My Dino Box {or Dinos in a Tin!}

When we visited the Royal Tyrell Museum this spring, we picked up these tiny adorable pocket dinosaurs. They were perfect in the quiet bag for church and of course, Otto was over the moon for them, he thought they were so cool. I've had an idea in my head to create a landscape for them. Originally I thought I'd make it out of fabric and felt and have it fold in on itself, but then I found this tin and it was perfect! It would hold a tiny landscape and the dinos themselves, and would be sturdy enough to withstand two little boys playing with it. Perfect. I used scrapbook paper, some stickers, letter stamps, and felt inside for the sun, lake, and volcano. I mod podged the outside of the tin where I stuck paper. 

I love having boys. Sometimes this means that I don't have to frill things up - I can just leave them plain and simple and know it will be well loved.

Family Memory Game in Felt Bag Tutorial

I made my first felt bag for a set of flash cards I got at a garage sale. I can't stand having cards in a plastic bag - the bag gets wrecked, discarded, and you end up with a flash card here or there, under the couch, in the toy basket, etc. So, I made a felt bag to contain them. Otto loves it and so does my sanity.

Last year I made a Family Memory Game for both sets of our parents - they were a hit, especially with the grandchildren - they get to play a game with their own faces on it, how cool is that?! The game itself is pretty easy to make:

Supplies:
One set playing cards with colorful back
Photos - 2 of each person/couple, size 2x3
Double-sided tape
Laminating Sheets
Laminator
Corner rounding punch

Tape photos onto the playing cards, then laminate. Round the corners with the corner-rounder punch. See? Easy.

The next part is the tricky part (for my artistic side of the brain vs. wherever the heck my math side of the brain is). You will need to measure your finished deck of cards like so:


Supplies for your Felt Bag:
Felt (I use a thick felt)
Strip of cotton fabric
Snap and Snap setter

Do you have your measurements? Now you have to do a bit of math.

Add: Width" + Depth" + .75"= width to cut your felt.

Add: (Depth" x 2) + (Length" x 2) + 2"= length to cut your felt.

Now cut your felt.

Measure the length of the felt and add 4".
Cut your cotton fabric: 2.75" (width) x (length of your felt + 4")

Okay, now the hard part is over and you can get to the sewing, Yay!

First fold over the edges (1/4") of the cotton strip and press.

Center the cotton on the felt and pin.

Turn over and pin the cotton approximately 1/8" from the end. This is really important because you will be stitching from the top and the pins will be your guide as to where to sew the ends down.

Sew all around the cotton piece, 1/8" from the edge. Now go back and sew from where you pinned on the back down to the other pin to close the cotton on the other side. After you are done, it should look like this on the back:

Fold the felt, right sides together and sandwich the deck of cards in between. One end of the felt should be flush with the top of the cards. Pin (like above) to indicate the top of the deck. [If you are attaching a label/tag, now is the time to sandwich it between the side seams] Sew the sides together up to the pin.


Trim the sides of the flap down to your sewn edges so you won't have extra material "flapping" out the top.

Put the corners of the flap together and round them with scissors.

Turn inside out - You are almost done!

Center the snap and attach according to package directions.

Now admire your handywork and pat yourself on the back for a job well done!


This is my first tutorial, so leave a comment if you liked it or if I need to change anything so it's easier to understand! Thanks!

Cute Fabric Banner

I whipped up this cute little fabric banner just the other night. It took very little time and I love how it turned out. It was for a little girl who turned two! I hope she can put it in her doll house!

I finally made a Laundry Line for our family(before Christmas actually)! If you want one for your family or for a friend, put in an order! email me at treetopstitchery@gmail.com or visit my Facebook page: treetopstitchery.com

Coming soon: a felt pouch tutorial. Somewhere to put your flash cards, playing cards, groups of mini books, etc.

Circles Baby Quilt

I LOVE this quilt. Don't get me wrong, there are tonnes of mistakes, as this is my first attempt at free-motion quilting, but I think it turned out all-right in the end. As we don't know the sex of this next baby, the colors are pretty generic, and perfect for us.


As for free-motion quilting - it sounds like a fun and fanciful free type of quilting, doesn't it? You can make whatever shape you want! You can go out of the lines! But OH! How difficult it really is! It is tiring on the muscles, and it is SO hard to get uniform stitches! But I do love that I can do circles and go anywhere with the stitches. {Just don't look too closely!} The special gloves {on loan from a dear friend} were a great help.

Here's a close-up of the backing. I used a soft minky, which will be perfect for babe.


I did a bit of a practice run first with this wee tag blanket. My favorite is the rick-rack around the edge.


I found and fell in love with the pattern on Cluck Cluck Sew blog. I changed the measurements to suite my project and my liking, but her tutorial was a fantastic guide!

Family Laundry Line

I am SO excited that this project turned out! This is my Family Laundry Line fabric artwork. I've had this idea {and many other stitched artwork ideas} floating around in my brain for some time and wondering if I might make these to order.... I must admit that I thought I might be an original or very near original by making the laundry line into a fabric project, but sadly, my idea was found {almost exactly} on the front of this book! *gasp* Oh well. I actually bought this book and it is a fantastic resource for many of the stitching/fabric projects I have in mind! I must give credit where credit is due and tell you that some inspiration for a laundry line came from here and here. And I couldn't have done it without a dear friend's generous donation of her itty bitty fabric scraps {and some not so itty bitty}!

Update: Now you can order your very own! Visit my Facebook Page at treetopstitchery.com

Valentine Minis

I've recently had a burst of creative energy. And just in time for Valentine's Day! I've had a Summer Mini Album in my mind for some time now (more on that soon), and these 2 Valentine minis were taken from this tutorial. I LOVE Ali Edwards! Her designs are wonderful and simple, and I actually use many of her journaling spots and overlays in my projects. By the way, Designer Digitals is having a fantastic sale on right now until midnight Tuesday. Check it out.

So, I made these 2 mini albums out of felt and paper. I have wanted to do a little felt book for ages, and now was just the perfect time! The first one I made for my parents and the second one I made for my sweetheart, Andy. It was very simple with Ali's free download and her fantastic instructions.











I also used this die to make valentines to hand out to some family and friends and it was a big hit! I borrowed the die from a friend, but will have to get my own because I know I will make good use of it. I can see thank yous and birthdays and favors and special holidays celebrated with this box and a handful of candies. It is SO adorable! I wish I took a picture of one of the ones I made, but they were gone fast! I will post another picture another time.

I hope your Valentine's Day was a lovely one!

Catch Up: Part 1: The Many Crafts

I've been missing from the blogging world for 2 months now! I don't know where the time went or what I've really been doing. Well, doing a lot of things but that isn't really an excuse. So here's a bit of catch up.

Crafts: many.


Sock Monsters
Originally the plan was to make a bunch and sell them at a Mom-to-Mom sale in Lethbridge. So I got busy making them on a scrapbook weekend at the church with the ladies. However, I ended up not making one sock monster to sell at the sale! Instead, every sock monster I made that weekend was promptly snatched up, and one in particular was an extra long (in actual length!) custom order for one of the ladies present. I even left the weekend with an order for one not made yet! So, really a success all around. It turns out that the sale in Lethbridge fell through for us, so if anyone is interested, the two small ones on the end are available now!

Scrapbooking
This is actually the only layout I've done in the past three months, but it's a favorite already. I saved several shots I had of Otto sleeping in his first 3 months and compiled them on one layout.

Silversmithing
Andy and I took a silversmithing course and I came out of the weekend with these two pendants. I actually made one other pendant, but it didn't exactly turn out the way I invisioned, and I'm still a bit embarrassed by it. (It's sitting upside down on my dresser so I won't have to look at it, but it is there anyway to remind me that I actually need to finish it.) Anyway, the course was really fun. Andy made me a ring with a stone setting and he began to make a copper LEGO man replica. I told him he needed to make something for himself in this class, and his mind immediately turned to LEGO. Anyway, it all turned out awesome.

Stitching
I'd had fabric yo-yo's in the back of my mind for forever! Then one night, I just decided that they would look cool on a necklace. I'd seen similar looking neck pieces in different places online, but made out of different materials. So, I got out my cool green fabrics and whipped this up. I plan on making a multi-colored one as a bright summer piece. It really dresses up a plain old T-Shirt, and often people think it's actually attached to the shirt. This way, I can wear it with any shirt!

Productive Sock Saturday

This past weekend I was in Rosemary for a craft weekend and I'm happy to say it was productive! I started out making these sock monsters as gifts, but when I ended up having to hand-stitch the green one and it kept looking more and more adorable, I decided that I must keep him! We've named him Desmond. He'll be one of Otto's Christmas presents.











I love how ridiculously small the wings are on the huge yellow one.


















I'm thinking of making more to sell at a show in Lethbridge, where my sister-in-law will be selling tag quilts.