For my mother-in-law, Suanne:
These things just do not model well!
I'm pretty happy with my tote bag pattern, and I knew that my lovely mother-in-law always has use for tote bags (so do I!) so this seemed like a good fit! Stephen even helped pick out the fabric! Ok so he didn't actually go to the store with me, but I'd used the brown fabric for a previous project, and Stephen has a love for all textiles involving embroidery, so he suggested I get some more for the bag. It really is a pretty fabric, so I was happy to oblige. I really liked how it turned out, and I hear it's getting a lot of use :)
For my brother, Mike:
No books were harmed in the making of this project... except this one
I started this project waaaaaaay early. Like Mega-early. Maybe as far back as early October. It was definitely before my birthday. I had seen a tutorial for a secret hollowed out book (who really needs a tutorial for this, anyways? It's pretty simple - in theory at least), so soon I was just itching to make one. So I went to the giveaway book shelf at the library and found the biggest, most boring looking book I could for the project. Big mistake. I took it home, whipped out my handy box-cutter, and got to work. It wasn't long before I realized that my handy box cutter wasn't so handy after all. In fact, it was broken, dull and pretty much all around lousy. I closed up the book about a 10th of the way in (if that) put it on my bookshelf, and left it there. For weeks. I thought this hollowed out book idea was pretty much bust. Oh well. It would make a nice 800 page paper weight.
Then I caught a lucky break! For my birthday I got a very pretty new box cutter (see photo) from my friend Pam. What a difference! I whipped through the rest of those 700 pages in no time. I could hardly believe it. I made more progress in 30 minutes than I'd made the entire time trying to do it with that lousy old box cutter. I sliced and diced, glued and let dry, filled with candy and wrapped, and gave that thing away! That's it. I can't give you more details on this book. Then it wouldn't be a secret anymore.
My niece, Josie:
Meeeeeeow!
The final present I made was this little kitty purse. My niece, Josie, has a thing for kitties, or so I'm told. Currently, I think she might be more interested in little houses, pancakes, and car rides, but I may be wrong...
For this project, I was inspired by a felted wool kitty purse pattern I found on lionbrand.com, but soon realized I had nowhere near enough time to crochet a purse before Christmas. I decided to sew something similar instead. I sewed on the face with white thread and a thin zigzag stitch. Then I just improvised the rest of the pattern to make it look like the felted one. I ended up finishing it in only one night (because I was incredibly stressed out about getting done in time for Christmas). I hope she likes it! If not she can always stuff it in the seat of her new trike...
***UPDATE***
She likes it!
Fashionable Miss Josie, out on the town with her Key-Cat purse - "No Pictures, please"
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2 comments:
Hey, She loves it! And it is actually referred to as her "key-cat purse" I will send you a picture of her with it on so you can post it. We had to tie a knot in the strap because it was too long, but no biggie.
PS I know you guys were all jealous of my hollowed out book when we were kids. I will claim inspiration for the book, because I know it really wasn't the tutorial that got you thinking about this. :)
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