Tis the season!! Who's still shopping for gifts? On the present front, you have to check out Shoestring Magazine's "Shop Local" map of handmade goodies under $50 made in each of the 50 states. It's amazing, and yours truly is mentioned in CA! (PS, for those gifting a copy of NDAD for the holidays, click here and fill out your info to get my sewing playlist and be entered in a fab raffle of craft goodness!) Who's still decorating? On the decor front, I've got you covered. I'm going to show you the amazing upcycled ornament that was made at my fun craft night/book signing at Kettle Coffee & Tea in San Diego with these lovely ladies below...
The amazing Tricia owns Kettle and was gracious enough to host the night at her shop with delish sips and treats (which you'll see down below) along with Katie of Latte Love Blog and Rebekah of Twinkle and Twine who really spearheaded the craft! (You can see R's full tutorial here.)
Basically we started with swatches of fabric that came from thrifted dresses (we went with a 2" size and 75 of them, however I used about 60 for mine), a styrofoam ball (we used a 2"), straight pins, and a little bit of glue!
The ball is going to be covered with these bits of fabric on pins, so to start off gather each of the four corners and place a pin through all four edges to make little puffs, as Rebekah called them. I started off slowly...
...and then got on a roll! I didn't use a thimble, however feel free to bring that into the equation. It will definitely help, especially if you're using thicker fabric.
With my fabric puffs ready to go, I dabbed the pins in some Aleene's Tacky Glue...
...and then started pinning into my ball!
I had a little dab and press party...
...until my ball was finished! You just want to make sure that all the styrofoam is hidden. Depending on the size of your styrofoam, you'll need more/less to cover the exterior.
- Fabric Success!
Now it's time to finish up the ornament with some ribbon!! Gather two strips - I went with two different colors that I snagged from my mom's box o'holiday ribbon. One will hang the ornament and the other will be turned into a lovely little bow.
I took the non-bow-tied-ribbon, and glue/pinned the two edges together into the top of the ball and then glue/pinned the bow in front. (I put the pin through the back of the bow so you wouldn't see it peeking through!)
After making sure the glue had completely dried, here's the final product that I came out with!!
You'll get to see some of the other crafter's projects below in the amazing photos that were taken by SD based photog Courtney White of Courtney White Photography. Here's the fun rundown of the night...
I was running late because of crapster traffic (took me 3.15 hours from LA to SD...for those of you familiar with that drive, how wack is that??) but the beautiful facade of Kettle welcomed me with a non-trafficked street/meter space right out in front, smile.
I loved the chalkboard sign as I walked inside!!
All the guests got to pick a bevvie from the menu below...
...and it was the first time I got to see the pour over method that Tricia so skillfully prepared.
Oh, but you can't really have a crafty gals night without sweets. Yeah, the sweets were totally handled in the form of peanut butter and chocolate brownie goodness.
Once the snacks were prepped, the crafting began!! Rebekah printed out directions for all the gals to have to make it super easy to follow.
I was loving what everyone was coming up with! I stuck to one print, but I loved the gals who used a variety of fabrics on their ornaments like this one...
...and these guys!
Post-crafting, I showed some pieces that I had on my agenda to work on...
...as well as having mini-consultations on pieces that my SD pals brought, like this ill-fitting dress...
...and this piece, which was my favorite. It had coffee beans all over it and something brought specially for Kettle owner Tricia.
After looking at it we felt that it was kind of perfect to wear at the shop, and something you could totally get away with when you own a fab little coffee and tea house! (I don't know who was buying this previously though...)
We signed books...
...and just hung out and chatted like girlfriends.
We also took tons of pics too!
It was such a fun night to get to meet/drink/chat/craft with some awesome ladies!!
Thanks again to my lovely hosts - can't wait for the next SD craft night!! And those of you near Escondido, go check Kettle out because the coffee is just amazing and there's tons of cush spots to veg/work on. If I only lived closer, I'd be there all the time working!
