faces. I only managed to make three of them, but I will the rest done soon and I might just try painting something else. Perhaps all of those unfinished wooden cars and trucks and boats and planes that have been decorating the spuds Christmas tree for the last 20 years.

I know I am very late to the game, but you can still check out all of the other scary Iron Crafts over here on Just Crafty Enough.

Iron Craft 42: Imaginary Friends

Here is a bit more about my imaginary friends from the previous post...


This is Mildred. She loves to dance with joyful abandon.


This is Irene. She is a bit more inhibited than Mildred but she is bound and determined to do her best to keep up. She finds that a nip of bathtub gin sometimes helps. Besides, she'd like very much to catch Jack's eye.


This is Jack, the sailor. He dances a jig and keeps all the ladies guessing as to where his wondering eye might land. He has a buddy Arthur who is hiding having just dumped the contents of his flask into the punch bowl. That is most likely the reason everyone is just a bit fuzzy at the dance tonight.

Frank and Evelyn are here too. They are too busy working the farm and too tired keeping track of the kids to join in the dancing so they are watching from the sidelines.


Frank is holding Frances who would love to jump down and join in.


Evelyn has baby Walter in her arms. She is so tired she fades into the wallpaper. But she does enjoy the music.


Their son Harold is hiding behind the curtain. He saw Arthur at the punchbowl and is wondering whether to try some. He has his slingshot behind his back.


Just so you can really see the whole family, here is a picture of them in the wheat field from earlier in the year.

Thanks for coming to the dance. Drive safely on your way home. Frank, I think the horses know the way so you won't have much trouble. Mildred and Irene are going to need a little help getting the Model T turned over, but I am sure Jack and Arthur will assist.

For more Imaginary Friend fun check out the entries at Just Crafty Enough.

Iron Craft 39: Thread Jar and a Bizzare Haunting

This week we were challenged to make something using a glass bottle or jar. I don't think the chairman is going to be very excited about my offerings this week. First I thought I would use a cracked pitcher and make a wee ghostie for it like Homemade Mama via Craft Gossip. I couldn't come up with a good plan for eyes and I need to break out my fimo to make wee feet which won't happen this week, so a bad copy of a good idea.



I decided I needed to make something a little more creative and a little better quality. I had a lovely spaghetti jar sitting on the counter and a pile of scrap fabric from a project I am working on. I simply decoupaged the scraps to the jar intending to use it as a thread keeper for all the embroidery thread that comes off my machine. Not so much here either. As usual the pictures tell the truth. Oh well. The joy of Iron Craft is that there is always next week.

Scoot on over to Flickr to check out all the really cool projects from this week. And keep an eye on Just Crafty Enough to see the full gallery and next week's challenge.

Update: Thanks to everyone for their words of encouragement on my kindergarten art this week! I decided to take your suggestions and start over.... sort of. I now present.... the hippy mummy jar thread collector! If you look closely you can see the threads he has already collected while sitting as scraps of batting on my craft room floor!

Maybe I'll give him one of those electric candles so all his hidden hippie goodness can shine through! OK, stop me now before I craft again!

Iron Craft 39: Hold It

I am pushing the limits again this week in my Iron Craft Challenge. I am in a mad rush to get everything ready for a show this weekend so I didn't get to do my original idea. I have a stack of wool sweaters to felt and I was going to make mittens... mittens hold things!

I've been making lots of mini messenger bags and wool felt purses, but I already used the bags for a challenge so that didn't seem right.

So I am just going to have to submit my ever-so-lame display board for holding badges at the show. I am hoping that this will work to let people easily see what badges are available.

The details: It is a large bulletin board covered with batting and muslin. The 'sash' is a strip of denim. The badges are simply pinned on.



If you look closely you can see some of the new badges that I've been working on.
I like the words and I've started adding more adult beverages to the mix. I'd love to get suggestions for other things that you think need to be made into a badge.

Now... I've got to get back to work, but you can go see all the other cool holders at Just Crafty Enough. See you all next week.

Iron Craft Challenge: Black and White

It took me so long to figure out what to do this week that I am late getting my pictures posted and I don't really have the project complete. Annie had a great suggestion to play with space in black and white. I spent a lot of time trying to figure out how I might do it in fabric using fusible web. The problem I couldn't get past was my ability to cut symmetrical shapes. That way, I could fuse the fabric and flip the segments around without having to flip them over. Flipping them over would mean I had to add the fusible web after the shapes were cut. Then I would have to clean my iron. Again. I'll keep pondering it. Perhaps it will be the basis for my next Alzheimer's quilt donation.


So first up is a very quick project. Spider web coasters made from a sheet of craft foam I had Laying around. Simple. I drew spider webs with a sharpie and cut around them. I've done this in the past with white foam paint on black foam. I think I like those better, but this was easy and the materials were ready to hand. They will probably become a Halloween hostess gift.


Next up is a damask pillow. It is made of flannel. All the fabric is flannel. Not my usual plan but I couldn't resist the black and white fabric with a 40% off coupon. The center is a machine embroidery design from Urban Threads. If you look closely you can see the spiders and webs and black cats and fences. If you look again you see a sinister skull looking at you. The backing is a deep envelope style backing in black flannel. The edges is a typical binding, machine stitched and finished by hand.

I've stitched the inverted pattern to make a second pillow that is mostly complete. I've also got some ravens and few others that I will finish up in the next week. Boy blacksmith will take them to Arcon to see how they sell there.

Check out all of the rest of the cool stuff from this week's challenge on the Flickr page or here.

Mini Messenger Bag

I've been making badges or patches for a while now. Lots of folks look at them, note that they are cute and then wonder what they would do with them. I figure I need to make some samples and examples to give them ideas. Most of the craft shows going on now only have room for a 6 or 8 foot table. I need to have display items that don't take up too much room.

Today I made a mini messenger bag out of a pair of khaki pants. One of the things I love about it is how you can see the seams from the original pants. I think that makes it fun and gives it some character. It is approximately 10 inches long by 7 inches high and is about 2.5 inches deep.

This picture has a dollar bill in it to give you an idea of the overall size. The badge is 2 inches in diameter. It is a Monarch butterfly stitched out on upcycled denim. I used one of the iron-on patches and it worked beautifully once the iron got medium hot.

Since this was a rough prototype, I didn't use any interfacing or batting to give it substance. The lining is simple unbleached muslin. I think this might actually be a nice size for a purse if I put some simple pockets inside (or figure out how to use the pockets from the pants). I also need to figure out some sort of fastener. I'm not sure I want to make buckles. I'd like to find some kind of upcycled solution. Any suggestions?

Since this week's challenge for Iron Craft 37 is Shrink To Fit and the challenge is make something smaller, I will submit this!

Small Batch Preserves

A long time ago, I inherited my grandmother's canning kettles. They are huge. You can barely lift them when they are full of gardeny goodness. I used to can. A lot. Each Summer and early Fall I would make tomato juice, spaghetti sauce, salsa, pickles, canned fruit and jams and fruit butter. Each one was a production. Get the fruit. Peel the fruit. Cut the fruit up. Cook it down slowly. Watch so it doesn't burn. Measure the hot fruit sauce. Calculate the pectin and sugar. Cook it down until it sheets just right. Which, by the way usually wasn't until 10 pm at the very earliest no matter how early you started. THEN it all had to be put in sterile jars. More hot boiling water. More mess on the counter. Timing. Lifting. Waiting for each lid to pop.

It was wonderful to have all those lovely jars in the pantry. It was even better to have all those tiny jars of jams and preserves to give to the staff at the holidays. But... it was hard work.

Now I just make small batch preserves when the mood strikes. Given that the Iron Craft Challenge this week is for creative endeavors a la State Fair, the time seemed right for a quick batch of plum butter.

You can google recipes or pour through your big blue book of canning to get precise measurements and temperatures, but it really isn't all that important for this scale. You are making a small amount to keep in the fridge for a week or two, if it lasts that long.

Start with some fruit. A couple pounds are sufficient. I often make up a batch of strawberry jam when I have a couple cups of strawberries left over. Today I started with about 3 lbs of plums. These were black plums.

Wash them. Remove the pit. Chop them so that you don't end up with giant pieces of skin in the end product.

Put them in a sauce pan with a splash of water and cook them over low heat until they are soft and mostly lose their shape. I was a tiny bit impatient with this batch and stopped cooking a little soon, but not much. This batch will just have a few larger chunks of fruit.



Add sugar. The rule books tell you to add sugar equal to the amount of fruit you have. I find that usually leaves me with a nice cooked sugar flavor and not a lot of fruit. I really just add it to taste, although I probably almost always put in at least a cup. This is in a 2 quart pan. There are probably about 3 cups of fruit. I added about 1 1/4 cups of sugar. Then taste. Be careful tasting. It is HOT. These plums were not as tart as I am used to so I added about 2 tablespoons lemon juice to brighten it up.

Now you just cook it a little longer until it sheets off of a cool metal spoon. Or until it coats the metal spoon. Or until you can dip in the metal spoon and draw a line through the jam that coats the spoon. It will thicken more as it cools. One good test if you really must have some rules is to put a drop on a small plate and put the plate in the freezer for a few minutes. Take it out once it is cool but before it is frozen. Stand the plate on its edge. If the jam runs off the plate you need to cook it more. If it does a slow drip or stays put you are done.

Let the jam cool. Put it in a pretty glass bowl. Cover it and keep it in the fridge. No boiling water. No sterile jars. No 6 bottles that didn't seal. No fuss and you have fresh jam whenever the mood strikes.

This batch is most likely destined to become plum sauce, since I have a lovely batch of pulled pork that we slow cooked along side the jam.

(Sorry the pictures and not all that this time. Taking them on the stove with the available light just wasn't working.)

Update: Want to see more State Fair quality crafting? Check out the Flickr group here. You can play to by checking out Iron craft at Just Crafty enough here.

State Fair

Image from the St Louis County Fair page found here.

The new Iron Craft Challenge is Creative Activities. We are to make something that would fit in to one of the Minnesota State Fair creative activities categories.

I love the fair. My dad would take us and teach us the fine points of large animal judging. My grandmother could always be found sitting in front of the Grange display. My uncle was usually one of the sheriffs on duty and my cousins could be found making funnel cakes for the band boosters. It would always rain and the tractors would have to drive over from the tractor pull to pull cars out of the grass field.

I come from a long line of competitive fair entrants. My grandfather regularly entered vegetables and gladioli. My mother took second place with a cake at the Ohio State Fair. She was trying to win the gas range that went to the first place baker, but ended up with 50 pounds of flour instead. I used to be competitive in the baking and art categories at our county fair. Boy blacksmith just took 3 medals with his soda at the Colorado State Fair.

So now all I have to do is decide what to make! The quilt on a stick has a particular appeal!

Done Reading? IC 35: Book Finial

The challenge for this week on Iron Craft was to make something out of a book. I chose to make an ornament that aside from ripping off the covers left the book still legible (for a determined reader). I present the book finial.

I am confident you don't need a tutorial to make this project, but the camera was there so I took some shots and decided to write it up.

This is a very simple project. After you remove the front cover, each page in the book is folded in the same way.

Step 1. Fold the top right corner of the page into the binding of the book, making a right triangle.

It is just one big dog ear!


Step 2. Fold the folded edge of the triangle into the binding of the book. The bottom corner will hang below the bottom of the book.


Step 3. The the bottom edge of the folded page and bring it into the binding so that it lines up squarely with the center of the book.



Make a sharp crease for every fold and then move on to the next page.


You can see from this photo that as you get closer to the end of the book it gets a bit trickier to get the top folds tucked into the binding. It is possible to make it neat and pretty with a little patience. But in most cases it won't really affect the overall look of the finished finial.

These can be hung by threading rope through the spine and tying a knot to secure it below the book. They also look pretty cool used as fake finials on the mantel or in pots to look like topiaries. This one will likely find its way into my Halloween decorations.

No content of any book was harmed in the making of this craft. Should you choose to paint yours or use glue you will be on your own in any subsequent interactions with librarians.

Update: I always forget to add the link.... I'll do better in the future. You should go check out what the other Iron Crafters have produced in response to this week's challenge.