knick knacks & ric rac

these cute shirred ric rac flower brooches are super fast and easy to make, even for someone like me who has little patience for hand stitching!

these are based on part of a ric rac wallhanging project from the book “creative crafts & stitchery” (1976). in the original project, the shirred ric rac was glued to a cardboard base. i modified it by sewing the ric rac to a felt backing to make it more wearable.

for the backing, i used two layers of felt cut into circles. shirr the ric rac by stitching in and out at the bottom of each V, gathering and sewing down to the felt backing as you go along.

i found that the soft, cotton ric rac is easier to work with than the stiffer poly ric rac. this would be a great project to use up all of those packages of vintage ric rac that are too fragile to use on clothing!

finish up the center with a pom pom (or three!) and sew on a pinback. the next one i make, i think i’ll sew a cute button in the center. ooh, or maybe a flashy acrylic gem!

the medium sized light green brooch is about 2¼” wide and used about 2 yards of size 29 ric rac.

P.S. i just made a few of these with patterned ric rac and ric rac with lurex, they came out really neat! check them out here.

i love reading other people’s diaries. not when they don’t want me to, of course, but once they’re published for the world to see, that’s okay, isn’t it? i love the ‘covered wagon women-diaries and letters from the western trails’ series which goes from 1840-1903. there are 11 books in the series, i think i’m about half way through.

 i just got an email from amazon saying a ‘best of covered wagon women’ book is coming out at the end of the month. you should read it!

another one of my favorites is also in this picture “i am the most interesting book of all-the diary of marie bashkirtseff vol. 1” i bought this as soon as it came out, having read the original translation from 1889 which had alot of portions removed before publishing. i was so excited after i read volume 1, i wrote to chronicle books asking when would the second volume come out, i couldn’t wait to read it, and they told me they would not be publishing it! i was so bummed. i read something online a while ago that the second volume may be published by another company. that may just be a rumor but i’m still clinging to hope.

do you have any good diaries to recommend? i really only read diaries written by women, but i won’t discriminate!

i took a little break from making them, but since i’ve gotten a bunch of requests for them, the dutch treat tea towels are back!

i’ll be offering more of the toadstool tea towels too, as soon as i have a chance to print them up.

here’s a sneak peek at one of the new skirt prints i finished up this week. i’m calling this one ‘fairytale forest’, for obvious reasons! there’s also a third colorway featuring red riding hood. it’s a wrap-around skirt with the deep dark woods print all the way around, and fairytale figures on the very end based on illustrations from a set of antique puzzles that i have hanging up in my living room. the awesome felt log pillows are from my imaginary boyfriend!

this one is all printed up and waiting to be sewn into skirts and trimmed with giant jumbo-sized purple ric rac. yay!

i hope to have these and a few other new goodies up on my website by the end of the month, so stay tuned!

last year, jen (the brains behind the indie fixx blog) started posting a great series of wednesday indie artist interviews every week. guess who is interviewed today!

i also love her new tutorial tuesday series featuring how-to’s, free patterns and fun projects to make!

yeah, i know, decorating with fake flowers is frowned upon by the professionals. it’s #1 in the hgtv list of top decorating mistakes (apparently i also suffer from #3, ‘knickknack overload’!) the problem is these guys have it all wrong, they tell you if you want to decorate with fake flowers, to buy realistic looking flowers in natural colors, when i think trying to pretend they’re real when they’re not is what makes them cheesy. try my decorating advice: the faker the better! i went to the thrift store and they had 3 huge boxes full of these neon plastic flowers. needless to say i was thrilled to pieces and bought some to make a few spring arrangements with. i especially like these ones, they seem to glow when the light hits them. i might have to go back and get some more.

you’ve seen the fun fruit and vegetable people portraits in my kitchen here, and the veggie folk i adore here. i also love these plastic fruit and veggie people figures…did these come as a kit?

(you might recognize two of these guys from my ‘down on the farm’ print)

fun veggie critter decals! somebody applied these to plain tiles and attached hangers to the back.

i bought the felt veggie dolls on the left online a few years ago, and the cutie-pies on the right i  bought on etsy recently.

and of course the classic embroidered veggie people! these guys used to be on an old stained tea towel so i cut them out and framed them.

i just came across this great veggie people trim on etsy! wow! i would love to have a stockpile of that!

you might have figured out that i really like alpine-y style woven trims. i designed the ribbon print skirt based on a few that i have, and i make this belt out of super wide vintage 60’s woven trim. okay, i’ll admit i may be a little obsessed with them, and when i find ones i like i hoard them. sure, i’ll use some of them on the clothes i make, but the really fancy ones i’m almost afraid to use, especially if i only have a few precious yards. i particularly like the ones that feature people in them. here are some pictures of cute trims from etsy and ebay for inspiration. (see, i even hoard pictures of trim!)

since the article in craft magazine i’ve gotten a bunch of emails asking about my screen printing set-up, so i thought i’d share a peek inside my screen printing shack…

i found these guys at the thrift store yesterday. i love them! i wasn’t really planning on going, i was out doing some errands, i turned the corner and the thrift store was calling me. i was compelled to go in. they had been spray painted white but i took the paint off.

this is the kind of stuff i imagine happening in the back yard when i’m not looking!

i also found this giant heart shaped swiss chocolate mold which i’m going to hang up on the wall. it gives me an idea for something fun to make and wear!