going once, going twice

Way back in March, the Relief Society turned 168. To celebrate, our ward held a service auction. Everyone brought an item or service to auction, and then completed this form to earn points for bidding. (I compiled this questionnaire from my memory of a similar auction I attended when I lived in Iowa City, plus ideas from here and here. Plus my own madness. (Mostly the last one.) Feel free to use it if you'd like.)

It was a wild night.¹ Sweet Sister Carrero, in her eighties, with more points than anyone, won every item she bid on.

I won a basket full of free ironing. I haven't redeemed it yet, but you'd better believe I'm cramming that basket as full as I can get it. (You know, to make sure there are enough wrinkles to make it worth Fran's time to iron.)

This is what I took:

Two dolls with purses.

In a matching purse.

These dolls belong to Grace, and she would not have approved of me selling them off. So these were just examples; the item up for bid was a custom set, made-to-order.

My friend Sara won, and requested a set in pink for her two little girls.

(With no purses, "cause they'd just get eaten by the dogs.")

But I couldn't just send them off without any accessories at all, so I gave them each a stretchy pink necklace that their owners can also wear as bracelets. (Of course, the dogs might just eat those too. Didn't think of that. Sorry Sara.)

Anyway, back to the red set. I made the purse(s) to match Grace's dolls to save myself time coming up with a sample set, but Grace actually didn't care for the red purse very much. (She is fiercely loyal to her favorite colors: pink and purple.) And that was fine with me, because I kind of wanted it for myself. I'm a little bit in love with the rhinestone trim.

What rhinestone trim, you ask? Well, let me give you a better look:


It's very very sparkly, and would have been very very expensive, if I hadn't swindled it from little old ladies. (There was at least a yard of this stuff in a three-for-a-dollar pile. I KNOW!!!)

But then Sam's school asked for donations for a Chinese auction fundraiser, and I went and volunteered to make something. When it came down to it, though, I ran out of time and motivation. So I decided to donate the purse, because it was already made, and -- let's face it -- there was no way all my junk could fit in that little thing. I mean, where's the key fob?!

And it's time for me to start de-cluttering anyway.

So the purse had to find a new home. But I couldn't send her away alone, could I? So I made this matching head band.

More ruffles. More sparkly trim.

And because Coach wasn't home to stop me (or to try it on himself), I had to see how it would look on a baby. If only I had one nearby.

Oh look! There's one! He won't mind!


And another one. See how sparkly?

Despite Miles' clear attachment to the set, I donated it. It ended up with a 3rd-grade(ish) girl who really seemed excited about it. And I even got an appreciative (apologetic?) look from said girl's grandmother (who had previously snapped at me for asking if I could sit in an empty chair at her table) when the teacher running the auction pointed me out as the maker of the purse.

So that felt good. It also felt good to have the teachers gush and ask about special orders. When one asked what I'd charge for a bag, I foolishly said "fifteen dollars," instead of "two weeks of clean toilets." I'm such an idiot!

_____
1. At the risk of making my blog read like an undergraduate research paper, I've started adding footnotes to my entries. It's ridiculous, I know, but I just can't get it all in parenthetically. And I figure reader(s?) will indulge me as long as my photos of cute babies outnumber my footnotes.

Anyway, before this footnote needs a footnote of its own, I need to get to the point, which is that the service auction was a raging success, and I am so so so grateful to all the ladies who pitched in. Laney was fast-talking auctioneer; Lizzy tended a fussy (and occasionally stinky) Miles all night; Sara, Rachel, Margaret, Emily, Natalie and Kristie were lifesavers with setup and clean up; Amber handled registration; Kennon and Savannah watched kids; and dozens of other ladies brought treats to share and services to donate. I said thank you to everyone at the time --and really meant it!--but I still can't think of that activity without getting a little verklempt. It went well. And it was all their fault. And I'm so glad. Thank you everyone.

Birthday Princess 4.0

Now here's a girl who knows how to open birthday presents. I think in this shot she's unwrapping undershirts. And she could not have been more excited. It was adorable.

Anyway, as you can see she was quite pleased with the Sleeping Beauty style crown and necklace set I made from stash fabric. She and Grace love to play princess dress up, so I know they'll get a lot of use. (I'm thinking about writing up a tutorial for making these crowns. They're definitely a minimum-work-for-maximum-impact kind of project.)

I was excited when she got to the little purse set her mom hired me to make. (It was a bartered hire, just the kind I like. I got four big bottles of laundry soap, and countless hours of babysitting. Plus a couple weeks of dog sitting. And the kind of like-a-sister friend every girl needs. Yeah, I totally overcharge.) Abygail's take included a purse, a keychain, a makeup bag, and a wallet. And stickers! Inside the wallet! Abygail was beyond thrilled.

And I was too.

Happy Birthday Princess Abygail!

Super O!

I'm often annoyed with myself for forgetting to take photos of a project before giving it away. Usually, in the rush to get out the door to the party or shower, I don't take the time to snap a few shots, and then I regret it later.

This time, however, I almost regret taking the photos. This project looked better in my memory than it does here in the photos, which I just pulled off the camera and looked at for the first time this evening.

The model looks sharp, I'll admit (he always does), but the details are sloppy. The cape looks wrinkled and ill fitting, and close up especially, the appliques are a mess.

See?

And see?

But you know, this blog is more about recording my projects and the things I learned while making them than just showing the pretty pictures.

So, while I love this metallic gold fabric (also used for princess crowns here and here), I won't use it again for an applique project -- or anything else that leaves raw edges exposed. It just falls apart too easily. And I really need to work on my stitching technique. How do you backstitch a zig zag stitch without the overlap looking so sloppy? (See the (not so) super O above?) I stuffed the CTR letters to add dimension, which I like, but there are several sections of batting peeking out the edges, which I don't like. There's got to be a better way to do that. And I don't know if it's because they're polyester or what, but both the black and the blue background fabric were impossible to get (and keep) wrinkle free. I pressed and pressed and pressed that thing, and it still looks like it spend a month in the trunk of my car. (Not that anything would ever sit in the trunk of my car for a month, of course.)

It's frustrating to spend time on a project and not have it turn out as well as I'd wanted. And yet, I still count this one a success. I was happy with it when I wrapped it up (it's been a couple weeks now), and all reports say Super O loved it. It was made entirely from the stash, I completed it in just a couple hours, it's personalized, and it's not plastic. Plus it's righteous. What more could a six-year-old want? Perhaps most encouraging, Sam wants one for himself. (I think for him, though, CTR stands for "Choose the Rocketlauncher." He's really into munitions lately, but that's probably and entry for another blog.)

Princess Katie

Jean

Rachel

Three

Grace turned three, so I made her three dollies.

I'll admit that some of the details were more for me than for her. Jaguar ruffles, rhinestone barrettes, vintage lace and buttons.

But I think she likes them anyway.

Copy Cat

I had a jewelry party last week. It was a lot of fun, and got me in the mood to do some more beading again.

That's a good thing, because I have a lot of beads.

This is what the project area looked like after the party. After about 10 ladies had used the stash to make stuff and left with it. This was LEFT OVER! See all the stuff back there on the sideboard? Beads. Plus, there's stuff I didn't even bring out of the back room. Yeah, the stash is a bit out of control.

Anyway, before the party I bought a bunch of jewelry from Old Navy to use for ideas. Amber liked this one (with the tag attached, on the right below), but looked at me like a crazy person when I suggested she try making it from a length of chain from a bike lock (cause that's the kind of stuff I have in my stash).

The next day, I decided to give it a try. I've never purchased jewelry with the intent to copy before. I don't think I'll make a habit of it, but I don't feel particularly bad about it because it's Old Navy -- not some struggling artisan. Plus I made a few changes. And mine is completely recycled from old and broken jewelry.

Here's the side-by-side comparison.

And here's the glamor shot.

My favorite part is the pearl button at the bottom of the bike chain. It's a clip on earring.

Commissions

Before Christmas I made a bracelet and earring set for my friend Tiffany to give to her cousin. We wanted to get together so I could teach her how to make it herself, but the schedule just didn't work out. So this became my first commissioned project. It's shockingly similar to this set made for Dawn last year. But this time I got better pictures of it.

And then last month a friend who works with Shane ordered a little purse, also shockingly similar to purses previously featured here.

It is a bit thrilling to have people like my stuff enough to buy it, and while I've contemplated opening an Etsy shop or actually doing a craft fair, I think I like crafting best as play, not work. It's more fun to create something for the first time than to make it to order. And when I'm making gifts, I don't mind spending a lot of time on it figuring it out. That's just part of the gift and part of the fun. But it's not quite the same when I'm thinking of my time as money. So, yeah. No shop for me. I'm still happy (and flattered) to take an occasional order, but this isn't anything I'm ever going to make real money off of. And I'm fine with that.

But you know what would be awesome? Bartering. I make purses, you clean my house. That kind of thing. I don't expect any takers, cause my house is a disaster and everyone knows that. But still, it's fun to dream.

Busy Week

In the past 10 days I've been to baby showers for four women, and birthday parties for two little girls.

I need to write a post about everything I've learned while making "quick and easy projects" gone slow and complicated. But all's well that ends well, right? So for now, I'll just post the pictures.

For the babies:

For the three-year-olds:

If you're counting, you may notice that there are only three baby gifts pictured. I didn't bother taking a picture of the fourth, but I'll tell you about it because I think it's a pretty great idea and you might want to use it sometime. Get a package of disposable freezer containers and wrap them up with a list of your favorite meals that freeze well. Write a note telling your friend to pick five (or whatever) and return the list so that you can stock her freezer before the baby arrives. Bonus gift: stock your own freezer while you're at it, cause you might as well.

Black Apple Dolls

I may be the last crafter on the Internet to discover Emily Martin and her Etsy shop, The Black Apple. But I'm sure glad I finally did, because making these little dolls (as featured on Martha) just might be my new addiction.

This first set went to a couple of strawberry blond cuties who just turned one.

Turning those skinny arms and legs right-side-out is a bit of a pain, but other than that these dolls are a breeze to make. Unless of course you have a giant stash of fabric. Then it will take you hours to contemplate all the possible combinations. Everything here came from the stash -- most of it from the stockpile I swindled from little old ladies. These vintage prints are perfectly suited for this sort of thing, aren't they? I'm already planning more for an almost three-year-old I know. Shhh! Don't tell Grace.