The gussied-up guest book

Hello, everyone.

A few posts back I had mentioned putting up photos of the guest book as it was used.

We have many swatches of lace that were gotten for another reason. This one was chosen to decorate the front cover of the book. It is glued in place.

Inside the cover, a piece of navy blue satin to cover the raw edges. (Also glued.)

Bead stash usage: another purse charm

Hello, everyone.

This is another purse charm, all bits from stash. The colors are in a springtime theme.

As with the last one, the catch was in that three-pack at Hobby Lobby. Most of the beads were from Fire Mountain Gems--some in their Boss's Bead Bag which is a random mix. (That used to be really fun to go through but the last time, some years back, it was less exciting. Still really useful, though.)

There are 5 strands strung onto 6# Fireline. I used a wrapped loop to connect the strands to the catch inside of the cone finding. Two of the strands were designed to provide balance to the other three, which have accent beads up and down the strand, so they're just plain old mixed white/clear seed beads.

I tied the bottom bead of each strand thoroughly, strung it to the right length, and held it in one of those little spring type bead holding clips. When all 5 were strung, I tied them to the wrapped loop, dropped the cone finding onto the wire, and made another wrapped loop to connect to the catch.

Stash usage: flannel fabric

Hello, everyone.

The last several days have seen more stash consumption around here. There were 2 self-binding baby blankets (forgot to photograph) and a collection of burp cloths. All in cotton flannel.

Some of the flannel, while delightful in pattern for babies, was in too small of pieces. They got pieced. The first picture is of some that had cute patterns but the on-grain length was just too short.

And, yes, the ironing board doubles as a work table. The print has been seamed to a longer piece of the yellow solid, seams pressed open, and then folded around so there are two yellow borders. Then the side seams were added, the pieces turned, and then pressed and top stitched. It was a really quick way to make a burp cloth.

Several cloths rolled and ready for giving:

The flowered one is a little long but it will be useful anyway. Y'all will notice that scraps of lace and ric-rac got included into the projects. I tried to keep the decorations to places where they won't make a lump under the baby's cheek.

One user tip for making flannel baby items: it goes a lot easier if you use a walking foot. With the regular foot the fabric crawls under the presser foot and makes it rumple.

A surprise in the yard

Hello, everyone.

The other evening, after a windy afternoon, I went outside with puppies to supervise their romp around the yard. They were happy, bouncy puppies, of course. Then I saw a round lump under a tree. Under an avocado tree, in fact.

We didn't even know it was up there, until it fell.

Even in town, you never know what will turn up.

A Beaded Hairpin (more stash usage)

Hello, everyone.

Today's picture is another hair pin. It began as one of the bridesmaid hairpins, but the work was coming out too dense: the little branchlets too close together. Fortunately this was discovered before the whole hairpin was constructed. The densely twisted piece was set aside.
Today it became a hairpin by itself:

Interested viewers may note that this time the background is more friendly to the project. (They may show up well in person on black, but the photo of that was not so good.)

Teardrop faceted bead plus bead cap for the top bud, assorted faceted glass and pearl beads. The smallest perle beads are 3mm Swarovski beads, left over from another project some years back. The top pink bead is a 4mm Swarovski bicone, accompanied by a couple of simple 3mm fire-polished faceted glass round beads.