Warm Fuzzies

Crafty Goodness in the Mail Part 2: Things I've Sent

As promised, here's the little package that I sent to the wonderful Kari.

A little stripey sock dog, and apple cozy for Kari's mom (she has a "P" name and is just as awesome and crafty as her daughter).  I haven't really sent out many packages or letters through snail mail before, so I didn't have any nice stationary sets and cards on hand.  I know, bad, bad, Shirley.  So, I made do with what I had available, broke out my colored pencils, and drew a little card.  The dog's supposed to be a Shiba Inu, like Kari's dog Ginger, Crafty Ginger's little star.

    

Just as I was about to embroider eyes on the sock dog, I was struck with an idea...I could leave the dog unfinished, and leave Kari with the option of embroidering features of her choice.  And I'm so glad I didn't finish him; I would have chosen something boring...plain old black circles, most likely.  Kari's going to embroider sleepy eyes on him - I would have never thought of that, but it'd be *so* adorable.

And, hehe, I'm really ashamed to admit this, but the package that I sent to Kari wasn't put-together nicely like the one she sent me.  Everything I sent her was, get this, shoved into a plastic grocery bag, and stuffed into a Priority Mail envelope.  *cough*  Lucky for me, Kari's an angel and didn't scold me for it.  But I'm not always this awful at presentation, honest!  (Then again, there were all those years in college where my friends and I would put birthday gifts under a blanket, consider that "gift-wrapped", and let the poor recipient lift the blanket to "unwrap" her presents...)

 

This is the little something that I sent to Anna, along with some munchies, as a thank you for the quilted pencil case she had sent to me.  The two little birds are made with polymer clay, and are meant to be table-toppers.  And the card...well, Anna has two adorable birds in London, and a cat named Booty in the U.S.  I don't know how I got it in my head that they all lived together, but there you go.  Heh, I'm sure all her animals would get along if they every were in a room together, but it's fun to let your imagination run away at times, right?

I actually drew Kari's card and Anna's card on the same day.  The way I saw it in my head was that if you put the two cards side by side, they'd read as a single picture.

   

Heh, it kind of works, right?  =)

Crafty Goodness in the Mail Part 1: Packages I've Received

I woke up this morning to a most lovely surprise.  Kari, the superstar over at Crafty Ginger, gave me the heads up last night that a package she had sent out should be arriving any day now.  After a whole night of anticipation, I jumped out of bed this morning - disheveled, unshowered, but oh-so-excited - and rushed to the lobby floor to greet "the mail guy" in my PJ's.  My heart skipped a beat when I saw that a package was waiting for me in the mailroom.  I quickly signed my name, grabbed my package, raced back up to my apartment, and attacked the box with some scissors.

I greedily emptied the box of all its contents.  Just look at all these lovelies!  There's a gorgeous pair of hand-made earrings (made by Kari and her mom), a Crafty Ginger tsumami kanzashi wristlet, yummy ribbons for my stash, and a hand-made card (from a Craftster swap).  Kari also thoughtfully included two giant bags of Flamin' Hot Cheetos (my secret vice...I literally drooled when I saw them...isn't that awful?).

Here's a close-up of the earrings, and the note that accompanied them.  I LOVE these earrings!  They're so me, it's scary.  The iridescence of the pearly beads, the extra hint of purple from the smaller bead, and the skill with which they were crafted fascinates me.  I put them on immediately, and they instantly added class to my pajamas.

    

Here's the piece d'ressistance: The tsumami kanzashi flower wristlet that Kari will eventually sell in her etsy shop.  Look, it's made (with care, hehe) just for me!  Woot!  Her packaging's simply marvelous, and I love the color scheme.  One of my *favorite* color combinations is lavender and green.  Kari, how did you know?

   

I love everything about this wristlet - the ribbon band, the buttons, the carefully-made flowers.  As you can see in the picture, each kanzashi flower has a button at it's base, so you can change them to suit your mood.  Nifty, huh?  And there's more!  Kari also included a pincushion with a button on its back, so I can just pop that on and sew my heart away at my fancy.  (What a great idea, might I add).

That's my right wrist making it's modeling debut.  Isn't the wristlet lovely?  Bwahahah, and it's mine, all mine!  *cackle*  Kari, I am so sure these will sell like hotcakes when you do get around to listing them in your shop.  Thank you so much!!  I'm still not over how wonderful I felt opening your package.  Everything inside is so special.  You are awesome.

While I'm on the subject of crafts and mail, Anna sent me a lovely little package a little ways back.  It came with the cutest mailing label, ever!  It's a beagle from her Some Dogs (c) illustration.  I was a little peeved that the people in the mail room heartlessly wrote my apartment number over the label, ruining it's perfection.  *sigh*  I suppose I'm over that now...well, as over it as I'm ever going to be, at any rate.

   

And here are the goodies inside:  A wonderful pink patchwork pencil case, two gel pens, and some fruity gummy candy.

I've been using the case to store my crochet hooks; it's the perfect size for them.  Haha, not at all uncharacteristic of me, I immediately ate the candy...so delicious!  Thanks a bunch, Anna! 

Stay tuned tomorrow for "Crafty Goodness in the Mail Part 2: Things I've Sent."

Coasters and Chocolate and Pudding, Oh my!

My parents were in town all last week, and I've been having such a blast with them (eating, shopping, watching shows, living the good life) that I just cut loose and didn't do much else...for 9 days.  It was just what I needed to end a busy summer and kick-off the fall.

But now my parents have returned to California (*sniff sniff*), and I've gotten back into the swing of things.  Well, okay, that's not entirely true.  My list of neglected chores gets longer by the day; I have errands galore, an empty refrigerator to fill, and a pile of laudry high enough for the princess not be able to feel the pea underneath the mess.  But I did manage to start to ease myself back into the crafting groove.

I've had this project bookmarked and on my mental list of to-do's for a while.  I didn't own any coasters (my poor tabletops suffered for it), and had an abundance of throwaway CDs lying around, so this was the perfect project.  I only made one (I intend to use it as part of another project that I've been dying to work on...more on that later), but I'm planning on making a whole set of them.  In green, of course. Can't wait to put my soon-to-be-made coasters to good use.

A little while ago, I promised Hershey bookmarks to a couple (and by a couple, I mean two) people.  Well, I purchased the Hershey bars right away, but didn't have a chance to finish the bookmarks until early this morning.  And what did I do with the milk chocolate? Voila!  I give you Spoon Candy.

I found this image while browsing through collections of old food labels online (having my parents around made me feel nostalgic for things of the past).  Apparently, Spoon Candy was quite popular as a treat for children in the 70's.  I've never had it before, but my interest had been stirred, and I immediately decided to make a little Spoon Candy for myself.

The original product's been discontinued for quite a bit of time, but I figured that it'd be easy enough to make something similar.  Since Spoon Candy was originally a Jello product, I just used Jello pudding for the base.  For the chocolate layer on top, I just melted the chocolate from my two Hershey bars with a touch of butter.  Ah, so quick and easy.  And the result? 

Pretty tasty, if I do say so myself.  I even ate the chocolate layer...all of it.  It's nice to set food snobbery aside and enjoy something simple and fuss-free once in a while.

Jello Spoon Candy (serves 4-6)

• 1 (3 oz.) package of vanilla flavored Jello instant pudding
• 2 cups fat free milk
• 2 (1.55 oz.) bars of Hershey milk chocolate, broken into pieces
• 1-2 tbsp unsalted butter
• 4-6 ramekins, or other small containers

1. Put the instant pudding in a bowl, gradually add the milk, stirring with a whisk while you do so.  Continue whisking for 2 to 3 minutes, until the pudding is thickened. 
2. Divide the pudding evenly between the ramekins.  Refrigerate, uncovered, until firmly set.  (This will take 45 minutes to an hour).
3. When the pudding is set, take the ramekins out of the fridge and set them on the counter.  In a small saucepan, combine the butter and chocolate.  Turn the heat to low, and hold the pan over the flame, a few inches above the stove.*  Stir constantly with a wooden spoon, until the chocolate is melted.
4. The refrigerator chill should have left the pudding by now.  Spoon between 1 and 2 tbsp (depending on the size of your ramekins) of the melted chocolate on top of the pudding, and swirl the dish around a little to make a nice, even layer.  Return the ramekins to the fridge for 5-10 minutes, until the chocolate layer hardens.
5. Break out the spoons and dig in!

* You can use a double boiler to melt the chocolate, too.  I've found that when melting just a small amount of chocolate, the method I described above does the trick.

Love is in the Air

Even though it's hardly spring time and we're rapidly approaching fall (yay, my favorite time of year!), the love between these two little birdies is just starting to bloom.

Harold and Sandy first met on the arm of a futon; they were both new to the area and interested in meeting a few of the other birds in town.  Fact: futons are to birds as bars are to humans...in my apartment, anyway.  Harold is convinced that he saw Sandy openly staring at him first, but Sandy insists that she only started noticing Harold because he was constantly ogling her.

Harold is by no means shy, and since he knew that he was in posession of a great singing voice, he quickly approached Sandy and courted her with song.  But Sandy was no bird brain, she didn't really warm up to Harold until she had a better idea of his intentions.  After all, futons really aren't the safest of places, and Sandy knew that she had to keep her guard up.

Harold was so straightforward and genuine that Sandy soon found herself completely at ease with him.  She began to open herself up to him, and he to her.  They talked about anything and everything that night, and the two of them have been inseparable ever since.

I crocheted Harold and Sandy based on an image from this book that had been posted in an auction on eBay.  I thought that the birds were adorable, and figured that they were basically giant eggs with a couple of added embellishments.  So I took a crack at making one (Harold) by the "wing it" method.  Since then, I was able to get my hands on an actual copy of the book (lots of other great projects in there!), and Sandy was born.  This explains why they don't match exactly (Harold's wings are a little "special").  But they looked past their differences, and are happy as amigurumi birds can be.