Design by Night

Setting the table for a nice dinner? Well take that place mat, turn it into a purse and go out to dinner instead! Place mat purses are quick and simple sewing projects, plus they make great conversations pieces. Follow these simple steps and repurpose that place mat in to a purse.

What you will need:
Place mat (pick one with a little stiffness to the fabric)
Purse Handles
Foot of Grosgrain Ribbon
Sewing Machine
Coordinating Color Thread
Scissors
Straight Pins
Fold right sides of the place mat together and sew up the two side edges (fig. A).Keeping the place mat inside out, flatten the bottom corners. Center the side seams and sew a straight line across the corner about 2” up from the corner tip (fig. B).Cut the grosgrain ribbon in four 3” strips. Pull each strip through the ends of the handles to create tabs.Center each handle on alternate sides of the purse body, pinning the tabs on the wrong side of the fabric. Stitch across the tabs to attached them to the purse. Stitch again to reinforce…

Living in a day and age where scrapbooking has become big business and a page isn’t complete without elaborate embellishments, it is hard to remember a time when a scrapbook was simply a book filled with scraps of paper. Not purchased paper with themes, instead a visual story told with fragments of matchbooks, paper clippings and other free found objects.


Recently I was pleasantly reminded of this when I cleaned my craft room. I came across a box of old family photos and in this box was a scrapbook made by Diane L. (my mother) in 1954. The scrapbook tells a tale of nine year old Diane’s family vacation where they drove from Baltimore to Las Vegas. Not only does it capture a moment in my mother’s life, the collection of menus, matchbooks and free postcards acts as a time capsule in book form. Her scrapbook reminds the viewer that there was a time when every celebrity actually had talent and you could go to the Golden Nugget for a $3.50 prime rib and wash it down with a $.25 Ovaltine.



He…

I love books! Not only are they great for entertaining you on a rainy Sunday afternoon, they are also great for crafting. Generously used books that have seen better days with tattered covers and brittle mustard colored pages are some of my favorites! As far as genre of books to be used for crafting I would have to say cookbooks or text books from the 60’s and 70’s with illustrations.

Using books as a craft supply can be expensive unless you live Baltimore. Thanks to a local book worm with an active social conscience and a love of literacy, we have The Book Thing of Baltimore with the noble mission of placing unwanted books into the hands that want them.

Do I feel guilty tearing up these books instead of reading them? Sometimes, but I always try to choose books that are falling apart or extremely outdated like a 1970’s cookbook or chemistry text book. Furthermore, for every book I take I make sure to bring at least two books in good condition to replace it. Plus, like a good hunter, I …

This past weekend was my first trip to the New Jersey shore, specifically Cape May. Unlike most sea shore towns, Cape May has chosen to keep it’s lower capacity but immensely more appealing, unique historic beach houses and inns rather than building concrete monstrosities for the masses. Unfortunately, most inventory of the local shops do not share the same aesthetics so I was extremely delighted when my nose led me to a shop on Carpenters Lane called Good Scents.
Good Scents is an adorable store that carries everything your mind and body might need to spur creativity, calm down after a stressful day or naturally help those sinus issues. I found the overall aesthetics of the store (especially the scents) to be extremely inspiring.

Here a are a few photos I took but they just don’t do the place justice, if you would like to visit the store it is at 327 Carpenters Lane, Cape May NJ and they have an online shop for their products at www.sensia.com. I especially recommend the purchase of…

So as I sit here two days away from April looking out the window at the drab gray skies I'm wondering when spring will come. I love gardening and have been waiting for a beautiful spring day to get out and play in the dirt.

But since that day has not come, I looked for a little help from my friend Megan from Eternal Etchings in Villas, NJ for some alternative spring gardening. Megan is a great artist whose main canvas is the human body. On several occasions she has drawn and tattooed custom work for me, my husband and our friends. This is a tattoo added to a grouping of flowers that start on my foot and wrap around the back of my ankle.

Hopefully this will inspire you to think of alternative ways to garden yourself even in bad weather.

So here is my spring garden compliments of Megan.

Here is the first half of the tattoo that is on my foot and starts rapping around the back of the ankle:

So on one of my weekend outings I found myself at Wish Me Antiques and Collectibles in Parkville Maryland. If you want odd ball knickknacks, historic postcards or quasi antique finds this is the place to go. The carry nice collectible glassware shelved next to button jars and old pretzel containers full of old matchbooks.

But my find of the day was a $5 grab bag of old jewelry goodies. The bag held lots of good finds that would soon be made into bobby pins that I sell on my Etsy site. But by far my favorite "hidden treasure" of the grab bag was a funny yet fabulous paper clip necklace.

I imagine an underpaid overworked bored receptionist somewhere out there carefully rolling pieces of gingham contact paper around each paper clip just so and arranging them in a flourish at the end.

Although the photos show a co-worker of mine displaying the priceless piece, I am currently wearing this wanna-be Tiffany treasure with pride. Perhaps some of you cubicle dwellers out there will be in…

This past Sunday a friend and fellow Etsy-ian, Jill Popowich, went to a large thrift store to do a little shopping. While Jill was trying on $7 ball gowns I happened to look up and see rows and rows of plastic bags full of naked Barbie bodies and limbs.



Well the little goth girl that lives deep down inside was tickled. Furthermore, within the past six months I have become a fan of Dexter, the kinky and quirky Showtime series about a serial killer with homicidal tendencies hidden in an ordinary façade. Although the bagged dolls were slightly disturbing I found it darkly funny and a bit inspiring so I took out my camera and snapped off a few shots of the Dexter styled mutilated and bagged Barbies.

Since then I have been pondering going back to purchase a bag of dolls to add to my eclectic craft supply collection. So I did a little research to see if any fellow Esty crafters have used dolls and found some great finds that I believe even Tim Burton would be proud to call his own and thought…