New Year, New Look, New Giveaway!

Hello! I'm back! We had a very busy, very snotty, very fun, very exhausting Christmas break. I got a shiny new Nirve bike from my husband (who also happens to be a designer at Nirve ;), Season 5 of LOST, money for some fresh drawers, and books, books, books.
I did manage to squeeze in some time to do a site makeover, and with the help of the Three Column Blogger, my Blogger site is now a stylin' Wordpress wannabe. Which I love, because now I won't have to pay for Wordpress! If you read me through an RSS feed, you should come on over and check it out because there's lots of fun new goodies in my sidebars. I also finally joined Twitter, and you can see my recent Tweets over in the left column. If you're not already doing it, you should follow me on Twitter. If Twitter's not your bag, scroll down a little further and you can keep up with me on on Facebook or Google Friend Connect.
One of the books I received was Bend-the-Rules Sewing by your (second) favorite blogger and mine, Amy Karol. I was inspired by her zip pouch tutorial and made this little beauty:



Meet Svetlana. Isn't she a cutie? The appliquéd girl came from a piece of fabric I bought last year. It was one of those cut'n'sew patterns where you're supposed to cut out the printed images along the dotted lines and sew them together to make a stuffed doll or, in this case, circus-themed puppets. The bag is fully lined and measures approximately 8" x 8", and I should note that it is a pouch, not a purse (i.e. no handles or strap). AND she could be yours! That's right--it's giveaway time again! All you have to do to enter is leave a comment on this post before next Thursday, January 7, 2010, at 11:59PM PST. But, wait, there's more! Twitter followers will be automatically entered into this drawing, so if you leave a comment AND follow me on Twitter, that's two chances to win! Do it before next Wednesday, when I will randomly select a winner.



AND, if you want one more entry into the pot, tweet about the giveaway. I'll even make it easy for you, you can cut'n'paste this right here:

Hideous! Dreadful! Stinky! @stinky_crafter is giving away a super cute handmade zip pouch: http://bit.ly/win_svetlana

No need to tell me in the comments, as long as you include @stinky_crafter in your tweet, I'll know that you did it!

Giveaway closes on Thursday, January 7, 2010, at 11:59PM PST.
Winner will be announced on Thursday, January 7, 2010.
This giveaway is open to everyone, including international participants.
I will announce the winner on my blog and make every attempt to contact the winner (you may wish to leave your email address in your comment, or a place where I can message you via facebook, twitter, etsy, etc.) If the winner doesn't respond within 10 days, a new winner will be chosen.

Good luck and Happy New Year!

Clay Ornaments

This weekend I completed a project with the boys making some clay Christmas tree ornaments to give as gifts. We used a simple baker's clay recipe, and they were both very engaged with helping me roll out the dough and cut out the shapes with cookie cutters. Milo tried to eat the dough a little bit, but it was pretty salty, so he stopped after just one tiny nibble. The final baked ornaments puffed up more than I would have liked, but otherwise I found this dough to be very easy to work with, pliable and not too sticky. I read a suggestion somewhere that if you let the dough air dry for several hours before you bake it it will be less likely to puff up in the oven.
This also became my first painting project with both boys. I started painting with Huck when he was about 18 months old and I remember being surprised at how interested he was in it, and that it wasn't all that messy of an ordeal. Now that Huck is 3 and Milo is 18 months, I felt brave enough to give painting a go with both of them. Not the best idea! Huck was great, for the most part. He sat nicely and talked to himself painted the whole time. He got up a few times with a loaded paintbrush, but was good about listening to me when I asked him to not touch anything. Milo, on the other hand, lasted about ten minutes before painting ornaments got boring and fingerpainting on the kitchen cabinets seemed like a much better idea! When I stopped him, he started grabbing wet ornaments off of the table and throwing them on the floor in an angry fit. That kid is really something else! After that, Huck told me, "I am a very good painter, and Milo is a very sad painter."
Anyway, I learned my lesson, and I waited until Milo's nap to add glitter to the ornaments with Huck. By the way, when I glitter with kids, I always mix the glitter in with white glue and then let them "paint" on the glitter with an old paintbrush. You can add a drop or two of warm water, if the glitter soup is too thick. It is less messy and the glitter sticks better than the old glue-then-glitter-then-shake-off-excess-glitter method. Although, some glitters won't look as sparkly of you do the glue/glitter soup mix, but most ultrafine glitters work very well with this method.

Our complete collection:

Minty Chocolate Christmas Tree Spritz Cookies

Have you made your Christmas cookies yet? Lately, I have been stuffing my face with Trader Joe's Peppermint Joe-Joe's crushed into vanilla ice cream. So when I had a cookie exchange come up, I decided to make something inspired by my latest addiction. Now, as a disclaimer I should say that they don't taste like or have the texture of Joe Joe's! But they are very minty and super yummy.
Last Christmas I received a cookie press as a gift and was really excited about it--used it once, loved it, and then put it away and forgot about it. The thing I love about cookie press (or spritz) cookies is that they are just like sugar cookies, but there is no waiting around to chill the dough or messy flouring the table and rolling out the dough that is required of cookie cutter cookies. Of course, your cookies are much smaller with a press, and the designs are limited, but I really enjoy the process of pulling the trigger and squirting out a lump of cookie.
For these cookies, I used the recipe for Chocolate Cookies that came with my press, and then winged it for the mint creme filling. For a little crunch, I think it would also be really tasty to add a few finely crushed peppermint candy canes to the filling (although I would reduce the peppermint extract to 1/2 tsp and taste test from there).

So, without further ado, here's the recipe:

Minty Chocolate Christmas Tree Spritz Cookies
makes 2-3 dozen sandwich cookies

Ingredients

cookies:
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter
1 cup granulated sugar
1 egg
2 Tbs. milk (or water)
2 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
2 1/2 cups all purpose flour, sifted

minty creme filling:
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
2 Tbsp. butter, softened
3/4 tsp. peppermint extract
3-4 drops green food coloring
1/2-1 Tbsp. water*

To make the cookies, preheat oven to 375 F. Combine the butter and granulated sugar in a large bowl and beat until light and fluffy with an electric mixer. Beat in egg, milk, vanilla extract, and salt. Using a spoon, stir in the flour and cocoa powder until well mixed.
Pack dough into the cookie press. Fit with Christmas Tree disk and press dough onto an ungreased, nonstick cookie sheet, one inch apart. Bake until cookies just begin to brown 9-11 minutes. Allow to cool on cookie sheets for 2 minutes, then transfer to a cooling rack.

To make the filling, combine powdered sugar, butter, peppermint extract and food coloring. Stir in just enough water to make it a spreading consistency.

When cookies are completely cool, spread filling on a cookie's flat side. Top with another cookie. Allow to set several hours or overnight.

Store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 4 days.

*if you prefer to use milk instead of water, store your cookies in the refrigerator.

Friday Find: Meylah

So, today's Friday Find is not a list of cool stuff I found on Etsy. I am DONE shopping. Do you hear me? Done!

Almost.

Anyway, I was recently contacted by one of the contributors to Meylah.com who asked to use an image from this here blog. I had never actually heard of Meylah before, so I went to check it out. If you are an artist/crafter/designer/etsian/creative entrepreneur trying to build your online presence, you HAVE to check out this site! They have an amazing collection of tutorials about navigating the various social networking sites, interviews with successful creative bloggers, etsy shop owners and entrepreneurs, advice on how to take great photos of your products, getting in touch with your local creative community and super cute crafting tutorials to boot! It is a young site (I believe it launched in October), but already there is a wealth of information for the budding creative professional. A fantastic resource for many of you guys, I'm sure. Check it out. Good stuff!

Deck the Halls!

Our Christmas tree is a 3-foot tall white tree. It was about $15 at Target. Having two little kids, I can't commit to anything bigger and promise that the decorations will go down anytime before Valentine's Day. It is decorated simply this year with some glass ornaments given to me by my mom and a few sentimental ornaments I've collected through the years. The main focus of the tree, though, is the paper garland which I created with the help of my nieces and nephew (ages 9, 6 and 4) during their visit over Thanksgiving.



I purchased this faux deer head many months ago. I had seen similar heads selling on Etsy for upwards of $200, and decided that I could do something similar myself. Lucky me, I purchased this head for $30 with the intention of covering it in fabric or paper. In preparation to do that, I painted it with a white base coat. But I kind of liked it just white, so I left it that way. For Christmas I added a bird-in-nest ornament and some red Christmas balls hanging off of the antlers. Any name suggestions, by the way? I like to name my fake dead animals.
The felt stockings were something I made last year. I would still like to add our names to them somehow, but I haven't decided how I want to do that and am afraid of messing them up!


And the last picture--Milo and Huck with Santa. This picture SO sums up their personalities.

Friday Find: Gifts for Your True Love

On the twelfth day of Christmas,
my true love sent to me

Twelve drummers drumming,

Handmade Drumsticks $50 from Creative Design Group


Eleven pipers piping,

Vintage Nancy Drew Book Purse Whistling Bagpipes $45.99 from Retro Grandma


Ten lords a-leaping,

Lord Byron Tie Tack $8 from Funcky Love Designs


Nine ladies dancing,

Vintage Japanese Dancing Ladies Cameo $2.50 from mk supplies


Eight maids a-milking,

Two 1960's Maids A Milking Christmas Ornaments $8 from Atty's Vintage


Seven swans a-swimming,

Vintage Crocheted Swan Doily $10 from Ephemera And More


Six geese a-laying,

Heavenly Pearl Drop Faberge Style Decorated Goose Egg $34.99 from eggstreme


Fiiiiiiiiiiiiiive golden rings,

Five Golden Rings $55 from FusedNTwisted


Four calling birds,

Four Calling Birds Custom Address Labels, Shop Stickers, Gift Tags $5.50 from Bohtieque Design


Three French hens,

French Hen Feather Wreath $12 from maka le wakan


Two turtle doves,

Two Turtle Doves Card $4 from Olivia Bossy


And a partridge in a pear tree!

Partridge in a Pear Tree - Holiday Comb $30 from whichgoose

Fuzzy Felted Bangles

I had some leftover merino wool roving from a project I did with my visiting family, so I decided to try my hand at making felted bangles. I followed this video tutorial series on eHow and was very successful on my first attempt. For some reason my second and third bangles were not quite as smooth and even as my first one, but I still think that they came out nicely. I think it would be even easier to wrap the roving around a cheap wood or plastic bangle.

Friday Find: Swine

In honor of the Swine Flu that I am suffering through right now, this week's Friday Finds are piggy themed.
I'll get back to posting my own crafty goodness soon, but our whole household is still down for the count. Also, in case you somehow missed me gushing about it all over facebook or my other blog, my Faux-y Lady scarf got a runner-up prize in the Me, My Scarf and I contest. Yay!
Onward to the swine!


Orwell Clutch - Gunmetal Piggy Purse - Made to Order $80 from TsuruBride



Pig Greeting Card PERSONALIZED for YOU ( A2 4.25 x 5.5 ) $2.50 from MyDearDarling

Salt Pig Handmade Stoneware Pottery $34 from Darrielle's Clay Art


Little Piggy Hat $24 from Kids' Knits by Knittin' Mama


Miss Piggy Ring $6.50 from Much Love, Anna