Bandana Picnic Blanket & Weekend BBQ

Hubs and I hosted our annual summer BBQ this past weekend.  It's a lovely opportunity to get all of our friends and family together - some of whom we see all year long and some that we only see a few times a year. 

We have many friends that have young children - and I always like to try to accomodate them.  One of the things I did this year was to sew a little picnic blanket for them.  I found this great idea over at Aesthetic Nest, and featured it in one of my Week In Review posts a little while ago.  You can see Anneliese's post and directions HERE.

I made mine three by three bandanas big - and picked the bandanas up from Hobby Lobby for 99 cents a piece.  I plan on backing it later in the summer to give it a little more weight - but overall I was really pleased with how it turned out.

I had a crate of outdoor toys for the kids, and a little kid-size table and basket of coloring stuff, bubbles, and play doh.

I think they liked it...

We provided the burgers, hot dogs, ribs, condiments and buns, and everyone brought a dish to pass and some beverages to share (we provided some drinks, too)  I've found potluck style is far and away the best way to go with almost any large get together - it's less stress for me, and with very little planning there always ends up being a huge selection of food! 

I wish I had taken a picture of the food table when it was full!

I used brightly colored re-usable tablecloths, and summery colored  glasses, straws and drink stirrers.

We had a great turnout...we counted about twenty-five people in our little backyard at the height of the action.  It was a really lovely evening - I'm so glad that we do this every year!

I hope that you all have the opportunity to spend summer evenings with friends and family at gatherings big and small this summer!

Guest Post: Repurposed Clothes Collage Pillow

 I constantly find myself in awe of the wonderfully talented people I encounter daily - especially here in the land of blogging.  I share links to some of the fabulous projects I come across each weekend in my Week in Review posts, and now on (most) Wednesday's... at least for a awhile... I'm going to be going a step further and inviting one of those creative folks to guest blog here at Ready, Set, Craft!  

Today please welcome Ashley from The Creative Place.  I've featured Ashley's projects on my blog several times, she's so talented and I just love visiting her beautiful space on the web!  Enjoy!

Hello! I'm Ashley from The Creative Place and I'm so excited to be sharing a tutorial here at Ready, Set, Craft! I love Joanne's blog - she always has fun crafty projects that are totally inspiring, as well as all of those cupcakes she shares (they always make me drool and want to drop everything and head to the store to get ingredients to make some ;)).

In honor of this week being Earth Week (Thursday is Earth Day!), I wanted to share a tutorial about recycling/repurposing old clothes that are no longer wearable for whatever reason - too worn (like threadbare in places :)), rips or tears that aren't mendable, stains that even oxi-clean won't get out... you get the idea :). So, if you have clothes like this up in your closet, but can't bear to throw them out, this is the project for you! :) All of the clothes I used have some sort of special meaning/significance to myself or my hubby, so this was a fun project to develop! :)

Repurposed Clothes Collage Pillow by Ashley @ The Creative Place

Supplies:
- Pillow form (whatever size you prefer, I used an 11"x16" form)
- Buttons (optional- if you want to embellish- I ended up not using any buttons, but they're pictured below ;))
- 2 pieces of plain fabric (or more clothes pieces!), each 11" x 11½" (this is for the back of the pillow)
And of course,
- Your old clothes
- Thread
- Ruler, cutting mat and rotary cutter
- Sewing Machine
First, I took apart the clothes by cutting them up into pieces I wanted to feature in the collage (I have strategically avoided showing you the awful rust and/or marinara sauce stains on my white shirt below ;)). I used the majority of the necktie (never knew what the inside of a tie looked like!), the sleeve of a white shirt, a big plain area of one of my hubby's shirts, the cuff of some PJ pants (which I'm making into PJ shorts!), and the buttoned up section of a floral shirt.I loved how the floral shirt looked buttoned up, so I decided I wanted to somehow incorporate the buttons into the collage. I cut a section out (while it was buttoned) and sewed a straight stitch by the buttons so it wouldn't come unbuttoned (although, it might be nice for it to be unbutton-able, you could stash little notes or such about the ingredients of your collage pillow! ie- what clothes you used and why they have significance, etc)Once I cut all of the sections out (make sure all your sections put together are big enough to cover the pillow- and don't forget to allow for seams), I arranged them to my liking on the pillow. Ready to start sewing some more? :)
Pin two sections and sew a straight stitch with a 1/4" seam allowance.
Press the seams open with an iron and keep pinning and sewing the sections together.Voilà! A nice collage! Now, trim off the excess - trim the collage down to the size of your pillow plus 1/4" on each side. For example, my pillow is 11"x16", so I cut my collage down to a 11½"x16½".
Now let's work on the back of the pillow. I used white linen fabric, but you could use more clothes or any other durable fabric. Press a 1" fold onto the long side (11½" side) of each of the back-side fabric pieces. Sew a straight stitch down the middle of each of the 1" folds
Now, with right sides facing up (flaps will be facing down on the table), layer the two pieces so that the sewn parts are overlapping (see picture).
Now, put the collage front facing down on top of the back pieces you just overlapped with right sides facing up. Pin this together so you have a sandwich (with no meat or cheese, just the bread ;)).Sew a straight stitch all the way around with 1/4" seam allowance.Now it's time to flip it! Pull the corners from inside the sandwich to the outside.You're almost finished! :)Now put your pillow form into the cover :) Voilà! A fun-repurposed-clothes pillow cover! Thank you so much for having me today! :) Feel free to email me with any questions about the tutorial- thecreativeplace@gmail.com :) Have a fabulous day! :)

It's a Wrap! Creative Valentines Gift-Wrap...

Now don't get me wrong... I LOVE gift wrap.  I love all the fancy paper stores with beautifully designed paper, luxurious bows and colorful sprinkles and tags.  What I DON'T love, however, is the price of these things.

I mean let's be realistic... if you plan on buying gift wrap or bags plus tissue and ribbon from even a major chain store, you've got to add another $10-$15 onto your original budget for the gift you're buying and wrapping.  That's $10-$15 more you could be spending on... whoever!

I'm not suggesting that I don't succumb to all of those beautiful store-bought gift wrap options sometimes, because I most certainly do.  This Valentines day however, I tried to get a little more creative... and sustainable, too!

I've sewn several of these bags from 1/4 yards of fabric to make gift bags.  I used satin ribbon as the draw string pull.  Cute, no?  They are mostly going to be given to little girls... so I am hoping they can re-use them for something?

And here's how I wrapped hubby's Valentines.  I simply stamped some newspaper and pulled out some red ribbon from my stash for the bows.  Since hubby in particular cares very little for wrapping, I figured that this was especially cost effective and appropriate!  Not to mention I think it looks quite pretty!

I don't have photos yet because I'm still finishing things up... but I'll also be using these to wrap some gifts for little boys.  Plain red paper, nothing too fancy or girly.  Keepin' Valentines as macho as possible, you know what I'm sayin'!?


Thanks for stopping by Ready, Set, Craft!  Have a beautiful day!

The Quilt Patch - Tecumseh, Michigan

My parents live in Tecumseh, MI - a small town by Ann Arbor on the east side of Michigan. I was in town briefly this weekend, and as always my Mum and I squeezed in just a little shopping time.

We headed to a few of Tecumseh's little boutique stores, which are mostly of the home decor / gift nature. My Mum suggested we go visit the quilting shop - The Quilt Patch - since I have never been. So off we went...


I didn't know what to expect - other than I envisioned a quaint mom+pop shop with a small selection but some interesting things.

There were some great displays when we first walked in, and two large classrooms for the full range of classes they offer. Neat!



And then a reached the other part of the store. WOW!




I did NOT expect there to be a HUGE selection of fabric. Yikes! Great names too - like Moda Bake Shop and Amy Butler. Plus patterns, notions, and so much more.

I purchased some cutsie animal fabric (project coming to this space soon...) and an adorable apron pattern, but could have spent hundreds and hundreds of dollars in there. No joke.

Shame on me for having such low expectations of this GREAT small town find. Mum tells me people travel from all over to visit it! Check out their website for more info - I will definitely be returning soon!

Chairs with FLAIR!

This makes for two posts in very quick succession, but I'm so thrilled about these chairs that I just had to share - immediately! Because I tackled this project in the evening and HAD to post them RIGHT NOW, the photos aren't the best - the chairs are even MORE fabulous in good light I swear!

BEFORE (old, stained, plain-jane seatcovers)


AFTER (sassy, coordinating chairs with FLAIR!)



This was amazingly easy. All I did was unscrew the chair seats, and use a heavy-duty staple gun to wrap and staple new decorators fabric right over the existing fabric pulling tightly and tucking as I went around.

I found this Amy Butler print on super sale for just $9.95 a yard. One yard covered both chairs with a good amount left over to add to my stash.


I'm SO thrilled with the result, I'm off to see what else in my house needs a re-covering makeover!

Flip Flops Two Ways - Part Two

In class tonight the girls finished their two pairs of flip flops. Head back to part one of this post to see the tutorials and find out about their flip flops! They turned out sooooo cute! How fun would these be for a girls' birthday party or slumber party? And the best part of all is that they are super cheap to make!






I'll be posting from our final week of jewelry & fashion art class next week with our last two projects...until then, here's a sneak peak of the tee shirts the girls are making...

Teriffic Tutus!

I know, I know. You're sick of hearing about the dance recital, right?

Well... now that it's over and I've had chance to process, I had the time and energy to go through all of the costume boxes to organize and store them. They will be kept by the dance department and used again for future performances.

I took the opportunity, while I had it, to snap some shots of the completed costumes - and thought you might like to see? They look even better on bodies, believe me, but this should give you a good idea at least!