Daffodils on my mind

This is my first post to Philly Makes. Eek. How exciting.

This is the week the daffodils are really, truly finally blooming. They always do in time for my birthday, which is this Friday. So all I can think of are daffodils, daffodils, daffodils. I made this little Tshirt design for my new etsy shop to release some of the daffodil love floating around my head. Ha! Sorry. I'm not always this corny.

The phrase "jocund company" comes from Wordsworth's poem "Daffodils," which I've always loved. I thought it gave a nice poetic twist to the overall design.

Boats and Travel

Here are some travel related cards for men. I am really digging the second one, because I tried my hardest to make the paper containing the compass look like a sail. I think I did the best I could with a stiff material like paper. I also use 100 lb weight cardstock, so it is thick and certainly doesn't help when you are trying to go for the "flowing" look! I also like how the linen thread looks when I wrapped it in a rope like way under the eyelets. For the first card, I sewed fabric onto my paper and inked up the boat stamp in matching colors using chalk inks. When doing this, it is so much easier to use the chalk inks because the ink pads themselves that I use have a teardrop shape and are small, so I can use the ink almost like a pen to get pretty exacting on the stamp. You always want to work with the lightest color first, so I actually inked up the middle of the stamp first and then hid my imperfections with the darker colors on the top and bottom of the sails. For the boat bottom itself, I used what is called a "kissing technique." This is when you have a solid image (the bottom of hte boat IS a solid image) and you take a clean stamp (in this case I took a stamp that looked like a rope) and after the solid image is inked, you go and actually stamp (using the rope stamp) on the already inked stamp (solid boat) to create a pattern on the solid image. It is really fun and I should honestly do it more often. Hope you all have a great day! Lancaster was so much fun. No pottery was bought, because the piece I wanted had some major glaze issues. Oh well, I bought a really nice shelf instead! Spent the whole day in NYC yesterday. You know what? Philly is SO much better than that city!

Pillow Cover- WIP

I'm a little disappointed that I didn't check this week's theme a little sooner... I've had this sail boat idea kicking around for a while... oh well, maybe I'll just be a week behind for next time!





Anyway, I have some new ideas that I'd like to try this year, and one of them includes some new designs for pillows and wall art. Here is a pillow cover in progress:

Sorry for the poor photo quality. And I did learn why we use embroidery hoops! (I tried without one & it's a little bumpy). The backside will be an envelope closure in a fun print. I'm not sure how I feel about the design yet. I guess I'm still experimenting. Any suggestions/feedback?

Painting in Progress

This is a small mixed-media/collage painting on canvas board. I was hoping to finish it this past weekend, but I'm still fixing a few things. Namely, the sky area. First it was too white, but now it's too blue. One of these days I'll get it right!

Two for you...

I have two lovely creations for you today-since I missed last week, you get two for one today!
This pair of dragon wings is called Boris, and is so named after the scaly star of the Elmer and the Dragon series. These were a custom order for a special young man's birthday this month. As you can see, the wings are butter yellow and are accompanied by an extra long blue and yellow striped tail. I added a little bit of weight to the bottom of the tail so it drags realistically. These turned out so very cute!


And since I was so thrilled to find out the Twilight movie came out on the 21st, I decided to create a tiara for Bella in homage to Stephanie Meyer's brilliant series. This lovely piece features three gorgeous crystal hearts, suspended from non-tarnishing silver artistic wire. They are accented by black glass tear drops along the top and bottom edges. The tiara base is rimmed in deep red garnet nuggets while the space around the hearts has been woven in with black wire and glowing citrine chips.

Crochet: Work In Progress

Website Design

Oh man! I missed my day again. I'm so lost in own world lately that I don't know what day it is. Well, it's the time of year when we redo Hot Knots and Tara's website and catalog. I wish I could have 10 more clients like these gals. I love their stuff, I love how they run their company and I love that they love having a super creative completely redone site every year. Here's a little sneak peek, a (very) rough screen shot of what's happening this year. You can see past years archived here and here. This is where I've been all week. Oh and hey do sock monkeys count as animals?

Stinkin' Cute

So in keeping with the animal theme, I thought I would post this card this week. I don't usually do "cute", so this one is a bit out of the box for me. Hope you all have a great weekend! We have 27 German exchange students in town for three weeks (my husband is a German teacher), so we have been showing them around the city today and are headed to Lancaster with one of the teachers this weekend. I collect redware, so I am anxious to go shopping as well! Little Flower Designs...I am taking notes on what I want to get from you as well! I love pottery of all kinds, so I am excited to get to see your things in real life!

~Becky Oehlers

The Kai Shirt for O

My first foray into collared button-down (or in this case, snap) shirts for O.

The pattern: The Kai Shirt from Heather Ross's Weekend Sewing
The fabric: From the Robots line for Free Spirit
The source of both: Cloth and Bobbon, Narberth

Mixed Paper Madness!

If there's one art supply that I lust over the most - it is, hands down, PAPER. I just LOVE paper and consequently have quite the collection of random papers. I had been thinking for a while about mixed paper journals and came up with these, which I've made over the past few days.

intermixed with neon pages


intermixed with blue pages

Record in Progress

I designed this new background stencil a few weeks ago and I have been playing with it ever since. This record in progress was made using spray paint, a stencil, and then outlining the stencils design with oil paint. I hope you like it. You can see more at Cbeauty.etsy.com.

new here

Hello, I am Linda from Little Flower Designs - maker of nature inspired pottery. Today I am sharing a new bird sketch which will soon be a character on my line of pottery. Since pottery is a slow process, sketches and other projects will be more shareable on a weekly basis, fun! I haven't named this guy yet but he is loosely based on the purple martin. I am working on more detailed birds and flowers so watch out, spring is always so inspiring!

rawrrrrr!

I have been so busy at work and such (planning a wedding) that my creative juices are all being used up. So in order to replenish them, I went in the darkroom to work on some prints. This roll of film was an experiment in push processing (I can explain that in more detail if anyone wants to know...it's all filmy technical....) When shooting the film my cats were so cooperatively sitting in some sun patches bathing it in - when one cat yawned. I snapped his pic and moved to the other cat....shot a few pics of him...then HE yawned. It is contagious!!!
here they are, looking ferocious....although they are big softies.

New necklaces!

I finally finished some new vintage optician test lens pendants! Other things kept getting in the way, so I was happy to finally get some of these done this past weekend.





These and some of my other work are featured on the online juried exhibition site papernstitch until April 26. Please go check it out and vote for me too! Thanks!

Post #3: Mural Volunteer + Multicolored Amigurumi Bear

Today I worked for a few hours as a volunteer with the Mural Arts Program. The Neighborhood Interfaith Movement's paint-and-mosaic mural will depict the diversity of Northwest Philadelphia. See the post on Handmade Philly's blog for a few more pics from today.


Afterwards, I finished up the bear I've been working on. Busy day!

Lots and Lots of Cupcakes

This week I made cupcakes. Lots and lots of them. Carrot cake with cinnamon cream cheese frosting, lemon with a lemon glaze, and 'black bottom' ones with chocolate chip cream cheese filling and buttercream frosting.

The green? These great little pinwheel cupcake toppers as a nod to my husband's work in wind energy.

For those of you keeping track, I also finally finished the county fair nightgowns from my post last week. Now onto some new dresses for the shop...

My First Post! Button Inspirations!

A tea container and some cards for today!

I was so excited to stumble across my own Philly peeps through this site and felt I quickly had to jump on board! So here is my first post! I have been completely inspired by buttons recently so here ya go! Thanks for looking!

~Becky Oehlers

the moment you love you are unlimited.

finally, I am posting! I was supposed to post on Sunday - but time just got away from me. This series was shot as I was making my wedding invitations -- these strips of vellum were glued to the front. I will post the invites when they are finished.

Spontaneous Sewing Notions 1" Pins

(Hello! First post!)

It's pretty typical for me to get distracted while making things, resulting in interrupted projects and random experimentation and often times, there are some exciting results! While well into the throes of Scrapple 1" pin production, I spotted my jar of sewing notions on the other side of my desk... What would ric rac and thread look like on a pinback button?

A little something like this:


And it's always exciting to add a new item to my etsy shop!

After that spontaneity, it was back to the Scrapple wares in preparation for this Saturday's ScrappleFest at Reading Terminal Market! Read more about that, over at my blog.

My first post

Here is my first post for thing a week (I know I already missed a week, but I am going to try to be more on top of it from now on)



To check out more of my work visit my etsy site at Cbeauty.etsy.com

Week Two- Veggie Burgers

I have been doing a lot of cooking this past week, so much that I really haven’t gotten much craft time. But I am very excited to share this recipe for homemade veggie burgers. They get my 5 smear rating. Ok, that didn’t sound so good-- let me ‘splain: Basically, the better the recipe, the more messed up my recipe card gets with ingredients while I‘m preparing it (I‘m a messy cook), hence, the smear rating. Anyway, if you’re a fan of the store bought variety of veggie burgers, I think these are MUCH better, not very complicated to put together, healthy, and delicious (my 2 year old even eats them!). Plus, when you add it all up, they end up costing something like $.25 per burger, which makes them healthy for your wallet as well.

INGREDIENTS:

1 (16 oz.) can black beans, drained and rinsed
½ green or red bell pepper, cut into wedges
½ onion, cut into wedges
3 cloves garlic, peeled
1 egg
1 tbsp. chili powder
1 tbsp. cumin
1 tsp. Thai chili sauce or hot sauce
½ cup bread crumbs *

DIRECTIONS:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees and lightly oil a baking sheet.



2. 
   In a medium bowl, mash black beans with a fork, until thick and pasty.



3. 
   In a food processor, finely chop bell pepper, onion, and garlic, then stir into bean mash.



4. 
   In a small bowl, stir together egg, chili powder, cumin, and chili sauce.



5. 
   Stir the egg mixture into the mashed beans. Mix in bread crumbs until the mixture is sticky and holds together. Divide into four patties.



6. 
   Place patties on baking sheet, and bake about 10 minutes each side. **
   

* I used quick oats instead.
** In my oven, 13 minutes each side worked better. They might seem to stick a little at first, but once you flip them, they should firm up & be fine.


Mine seemed to need to stay in the oven longer to “set up”, but did seem a little dry- they were fine, though if served with some kind of sauce: salad dressing, ketchup, etc. Also, I felt like they could’ve used a little salt, but other than that- delicious! Bon Appetit!

New digital collages

I spent a LOT of time sitting at the computer this past weekend, making some new digital collages. They'll be on display/for sale at Curiosity Shoppe starting March 27.

(Click image to see a larger version!)

dejavu

I've been very busy making jewelry lately. I'm working on creating bracelets, earrings, and necklaces out of re-purposed materials--denim, felted merino, and cotton from jeans, felted sweaters, and t-shirts I'll never wear. Hence the name for my new collection of work: dejavu by koco.

J9, my younger sister, came to visit for the weekend and we took some fun photos of the work and some pictures for her 365 project. She takes a photo every day, and she's halfway through a year of photos! Here she is with a finished spiral piece made from jeans with a small silver trinket I picked up in Thailand.

Week #2: Rainbow Bear

I can't wait to see what the team creates this wk! My post for wk number 2 is a bear in progress...

All Aflutter!

I am currently working on a new angle for my customers that will allow full customization of a few of my original design fairy wings. In particular, my wedding-focused Etsy store, FairyTaleWedding, will be showcasing these two small fairy wing designs in the very near future.
The first pair is my "Bethany" style, featuring three wing panels on each side. As you can see, I used a gorgeous swirling white sparkle organza for the base fabric and airbrushed the edges in gold. The center is decorated with tufts of eggshell marabou feathers, tiny speckled hen feathers, a large velvety orange lily and accented with a crystal and copper glitter paint. My customers will be able to choose the base fabric, wing tip, and ribbon strap color as well as specify the type of decoration they wish in the center. I also offer a strapless design for costumes or dresses with corset or low-back tops.
The second pair is my "Ceres" design, a double wing design with butterfly inspiration. For this pair I used a white crystal organza base fabric and painted the edges an opaque mint green. The center is decorated with white marabou feathers, sheer green rose petals, green hydrangea flowers with tiny crystals in the center.
I need to apologize for my picture quality: I am currently suffering from the latest plague to hit town and too weak to move my lights around, so this is the best I can come up with until I kick this bug!

my turn! my turn!

Yeah, I love doing this, this thing-a-week thing! Yay! So for this week I have a wedding present to show off. It's for two very good friends who are getting hitched in June. It seems to be a habit of mine these past couple years to give a "lovers" quilt as a wedding gift. I just can't give money or buy something off a registry it's so not my style. I want give someone something that they'll always remember and use. I got a handmade quilt a long time ago, long before I really cared that much about whether something was handmade. It was from my(at that time) boyfriends Mother and I still cherish it. That is the kind of thing I like to give at weddings.

Now, this friend - Courtney loves turtles and always has as long as I've known her (long time for me), hense the turle fabric. She's an Earth loving bohemian kind of girl, hense the earthy colors and the lots of reused/upcycled fabrics. I try to reuse/recycle/upcycle whatever I can with quilts (or anything for that matter) . I just like used fabric so much more than new - they're much softer and fabric manufacturing is VERY hard on the environment so I try to limit how much I buy.

County Fair Nightgowns

I had hoped to have these finished today but they are definitely still in process. The end result will look like this and will actually be matching nightgowns for two sisters I know.

I think the coolest thing about these nightgowns is that they are being bartered instead of bought.

The mom of these girls is a landscape architect and, in exchange for the pair of nightgowns, she's going to do some consulting for us and help us figure out what to do with our yard. Now if she could only help us keep the plants alive...

Crocheted Amigurumi Bear

There's nothing like finishing a project. Especially a project that took waayyy longer then it should have. Take this bear for example. I decided to learn to crochet by making this cute little amigurumi bear. With only the most minimal knowledge, I bought a book and each day on the way to and from work, tried to make this bear. I made and unmade the head about 80 (or 180) times...the thing is I am so not like that usually. Usually I make an item one time, and there is no pulling out stitches, unless it's absolutely dire. Anyway...I am super proud...though this little guy isn't perfect - he's complete. Hooray!

Baby Gnome Outfit

The hat and pants have been made for a little while, but I did finally finish the shirt... is that cheating? The model is Jackson Grey, the newest member of our clan. Bookings can be done through the Gigglepotamus Modelling Agency (just kidding!).

Mushrooms and gnomes are all the rage this season, and we have both! Pants are a sage green fleece with elastic waist and a brown pocket on each side with appliquéd mushrooms. The shirt features a matching mushroom appliqué, and the red gnome hat completes the ensemble. Perfect for a day of frolicking in the woods!

little house for iPod shuffle

I made this little home out of a small matchbox -

collaged the outside, and did the drawer to match.

The iPod fits perfectly in the drawer and into the sleeve.

Presto! There you have it.

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