pack a lunch

have you noticed all the wonderful reusable lunch bag projects popping up on crafty blogs recently? this one (above) is the adorable embroidered lunch bag from the purl bee, with great step by step instructions as always.

today on whip-up, there's also a round up of other lunch bag tutorials.

i am curious to try this oilcloth version, from skip to my lou.

and along similar lines, this tyvek one from sternlab, via craft.

i'm feeling the urge to sew more, and looking forward to being back in japan in a few weeks, thinking about sewing projects i want to to try...

great PR advice on design*sponge

in addition to curating one of the must-read design blogs, grace bonney of design*sponge has done a lot to support young designers and women in business.

today's 'biz ladies '09' feature on d*s is all about PR, with this great overview by alisa carrol, and more detailed advice about putting together a media kit from the smart ladies of BAKERY. really great concise and insightful advice for anyone with their own crafty business.

good business sense

i finally got around to buying and reading craft inc. by meg mateo ilasco. it's gotten a lot of rave reviews in the blogosphere, and rightly so. this book is an indispensable guide for any crafter thinking about running a business and valuable for whatever stage your business is at. i read it pretty much straight through, and plan to keep it nearby.

BAKERY is also a great new resource for today's crafty business owner. the women behind this new site have a wealth of experience in publishing and marketing, and their blog regularly offers concise tips that are smart and easy.

of course, the switchboards, founded in 2004 to support women in business, is the classic go-to resource for any question you might be having about running a small business.

vote TODAY on change.org to save handmade!

have you been following the news about the c.p.s.i.a.? it stands for 'consumer products safety improvement act,' new legislation slated to go into effect on february 10th.

the idea behind the new law is to protect children from toxic products. but the way the law is currently written, even small and home based business who make all natural items in small batches for children would be forced to pay exorbitant testing fees to say in business legally.

the image above is from cool mom picks.

there is a lot of information available at http://www.handmadetoyalliance.org

most importantly, today is the last day to vote at www.change.org!!

felt stocking ornament tutorial

this is a quick holiday project, perfect for someone who has tried a little bit of felt making, and is ready to try felting around a resist. it's a very small project, but once you know how to make this stocking, you can make the same project at a larger scale, or explore other projects that involve felting around a resist. these instructions are part of a 'how to make holiday felt kit' available in my etsy shop. feel free to use and share these instructions, but please link back here and give credit to felt cafe, thank you!

you will need a small amount of wool roving (less than 1/2 an ounce), dish soap, hot water, a waterproof working surface (tupperware, even a dinner plate works for a small project like this one), a small piece of bubble wrap to make the pattern. if you have never tried making felt before, i suggest you check out my felt 101 tutorial here; you can even download the how-to-make-felt pdf instructions for free.

make a pattern out of bubble wrap. the pattern will also be the resist, which you will be felting around.

lay out one layer of wool roving horizontally, as shown. try to have the ends extend past the bubble wrap resist, but not have any extra roving above or below. the key is that the roving should extend past the resist when it is perpendicular to the edge. when the roving is parallel to the edge, try not to have the roving extend past the edge.

lay out a second layer of fiber vertically, perpendicular to the first layer.

drizzle a little bit of dish soap and hot water over the wool. try to keep the it in the center, where the pattern is, and keep the ends of the wool dry if possible. press down on the wool, working the soap and water through the wool.

turn it over to the other side, the patter will be on top, over 2 layers of wool.
wrap the ends around the pattern.

the same way that you did at the beginning, lay out 2 layers of wool on the 2nd side, the 1st horizontal and the 2nd vertical, the same as you did on the 1st side. drizzle a little dish soap.
and hot water. press down on the wool as before.
turn it over, and wrap the ends around.

without turning the felt over, lay out another layer of wool horizontally. (this is the 3rd layer on the 1st side.) press down on the wool, and turn it over.
wrap the ends around.
lay out another horizontal layer or wool. (this is the 3rd layer of wool on the 2nd side).

turn the felt over, and wrap the ends around. press down on the wool, rub it in small circles with your fingertips. repeat on both sides several times. hold it flat between the palms of your hands, and rub them back and forth gently. all of these things are creating friction, and causing the wool to felt, which means that the tiny scales on the wool fibers are becoming locked together.
the felt will become soapier while you work it. continue to rub and agitate the felt until you feel that the wool fibers are joined together, and you can't easily pull them off individually.

trim off the top of the stocking with scissors. your felt will probably have grown a little bigger than the pattern you started with, so you will likely be able to cut straight across and not cut into the pattern (in case you want to save and reuse the same pattern piece). as you cut the felt, you may see that you are cutting through some but not all layers. you need to cut through all the layers, so trim it again if you need to.
when you cut through all the layers, you can see the bubble wrap inside.
take the bubble wrap pattern out, and continue to rub the felt as before, this time with 1 or 2 fingers inside the stocking, and your other hand outside. this is important if you want to keep the pocket part of the stocking, otherwise it will felt together. gradually rinse out the soap, continuing to rub the felt.
if you rinse out all the soap and you feel like the stocking is too fuzzy and not felted, you can add soap and hot water again and repeat the process of agitating the wool with your hands.

to make the loop to hang your stocking ornament, make a partial cut about 1/4 inch from the top of the stocking, and stop about 1/4 inch away from the heel side. lift up the part the you cut, it will become the loop. add a little soap and hot water to the cut edges, and rub them a little bit so they felt.

felt french press cozy tutorial

i'm loving my new design for a felt french press cozy. as winter is coming, it brings together 2 of my passions–felt and coffee! so i wanted to share my tutorial. if you don't want to make your own, i sell french press cozies in my etsy shop.

it's actually really easy if you already know the basics of making a flat piece of felt. it's basically a flat piece of felt that wraps around the french press and closes with 3 sets of snaps. and if you don't want to make your own felt, you could use a thick fabric and hem the edges, or knit a long rectangle. you could also substitute buttons instead of snaps.

if you do want to use your own handmade felt, you should first have a go at making a small piece of felt, the size of a coaster. i have a beginning felt making tutorial, felt 101, that you can see on my website and download for free. it's the basic technique of making felt from soft fluffy roving (wool before it's been spun into yarn), by adding dish soap, hot water, and creating friction to join all the little fibers together.

i'd also like to point you to a few other great felt resources:

the forums on craftster.org, the fiber arts forum has both a 'felting:completed projects' and 'felting:discussions and questions' board, and the moderators and felt folks over there are super. tons of inspirational projects and tutorials.

the felting forum is also a wealth of information.

so now that you have made a small piece of felt and understand the basic process, here's what you will need for this project:
2-3 ounces of wool roving. i would recommend a more sturdy and coarse variety of wool, like romney or icelandic or even corriedale, over a something extremely soft like merino top, since this project will be working to keep your coffee warm, not your neck.
dish soap. i like seventh generation of the natural biodegradable options. dawn or ivory work great too.
hot water. your tap water might be hot enough, otherwise heat some up in a tea kettle.
a waterproof tray. you could use a cookie sheet, or a tupperware/rubermaid lid. i use a tray from ikea. it just has to have low edges to keep water from getting everywhere.
some old towels, because some water will escape.
some nylon netting, or bubble wrap, or a bamboo blind/sushi mat. these are optional, but might help you save time.
3 sets of large snaps, and thread.

ok, lets get started!
measure your french press. mine is 12" around and 7.5" tall. i measured from the table to the top edge of the glass. this design has the felt wrap around the french press and close over the handle, so the final 'long' dimension will be 12" plus 2 to 3 inches on each end, depending on your preference. that gives us a final dimension of around 17" by 7.5".

since felt shrinks during the feltmaking process, and we will be trimming the top and bottom edges, i think adding about an extra 2" to each side is about right to make it easy work get good results.

lay out 3 layers of wool (perpendicular to each other) in an rectangular area 24" by 12" inside your tray, or waterproof workspace. if it's easier for you to have a pattern to work with, you can make yourself a 24" by 12" rectangle out of inexpensive fabric (that can get wet) or netting, or bubble wrap. you can also line the entire tray with bubble wrap (bubbles up) before you start. bubble wrap increases the friction and will help the wool felt more quickly.

drizzle some dish soap over the wool.
and some hot water. we will now pretty much follow the same process from my felt 101 tutorial.
one exception: for larger pieces of felt, it's easier to keep the felt from moving around if you put down a layer of nylon mesh over the wool, and rub your hands on top of that. the water and soap will bubble through, which is fine. you don't need to do this, but it will help you get consistent results. you can use a mesh bag that you would use to wash delicate laundry in the washing machine as well. oh, you can also put your hand inside a plastic bag and rub the wool with that, the plastic bag will move more smoothly over the wool.
the nylon mesh doesn't want to felt to the wool, but you should peel it back every once in a while to make sure no wool fibers have caught in it.

for the short ends of the rectangle, fold in the loose fibers to make an even(ish) edge.
you can fold in the long edges as well, although we will be trimming them off. so the purpose of folding them over is less to make a perfect finished edge, and more to make a more sturdy edge to work with in the following steps.
after the felt is holding together, and you can turn it over, rub your hands in circles on both sides. roll it up and roll back and forth. you can use a bamboo blind or small sushi mat to roll it up with, just another way to increase the friction and help turn your wool into felt.

unroll and reroll in both directions on from both sides. remember that felt shrinks in the direction that you are rolling.
if your felt is getting cooler, you can add more hot water.
unroll and fold over onto itself and continue to work the felt.

when the felt has a uniform surface (not individual fibers that you can pick up), you are ready to cut the felt.
my final height (short dimension of the rectangle) is 7.5," so i cut it a little larger, 8" wide.
i like to have a cut edge on the long edges (that become the top and bottom of the french press cozy and wrap around) and leave the short edges (that fasten around the handle) uncut and more organic, which also leaves them a little bulkier due to the folded edge. if you prefer to have all cut edges, you can cut them all now. remember to leave the rectangle at least 5" longer than the measurement around your french press.
this is the cut edge. because of the nature of felt, the top surface and the bottom surface will be more felted, and when you cut through the felt, the edge is less felted.
so felt just the edge, the same way that you felted before, by applying friction. there may still be enough soap left in your felt to felt the edge, if not at more. rubbing the palms of your hands together perpendicular to the cut edge is my preferred method.
you can use your fingers too, that would just take a lot longer! once you see that the cut edge is becoming denser and more solid, you can rinse all the soap out. if you want, you can make the felt a little smaller by continuing to apply friction and rub the felt as before. this is called 'fulling.'roll up the piece of felt in a towel to absorb extra water. depending on the wool that you used, and how dense your felt has become, you may be able to stretch and shape your felt a little bit.
let it dry flat. the last step is to sew on the snaps.
i use 3 sets of snap: one below the handle, one above the handle, and one inside the handle. i hold up the felt to the french press so that both ends extend the same amount toward or past the handle. then i position the snaps for a snug fit. usually i start in the center, then attach the top and bottom snaps, checking the fit before sewing on each snap.that's what it looks like with the snaps fastened.

i hope you enjoyed this tutorial! if you have any questions or comments or suggestions, i would love to hear them, thanks.