I made these St. Patrick’s Day Shrinky Dink necklaces and pins to spiff up St. Patty’s garb just a little bit.
Of all the holidays, St. Patrick’s Day is among the least classy when it comes to accessories and my sweet Irish-home-Chicago is a prime offender — gaudy glitter clover headbands, shiny green and gold beads, beer-logo-strewn clothing, face painting and the like are de rigur. And I’ll say it: if you’re over 23 you are too old to wear these or these, please and thank you.
Now I’m not claiming that my Shrinky Dink necklaces are totally chic but they sure beat clover earrings and leprechaun sweatshirts. Oof.
I made an assortment of Irish-inspired charms including a map of Dublin in both circles and squares and some St. Patrick’s Day Irish sayings – Kiss Me, Irish, Craic, Lucky. I also made a charm from this photo that my sister took on our trip to Ireland – it’s a clover made out of horseshoes that we saw in Dingle. Love.
We all know that Shrinky Dinks are fun to make no matter your age. I still love making Shrinky Dinks like these lucky rabbit’s foot napkin rings. And these St. Patrick’s Day necklaces are just as cute on the kids.
Hooray for celebrating all the new babies out there! And for one lucky reader, the celebration is going to look super well designed, thanks to Minted who is giving away your choice of either 25 flat Baby Shower Invitations or 25 flat Birth Announcements plus free ground shipping to one lucky MerrimentDesign.com reader.
Remember when I made personalized wrapped sugar cubes to go with my friend Debbie’s shower gift? I’m still obsessed. And this time I made a video to show you exactly how to fold paper rectangles to make individually wrapped sugar cubes. Watch the video and let me know what you think – it’s my first with a voiceover (so self-conscious).
Keep reading for free Def Leppard-inspired wrapped sugar cube printables for you! During trial-and-error of looking at photos of vintage wrapped sugar cubes and experimenting with wrapping I couldn’t get “Pour Some Sugar On Me” outta my head.
C’mon, you know you love this song. Maybe like me you were, ahem, in high school when it came out, and it was one of your varsity volleyball team’s key warm-up songs (and we wondered why the football team always came to watch us). So here are free printable sugar cube wrappers for you that feature choice “Pour Some Sugar on Me” lyrics:
“Pour some sugar on me”
“I’m hot sticky sweet”
“You and me babe hey hey”
“Little miss sugar me yeah”
“Sweet to taste saccharine”
“Sometime anytime sugar me sweet”
“You got peaches I got the cream”
“One lump or two?”
So I like oilcloth, laminated cotton, PUL fabric and oil canvas but let’s face it, they can be a real pain in the ass to sew. Case in point: using pins will leave a permanent teeny hole in whatever you’ve made. You can try to put your pins so they’ll be hidden within the seam allowance. Or you can be a little more resourceful.
I’m using some oil canvas right now to make a Play-Doh mat for my daughter Elise. I really want to buy the Clover Wonder Clips but (1) it’s really snowing out so no trekking to the store for me, (2) I don’t want to wait 2 days for Amazon to arrive, and (3) OK so I’m cheap and want to buy it with a 40% off coupon (check out using code AE2121).
So in the meantime I went into the bathroom, grabbed a handful of those metal barrettes that snap shut and guess what? They worked like a charm! They not only easily held together two layers of fabric plus bias tape but also stayed tight with no marks once removed.
Hooray for snow-bound resourcefulness. What sewing hacks can you share with everyone?
Hop to it and make these cute little fuzzy bunny slippers from recycled felted wool sweaters to keep the kid in your life snuggly warm. This free slipper pattern features a cute little face with floppy ears on the slipper toe…
…and a little tail on the slipper back.
The snuggly wool interior and no-slip slipper bottom make for safe hopping on hardwood floors.
I saw some animal slippers over the holidays and thought I could sew up an even more cute and comfy version for my 2-1/2 year old daughter, Elise, from items already in my craft closet. So I felted some wool sweaters to recycle the sweaters into more useful things, choosing the green super soft felted sweater for these slippers.
You can use my free bunny slipper sewing pattern as a base to make all kinds of creatures – bears, cats, dogs, you name it. And the bunny slipper sewing pattern can be sized up on a copier for bigger kids or kids-at-heart. Hippity hoppity!
