This week's Try It Tuesday is a major blast from the past! This book, Softies by Therese Laskey, was one of the first sewing books I got after I became really interested in sewing a couple of years back.
After I had some minor surgery on my knee, I was so anxious to make the tooth from this book that I used a piece of extra bandage.
I love this project so much that I've made several over the years! The top tooth was made for a friend who was having her wisdom teeth removed. I made the hockey tooth for my husband. I love his black eye!
This week Don Henley makes his triumphant return to the sad song list! I'm sure I have at least one more untapped Henley reference, and that's not even counting "Sunset Grill."
Anyway, to me this song is about how something is about to slip away, never to be retrieved. In this case, the object in question is "our love." It's clever to equate their love with the summer because everyone alive can relate. Summers are generally considered to be a time filled with fun and unusual things that probably wouldn't happen in other seasons. Not to mention that the "summer" portion of your life is the time that you reach adolescence and would be likely to experience your first love. Impressive underlying associations, Don Henley!
This is the perfect song for closing time when you're working at an outlet mall near a seasonal town during the fall. It's starting to get darker earlier as you fold all those t-shirts. You're starting to need a coat to travel home. So when the radio starts playing this song, everything seems especially depressing.
HAPPY: Thin Lizzy- The Boys Are Back In Town
To counteract all that Don Henley, here's one of the happiest songs ever!
It's so easy to have happy feelings about a song that has been in nearly every movie ever made. Correction: it's been in every movie ever made since it was written.
It seems that various accounts exist regarding the meaning behind the song, but they all relate to men coming home from a life changing event (i.e. war). It's an obviously upbeat song, but it also has the comforting idea that you CAN go home again. People and places haven't changed! Everyone missed you! And we all know that sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name.
I would love this song even if it was awful, due to the following lyrics:
And that time over at Johnny's place
Well this chick she got up and slapped Johnny's face
This week I have a different kind of Wednesday Want- a destination! I really want to go to Kings Dominion near Richmond, Virginia!
I grew up nearby and we used to have season passes every summer. Some weeks we would go more than once since we had friends that also had season passes.
It's changed a lot there over the years, but I could still find my way around with my eyes closed! :)
One of my clutches just got featured in a new treasury, so I thought it would be fun to try out the CraftCult.com treasury tool and document them all! If you'd like to see the rest, they're after the jump.
I love this tutorial! I've been buying Stitch Magazine for a while, but this is the first project that I saw and immediately had to make.
My sewing desk is often a mess, so anything that can get important items out of the chaos is awesome!
The tutorial is several pages long, but here's the gist of it. Find a large embroidery hoop. (I bought mine at A.C. Moore for $1.69.) Choose your fabrics. Fold one over and press to make the pocket area. Pin and sew at intervals to create the pockets. Cut a piece of regular old batting (the tutorial called for fusible fleece-and I say "no thanks") and place it behind fabric on top of the inner hoop. Secure fabric and batting inside of hoop. Cut extra batting as close to the hoop as you can. Glue along the top edge of the hoop to secure everything. Cut off any additional fabric.
I've got so many ideas for future wall pockets! :)
Of course, I just couldn't help myself in the face of souvenirs (or fabric).
As promised, here's my stash from Asheville, NC! Most of the souvenirs are from various gift shops along the Blue Ridge Parkway where we went hiking. The motorcycle postcard is my favorite! The postcard with the baby/pig on it is an advertisement for the product that made the owner of the Grove Park Inn rich. The print is from the awesome Woolworth Walk. The pouch made of measuring tape and the "Yay! Asheville!" magnet are from Malaprop's Bookstore.
I also got to visit two awesome fabric stores while in Asheville. I love, love, love being able to see "designer" fabric in person!
The first store I visited was Kitsch Fabrics on Haywood Road. They had a great selection of unusual fabrics, some of which you can see above. (I can't remember the designers off the top of my head-other than the Jay McCarroll mushrooms. Email me if you're really curious and I'll check out the selvedges.)
The other store I visited was Waechter's Silk Shop. By visit, I mean run down the road to 14 minutes before they close and make a giant stack of bolts. :)
Those red wagons remind me so much of PeeWee Herman!
I was so excited that they had the "Prom" print from Michael Miller! The Tammis Keefe tribute fabrics from Michael Miller are so adorable. I can't wait to find the perfect project for all this new fabric!
(Did I miss any amazing fabric stores in Asheville? Let me know so I can visit next time!)
