Wednesday, April 7, 2010

been busy

Life moves along and sometimes you lose track of things...like your blog. Working on my mom's new blog (located here) has renewed my inspiration and here I am, writing on my own blog again. Looking at my galleries, I think of all the things I've made since my last update. So many projects I don't know where to start! I'm not limiting myself to just paper these days. I have a growing stash of fabrics I've had to find a place to store and I invested a whopping $3 on a new glue gun. It's a cute little guy :O)

I know where I'll start...one of my dogs ate my pin cushion! Max (the lab) decided it looked tasty (tomato shaped, he's not the brightest crayon in the carton) so he took a bite. Did you know those pin cushions are full of sawdust? I didn't either. SO, I needed a new pin cushion. I had an empty almond can (thanks becca!) and fabric left over from another project*.


I covered the outside of the can with some self-adhesive fabric from my scrapbooking stash. I cut a circle of cardboard the same size as the lid. I hot glued a fluffy blob of fiberfill stuffing onto the circle. I cut a circle of fabric approximately 2x larger than the lid size (ended up being 6 inches across) and centered it over the fiberfill. Next I hot glued the edges of the fabric to the underside of the cardboard, creating a fat pillow with a cardboard base. Have I mentioned how much I love my new glue gun? It's low temp so I can manipulate the glue with my fingers (or press fabric directly onto it) without burning the heck out of myself. Of course, this only holds true if you don't touch the TIP of the glue gun. ouch. cuticle burn.


Once I had my fat pillow/pincushion top, I cut a long strip of fabric (3x the perimeter of the lid) folded it in half along the length, and hot glued as I gathered it to the underside of the cardboard, creating the ruffle.

I filled the can with aquarium gravel to keep it from tipping, then hot glued the lid on. I hot glued the padded pillow/cardboard piece on top and here we go!



*Fabric remnant is thanks to my amazing sister-in-law Tracy! She made me an awesome-wicked-cool ribbon board using this fabric, and gave me the leftovers so I could use it for other projects. Now, my pincushion matches my ribbon board! and I still have gobs of fabric left.

SO, I will try not to be a stranger, in fact, you may get sick of my posting projects soon. Just a warning.

Linking it up:





7 comments:

Ann @ makethebestofthings said...

Love this little pin cushion and now I have to make one! I'll just dump the almonds in a baggy so I can get to it. Love that the skully is right on top so the kids can stab him and you know they will. Who knew a pin cushion could be so cute?

Jingle said...

Holy cute! I love this so much! I like to make them from little jars and bottle caps! It's just so much fun!!!

Unknown said...

so cute, and made from something you were going to throw away! excellent!

Snuggly Monkey said...

Super cute! I got a pin cushion for christmas made from felted wool w/ wool roving as the "cushion" part. So many different ways to tackle the same project.

Thanks for stopping by, glad you like the fabric origami!

Atasha said...

Ooooh I really need to make one of these! I love the fabric and it came out great

BLJ Graves Studio said...

I love your pin cushion! So much nicer than the tomato shaped ones (like the one I have)... I am going to give this a try. Thanks for the inspiration. :-)

Sarah @ The Pumpkin Patch said...

what a cute pin cushion! And I love the yo-yo's you used. I sewed about 150 yo-yo's in college to make a quilt, but never finished it. I guess now I know what I can use them for! Thanks for stopping by my blog and joining my linky party. Hope to see you every week!