My sister rocks. She sent me a great two part gift: the most excellent pizza cookbook Pizza: More than 60 Recipes for Delicious Homemade Pizza, accompanied by my very own pizza stone, pizza cutter, and wood paddle set. I got it into my head to have a pizza making party last weekend, but then had too much work! So I had a mountain of pizza toppings, but no people to eat it and no dough to use them with.

{image from amazon.com}

Why no dough? In the most excellent pizza cookbook, there are quite a few dough recipes I was planning on trying. Once I finally read through the recipe I read the final words of the last paragraph I had skimmed over, “Let rest at least 10 hours and no more than 2 days in the refrigerator before kneading.” Say what? Well, crap. That takes thinking ahead, which I had not done. Leading into the busiest 2 weeks of the year, painting a mural + coordinating volunteers, I will not have time to make said dough. Well, double crap.

I definitely didn’t want to let all these amazing toppings go to waste and I definitely wanted some homemade pizza. I had been anticipating it for awhile. So here is what I did.

Option 1: Jiffy pizza crust mix. This stuff is 59 cents and simple and tasty. It takes about 10 minutes to prepare and all you have to add is water.

Option 2: Pita pizzas. Pitas are a great inexpensive base to make personal sized pizzas on.

Some pizza thoughts: Jason worked at a pizza place for quite awhile and he said that you may think “more toppings = more tasty pizzas.” That is not always the case. The more toppings you add, the harder it is to cook all the way through. If you are loading it up with things like tomatoes, it causes the dough to get soggier.

Jason and I debate about cheese on top or cheese on the bottom. He says you should go: sauce, cheese, toppings. I say: sauce, toppings, cheese. Ha. It’s a personal preference, so use your own judgment.

On the pizza above we used the Jiffy pizza crust mix, canned pizza sauce (I was in a rush), italian sausage (spicy), Canadian bacon, red onions, and mozzarella cheese. We went all meaty on this one. We also have mozzarella, basil, and tomato pizza pretty regularly. My favorite and Jason’s least favorite: sauerkraut and Canadian bacon!

On my next pizza adventure I’ll share the dough making outcomes and my favorite homemade sauce recipe.

Happy pizza making!

Kristin

I can easily figure out ways to use a half a skein of this and a half a skein of that, but it’s those last 2 yards that leave me stumped. Today I’m going to show you how by braiding yarn, you can refresh the life of your yarn scraps! And of course some fun project ideas to use those braided pieces.

Three Strand Simple Braiding: Knot 3 lengths of yarn together and safety pin to a cushion. And braid away. Knot the other end and your yarn is now ready for some great projects.

While written for fabric scraps, this project could be done with yarn easily. Make your own Scrap Necklace. I love this project, it’s so beautiful.

You can use it as cording for upholstery projects. Check out this great tutorial here on CRAFT on Upholstery 101. I will definitely be using this when I re-cover my lounge chair for the Apartment ReDress Project.

If you have a loom, you can check out Whimsies in Wool for a great tutorial on weaving a rag rug in CRAFT: Vol 8.

You can also make a braided rug with the stitching method shown on Sunshine’s Creations, I originally saw a link to this here on CRAFT. If you choose this project, use more strands together for each braided piece.

If you use more strands together, braiding can make great handles for your knit or crochet bag project. The Via Diagonale knit bag from knitty.com would be perfect with a braided handle.

Or with just 3 strands for the braid, you can use it instead of an i-cord. Use them for tails cute, little, stuffed animals tails, to hang an ornament, as loop fasteners instead of button holes. In the the cute little Itty Bitty crochet bag pictured above braided yarn is used for a drawstring. That was a guest post by Mary Grace McNamara of Hooked on Needles.

What’s your favorite way to use up the last yard or two of yarn?

Look at that mess. Sure it’s not horrible and at least it’s all in one drawer. But it could be a whole lot better. My friend Aimee got it into her head to set things straight.

First she emptied the drawer and measured it’s width, depth, and height.

Then she cut notches in some scrap cardboard we had around the studio. So brilliant!

And check this out, organized! And I found out I have a bunch of neat stuff that is not yet in the shop. That’s Aimee’s next mission.

This is a great way to divide up any drawer when you need smaller slots to keep things organized.

Aimee is helping me out in the studio every Friday afternoon so I don’t go crazy, or to help me recover from going a bit crazy. It’s such a huge help while I’m juggling the mural and the book and Craft Leftovers and, of course, life!

Happy crafting!

Kristin

Today’s project is brought to you by the creative force behind Poppy Chic Designs, Taryn Sisco. Make sure to check out her super fun items in her etsy shop and on her blog.

My first tutorial is here!  These cute little bracelets are super sweet and fun to make too.  Whenever I wear one people always ask where I got it… well now you know!

Materials
Some scrap fabric, 2”x18”
Metal bangle (thin)
A little sparkly button with a shank
Scissors
Hot glue gun or fabric glue

Instructions
Step 1: To start wrapping your bangle, leave about 2 inches as your starter.  Then neatly wrap the fabric around the bangle.

Step 2: Keep wrapping the bangle, giving a little “tug” every once in a while to tighten the wrap.

Step 3: Tie the remaining fabric in a secure double knot and even up the edges.

Step 4: Use a hot glue gun or fabric glue to put a drop of glue into the crevice of the knot (this is where the shank of the button will push into).

Step 5: Add your sparkly button and hold it in place for a few seconds… and YOU’RE DONE!

Tips: Play around with different fabrics.  You can make them a bit longer (2”x26”) to tie a bow at the end too.  Be creative, it’s a sweet thing!

Author’s Bio: While working as a showgirl for Carnival Cruise Lines in the 1990s, Poppy Chic Designs creator Taryn Sisco would also help out as a seamstress for the costumes and accessories.  A decade later the former showgirl turned crafty mom decided to take her love of accessories to the next level and focused on starting her own line of girly goodies.  Always inspired by vintage style pin-up girls, and the fabulous styles of the 1920s through 1950s, Taryn created Poppy Chic Designs!  A line of boutique style flower hair accessories and unique jewelry with a retro flair designed for moms, teens, and little girly girls.  From sweet layered flower hair clips to big bold fabric corsages, tiny blossoming flower earrings to fabulous vintage bloom cocktail rings, each piece is handcrafted using a mix of amazing new and vintage fabrics, lace, tulle, rhinestones, pearls and of course love!

Mother Nature that is! After working  with my Craft Leftovers for the last 4 years, I have found that stash busting is a two part process.

Part 1: Use your stash/leftovers BEFORE going to the store.

Part 2: Buy only what you need. Or even more simply put: Buy less!

What do you do when people don’t know you are trying to work on this two part plan and they give you things that aren’t part of your master plan? Well, you could toss them, recycle them, donate them. But even better, just use them too!

A few months ago Diane helped me put together a great ebook all about using up those leftovers related to receiving gifts. Wrapping paper, greeting cards, and curling ribbon are all taken on. Learn how to make cards into paper, wrapping paper into collaged, hand designed fabric, and curling ribbon into festive baskets! It’s such a fun book and it seems so perfect for earth day. Mainly because these are some of the things that most readily find their way into the recycling bin or landfill.

Diane and I have decided to team up and give all of you a super awesome deal on Card. Paper. Ribbon and she’s even offered up her own ebook project–weaving magazine page jewelry! It’s such a fun project!

From now through Sunday, April 25th, you can get $3.00 off this bad-boy by typing EARTHDAY in the coupon code field at check out in the CraftyPod Shop.

Happy Earth Day! Let’s keep this lady nice and green!

Kristin

Hi all, I didn’t want to take up a regular post to share this, but I think it’s pretty good info to know about. I know a lot of you are on the rss feed and don’t always stop by the site. I wanted to make sure that this got to you too.

New Archive!

First of all, the archive is changing over to a new-improved system. I’m using wordpress’s built in category feature to be able to update the archive with a click of a button. Instead of having to make a button image, type type type, and whatever else, I just click the correct category for the post and it’s all set! This will be a huge time saver for me and a huge benefit to you. No more waiting for every once and awhile archive updates. Now they are added to the project archive as soon as I post them. Hooray!

There are some cons. It’s taking awhile to make new excerpts for all the old posts, but they are coming. So when you look through the projects, not all of the summaries have images yet–lame. It will just take some time. I have a friend helping me through this and so it should hopefully be completed by June.

Tweeky little things

My friend also pointed out that my homepage was a little confusing, so I’ve changed that up. The slider is “this week in CL.” So projects from the last/current week are there. Down below, instead of “news and notes” it’s “from the vault.” Each week I’ll feature 4 projects from the archive in this area. Then there is the twitter widget, which is what it is. If you tweet you know what that’s all about. If you don’t tweet, think of it as “today on CL.” :) I usually link to the newest post there or tweet about things that are going on in the studio.

My friend also pointed out that on the blog summaries, it’s a little hard to tell where one ends and one begins. I can see that. So it’s now a heavier line that’s black vs. gray. So you know where to click, I changed the “continue reading…” to blue.

I also changed the “next post/previous posts” to bold so they are a little easier to see.

More to come…

Though it won’t be immediately apparent, I’m going to continue to spend an hour or two a week working on the website to make it more user friendly. I’m also working on updating the project posts that are in the archive to make the pictures nicer and the patterns of better quality. I’ve learned a lot in the past 4 years of pattern writing. I love a lot of my earlier patterns, but I know they could use some serious tech editing as well as design editing. Ha. It just shows how much I’ve grown. :)

If you have any ideas or suggestions, let me know by leaving a comment on this post or sending me an email at kristin [at] craftleftovers [dot] com.

I’ve been cleaning out my apartment one space at a time. Today was my studio. After collecting all my butterfly bobbins of wool, I was confronted with a shopping bag full of random colors. Some people may see this as overwhelming, depressing, and challenging. (What to do with all these random colors?) Well honestly, it filled me with childhood glee! You see, wool is great for crewel–all those random colors? A painters palette!

Sometimes it’s fun to mix things up a bit. Just because you have leftovers from a knit project, does not mean you have to stick with knitting for the leftovers. Those last 3 yards are perfect for a variety of projects and crewel is on the top of my list. It’s freestyle embroidery with with 2-ply wool yarn. I’ve used a variety of fiber types with good results though.

Crewel is a great way to use those last bits, and to me it’s a family tradition. Going back to my great-grandma, we have all preferred crewel embroidery. I’m not sure what it is, maybe the thrifty nature of using up leftovers, the soft texture, or just that it was the late 70′s early 80′s when it was all the rage and my grandma and mom were into it. And of course little girls want to be like their moms.

The first crewel work I ever stitched was a little fisher boy kit. I still have him around and think he’s pretty cute. I had forgotten about my crewel beginnings though. That was until I was in Dekalb, my first year of university, and I saw this great book at the library. It’s called The New Crewel. It sparked my interest in crewel all over again. I thought I had never seen anything like it. It’s funny how in reality, I was surrounded by it my whole childhood. If you haven’t already, check out this great interview with the author of the New Crewel, it was posted on CRAFT last fall.

My grandma made this when my mom found the pattern a bit too much.

And this has hung in the hallway since I was a kiddo.

Here are some great resources for crewel embroidery, starting with the history and ending with some project ideas. I am particularly fond of the coloring book idea, just brilliant.

• A Guide to Crewel Embroidery on Pretty Impressive Stuff
• How Crewel by Elizabeth Creeden from the Caron Collection
• Jacobean leaves embroidery pattern series on Materialistic
• A Crewel Embroidery freebie on Love Stitches
• Sharon B’s Stitch Dictionary
• Jacobean Flower to Stitch on Stitching with a Shimmy
• Free Vintage Crewel Pattern on Two Kitties
• A great idea by two kitties to use coloring book pages for crewel embroidery
• Free embroidery patterns on Craft Leftovers

Armed with a bag full of wool, you will be sure to see some new embroidery patterns coming up on Craft Leftovers.

Last year I decided that it was much more affordable to purchase a kiddo bike trailer than a flat bed. I’ve used it pretty regularly to haul things from here to there. Going to the grocery store, workshops, the office. It’s served me really well.

This year I thought it would be so neat if we had a real life Ames C.art cart for the parade we were going to be in. Wouldn’t it be fancy if instead of just walking in a parade we were walking with a big red cart? I sure thought so and so did all the other Ames C.art members.

We all pitched in ideas on how best to make one and finally landed on brilliance–let’s convert my bike trailer into the cart! Then it will be ready to go for riding to Ames C.art summer events as well as in the parade. Sweetness!

It worked out so well because the whole thing can be easily assembled and disassembled. You take out the pins and simply lift off the top. The wheels can be taken off and the bike arm folded under for super easy storage.

We used some of the birch panels I had laying around for the bottom. With loads of hole drilling, skill saw sawing, painting, and gluing, we had this lovely beast of a cart.

And here we are walking in the parade. I love the little cluster of balloons floating off the back. :)

Do you love bikes as much as I do? Be sure to check out the April issue of Craft Leftovers Monthly!

Happy spring parading!

Kristin

This sweet little bunny was first published in the spring of 2008. It’s a unique construction because the base of the little hopper is knit like a heel flap. The first time I made him, I used some vintage acrylic and the last few times I used leftover cotton. You can use just about any worsted weight yarn for this project. I’ve even seen people use faux fur with some pretty fun results. Read more →

This is going to end up being a 100 part series or something. I’m not sure what it is about this particular set of shirts, but I keep getting stuck on them. Thankfully, a friend of mine from the Sew ‘n’ Swap Judy, had a brilliant idea. Lining for the lining!

Here was the issue. I had bought this interfacing so I could finish up this shirt dress jumper deal, but it was pretty uncomfortable looking. I couldn’t imagine wearing it against my skin.

This is where the creative, awesome, more talented and more experienced seamstress, Judy stepped in. “Why don’t you just line it with that old shirt there?” It was an extra large, extra soft blouse that had already been partially used for sewing. Hmm, why not indeed! It was perfect. It fixed my scratchy interfacing issue AND used up some of the shirt that had been haunting my stash for over a year.

I’m hoping I can get this little number sewn up soon. There are a lot of non-sewing related things going on lately that need to some first. I sure do miss my normal crafting binges. I am just about to start painting the mural here in Ames. All the coordination, planning, and city hoop-jumping is taking up too much of my time. I can’t wait to be post-mural. :) Or at least I want the painting to start…that’s the fun part!

That’s the wonderful thing about Craft Leftovers. It gets me to keep working on these projects. I know if I keep checking back with all of you on this freaking shirt it will eventually get done. Then we can all celebrate the long road called “creative process.” Haha.

Do you have any projects sitting on the back burner while you figure out what to do next? Figuring out the next step is usually what puts my projects into solitary confinement.

Happy sewing!

:: Kristin Roach ::