Thompson Family-Life

More Ornament Collections

I found this vintage lot on Etsy or Ebay a couple years ago. Perfect colors? Check. Felt and flocking? Check. The perfect dose of kitsch? Check.

This set of ornaments were handmade by my friend Karen. Her shop is closed for the holidays, but hopefully you can stock up on some ornaments for next year when she reopens! These are just as exquisite in person as they look in this photo. They are lovingly handmade with the most thoughtful and careful craftmanship. These are probably my most favorite ornmanents I own. (Thank-you Karen!)

I found this handmade needlepoint plastic canvas lot on Ebay or Etsy last year, or the year before. I LOVE these. I always try to imagine the person that made them. I love the little Santa shadow boxes. They are just all too perfect.

See more of our ornament collections here.

I'm not sure what it is about this time of year, but I'm crafting and making things like a mad-woman. There's always this almost compulsive desire to MAKE things. I love it. I always cram in too many projects in a short amount of time, but I wouldn't have it any other way! I love the busyness of this time. I love seeing everyone else's busyness. Everything is rush, rush, rush, and that just adds to the excitment of things for me. 

I'm hoping to get some good photos of our decorations in the next couple days. I'm running out of time! Our decor always seems to change in some small way every year. I like changing things up. 

On a sad note, my Cambpell is still so sick! :*( We're going on three weeks of a horrible, horrible cough. I took him to urgent care last night, but his oxygen is good and his lungs sound fine for as bad as he sounds with the coughing. I'm going to look into seeing an allergist for possible reflux causing the cough. The doctor at the ER said the cough could persist for more weeks! But he's missing school because he has coughing fits constantly. Anyone else have a child with chronic cough like this due to reflux? He's been on steroids, antibitiocs, breathing treatments, the works, and nothing seems to give him relief. It breaks my heart.

Doll Crazy

I've had dolls on the brain lately! I've always been fascinated by handmade dolls and doll construction. I've always wanted to make cloth dolls, but felt so intimidated by them. They require so many steps, embroidering the facial features, using the sewing machine (my nemesis!), stuffing parts, yarn hair... it just seems so skeery, right? Haha, I know. They don't really look that hard to make, I've just never commited to making one. But as you've seen on my blog, I have a thing for dolls! I just love them, especially vintage-inspired ones. Even though I've kind of lost interest in my Blythes (GASP, I know... hopefully temporarily), I'm super excited about jumping into this world of doll-making.

That rag doll on the far left in this photo is amazing! I wish I still had it! : )

I found these A-MAZING sewing doll patterns in a vintage craft book I found a few weeks ago at a thrift store. It's from The Complete Encyclopedia of Crafts series, Volume 21, copyright 1975. I love how HUGE these dolls are! Like big pillows. I'm determined to make one. I favor the horse, the cat is cute, too, but...

 

 

... *THIS* GIANT lion pillow!! Ohmagah. So awesome. I want to make this for the boys. I showed it to Ethan and he was like "uh-huuuh." I think what's so perfect about these is the combination of patterned fabrics and colors. 

 

 

These are cute, too, from Better Homes & Gardens, Gifts to Make Yourself, 1972 book. My favs are Humpty (the braided yarn legs and arms, and little tuft of yarn hair, and gingham body! eek!) and also Hansel & Gretel.

 

Honestly, the biggest problem I have is finding the time to make things. I know so many people feel this way. Life moves so fast.. you know, in the words of Ferris Bueller "Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it." Or miss out on making dolls. ; )

I tend to stick with short turnaround projects because I know I can get them done fast. Sometimes I just don't feel like I have the time to commit to anything I can't finish in a few hours. That makes me sad. Becoming a small business owner this year has really depleted a lot of my free time... not to complain, because I love the work! I know we all feel this way, don't we? Never enough time in the day. 

But you know what? I vow to make more time for these projects I've always wanted to try. To make the time. I think when you're your own boss, it's hard to put restrictions on when you can and can't work, you know? You're sort of always working, in between all the other things that life requires (being a parent, hello?!)

So recently, I found some felt doll patterns on Etsy that I'm going to make. I figured I would start with something easy (no machine sewing!), and it's something I can make while watching shows at night on the couch. And felt is so user-friendly. I'm really excited.

Here's to trying new things and making time.

vintage bedspread crochet pattern progress

I made some more progress on my crochet bedspread on our vacation. I still have quite a lot to go (we have a king sized bed!) but it's nice to see it looking like a blanket finally. I've posted some progress photos over the past 6 months or so here and here. Here's the vintage pattern I've been using. I love it! I can't wait to add that pompom trim.

I took these pics at the beachhouse (hence the gross carpet and awful bedspread... I've been spoiled by having hardwoods throughout our home, I hate carpet! We've been house-hunting and I'm realizing I might not be able to avoid it in our next home since we're looking at a lot of homes built in the 70's and most don't have original hardwoods)...

This has been such a fun project. If I'm really ambitious, I might be able to finish this by the time it gets cold again around here. (crosses fingers) The yarn is pretty chunky so the octagons work up pretty fast and those little popcorn flowers are so much fun to make.

This blanket will replace this quilt (old pics below) I had custom-made a couple years ago. The back of the quilt started tearing apart because vintage sheets were used and one was a bit too used. (sad face) I hope to have it repaired one day, but it will be nice having something new on the bed. I can't help but dream about how I'll be decorating this room when we buy a new home. This room is one of the few rooms I think I'd keep pretty much the same. I've been happy with it. Now all the other rooms? That's a different story! I'm been doing lots of decorating dreaming.

Do you have any fun spring/summer crafts you're working on? I'd love to see! Share some links!

handmade gift

It was my good friend Heather's birthday last week and I knew I wanted to make her something. Of course, the first thing that came to mind was to stitch up one of these cute cross-stitch pendants! When I think of Heather, I think of 70's style (she rocks it) full of 70's motifs and colors. So I came up with this butterfly design in orange, mustard yellow, avocado & olive green, and brown.

I always have high hopes of handmaking gifts, but my spare time is so... spare. So these really are the perfect idea - still with that handmade touch, but it doesn't take you forever to complete. I backed it with mustard wool felt and attached a chain I found at Michaels Crafts. I'll be putting together a pattern for this butterfly if you'd like to stitch up one of your own. You can buy the pendants here. I'll have that posted soon!

Cross-Stitch Pendants

I bought some of these wooden laser cut cross-stitch pendants many months ago from The Workroom and when I came across this project on Pinterest this weekend, I remembered that I needed to stitch some up! This is what I worked on during my hotel holiday weekend I mentioned. Even though they are relatively fast projects (it's not like you're making a quilt!) the did take me many hours a piece, but I was entertained with movies. These two little guys were serious therapy for me. Isn't that funny what crafting can do for a creative soul? It's just what I needed this past weekend.

These pendants were screaming for something 60's or 70's inspired, so I went searching online for some inspiration. I had no patterns, so I needed to come up with something. I stumbled onto these Vintage Japanese Ondori patterns from Gina's Flickr (of Doe-c-Doe). She has the most incredible collection of all kinds of vintage things, especially vintage craft books.

These Ondori stitch books are hard to come by, but I have procured a couple from Ebay/Etsy in the past. I used her photos as a guide and then asked her if it was okay for me to post about these on my blog. The good news is that I ordered an Ondori stitch book this weekend off Ebay and both of these patterns ended up being in it, along with a ton of other fantastic, small patterns that will work perfectly for more of these pendants. I can see these becoming my go-to-gift-craft. They are easy and fast to finish and so satisfying for that reason. I have SO many unfinished huge projects lying around, it's nice to find something that can be finished in a weekend. I can see these becoming addictive!

I bought some 36" chains at Michaels for these. I like the idea of them being long necklaces. I already have ideas for the next one I make. I guess I need to buy some more blank pendants!

If you end up making some of these, my tip would be to use three threads of regular embroidery thread (instead of the entire six) or you can also use cotton thread. I used that as well. I also used a cross-stitch needle. It was small enough to fit through the small holes in the pendant.

credits: Background patterned paper courtesy American Crafts from Liz Kartchner's new line. Digital Ribbon in intro photo by Minitoko.