Grinch Pills

Yesterday after school, the boys and I made "Grinch Pill Packs" for teacher gifts and whatnot. There's always someone that crosses our path that needs a little gift and it's great to be prepared! These are so cute and fun to make! Plus they don't require the obligatory dipping in chocolate mess, like our next project probably will...Oh yeah!
Brief instructions follow the pictures.

Front

Back

These are simple to make. It took us about an hour and a half to make a dozen, my kids are 11, 7 and 5 years old. Any age level appropriate embellishments can be used, we used stamps and stickers.

1. Using standard card stock in green or red, cut in half vertically, into two pieces, 4 1/4" x 11". 
2. Score them before folding to make crisp folds. Measuring from the left edge, score at 4" and 8 1/2" and then fold away from the score. This makes a nice envelope type fold, though the sides will be open.
3. Trim the edges with fancy scissors.
4. With the two flaps folded in, punch holes through the flaps, so the holes will match when you are threading the ribbon closure.
5. Now decorate however you want, with stamps, stickers, glitter, markers, rick rack, ribbon, punches, whatever you have on hand.
6. I found little zip bags in the craft jewelry and  beading department at Walmart and put in about a dozen green M & M style candies that I bought at Fresh Market. You can use any green candy, jelly beans or mints would be fine as well as any small bag for the candy.
7. I taped the bags inside the pouch, though you could staple if you like.

The poem came from here, which was posted on Pinterest and I pinned to my Christmas board. Also from Pintrest, the idea for the pouch came from here, though I modified it to the size I wanted and changed how the ribbon was used.
You could make these in lots of ways, there's a poem out there for Snowman poop or other kinds of "pills." I thought about the winter blues and blue candies, and a poem like "Has winter got you down? Can't get to town? Just pop a pill or two and say goodbye to the blues!" Or some such thing...
I hope you try these!

Community & Homeschool Families EXPO & Used Curriculum Sale

I haven't had my Etsy shop, Bag & Baggage, active for a while, but this Saturday, I'm participating in this Expo as a quilter, crafter, sewist, beader, etc...I have a little of everything and the pics to show it...

Ever have trouble at the airport luggage carousel, trying to recognize your suitcase from everyone else's? Luggage tags measure 4"x3", with a strap to attach to the handle of the suitcase.

 Little bags, coin pouches, ID pouches to wear around the neck, cell phone pouches, etc...

Baby shoes, what more can I say but CUTE! 

 These thingies are the most handy items! They are microwave bowl or mug holders. Have you put something in the microwave to heat and then the bowl or mug is too hot to touch? Put one of these under the dish before heating and just pull out by the holder. No more burned fingers!

 Fun hats for young children! A Viking, a mohawk and of course a cow for wearing to Chick-Fil-A on free lunch day! Others include a bunny, cat and elf.

 This tea party set includes a handbag for the party goer, tea set and a tote to carry everything. Perfect for the little lady in your family!















Kindles, Nooks or other readers will fit nicely in these covers. They can be turned into an easel to make watching a movie or reading with no hands easier.
The small covers are for a phone or iPod and will turn into an easel as well.

These little beauties are knitting markers. I have several assortments of different beads. This one is purple glass beads, including an odd shaped one to mark the end of a row, the center or whatever special marking your pattern might need.

These are burpie and swaddler sets. 100% cotton flannel, double layers.

And of course, an assortment of handbags. I got into handbag making when the kids were really small and I needed quick to sew projects to feel like I was accomplishing something!









I hope you'll drop by my table at the Expo at Boones Creek Christian Church on Saturday, December 8, 9:00 am - 4:00 pm. There will be lots of other vendors, including:
Kari's Heart Foundation
Gingerbread knick knacks
Tutoring Solutions
Eli & Zobella's Boutique
Everything Erin's Jewelry
Rodan & Fields skin care
The Sweet Tooth
Used Homeschool curriculum 
Cruise Consultant
Thirty-one
Elizabethton co-op
Mary Kay
Scentsy
Avon 
Visalus Rep
Gold Canyon
Tomboy Tools 
Baskets by Vickie
Organmi Owl
I got your back
Mystic Momma
Homemade Crafts
Crafts & Puppy Treats
Kreative Kristy 
Young Living Essentials Oils
Bags & Baggage
Initials Inc
ACE
Pet Friends Forever Daycare & Boarding
Al San Bella Treasure's
Tupperware
J Commons Photography
The Pampered Chef
Kreative Kristy Gifts & Jewelry 

See You There!

Craftsy Classes on Sale!

Hey, don't forget to follow the link on the right to see the selection of classes on Craftsy. They're on sale this weekend for only $19.99. Do you want to learn to sew, decorate cakes, knit or something else? There are quality classes available 24/7 for you to watch the videos anytime. No deadlines, no expiration dates, watch over and over or whenever!
Check them out!

New Pattern Available

Becky's Little Garden is not exactly a new pattern, but it is new in my Craftsy shop. I designed this a few years ago when my mom's new fabric line, "Fete de Fleurs, Poppies" was coming out. The pattern has been on her website for quite a while, but now I will be selling it from my shop.

The pattern is pretty simple, the best fabric choices are a large print for the big blocks and a smaller scale print for the smaller squares, then something that reads as a solid for the corner squares and triangles. Play with some ideas and see what you come up with.

I hope you are inspired!

Craftsy Links

You can see that I have added a couple of badges over on the right. One is because I think Craftsy's classes are high class and I recommend them. You can watch the videos anytime and as many times as you want and they are good quality, in depth and have easy navigation if you want to watch another segment of the lessons.  The other is because I have a pattern shop on Craftsy and I would love it if you would visit!

If you visit Craftsy from my links, you will give me credit for your visit, which would be nice. Just sayin'. Thanks!

Weekly Contest at the Quilting Gallery

I hope you remember the lovely Pond Challenge quilt that my friends on the Love of Art Quilts group on the Connecting Threads Quilt with Us community helped me to make. You can see the original post here.

Anyway, this weekend, the quilt is entered in the Weekly Contest over at Quilting Gallery. Voting is open Friday through Sunday, so hurry on over and vote for your favorite...hope that it is my quilt!

Have you ever completed a large project and when done, you just don't want to start another large one yet? I've been in that frame of mind for about a month, since I finished Secret Identity (see previous post). So, while cleaning up Secret Identity's mess, I ran across several things. (Amazing, I finished four projects in less than two weeks!)

Years ago, I read an article in Quilting Arts magazine in the Fall 2004 issue called Art Quilting Made Easy that caught my imagination. It incorporated vintage photographs, vintage looking fabrics and embellishments into small wall quilts, measuring 9"x14" or so. Of course, I scanned the article and paid no attention to the actual instructions, but ran with the look of them and made my own.

Here are my efforts. I really like them. They were very easy to complete, the hardest thing to do is figure out the best embellishments to use. (Sorry that the photos make them look misshapen, they really are correctly proportioned!)

 Ancestors I, 8"x10", fused applique onto stiff, thick stabilizer (like Timtex). Lace, buttons, couched pearl cotton, photo transfer onto Electric Quilt's Printable Fabric. Vintage photo of my husband's grandmother.

 Ancestors II, 10"x14", fused applique onto stiff, thick stabilizer (like Timtex). Lace, beads, my handmade tatting, photo transfer onto Electric Quilt's Printable Fabric. Vintage photo of my husband's great grandmother.

So, after I made those, I was rummaging around in a bag of things my friend Shirlee had given me. This bag originally came from another friend, Betty Bryant's stash. After Betty had passed away, her husband gave permission for her friends to go through her things and most of her fabric was sold by our guild as a fund raiser. Shirlee had taken this bag of unfinished items home and recently found it when rearranging her studio. She offered it to me, knowing that I like to make art quilts, as Betty did.

In the bag, I found many fun things, but all would take more effort than I was willing to put in at the moment. I dug deeper until I ran across a sample block that Betty had made for her quilt Confusion. Confusion was made for a Loose Threads (art quilting group) challenge, in which each participant was given an emotion to use to create a quilt. 

I recognized it right away. Betty had used this block to test her quilting idea. She did random lines of stitching, interspersed with a couple of decorative machine stitches with a varigated thread in primary colors. There were scraps from her borders, a black and white and primary colored narrow inner border. I used the scraps to piece a new back, since she had used muslin for the sample and the back is just about as confused as the front! I added a primary colored stripe from my stash for the front border and bound it in black. I love how it turned out, I didn't have to work hard to do it either!

This last one is a project done for a group on Quilt With Us by Connecting Threads. It is a fun community of quilters, who share their work and their lives with others, whom we may never meet in person, but who are friendly and giving. 

There are many small groups to fit anyone's taste. I belong to several and recently a new group called UFO Swap was formed. Diane, the group leader, assigned partners and we were to trade UFO blocks and each create something new and return it to the original owner. 

Gwen sent me these (I had already partially dismantled the left block before I remembered to take a pic): 

And I created this: 

It is 4" wide and about 28" long. The poem says, 

Apple Pie

Sweet, tart apples 

and cinnamon spice,

Sprinkle 

with love and sugar, 

Nice!