Love the IG

Last night it was just impossible to get a decent picture of these Instagram photo coasters. I'm not even sure this morning was better but I don't want to fall behind on the social media side of things.

I think we all happily snap away on Instagram but beyond having a record of the photos in cyberspace, what do we do with these fabulous shots? (Actually, I went here at Christmas and got myself a canvas print of that dirty nose picture, which is also my phone wallpaper.) Anyway, now we can protect the coffee table with photos of our favorite mutt. Jen at tater tots & jello also offers directions for creating a little holder for the coasters, but I lack woodworking tools (though not skills: I was in wood and metal shop classes in the 70s when we brought girls into the shop and boys into the kitchen and sewing room.)

Anyway, if you can glue and sand--and you can-- you can make these.

Love Your Superhero

Thank you for your comments. I am falling behind on following your blogs and on responding to your comments, but trust me you are keeping me out of the pit of despair.

So many things I would have done differently on these, like using the blue paint I bought and making a Superman ornie! (I had a brain freeze when I was making the strawberries and started using red paint everywhere.) Like buying glass instead of acrylic (apparently it's too much to ask to have the glass ones available when it's not Christmas). And, I thought of an awesome thing to do for my Minecraft crazy nephews after I had poured red and gray paint into the balls. (Green paint. Black vinyl squares!) But that's not what I did. I did this: Superhero ornaments

Love Your Whovian

This card has winged its way to the UK. My BIL should be opening it soon. This is right up his alley!

The directions for the Tardis card aren't awesome if you are a card crafter. There are some much easier ways to do the things she outlines in these directions. You can do it her way and things will work, but if you have some experience, you may wish to use, say, a paper cutter and square punches.

I'm not going to lie to you, the map fold--the interior--was difficult and frustrating. I have no ability to rotate shapes in my head, so I called in the dude, but he fared no better at following those instructions. If you're an old hand at origami, you should be okay. Otherwise try to find a video. (We couldn't.) But it is imperative to make the fold--it has to be bigger on the inside.

I finally just sort of did my best, and as it turns out, that was good enough!

Happy birthday, Alan.

Love Your Gardener

I know what you're thinking: daylight savings time started, couldn't you get a better picture? LOL. We'll all just have to imagine I'm a better photographer.

When we visited England two years ago in June, my BIL was complaining that between his younger son and the birds, they weren't getting a lot of strawberries. So when I saw this project, I thought it would be perfect for him and my MIL as well. They are both avid gardeners. So last summer when we visited the beach in Maine, I collected a bunch of strawberry shaped stones for this fairly simple project.

I don't know if they work, but they look cute!

Love Your Slob

Hey, gang. Our trip to D.C. was fun and we got to visit some fabulous friends. And we got home soon enough that I was able to head up to the craft room to make something.

I had this tie napkin pinned, but when I went to follow the link, it was dead. Still, I know how to do a fusible applique. Mostly. Sometimes. When I finally remember to use tear-away stabilizer. I figured it out on my own, but what I realize now is there was a reason I had pulled out a striped fabric. Stripes would make it easier to see the difference between the knot and the tie. In this example, not so much. But you get the idea. I love this fabric as a tie, even if the execution is iffy.

I did another search, and I found a new link to this project. This is pretty much how I made it up as I went along.

Remember to use stripes!

Thanks to all of you who are commenting regularly--or at all really--this blogging every day thing gets a little disheartening, and your little notes really help me along! I appreciate your visit and your messages. 

Love Your Lobster

I know I said I wasn't going to be able to get this done this weekend, but we had to have our car inspected before we left, and it took hours and hours. So I put myself to work. (I made two things, started a third, folded two loads of laundry, and still had an hour left, so I went back to the craft room!)

While masculine cards are harder than feminine ones, they are a lot easier than, say, masculine cross stitch pieces. Still I was happy to find this lobster card.

It's a great one to make for your favorite Friends fan! Though you could just as easily make it a birthday card, because who doesn't love a little lobster for the birthday? (I may be projecting.)

Also, I am happy to report that those Alton Brown pecans are ah-maaaaaaz-ing! I can't stop eating them.

Love the Rub

That sounds dirty, but you know I always get a little punchy posting every day. (Yes, TWO words. Each day. If I meant it as an adjective, it would be one word--everyday clothes, everyday dishes, everyday family.) But I digress, grill rub!

I made two of the three from that post but, you know, there are literally hundreds of grill rub recipes. Allrecipes has more than 50. About barbecue and grilling has a top ten. The BBQ Pit Boys have a recipe. How wrong can you go with something called "Meatheads Memphis Dust"?

Anyway, if you know a guy who loves his grill, I can highly recommend making some rubs.

(It occurs to me that I didn't take pictures of the actual rub, but, you know, it looks like mixed spices in a jar.)

Love Your Nut

Spiced Pecans from Alton Brown. Popped into a treat bag from the craft store and topped with a stamped card. I would have stapled it on, but our stapler is broken. :-p

I have a dilemma. I am leaving tomorrow morning for a short vacation with the dude. Even though I have tried and tried to work ahead, I'm not ahead. Not behind either, so that's something. I do have a project prepped for March 11th, but I can't show it early, it's for my BIL's birthday.

I could stay up all night and craft, but I have to take the car in to be inspected at 7 am and I'm still not packed. I think my successful run might have come to an end.

Love Your Souvenirs

I'm afraid the most difficult thing about craft-a-day is the associated social media.
(We entertained a local college student for dinner tonight so she didn't have to have iffy cafeteria food.) Anway, enough complaining...on to the craft!

I don't remember where I encountered this project originally, but I thought it would look great in the map room. In fact, that's what it says on my pinterest pin.

I knew I didn't have as many coins as she did, so I bought a small shadowbox frame. I glued them onto the backing. Some of the coins did resist the hot glue (the queen in particular) but I just kept reapplying. You can see coins from Bermuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Poland, Italy, Ireland, Great Britain, Canada, and Hungary. Some of those aren't even in use anymore. In fact, there's a euro in there somewhere.

See you tomorrow!

Love the Last Minute

Drive by post: Origami shirt. Card.

To bed.

Love Your Bucket List

Last night I was convinced I was going to have today off so I could work ahead on my Craft Month projects. Unfortunately (or fortunately) we hardly got any snow. (I feel for my friends to the south, however.) After a delayed opening (and I don't know where that time went) it was business as usual.

When I first saw this, I think on One Pretty Thing, or maybe in Papercraft Magazine, I fell in love with the quote: "I haven't been everywhere, but it's on my list." I definitely thought it could be made to be more masculine. First, lose the bow. I knew I needed to find a map scrapbooking paper to make it, and when I saw this 7 Gypsies paper at Joann's I felt like I was on to something. Then I found the balloon stamp. And I thought that carried through the "antique"ness of the paper. And you know how I love to stamp quotes with those typewriter style letters and cut them out like that.

The dude really likes the map. Of course, the only part I didn't have any hand in. Still, it could be framed to hang in a map room or it could be a neat first page in the scrapbook where you document all your travels.

Manly Men Men Men

My almost-BIL (my cousin's husband) had a birthday this weekend. I made him the manliest bouquet you have ever seen--booze, cigars, and moustaches!

Another pinterest success! I got the original idea here. I found the printable moustaches here. Something was up with my printer, so they printed in plaid rather than in black. The best screw-up ever! I had the pot in the basement. I bought a styrofoam disk and moss at AC Moore to hold (and cover up) the bamboo skewers I got at the grocery store. I had a really nice guy help me at the local cigar store (no web presence, d'oh). I looked for a printable "happy birthday" but the one I really wanted said "happy birthday, babe" which would have been totally inappropriate. So I made it myself in word. Everything is attached to the skewers with Glue Dots glue lines. Just a note, they worked much better on the square bottles than on the round ones. Total cost: $45 but you can make different choices about the cigars--which is where most of that cost came from.

The birthday boy liked it.

The guy at the cigar store said, "that's a great gift and presentation."

Its' man approved!

Goodies

What do you mean there was a 25% off sale where the shop owner got her orders delivered within the week? That's right! My order from One Star's Light--complete with extra goodies sealed with sealing wax--arrived today. And now Puff the Magic Dragon is running through my head.

I got some petite needles, Ink Circles Sea Stars, and, as an excuse to buy some Crescent Colors Belle Soie, a couple of French Country charts from JBW. And it's here already! I didn't have to wait for decades just because she had a sale.

Thanks for your understanding about my aborted rant and sage marital advice. My mom was full of advice for us girls as we went out into the dating world: "Never marry with intent to change [him]" and "All men are assh*les; you have to find the man that's the amount of assh*le that you can live with." Now you know why I didn't marry until I was 34 and Sissy (38) remains unwed. She also used to say--with much regret--"You don't just marry the man, you marry the whole damn family." Fortunately for her, his family didn't appeal to him all that much either (of course, there was the family business to deal with). Fortunately for me, I'm treated very well by my in-laws. (Each of the dude's aunts likes to tell me secretly that the dude is her favorite.) So I really should be able to behave better, but, sadly, I am a horrible person.

I Know What Boys Want

Thank you all so much for the anniversary wishes. We did the traditional anniversary things--hung around the house and then drove two hours to see friends and watch baseball. You can read about it here and here.

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I'm happy that people found the list of man gifts useful, if even just for a laugh. I can’t believe I forgot the link to the daddy caddy in the list, however. These are those things that you give to your brother-in-law to put over his favorite armchair to hold the remote and his reading glasses. You know, if your sister-in-law will let you…

When I was looking for boy items, I found directions to decorate a shot glass with polymer clay.

And this link to a list of man-gifts at getcrafty got left out somehow.
I know! How could that list have been incomplete!

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Searching around for crafts to make for boys had its highs and lows.

Here’s a high point: a little video of “boys” using a glue gun. Why are they so dumb? Is it genetic, linked to the Y chromosome? I’m pretty sure this is one of those times when the phrase “alcohol may have been a contributing factor” is appropriate.

So this question that we are asking is one that plagues us all. It is asked at Whip Up, SuperNaturale, and a flickr group. (Visit the latter and you will see some very adorable things for infants and younger boys, mostly sewing—appliqué, aprons, clothes, and bags. They yearn for the gifts for teenagers, and I know someday I shall too.)

So, while you're sewing, how about costumes? Very young ones love dressing up. I love how they like to go out of doors dressed in their Spider Man pajamas, or, you know like my nieces who once wore their rain coats, rain boots, and carried their umbrellas to the movies when it was 85 and gloriously sunny. My nephews are totally into pirates. I was thinking, what better thing to do than arm them? I wonder if you can get a wooden sword in the wood section at AC Moore. Paint the blade metallic silver and add jewels to the handle. How cool would that be?! But my sil’s will probably kill me. You could get a “pirate hat” and attach Captain Jack-style braids made from doll hair that you have beaded. Yay! A beading project you can make for boys.
Or, to hell with it all, I can just get them some 18th C handcuffs and let them have at it. (Did I ever tell you that my oldest niece use to call them “handcups” and she would make them out of rubber bands? “Let me put my handcups on you.” When you are so adorable, how do you even know what handcuffs are?)

But back to the costumes: It’s a known fact that every superhero needs a cape. That can’t be that hard to sew. And you could add a monogram to make it special. With the recent release of the Harry Potter movie and the anticipated last book, I think you could sew robes or knit the scarf. Just find out what house is appropriate. I’m also going to recommend looking at the pattern catalogs to see what reminds you of your favorite little boy.

Appliqués: there were a lot of appliquéd onesies, t-shirts, and sweatshirts in my research--especially on the flickr site. You could do this with all kinds of fabric, but I’ve got pirates on the brain. You can find pirate fabric: here, here, here, and here. Here’s another set of appliques just because they’re so cute.

I also saw pajama style pants for day and night. Tie-dye t-shirts are another easy and fun craft project.

We know from Barbara that her boys dig the bags. (Okay, am I making that up? I can't find it on her blog now that I need it!) I wonder what age boys have to be before they stop carrying things in handmade bags? (I’ll never forget the time, very early in our relationship, when the dude was going to carry his shit on an airplane in a plastic grocery sack. The horror, the shame! Fortunately, my dad is always getting swag in small duffle bags. And the break-up crisis was narrowly averted. But I digress.)

Encourage savings.
A hacky sack!
Hand puppets, more puppets, and more.

Flipping through some of my craft books led me to decorating a cork board. You could use one of those pirate fabrics to do something like this. Or you could glue on a foam or felt design--sports, dinosaur, dragon, whatever he's into (I saw this recommendation in a book; unfortunately no link).

We don’t normally think of giving boys bath soaps, but how could these cookies not entice them into the tub? Or soap with spiders, because boys are the dirtiest things on the planet.

Make a scrapbook, a day in the life of [your relationship to the kid] [your name]. I’m pretty sure that Uncle Dude is much more interesting to them than I am. So we could take a photo of him leaving for work, getting on the bus, getting on the el, walking around campus, etc. so they can connect with their uncle who lives 3000 miles away. Sorry, no link—I just thought of that!

I also once had to write a story book for a friend’s baby shower. I based it on “Good Night Moon” and had the little one saying good night to different landmarks in San Francisco (where she was born). You could write a little storybook and illustrate it with stickers, photos, recycled magazines, or your own drawings. I know, a lot of this is for little kids, but my favorite boys are all under six.

I also found some really cute things that cost way too much: this travel art set, this checker set, and this tent. All would be easy enough to replicate with scrap fabric and your own contents for way less than those prices! I did have trouble finding instructions for a tent.

Also, looking at some stuffed "monsters" gave me inspiration: you could recycle felted sweaters (felt is easier to sew) but add another dimension—a la Mr. Potato Head or Dapper Dan. Make them interactive by adding things you can Velcro on (easy to do because you only need the hook side—the felted sweater will be the loop) or add zippers, strings, buckles, etc. Man I am just on fire today!

Use fleece to make things—blankets, scarves, hats, or pillows. Check out the selection of fleece here; great stuff for boys and men: camo, plaid, John Deere (which is my youngest niece’s favorite thing, so I’ll have to make something with this!), sports, animals, and happy dogs.

If all else fails, buy them a gift card and stick it in one of these.

Man Gifts

Judging by the dearth of responses, it’s as hard for you to find things to make (not bake!) for men as it is for me. So I scoured the internet (and spent a ton of time on Martha Stewart’s website) for ideas for uncles, brothers-in-law, and other men (note: not for boys, but I will continue my search). The one craft I mostly avoided was knitting. Because if you are a knitter and you can’t think of something to knit for a man who lives in a wintery clime, you need more help than I can give you! I tried to find tiny needle crafts, but I did also look at crafts that seemed very general—ones that involved gluing, decoupage (which is just gluing), and etching (which is kind of like gluing).

It’s a tough one, though. "Crafts for men" brings up a lot of silly things your kids can make for father’s day. A lot. So I took another approach, "guy" materials. I started off slowly with duct tape. Check here for instructions on making bookmarks, checkbook covers, coasters, card cases, wallets, and more; here for a photo album, glasses case, and the usual suspects; and here for stuff from the guys who started it all.

Then I was on a roll and found denim. Here you’ll find a rug and a quilt (which brings to mind the t-shirt quilt.). You could turn him into "Denim Vest". And, well, go see the list Sharon B put together on recycling denim.

And of course, leather: a leather belt—this one’s for girls, but use your imagination or a leather placemat. (Hey, he might want to protect that table!)

Then I was warmed up and started thinking in terms of items, beginning with things you suggested. iPod cover in felt, Crochet, Duct tape, or Knit.

How much would the dude love a chess set? Well, he’d appreciate that I’d made it, but it wouldn’t get much use. (He sticks with his tournament set or the travel set.)

For the man with a home office, and just because it's the name of one of my favorite films, a Desk Set.

Then I turned to one of my favorite books, 101 Ways to Say Merry Christmas for Less than $25, which is now 15 years old, and no longer makes good on the $25 claim, but still has some good ideas, including

• Coasters Stitched, made from glue and rope, and Glass (good for scrapbookers). You could also etch a glass coaster (see below for etched glass link). Also, you could needle felt them, like this. (One piece of wool felt, with wool needle felted onto it in a spiral shape.) Awhile back, I made a wine coaster for my dad, using the grapes from a Betsy Stinner of Earth Threads design (Simple Elegance Sampler) and a wine coaster from Sudberry House. I don’t see the round one that I used on their web catalog, but I bet it’s out there somewhere.
• Book marks (give it with a book!) You can stamp these—in a future episode, I’ll show you how I made the dude’s "Aloha" bookmark. You can stitch these—duh. You can feature your face. You can sew something like this. (Actually, poke around that site, there are a number of things they sell that you could craft—notebook cover, desk accessories, etc.)
• Ornaments: stitched or crafted, there are loads of places to find these. I’ve made my brothers-in-law ornaments, and this book has pool ball ornaments.
• For the ecologically friendly, you could make a shopping bag, especially out of recycled plastic—all the rage: knit it , make a new fabric to sew with, or crochet. (Check it! Tutorials.)
• How about a kite?
• You can find directions to make a paperweight--glue! or paint one. And I know I’ve seen snow globes that you can insert a picture or maybe a little stitching into…
• If he’s a cook, make him some manhand potholders. (How many Seinfeld references can I include?)
• I think you could make this sun catcher for a man. In fact, it would be perfect for my bil, the geologist.

Here’s where I went kind of nuts on the Martha Stewart site:

• Monogrammed slippers
• Wooden boxes
• (You could stitch one too.)
• Monogram corkboard
• Etched glass. You could also paint glasses—every big box craft store has what you need. Those martini glasses in the Hallmark store with olives painted on would be easy to replicate. Who can’t paint an oval?
• Eye glass case. The dude always has scratched lenses. You could sew these, stitch them, or make them from duct tape. Somewhere on Martha's site, she also has a sewn eyeglass case that is lined with an eyeglass cleaning cloth. You can get great ones at the dollar store.
• You could totally riff off this Stewart invention to make an organizer—and it works for the studious or the tool-type.
• And speaking of the tool type, how about a tool caddy?
• Ties may be cliché, but you can monogram them. Hankies too! (I once bought one off the internet that was embroidered "snot rag." My stupid father threw it away with the packaging. Boo!)
• And last but not least, some guy Martha knows loves his, so this Gardener’s Apron might work.