Mini Canvas Art - Craft Night

This past monday night was another fantastic evening of coffee and crafts at Crazy Beans. As always it was a fun night with my regular crew and craft night newbies.

This time around we made mini wall art! It was a fun craft in miniature. Some of my crafty crew liked painting on the blank canvas. Some of the best pictures of the night included a city scape (with Bat signal!) and a beach scene. One of the newbies was really creative and used a straw to blow on the paint to create some interesting texture. I was particularly proud of my friend Joe. He's not a very crafty person compares being artistic to household chores. However he stuck it out and painted a beautiful masterpiece.

Some of the folks who attended, were having some trouble with inspiration. To help those guys I had printed out some stencils for them to use. There were some wonderful results from this technique. Including some fantastic mustaches.





If you want to make your own mini wall art here is how....

Materials & Tools

• Mini canvas
• Paint 
• Brushes 
• Paper towels (incase you make a mess) 
• Tape or stencils (optional) 

Instructions 

• Gather your supplies 
• Think of a design 
• Get painting! 
• If you are using stencils
• Paint a base coat, let dry for a few minutes 
• Place stencils on the canvas 
• Paint your second coat in a contrasting color 

Tips 

• Glue a magnet to the back of it and BOOM - instant fridge magnet! 

Drawstring Bag - tutorial

This is one style of bag that I have wanted to learn how to make for a while. Drawstring bags can be versatile. Small pouches are great scrap busters, especially if you have long pieces that can be used for the drawstring! You can also make them to fit a wine bottle (which adds a nice touch to a gift). You can even apply this technique to make a big bag for something like laundry.

Tools:

• Sewing machine
• Ruler
• Rotary cutter/Scissors
• Safety pin

Step 1:

• Measure and cut the bag
• (this bag can fit any size big or small, just make sure it is a rectangular shape with the skinny side being the opening)
•  For this example the bag is : 8 inches length x 10 inches width
• Add a 1/2 inch seam allowance, and a 2 inch seam allowance for the top.

• Measure and cut the Drawstring
• The strap must be at least twice as long as the width of your bag 
• The width is determined by how you want the finished drawstring to be, the multiply it by 4. 
• Example bag drawstring is: 12 length x 2 inches width

Step 2:

• Make the Drawstring 

• Fold the drawstring in half then press
• Open up, then fold each edge toward the fold, then press
• Fold up again, then press 
• Pin and sew
• (But Sarina what about the raw edges! I know let me get to it!) 
• Fold over the ends and do a zig-zag stitch on the ends 
• You may want to use a think needle for this step because you are sewing through a lot of layers. 

Step 3: Drawstring hole

• Take one piece for the body of the bag. 
• Measure where the hole will be. This should be at least 1 inch from the top

• This should be at least 1 inch from the top raw edge
• Make sure the hole will be big enough to fit your drawstring.
• Use the button hole attachment on your machine (or you can triangle stitch along your measurements)

• Use a seam ripper to create your hole

Step 4: Assemble the bag

•  Law two body pieces on top of each other, right sides facing. 
• Pin along the edge then sew
• Leave the top edge (with the button hole) open. Do not sew this together. 

• Use the triangle stitch to sew up the raw edges

• Fold the top edge inward, sew along the raw edge
•  this will create the tube in which your drawstring will go through

• Fold bag inside out

Step 5: Insert drawstring

• Use attach a safety pin to your drawstring

• Work it through the hole and along the top edge

DONE!

Sunglasses Case Tutorial

In my quest to rid my crafting world of this evil box of scraps I started making these neat little holders for sunglasses. It is very simple and quick to make.

First things first though.. you need some of this stuff:

Tools

• Sewing Machine
• Scissors or Rotary cutter
• Needle
• Iron

Materials needed, see dimensions below.

Materials

• Exterior fabric 
• 2 peices measuring 4 inches wide by 7 1/2 inches high 

• Lining 
• 2 pieces of felt material measuring 4 inches wide by 7 1/2 inches high

• Loop
• 1 piece of fabric 6 inches wide by 1 inch high 
• Button 

Step 1

Take one of your exterior pieces and measure where to put the button. I place mine 2 inches from the edge and 1 inch from the top edge. Sew and attach the button.

Mark where the button will go

Step 2
Take your two exterior begin to pin them 1/4 inch from the raw edge. The right sides of the fabric should be together. Pin along three sides and leave the top part open. Sew up along the pinned edges. Then turn inside out.
Repeat this same step with the lining (felt) pieces except only pin along the 7 1/2 inch sides and do not turn inside out.

The loop is pictured here but you will learn how to make it in the next step!

Step 3
Take your loop piece and follow these instructions

Fold strip in half, then press

Open, then fold into 1/4s and press again.

Fold, press then sew

Fold the strip in half to make a loop. 

Step 4
Now it is time to assemble the case.Get all of your pieces together

 

Sew the loop to the inside of the exterior piece. Make sure it is on the opposite side of the button. Also sew from inside of the case. (Look a few steps down to get what I am talking about)

Insert the exterior piece into the lining

Pin all of the pieces together from the inside.

This is what I mean when I say sewing from the inside. Its really tricky but go slow and WATCH OUT FOR THOSE NEEDLES! (if you forget one it can damage your machine and give you sad face)

Then turn your case inside out.

Stitch up that cap in your lining. Then push the lining into the exterior.

TA DA! Now you a lovely and stylish place to put your glasses!

 Tips:

• You can alter the dimensions and apply the same technique to make cases for stuff like phones, Ipads...the sky is the limit! 
• When sewing everything together I recommend using a quilt needed or a denim needle (something that can handle sewing threw multiple layers)