Ready, Set, Craft!'s New Year Resolutions

I'm baaaaaack!  Back from the land of Christmas-ing, travel-ing, eating (a lot of that!), snoozing on the couch, puzzle-putting-together, and blog auto-posting.  I'm back live and in person, although it's going to take me a couple of days to catch up and get back into the swing of things!

Thanks so much to all of you who stopped by this busy holiday while I've been on auto-post to check out my holiday gifts, project round-ups from across the web, and for leaving me some comment love!  I'll be responding to them all (in the comments sections) over the next day or two.  Please be patient with me, and know that your comments are so very much appreciated!

I have all kinds of fun things planned for the new year, and as 2010 and my one-year blogaversary later in January are quickly upon me, I thought I'd jot down some crafty new year resolutions...

1)  Sewing:  I will read ALL pattern directions, including cutting diagrams, all the way through at least once before starting my project.  Thus resulting in having all supplies on hand and not making last minute runs to the fabric store, correct cutting of all pieces and not adding more unnecessary scraps to my stash, and less stress in general...   : )

2)  I will not procrastinate on projects that have deadlines, leaving things to the last minute and causing waaaaay too much stress for myself (and usually hubby too, by default!)...

3)  Knitting:  I will make a commitment to fully graduate from scarf-making.  I will embrace stitches that are not of the knit, purl variety, and will take the time to learn them properly, and have the patience to know that they will not be as easy as aforementioned knit and purl.  But they sure will be pretty!  I will graduate from straight needles and experiment with circulars, dpn's...and whatever else is out there!

4)  Stamping:  I will continue to grow my Stampin' Up! business by teaching a minimum of one workshop and one class/event/club each month... (and of course I will share all of my stamping ideas and projects with you, reader!)

5)  I will not procrastinate on projects that have deadlines, leaving things to the last minute and causing waaaaay too much stress for myself (and usually hubby too, by default!)...

6)  Crochet:  I will learn to do it.  It will be fun.

7)  Cupcaking:  I will continue to bake and eat lots of them, and share my tutorials and decorating ideas with all of you through the CUPKINS collaboration...  YUM!

8)  Scrapbooking:  I will finish my wedding scrapbook.  I'm halfway into my second year of marriage and only one page of the damn thing is 100% completed.  This project must, must, must get finished this year - no excuses!

9)  I will not procrastinate on projects that have deadlines, leaving things to the last minute and causing waaaaay too much stress for myself (and usually hubby too, by default!)...

10)  I will not procrastinate on projects that have deadlines, leaving things to the last minute and causing waaaaay too much stress for myself (and usually hubby too, by default!)...

Do you have any new year resolutions of the crafty kind?  Is there any new craft you are dying to try this year?  Anything you want to improve upon?  Perhaps you have specific projects that you want to start, or complete?  Share with us by leaving a comment!  

I'll continue to share my progress as I go along, and perhaps you all can hold me accountable!  I'll also be picking your brains as I go through some transitions with this blog...but in the meantime... Happy New Year to you all!  May your 2010 be filled with much happiness, and crafty fun! 

Ready, Set, Craft's Best of 2009!

Before 2010 arrives, here's a look back on just a few of my favorite projects of 2009 here at Ready, Set, Craft!  Enjoy!

Tied Fleece Blankets

Mexican Tissue Paper Flowers

Playing Card Gift Tags

Metallic Transfer Magnets

Flower Pinata (as featured at Dabbled.org)

Chocolate Chip Cookie Cupcakes

Flower Pens

Appliqued Onesies

Do you have some of your own favorite projects from the past year?  Do share!  Leave us a link to you and your project in the comments section!

Ideas for Next Christmas: Roundup No. 3

This is the third of three holiday round ups!

Being a part of the crafty blog community is wonderful at any time of year, but I truly love it the most around the holidays. This year I was absolutely overwhelmed by all of the beautifully handcrafted ornaments and gifts, yummy cookies and treats, creative decor, and fantastic tutorials that cropped up all over the blogosphere.

I swear I bookmarked and printed sooo many projects that I wanted to try, and just ran out of time for most of them. For the next three days, I'm sharing some of those projects with you.

We'll call them "the ones that got away!"

So go ahead, check them out, and be sure to add to your "ideas for next Christmas" file for Christmas 2010!

Swirled Christmas Ornaments with Hope Studios

Quick Christmas Gift Tags with A Spoonful of Sugar

Raspberry Thumbprint Fudge Cookies with Making Lemonade

Stashbust Glass and Yarn Ornaments with Dollar Store Crafts

Have a wonderful Christmas project you've made or seen that we should hold on to for next year?  Leave a link in the comments section for us to see!

Ideas for Next Christmas: Roundup No. 2

This is the second of three holiday round ups!

Being a part of the crafty blog community is wonderful at any time of year, but I truly love it the most around the holidays. This year I was absolutely overwhelmed by all of the beautifully handcrafted ornaments and gifts, yummy cookies and treats, creative decor, and fantastic tutorials that cropped up all over the blogosphere.

I swear I bookmarked and printed sooo many projects that I wanted to try, and just ran out of time for most of them. For the next three days, I'm sharing some of those projects with you.

We'll call them "the ones that got away!"

So go ahead, check them out, and be sure to add to your "ideas for next Christmas" file for Christmas 2010!

Coin Purse Keychains from Dishtowels with Dollar Store Crafts

Knitted Ornaments with Permission to Unwind

angelina de la dawn tomato's felt ornaments

Gift Bags from Boxes with Maya Made

See you tomorrow for part three!

Ideas for Next Christmas: Roundup No. 1

This is the first of three holiday round ups!

Being a part of the crafty blog community is wonderful at any time of year, but I truly love it the most around the holidays.  This year I was absolutely overwhelmed by all of the beautifully handcrafted ornaments and gifts, yummy cookies and treats, creative decor, and fantastic tutorials that cropped up all over the blogosphere.

I swear I bookmarked and printed sooo many projects that I wanted to try, and just ran out of time for most of them.  For the next three days, I'm sharing some of those projects with you.

We'll call them "the ones that got away!"

So go ahead, check them out, and be sure to add to your "ideas for next Christmas" file for Christmas 2010!

Reuse and Recycle Wrapping Ideas with Mega•Crafty

Crocheted Christmas tree ornaments with Craft Passion

Cranberry Ornaments with Maya Made

Glittered Ornament Magnets with Samster Mommy

Check back tomorrow for part two!

Baby PJ's -- SEW Cute!

I don't have kids of my own yet, but we sure have a lot of little ones in our life!  Many of our good friends have had babies in the past two years, and I knew that I wanted to make something handmade for their gifts this Christmas.

I decided on some cute and comfy PJ's for the boys.  I used my applique technique to embellish onesies and tee shirts for the pajama tops, and then sewed matching PJ pants out of flannel.       

PJ pants are so quick and easy to sew, and flannel often goes on sale at the major fabric stores and comes in a large selection of prints.  I was really pleased at how these came out!

What hand-made gifts did you give and receive this Christmas?

The (long-awaited) Scarf

In May of this past year, I was in the midst of knitting a scarf for my friend Heather's birthday.  By the time her special day arrived, it wasn't done.  I'd only been knitting a few months at that point and the yarn I had chosen was proving very difficult to knit with.  I wrapped up the unfinished scarf, needles and all, and gave it to her - letting her know that I'd finish it ASAP.

Flash forward seven months:

The Scarf is FINALLY finished.

 

But let me explain!  Shortly after Heather's birthday, I screwed up the original scarf.  I don't even remember what happened.  I think I dropped some stitches off the needles and panicked.  I hated the yard anyways so I started over.

 

 

For a whole variety of reasons, scarfs 2, 3 and 4 didn't work out.  Not enough yarn and the yarn store that sold it closing (seriously!), dropped stitches, yarn that didn't knit up nice.  What a disaster!

 

I finished it just in time (days before!) to give to Heather for Christmas.  Better late than never, right?!  Merry Christmas!

 

A Very Merry Christmas To You...

It's finally here!  A very super happy merry Christmas Eve to you! 

I have been soooo thankful for everyone that has stopped by from PEAR, SITS, and elsewhere over the past month or so - and for all of my lovely, lovely followers and the wonderful comments people have left me.  I appreciate it all so very much!

I was especially thankful these past two weeks to have such wonderful guest posters sharing fabulous holiday projects with us.  Thank you all!  Did you miss any of them?  Check them out and leave them some crafty lovin'!

Crafty Ornaments with Angie from angelina la dawn tomato

Scrapbook Style Stocking with Meg from Mega•Crafty

Citrus Holiday Centerpiece with Abby from Steinway Street

Two Page Holiday Scrpabook Layout with Lindsey from Your Memory Mosaic

Interested in guest posting on Ready, Set, Craft?  I'm setting up guest posters for January and February - so don't hesitate to drop me an email at joanneroehm(at)yahoo(dot)com if you'd like to participate!

I'm looking forward to all kinds of crafty, artsy, sharing, and blogging fun with you all in the new year, and have all kinds of projects up my sleeve.  I've also got big plans in the works for my ONE YEAR BLOGAVERSARY at the end of January... stay tuned for that!

I'm off bright and early tomorrow to travel up and down the state of Michigan and spend some wonderful holiday time with family and friends.  I have posts set up to post daily while I am gone, featuring some of the Christmas gift projects I couldn't show you until after the big day, and some fabulous roundups of Christmas projects from across the web that you should put in your files for next year.  I won't be consistently responding to comments during this time... but know that I appreciate the comment love and will get back to you after the holidays!

I'll be back live and in person on New Years Day!

Here's to a beautiful Christmas season for us all, and bright beginnings for 2010!  My love to you and yours.

Joanne

Christmas Guest Post Series #4: Two-Page Holiday Scrapbook Layout with Your Memory Mosaic

I'm very excited to bring you the final guest in a series of four holiday-themed guest posts here at Ready, Set, Craft!  Today I'm very happy to have Lindsey of Your Memory Mosaic guest posting and sharing her scrapbooking talents with us.  Enjoy! 

Two-Page Holiday Layouts

Hi Everyone!  Thanks Joanne for the chance to do a guest post on your wonderfully crafty little piece of the world.  I’ve known Joanne since we were 14 and 15 singing in show choir and doing musical theater together… she is my favorite Sumo Ballerina.  (You can ask her about that one!) When Joanne asked me to do a post for her blog I was nervous, but excited at the chance to share something I love with all of her readers.

Alright – here we go!  I don’t know about other scrapbookers out there, but for me I have A LOT of different things just lying around my scrapbook area.  For this layout I wanted to use the stuff I already had on hand.  If nothing else it proves to me that I don’t actually have to run out and buy the latest and greatest papers and embellishments available.

(I do apologize if the photos aren’t the best quality – my craft room is in the basement and while I love having my own space the lighting isn’t the best!)

What you’ll need:

2 pieces of dark sage green 12x12 papers

1 piece light sage green 12x13 paper

1 piece coordinating dark red paper

1 piece of your favorite 12x12 holiday paper

6 Mini Silver brads

White sticker letters (not shown or you can use your Cricut Expressions as I did)

½ thick white ribbon

Two holiday stamps

Gold stamp pad

Tape

Adhesive

Red Pen (for some reason I wasn’t thinking and included a black pen in the picture)

Personal cutter(s)

(For the solid papers if the dark/light green and red don’t match your pattern paper – no problem.  Just select whatever papers you want from what you already have on hand.  I picked these papers because I felt their either matched or went well with the colors in my pattern paper.)

Step 1:

Use your pattern paper and cut out one 4 ½ inch and one 1 ½ inch strip and adhere them to the darker green paper as shown:

Step 2:

Use your white sticker letters to spell out the words, “Silent Night” and “Holy Night” or whatever title trips your trigger.  I picked this because I had the song in my head.  I didn’t have enough white sticker letters to make out the words so I used my Cricut Expressions to cut the letters out for me. Adhere “Silent Night” to the top of one page as shown. Adhere “Holy Night” to the middle of second page like you see in the photo below.

Step 3:

Cut out two 14 inch or so pieces of ribbon.  Adhere one piece to the bottom of page one a big inch from the bottom.  Adhere the second ribbon to the top of the second page a big inch from the top edge.  I am pretty lax on how I adhere ribbon.  I just wrap it around the edge of the paper and use some scotch tape to hold it in place.  It hasn’t failed me yet so that is how I do it.

Step 4:

Cut out 2 mattes in the red, 2 mattes in the dark green – both 4 ½” x 4 ½”.  After that cut out 4 white mattes 4 ¼” x 4 ¼” (These will be the perfect size to add your 4x4 photos after the holidays!)  Glue the mattes together and affix them to the pages as shown.

Step 5:

Create two little mattes – 1 green and 1 red (2 ¼” x 2 ¼”) and 2 white ones (2” x 2”)

Step 6:

Use your two holiday stamps and gold ink to stamp the images on the small mattes on the diagonal as shown.  Adhere one to each page like you see in the photos.  (After I stamped these I felt they needed a little something extra and added a little red ink on them so they had a little more pop!)

Step 7:

I love me some mini brads!  Use your 6 silver mini brads to add a little shine to your page.  On the first page I used three along the bottom left hand corner spaced an inch apart.  On the second page I placed them on the right edge toward the top.  I like them there, but you can put them wherever your little hearts’ desire!

AND YOU ARE DONE!  I hope you enjoy putting together this two page holiday layout as much as I did creating it for you!  I hope it is quick and easy to put together so you can add four 4x4 photos after the holidays.

Thanks again Joanne!  Merry Christmas everyone!

A little bit about my work.  I started Your Memory Mosaic recently after much thought and prodding by my husband and friends.  I love scrapbooking when I’m not playing wife, mom or paralegal so moving it toward something for extra income made sense.  I really enjoy making pre-made layouts and scrapbooks for people to use themselves or give as gifts.  There is nothing better for a new mom or newlywed couple than a beautiful scrapbook to admire for years to come.  Especially when they just have to add the photos!  If you are interested at all in speaking to me about making a scrapbook for you please email me at yourmemorymosaic@gmail.com.

  

Thanks so much Lindsey!  Be sure to leave Lindsey a comment and let her know that you enjoyed her tutorial, and then head over to her blog to check out more of her work.  And don't forget to tell her that Joanne at Ready, Set, Craft! sent you over!

Merry Christmas, Kitties!

Gah!  Where did the day go?!  It's 7:00pm and I'm just getting around to posting.  Are you feeling the Christmas scramble, too?  I bet you are!  Thank you sooo much for popping by today, especially with life being so busy for all of us right now.  I truly appreciate it!  And now on to today's project...

 
Who says the feline friends in your life don't deserve a little Christmas lovin' too?  As a cat-lover and kitty mama to two (plus kitten fosters on occasion) I wanted to whip up a little something for my furbabies, and to give as gifts to fellow cat-parents.

These catnip stuffed kitten toys were really fun to make - and are a good way to use up scraps of felt that you have in your stash.

Felt Cat Toys

Supplies:
Felt scraps
Sewing machine and thread (or you could hand sew these if you wanted to...)
Jingle bells
Catnip
Polyfil stuffing

 

How to:

Create a template (I chose a fish!) from cardboard and cut out.  Pin to felt and cut TWO of your shapes per cat toy... you can stack two sheets of felt together to speed up this process and cut out two at a time.

Sew around the outline of the shape, leaving a small seam that can be trimmed later.  Leave one end of the toy open for stuffing.

Fill half full with stuffing, add a couple of generous pinches of catnip and two jingle bells.  Top off with more stuffing until firmly packed.

Sew the opening closed, and trim off loose ends.

Trim around the shape as needed / desired... and you're done!

 

And the final step?  Let your kitty ENJOY!!!

PS... please forgive the TERRIBLE lighting in these photos!  Things are so busy around here that crafting is taking place waaaay later in the day - and there's just no hope of good light in the craft studio after dark!