felt

felt

forever i have wanted to make a felt table runner with punched circles or squares along the edge. [i have also wanted to make a felt tree skirt forever but that is another post] i saw that purl soho had wool felt in a ton of colors but it's less than 1/16" thick and i wanted something more substantial. 

then i found filzfelt.  and now i am obsessed. 

in addition to selling yardage of 1mm, 3mm, and 5mm felt they also fabricate products and interior design pieces. check out these curtain panels and floor mats plus the placemats, ornaments and other goodies on their site.

                           images via filzfelt

i love that felt is so clean and simple and yields such pure, precise forms.

japanese sewing adventure 2

japanese sewing adventure 2

yesterday i had my first sewing class (at modern domestic). it was nice to be able to have someone there to explain each step - wish i could have that for every project! hopefully i'll be able to decipher other japanese patterns. i think the big hurdle will be my inexperience because if i encounter some new task, i'd have to look up elsewhere how to accomplish it and hope i'm doing it in a way that will work with the pattern.

there were just four of us in the class and the teacher was daniela caine who is actually german and speaks no japanese. she just really knows how to sew. i had a very easy project and should have finished it but was kind of taking my time (as usual) and finished up last night and this morning. when i put it together last night my first impression was that it was ridiculously large. but that's the way it's supposed to be, of course. i would like to find something light to wear under it the same way it is shown in the pattern book.

happily, i will probably take another class because i have some more left on my gift certificate ;) i really want to take the class on making jeans!

pies: phases two + three

pies: phases two + three

phase two: pies lined up on the buffet at my aunt's house.

[from l to r ] chocolate pecan tart, pumpkin, pumpkin chiffon [burned - ugh!], pear ginger, apple - chocolate cream pie was still in the fridge.

the pumpkin and apple pies are just traditional recipes from my mom's 1975 betty crocker cookbook [i found a copy at a yard sale]. the pumpkin chiffon is my grandmother's recipe - it's basically regular pumpkin pie but you beat the egg whites separately into a meringue and then mix them into the pumpkin mixture. the recipe for the chocolate cream pie was from the martha stewart baking handbook. i've never made pudding from scratch before - it is so easy!

and of course phase three is the best...breakfast pie on friday morning!

oh and i totally miscounted the number of crusts i needed to make. turns out i only needed 8 single crusts - not 10.

cornbread stuffing

cornbread stuffing

i made a few recipes from this year's living thanksgiving issue. the first was kale chips that i overcooked and they tasted burned - yuk. definitely chop out the larger stems when making those (note to self!). i also made the cranberry-apple chutney (good but maybe a little vinegery), the farro salad, and the cornbread, bacon, leek and pecan stuffing shown above. trevor's mom handled the rest of the dinner (turkey, beans, potatoes) and rose brought desserts. seemed like such an easy thanksgiving! can't wait to see what you concocted :)

ps, have you seen this blog the bitten word?

wreath

wreath

maybe the easiest project ever. martha stewart's pom-pom berry wreath. i used two grapevine wreaths: 18" and 24" and used tangerine and scarlet rit dyes (i already had the scarlet on hand). finally i have a wreath! everything was from michael's. i had been pondering how i might get some lovely branches to make a wreath, but felt like this would work for a few years. if only that awful front door was painted dark brown back there. too cold to attempt that project!

play dough

play dough

kathryn just sent me a link to this great playdough recipe using natural dyes

pies: phase one

pies: phase one

ten batches of pate brisee for thanksgiving pies. i have had a lot of success with this recipe - quick to make in the food processor, easy to roll, and tastes good. 

snow berries

snow berries

first snow and last raspberries

pinhole press

pinhole press

image courtesy of matter now

i have no image for got an image for this from the folks at mohawk papers|matter now. i think the site is really nice [and simple] and the products are really nice - so much simpler than all of the other photo gift sites out there. i really like the skinny little horizontal calendars. a little spendy though. as usual i think, "i could just make that myself" - but i'll never have the time!

coated cotton

coated cotton

here's the coated cotton they have at ikea. i think they just have the dots. i bought a couple yards to put on a new table we got off craigslist that needs to be refinished.

turkey

turkey

erin's mocha came out looking like this at petite provence today

houzz

houzz

home design

this is a project by my old firm in brooklyn i just saw on facebook... have you seen this houzz website?

local living

local living

pears and wine

pears and wine

late night pear poaching for dessert tomorrow evening :)

wow

wow

so I realize this blog is supposed to be about pretty things but I couldn't resist sharing this. we are going to a costume party tonight and the theme is "80s ski party". I picked this little gem up yesterday at salvation army. best $7 I ever spent!

backwards

backwards

sometimes i like to track backwards and see how i got somewhere on the internet. so...i thought of those ork posters because i got an email from perch! [i used to carry their stuff in my shop].

perch! candle holders [via martha stewart]

the perch! email directed me to the martha stewart crafts blog which is having a contest for vendors at their holiday craft fair [perch! is a finalist].

maptote brooklyn tote [via martha stewart]

i saw one of the other finalists, maptote, and their work reminded me of the ork posters. and there you have it.

ork

ork

have i shown you these posters from ork before? i LOVE them. totally reasonably priced too. i should get my brother the brklyn one for christmas.

cozy

cozy

This is the 1 hour project that turned into a 3 hour project after a broken needle and an annoying bobbin issue. It's a teapot cozy for Jesse's [belated] birthday gift. I used fabric scraps and insulated batting I had laying around and made up the pattern basing the size on some cozies I found online. Hopefully it fits her teapot which my brother described as "medium".

alluminare

alluminare

In my seemingly unending search for a pendant light I came across alluminare. They don't have what I am looking for but the concept is pretty cool. You can customize your lighting...you pick one of their hundreds of patterns then manipulate all of the colors within the pattern as well as the scale. They also do custom wallpaper and fabric using the same premise.

pop up christmas

pop up christmas

your post made me think of pop ups.

i just saw a pop up christmas card on etsy and it made me want to try one.. i definitely have a mild obsession with pop-ups! i think i need to buy oscar a couple books for xmas even if they get destroyed. they are too fun. here's a couple of my favorite cards on etsy for inspiration.

bankeladen (etsy shop)

cookie bits (etsy shop)

Relydesign (etsy shop)

My Handbound Books (etsy shop)

dform

dform

I've been looking around for pendant lights for a project and this image greeted me on the dform website. It is so bright and cheery - it makes me happy just to look at it - especially on a rainy, gray day like today.

john lautner

john lautner

this is the documentary i was telling you about. lautner was a student of frank lloyd wright and his early projects look very wright-ish in style but eventually his style becomes more his own, though the inside | outside connection is still the underlying design principle in all his projects.

i'm not sure if it talks about the roadside restaurants he did in this trailer, but i found those pretty interesting. lautner's design for googie's restaurant started a trend of 'googie architecture' [a term i had never heard of] which was criticized and dismissed by "serious" architects. i love it - it's the awesome 50's and 60's futuristic, jetsons style of gas stations, coffee shops and bowling alleys.