Making Cards

I recently made some more greeting cards, and I used a technique I found on (good old) Pinterest.  The technique is called "One Sheet Wonder."  The idea is that you take one sheet of decorative paper of your choice, and then cut it according to some given directions.  The result is several cards all using that special paper, with none of the pretty paper wasted.  

(Just go to Pinterest and search for One Sheet Wonder.  There are directions for different sizes of decorative paper, some 6" x 6", some 12" x 12", etc.)

And here are the cards I ended up with.

The directions show you suggestions for how to use the resulting pieces of decorative paper to assemble the cards.  Of course, one can do that, or one can invent some new designs.  I followed some of the suggestions, and made some cards with my own designs.

A few close-ups now.  I really liked this way of using little tiny 1" squares.  

Here I added a piece of doily and a little flower with a brad.

All of the suggested card layouts were quite precise, exact, planned out, centered designs.  This was the last card I made, and I decided to do something a little more "haphazard."  And I really like it!

I'm sure I'll use this technique again.  It's a good way to get a lot of cards made efficiently, and to work in a series.

Five-Minute Craft

This really does take only about five minutes!  Super simple.  And, no machine needed.  (Although you could use it, if you'd prefer.)

I found this cute little denim "container" on good old Pinterest.  Here is the link.

You start with the bottom leg portion of some jeans.  The hem on the jeans makes for a nice finished edge on the top of the resulting container.  Below you can see that I'm hand-stitching the upper portion of the leg together.

Next I pushed open the sewn-up leg and sewed across the shorter ends to box off the bottom of the container.

This is just a view of the other side of this boxing-off seam.  You can see where the hand-sewn seam intersects the side seam of the jeans.

Then simply turn it right side out, fold down the top a little, and sew on a button if you like.  Or a pin.  Or a brooch.  Or a ribbon bow. Or a different kind of embellishment.  

I've been using this on my sewing table to toss in little scraps that are big enough to cut into 2" x 2" squares.

I should add that I used a pair of my own jeans for this project.  I could get a bigger denim container if I used a pair of MisterStitches's jeans, because they have a wider leg.