REVolution

guess what?

this weekend i'm going away with these 7 lovely ladies: Liesbeth, Marsha, Danielle, Corinne, Monique, Haggith, Florence and yours truly) into a house and we are going to scrap, crochet, sew (anybody?), have fun, laugh till we cry, eat chocolate (some of us), drink water (others), drink wine (ME ME ME) and i guess we'll be singing "who let the dogs out? who who who!".

so, as a surprise i made 8 of these lovelies. i am not telling what these are yet, cause it is a surprise peeps! and just maybe maybe one of those lovelies checks my blog just before they leave. they'll be there this afternoon, i join them this evening, cause you know, business before pleasure. geesh.

life is good. girls, be with you in a few hours!!
rev 

my felt forest of hearts.

"wouldn't it be fun to lighten up the house with a little lovely forest of felt hearts?" i was thinking a few weeks ago. and so it happened. 

* don't you love my painting in the mirror. ha. gotta love shots like that.

what you'll need:
- enough empty jars, like fruitjuice/vegetables/younameit jars. clean them please.
- wooden sticks. i simply bought them at a do-it-yourself-company (dutchies: karwei 6mm circumference, 1.50 m long). can you picture me explaining to a dude: "well. i need sticks. to put my felt hearts on. to make a forest ya know?". i guess i am known as the wacko chick with the strange questions. and frankly. i do not give a shit.
- felt in all the gorgeous colors you like. heck. if you only use one color: be my guest
- scissors. of course.
- glue. i've used glue dots cause that really sticks well onto the felt. but maybe you want to use your own favorite glue. we all have them...
- embroidery thread. i've sewed my hearts by hand, but you can easily use your sewing machine. goes a lot faster. but i love the 'blanket stitch look'. i've used matching thread, but lighter or darker is fun also!
- stuff to fill up the hearts (fiberfill)

 yes. i love messy boxes of embroidery stuff.

first of all you need to cut a gazillion of hearts. 2 of each color (front and back). i've used all the colors felt i had. i love rainbows and lots of color.

than i sewed each heart, one by one, closed with the blanket stitch. leave some room to fill it up with fiberfill, and than close it. it's really relaxing while watching your favorite tv shows. like 'lie to me, the mentalist of castle' for me :D

just a little bunch of happiness.

look at the arrow. that's a glue dot. neat huh?

once you've finished sewing all your hearts, let's attach them to the wooden sticks. BUT. before you do so, make sure you've cut your sticks in different sized pieces. and be wise. i usually use my droopy face, so Arjan will move in to be my hero and saws my sticks. cause. what can i do with 1.50 meter long sticks, right? and me + saw = loss of fingers. use your hubby's to be hero's they love it. i'm sure. if not. your loss. ha.

 

when you put your sticks in the jars, they'll tumble and face the other way. the hams. so i simply cut my glue dots in half (i'm dutch, so i won't spoil...) and simply jammed the stick in, attached it inside the jar, and tadaaaaa it stays the way i want. me so clever.

hello lovelies.

let the fun start! decorate! you can put them in simple glass jars. or you make the jars a little bit more comfy, with let's say a crocheted jacket!

ahhh. don't they look lovely together? you can also spice the hearts up by attaching little accent. i adore skulls. the little pirate in me.

you can play with them on sticks. the muppets LOVE to play with them! and i let them. why not. my house is not a showroom. they can play with decoration too. if they wreck it, i will empty their piggy bank. don't worry.

they work perfect for photoshoots also! {remove the sticks loonies}

fab picture take by Corinne Delis.

now. go on. make your own forest of lovelyness and don't forget to show me! i would love to see your ideas with a bunch of hearts!

life is good. heart it.
rev 

felt food anyone?

they got this cute kitchen from Sinterklaas so now i'm working on some felt food, cause i cant' stand the look of the plastic blah. i've bought some gorgeous patterns in this fun Etsyshop and they are pretty amazing. if i can follow the instructions, anyone can! remember I AM the one that sews her finger INTO her project...

although the felt food is NOT a favorite of the muppets yet. they still prefer the plastic blah. that's more REAL. SAY WHAT? i guess i'll be "accidently" vacuming to closely to the ugly beasts and replace them (and the tears) with my beauties. sounds like a good plan to me!

life is good. plastic felt food too.
rev 

oh deer

he lost his mommy...

made the pattern completely by myself. thinking of making it into a tutorial, whatcha think?

life is good. love ya!
rev 

xmas thingies

the last few weeks i've been working on some handmade xmas thingies. let the love begin.

oops. in the picture. ahh well.

it should be a little house. but both Arjan and Ruben recognized it as a rocket. a rocket it is than.

 and of course rexie and the stars are there too.

 

ball on the bottom is from the HEMA. ball on top sewed by me. just trying peeps.

 

 LOVING all those colors.

 

 and LOVING my machine WHO CAN EMBROIDER. sweet. all the possibilities now. i've go soo many ideas. and of course i'll share them with you as soon as they are real.

 

so. what you're making?
life is good. xmassie good.
rev

how to make the felt star & t-rexie for your xmas tree or for your muppets...

pretty please READ it all before you start... i'm a bit messy and the steps are not always the right way. SO READ IT ALL BEFORE YOU START PRETTY PLEASE..

how to make the felt/fabric star and the felt t-rex. fun. sweet. good stuff. ready? GO.

get your stuff together. you need felt, fabric, embroidery floss, scissors, pins, a sewing machine or you can also sew by hand, fiberfill to fill the cuties up.

 

for the star i simply used a star shape from Word. printed it out on plane paper and made a template on chipboard. i will also post the scans of the templates. i'm not sure how they'll end up if you print them. so please shoot me an email if you want the templates for the t-rex and the star, i'm happy to email them to you. spirit of giving.

the template of the star is a bit bigger than the star. that's because you need some room to sew. if you sew by hand or by machine, always make sure you use about 0,5 cm (0,25 inch) for the seem. 

the t-rexie looks a bit like this. uploading the template isn't working. and i'm working on the step-by-step for the t-rexie but that's not finished yet and i need some chocolate first... so onto the star.

once you have the template, trace it over on felt (or fabric, whatever you want to use!) 

and than cut it out. 

so you'll have 2 stars. one for the front, one for the back. i used fabric for the back, but you make it however you like cuties.

it's pretty easy to sew the bugger with your machine. just remember: RIGHT SIDES facing and shabeng, go ahead. ALSO REMEMBER to leave one side open for stuffing like a turkey. 

and ofcourse you can sew by hand. íf i sew stuff like this i usually use the blanket stich (feston steek). 

oops. DON'T FORGET BEFORE SEWING: if you want to add ribbon or ricrac or whatever to hang your star on, make sure it's INSIDE the fabric/felt and sew it attached. 

rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr here you go! 

if you reach corners, just LEAVE your needle in the fabric/felt, lift the foot up, turn your fabric/felt, and let your foot  down again and proceed. easy peasy lemon squeezy.

so when you've sewn with your machine it kinda looks like this. see, on the left bottom side i've left one side open for stuffing. 

see. opening.  

what you want to do to get nice pointy stars: CUT OFF the points like this. see where my sewing lines go? make sure you DON'T CUT into the sewing lines (duuhh...) but just cut it straight. when you'll turn the star right side out, you'll see the pointy star!

 

what you also want AND NEED to do is CLIP in between the 'corners' of the star. see just half an inch on the right of my finer? i've clipped the fabric JUST BEFORE the sewing line. of course DON'T CLIP into the sewing line...

cut off all the other extra access. like i love to sew with LOTS of seam, so to make sure it's not getting bulky, i love to cut off the access fabric on the edges.

and than just make it a ball, throw it away and have a glass of whine. NOOOOOO. turn it inside out silly! that's what the opening is perfect for...

to make the points nice and pointy i use 'what's-it-called-you-use-to-scalp-clay-with'-thingie. lucky i took a pic for you... 

there's the opening. 

stuff it! as full as you can get it. you'll always use more stuffing that you imagine using. just like eating chocolate. it's always more than you thought you would... 

stuffed and ready to cook. 

i like to sew it closed by hand. of course you can use your sewing machine. it's your party.

onto the face. cut 2 circles out of white felt. i guess they are about an inch wide / diagonal. 

cut 2 just a bit smaller black circles, and than another 2 just a bit smaller white circles. to make the eyelids, cut a green circle, the same size as the biggest white one. and simply cut that in half.

for the mouth just cut a cute little mouth by hand out of red or cerise felt.

to keep my stress level low, i GLUE the smaller white & black circle on the bigger white circle AND i glue on the mouth. but if you are tha bomb, please sew it on. GLUE is allright though. i use Tacky Glue.

place the eyes cute and close together. WAIT a bit while your glue dries! 

sew the eyes to the body of the star. i use a simple stitch. the eyelids are NOT glued onto the eyes. i only stitch the edges so it looks like 'real' eyelids... 

ahhhh. CAJUTE! and i'm planning to make a gazillion of these buddies for my tree. see who can beat me? 

ok. uploading the templates isn't working now. so f that. just email me and i'll email them to you asap sweets.

life is good. make handmade ornaments this year. if it is only one. it feels so good.
rev

so PROUD of my girly girl

she designed her idea of a keychain, picked out the colors, the felt, the ribbon and all stuff her self. i helped her a bit getting started with the thread but she completely finished it herself. saweet.

very proud of her own design. looking like a pro on a picture is a whole other shabeng...

 

and look. chop chop. let the hairdresser chop a big deal of my hair. it was getting kinda long and usually when it gets long i want it short. and when it's short i want it long. but NOT this time around. she exactly cut it the way i wanted (long locks in front and shorter in the back) and i'm real happy with it.

cause i've got strange hair. i really do. it's a bit curly, straigth and sometimes wavy. but not 1 style. it's all mixed and that sometimes ALWAYS is a pain in the ass. but with this hairdo it works perfectly. THANK YOU ESTHER.

life is good. chop chop.
rev

space boy

finally. one for the dude again. he's so happy with his space boy with jolly goggles. ha.

 

 you can buy the pattern here: Wee Wonderful (and better look around, there are sooo many gorgeous patterns!!)

 and i've made the goggles to go on and off. isn't he handsome?

of course i couldn't resist a bit of a pirate look.

life is good. ai ai pirates.
rev

another little dragon...

another little dragon. also made the pattern myself. not completely done yet, and i went wrong with my sewing machine a few a freaking LOT times, but i kinda fell in love with the messed up little dude.

i guess it's a happy fellow.

and his backside is red with greenish dots. ca-jute!

so, if anybody is interesed in the pattern, i can make a little step-by-step with pics for this one on my blog. i've got request for the start, and i'll make that also a step-by-step on my blog. 

the muppets are painting together and it's starting to get a bit well uhm. messy. but that's ok. they have fun and cleaning can be done later, right? and actually that gives me some time to work on my new project, an ugly beats for Sanne.

life is good. paint, felt, fabric, scraps, bring it on!
rev 

what's on my table now...

almost done! the little snail house needs to be BIGGER than this. now it's like he's carrying his camper or something. not a real home :D. and made / thought the pattern myself and pretty proud of that. gna.

feels so good to be creative on a regular basis again. so good to wind down the day of hectic with some good old fashioned fabric, needles and stuffing.

tomorrow i'll be scrapbooking again! i'm gonna visit my sweetie Liesbeth again and i'm planning to scrap scrap scrap till i'm dizzy. Liesbeth, bring out the wraps please :D

life is good. creating rules.
rev