Think Crafts Blog – Craft Ideas and Projects – CreateForLess

October is National Book Month and we’re celebrating by slashing prices on selected project idea books. Choose from a wide variety of paper craft, quilting, home décor and craft books at our National Book Month Sale!

By Recycled Crafts Contributor, Anitra from the blog “Coffee Pot People”.

Design Originals Bottle Art Book

Design Originals Bottle Art Book – There’s an expression I use from time to time, “A good idea poorly executed.” I’m going to be honest here, and say that as I turned the pages of this book, I found it running through my head fairly often. Tastes differ, of course, but a lot of the projects shown just looked, well, not too great to me.

Having said that, I’ll also say I like this book. A lot.

Why? First, because some the projects really are pretty. And second, because it takes one simple medium–bottles–and turns it into…uh…wait a minute…counting here…at least eighteen different types of art. You can use the instructions in this book to make:

Wind Chimes

Earrings

A Variety of Jewelry Even black boards

There are also instructions for making photo holders, light catchers, terrariums, candle holders, goblets and tumblers, vases, bells, and decorated bottles.

Even better, when the author instructs you to use a technique, she doesn’t assume you know how. She has instructions for soldering a frame around a piece of glass, for cutting bottles into slices, for firing in a kiln (and for the first time, I want one!), working with polymer clay, and more.

In short, I think this book is well worth the purchase price, and that just about anyone is going to find it a very useful addition to his/her crafting library. Hope you will, too!

Showing some how-to instructions

By Recycled Crafts Contributor, Anitra from the blog “Coffee Pot People”. 

I’m a Janie-come-lately to stamping, and quickly learning to love it after several recent sessions making tags, decorated envelopes, and ATCs (Artist Trading Cards). I’ve taken to haunting the aisles and websites where rubber stamps may be found, and am intrigued by the possibilities, especially of stamped words.

One thing I’ve noticed, though, is that the words I might want often aren’t available, and if they are they’re sometimes the wrong size or font.

The other day, I ran across a whole aisle full of foam rubber shapes and alphabet letters. Letters? Letters are what you use to make words, and rubber is what rubber stamps are made of! Talk about a light bulb coming on. My options as to size and font might still be limited, but I suddenly had at my disposal any word I wanted. 

Here’s how you can build your stamp vocabulary. Start with:

• A package of foam rubber self-adhesive letters
• An assortment of clear or translucent items to use as foundations for your words—
  • Large clear marbles
  • Small plastic boxes
  • Acrylic stamp block
  • The little cases digital cards (like your camera card) come in
  • Scraps of plexi or strong plastic
  • Cassette tape cases
  • Etc.—Just take a look around as see what you have!
  • Glue

The first step is to figure out what word(s) you want to put together. With Halloween coming up, I wanted to do a few that would be good for Halloween cards and tags—Boo, Eek, Yikes. I also wanted a stand-alone “Happy”, something I could put in front of any holiday, occasion, or thing I wanted.

Once you’ve chosen your word, there’s one very important thing to remember: You have to apply the word to the foundation piece backwards, and the letters themselves also have to be backwards. If you don’t do that, you’ll be stamping backwards words and letters.

A note on the foundation for your stamp: You don’t have to use something see-through for it, but if you do, you’ll be able to see exactly where you’re stamping when you use it.

The easiest way to do that is to lay out the letters the way you want the word to appear, on a piece you won’t be using for that particular stamp. Lay the actual foundation piece on top of your word, making a ‘word sandwich’, pick everything up, and carefully flip it over and lay it down.  (It’s rather like turning a molded salad out onto a plate, you know?)

Glue the letters down. When the glue is thoroughly dry, you can peel the paper backing off the letter stickers. (Remember, you turned the letters over because they had to be backwards.)Your stamp will be assembled, but it will be sticky. Don’t worry about that. A trip or two to the ink pad will take all that away, or you can give them a light dusting of powder, which will also de-stickify them.

That’s it! You made a word stamp!

Here are some of my words:

Just a few more bits:

• Some letters are reversible. Take advantage of that, and just stick them down as usual.
• Foam letters are very flexible and malleable. Take advantage of that, too.
• I didn’t find any lower case letters, but judging from past experience there are very few you can’t make with a few judicious snips to the upper case ones.
• The word ‘OH’ is also ‘HO’ if you turn the stamp upside down, useful for Santa’s “HO HO HO” later! ‘XO’ for making ‘XOXO’ is also ‘OX’ when turned upside down…Well, you probably won’t ever use that, though.
• The bits of foam from inside the circle of the ‘O’, ‘B’, ‘P’, etc. can be used to make a paw stamp, polka dots, and…?

I’d love to hear what words you decide to make!

By Sewing Contributor Jessica, from the blog “Life Sew Good”.  

Oh, for the love. (Can you just see me rolling my eyes?!) 

Seth Aaron, from Season 7 of Project Runway was the Zipper Super Star.  He used zippers all the time—and not strictly for practical purposes.  Why, oh why can’t I have this same love for zippers?  Probably because I pretend that I know how to sew them when really I don’t, which creates for major frustration and sewing projects that take way longer than they should.  So, instead of experiencing the same frustration I have in sewing zippers, learn from my mistakes and check out the tutorials that I have found most useful.

1.       Know what kind of zipper you need. 

*Are you using it on a skirt, jeans or other pants?  Sewing a centered or lapped closure is probably most appropriate.  There are several ways to do this.  This is one of the best video tutorials I found on how to do this.

*Are you using it on something more formal? Consider an invisible zipper.  Personally, I like to use this zipper on my skirts as well.  Now, here’s the deal with these puppies:  they are super easy IF you have a proper invisible zipper foot.  If you don’t, it’s way more work.  Coats & Clark makes zipper feet that work on various machines, but for the record, they won’t work on Brother machines, so order one; you won’t regret it.  The same woman who brought to you the best lapped zipper video, also made a very clear and wonderful invisible zipper video (Thanks, Susan) 

*Are you using it as an exposed zipper or decorative touch?  Make sure you buy a zipper that will complement your fabric.  There are many options out there, but if you don’t find what you are looking for, decorate your own zipper!  This is a really well done photo tutorial on how to install a decorative zipper.

2. Baste in a different color thread. 

Actually, I recently made this mistake in shooting photos I had intended for this post!  I was using brown thread on brown corduroy fabric and when I got to the point of tearing out my basting stitches, I could not tell which my basting stitches were and which my real stitches were.  It was especially problematic when they crossed.  Oopsy. 

3. Don’t skip steps.

If you really have an aversion to basting, then at least glue it or tape it for a few minutes.  If you want to have a finished, professional looking garment, then do it the right way the first time!

4. There are different methods to sewing zippers.  Find what works!

If you find one way that works for sewing your zippers, then stick with it; however, if you’re getting frustrated and not getting the results you need, then search other ways to insert your zipper! 

5. If you don’t do it a lot, you’ll forget. 

The only good solution to this is to sew many, many garments, so go for it!

Calling all quilters! We’ve got a giveaway for you! Enter to win two quilting design books, the C&T Publishing Ricky Tims Celtic Fantasy Book and  Adaptable Quilting Designs by Sue Patten.

With the Ricky Tims Celtic Fantasy Book add drama to your quilts with flowing Celtic appliqué designs like knots, trees, flowers and more. You get a full-size freezer paper pattern, plus 9 bonus quilt “skeletons” and 25 Celtic appliqué designs.

Adaptable Quilting Designs has quilting patterns were made specifically to address the need to do more than stitch-in-the-ditch in problem areas such as strips, squares, corners, and triangles. This much-needed addition to any quilter’s quilting pattern library is formatted for ease of shrinking or enlarging every design to fit the tricky spaces that happen on all quilts. Minimal text provides maximum space for inspiration or tracing. Over 2 dozen color photos provide additional visual instruction for the quiltmaker.

Every Friday we’ll post a giveaway on Think Crafts and all you have to do is comment on the blog post answering the question of the week. We’ll pick the winner and contact them via email. Deadline is midnight tonight and the winner will be announced Monday. One entry per person please. Contest opened to all US residents.

Question of week: What is your favorite summer time treat?