Creative Life Week 8 - Create your own fabric prints

Unlike other artists where they focus on a single theme in their creativity, I do not have a theme to focus on. I just create anything I like to create. A  free crafter and do anything that I would enjoy making.

For this week, I created my own fabric prints using my old inkjet printer and specially treated inkjet fabric sheets and created 4 projects. Am unstoppable when am doing my own printing. I started making my own fabric prints about 8 years ago and concentrated only on memory quilts, pillows and family trees. I enjoy making items that shows pictures of real people.

First on the list are fabric bookmarks. Measuring 7.5cms x 18.5cms I printed pictures of my niece and nephew,  their names and a small message on each bookmark which characterizes each person.  My nephew is an avid reader (once joined a competition on being able to read 10 books in a month) so the message I printed on his bookmark is 'Please help me stop'. My niece is the exact opposite that sometimes we tease her if she would be able to finish reading the book in a year's time so the message I printed is 'This is where I fell asleep'. To highlight the images, names and messages I drew squares using running stitches and finished off the bookmarks with ribbons.

Front Panel Bookmarks

Back Panel Bookmarks

Second project on the list are Fabric mini memory pillow keychains. Fabric keychains measures 11cms x 8cms. Pictures and back panel prints are  printed on specially treated inkjet fabric sheets. One of the mini pillows is finished off with a blanket stitch by hand using a black thread.

Third project on the list is a memory heart pillow. Measures 15cms x 15cms(widest and highest points of the heart) On each side of the heart I printed pictures of my 2 nephews and finished off the heart with a ribbon for easy hanging on the wall.

Last on the list is a memory family tree pillow. Measures 35cms x 26cms, I printed an image of a family tree on a specially treated inkjet fabric sheet and made it into a huggable family tree pillow. The family tree includes the name of that special little boy or girl in your life, parents, grandparents, great grandparents on both the maternal and paternal sides which you write on the boxes provided. The picture of the little boy or girl can also be added below the name.

My gallery specializes in memory items made of fabric. I also accept custom-orders on any memory products including printing of images on fabrics. For more information, please send an email to enquiries@softtreasures.com.au or you can click on the 'Contact Me' option located on the left navigation pane.

If you prefer to do your own printing and creation of any memory items, specially treated inkjet fabric sheets are also available for purchase in my gallery under Inkjet Printables. Click on gallery or copy and paste the URL below in your internet browser to access my gallery.

http://www.softtreasures.com.au

Creative Life Week 7 - Little Fabric Houses

I wasnt so sure if I wanted to be creative this week as I wanted to have a rest from the past 3 weeks of serious creations. I thought that if I created something for this week I will have to use the fabric scraps I have been collecting over the years and increasing in quantity since I started making dresses for Dress A Girl Australia. Every bedroom door I have in my house you will find plastic bags full of scraps hanging on the doorknob. Am not only a fabric hoarder but a fabric scrap hoarder too.

Then while reading blogs I follow on the train on my way to work I found this blog of a lady living in Japan who wanted to collect 100 handmade little fabric houses for the survivors of the Great Tohoku Earthquake and Tsunami disaster which devastated much of the coastline and surrounding areas of Northern Japan. She wanted to collect 100 handmade little houses with messages so she can share them with the people in the community. I thought it was such a nice gesture and a good way to put my fabric scraps into good use. I also thought the little houses made from her pattern were so cute I needed to make one myself.

So for my Week 7 creative life, here are the five houses I made since Friday night. I was thinking of making only one house to send but after completing the little house, I decided to make another one until I ended up with 5 little houses. It was so much fun making them that I am going to make one more for my collection.

At the back of each of these little fabric houses, I attached the message below which I printed on a fabric sheet - 

ippo ippo minna no sutekina mirai e (step by step for a wonderful future)

I was in a hurry to pack these little houses so I could send it today that I forgot to take a picture of the back of the house.

To know more about the little houses project, click here. But hurry if you want to donate as the deadline for all houses is on the 21st of Feb. Or copy and paste the URL below in your internet browser.

http://jojoebi.blogspot.com.au/2012/02/little-houses-project.html

I hope these little houses will give hope to the japanese survivors of the tragedy which is turning one year next month.

What's New at Soft Treasures - Blank Gown-shaped Invites

Yes, after making those invites for my niece, I have decided to start making them to sell. For a pack of 12, you can buy them for $9.95. Gown-shaped cards are available in plain white, metallic white and yellow colours. Comes with a magnet at the back panel of the invite for easy display on the fridge. 

Gown-shaped cards measure 13cms(H) x 7cms(W single panel or folded). If card is open it measures 14cms (widest area in the lower section of the card).  All you have to do is embellish them, write down the details inside the card and off they go to your special girl's invited friends.

What is special about these blank invites is that for every sale of the invites the net proceeds from the sale will go to the postage fund of Dress A Girl Australia to help in the cost of distributing dresses to the less fortunate children around the world.

Click here to purchase these blank invites..

To know more about Dress A Girl Australia, click here.

Creative Life Week 6 - Final Invites

After 3 weeks I finally finished my niece's final invite for her 21st birthday and completely embellished. The last item to do was find small pieces of magnets to put at the back section of the invite so it can be decorated on a fridge. Instead of buying them, I decided to recyle the magnetic calendars and/or business cards you usually get for free on postboxes which I had quite a few. I cut them into pieces and glued them onto the back. 

Pre-final invites

Recycled Magnets

Final invites complete with  rose corsages and ribbons

The invites are now ready to go!!

For those who are interested to purchase blank gown-shaped cards for their special girl's special day, these are now available in my gallery to purchase. Net proceeds from the sale of these blank templates will go to the postage fund of Dress A Girl Australia to help fund the distribution of dresses to the less fortunate children around the world.

For more information about the Dress A Girl Around the World - Dress A Girl Sydney & Australia campaign, please visit Dress A Girl Australia's blog. Or you can send an email to dressagirlaustralia@gmail.com.

For general enquiries on the blank cards, please contact me by a click of a mouse on the left navigation pane under section 'Contact Me'.

Creative Life Week 5 - 2012 CD Calendars

I started making this project in early December and didnt have enough time to finish it. I could only make 2 months out of the 12 months of 2012 and decided to stop making it. My intention was to make them so I could sell them.

Two weeks ago I started to work on it again until I finally was able to complete the whole year but only for 1 set. Since I already had completed the templates, it was now easy to print additional sets. 

So this week I again decided to make more CD calendars and in 2 sizes. I was able to print 6 sets for the large calendar (4.75 x 5.5) and 4 sets of the smaller size (3.50 x 3.75). Both sizes are in inches. The monthly images from January to December are pictures of Dress A Girl Around the World distribution of dresses to the less fortunate children around the world. I printed more so I could send them to my friends, show off my latest creation of a CD calendar.

Below are the monthly templates for the small-sized calendars -

To see the complete 2012 CD Calendar set, click here.

"Share the Love" this Valentines Day Charity Drive for Dress A Girl Australia

In today's technology where everything seems to be communicated electronically, we are losing a personal connection that is so important to the human spirit. When you make something handmade for that someone special in your family and/or a friend you reconnect because you give that person your time, skill, care and love. 

Show how much you care not only with your family and friends by donating a pillowcase or a piece of fabric or a pillowcases dress to the 'Share the Love' this Valentines Day Charity Drive by Dress A Girl Australia and share that love and care you have in your heart also to the less fortunate children in this world this Valentines Day. 

For donations, please post them to - Dress A Girl Australia P.O. Box 240 Casula NSW 2170 Australia We need more happy faces in this world especially from the less fortunate little girls around the world who needs to own at least one dress for they deserve at least one. Please keep those pillowcases and/or fabrics and/or pillowcase dresses coming. 

For more information about this charity drive and/or dressing girls around the world, please send email to dressagirlaustrali@gmail.com. 

The 'Share the Love' this Valentines Day Charity Drive for Dress A Girl Australia started last 19th of January and will be running until the 17th of Feb 2012.

Creative Life Week 4 - New Project - Kindle Cover

I am still doing the invites for my niece but once you have decided on the card design, finalized what information you need to print and decided on what pictures to include on the invite, the next few steps tend to become boring. There is not much challenge when you have done the printing and start cutting especially after you have done it about a dozen times. Making about 45 of them starts to become so routine that I decided to squeeze in a new project.

This time I thought I would make something for myself so I made a kindle cover for my kindle. It wasnt really difficult to make since I only wanted a simple one, as long as my kindle gets protected from the car and house keys, wallets, pen and other things I have inside my bag. The longest task to finish was looking for a spare velcro from among my piles of craft supplies so I can close the cover when am not using it. Just when you need one you cannot find it. 

Being a fabric hoarder had an advantage again as there was no need to go and buy the fabric material. I have several metres of fabrics that are already padded and quilted so this saved me a lot of time but I would have wanted to use one with perhaps alphabets or books printed on it if I had one. I finally opted for the fabric with a 'travel' theme. Perhaps it will go well when am travelling with my kindle or taking the train to work with my kindle. :-)

Here is the kindle cover I made with my kindle on it. 

I hope you will like it. Or inspire you to make one if you have a kindle.

First flowering yucca of 2012

I dont want to say I am very busy because I am enjoying what am doing but today coming home from work, I saw that the yucca tree I had in my frontyard had grew flowers again and I didnt even notice it. 

This must be the third time it has grew flowers but the first time in 2012. I have neglected my front yard for quite a while now I think I need to hire a gardener.

I hope this flowering brings me good luck this year and in many years to come.

New Product - Natural Calico Bags

A unique and artistic way of packaging any kind of presents. Natural Calico bags which measures 23cms x 26.5cms. Can be stamped, painted, screenprinted, embroidered, applique or any kind of embellishing you can think of. Tied with a blue ribbon to close the bag but replaceable with your choice of tying.

On special at $1.00 each and available for purchase from my online gallery.

Creative Life Week 3 - First project – my niece 21st birthday in early March.

My first project is now underway and I reckon this project will take me about 4-5 weeks in the making or until the birthday party actually happens. Am not sure if I would be able to create new projects every week, if time would allow me to make small things in between within these 4-5 weeks timeframe but will see how it goes. I might be able to squeeze in a tag or 2 and be able to promote some of the supplies I sell. J

The tasks within this project would be (1) to create 45 invites with matching envelopes (2) create a small quilted wallhanging which will hold personal messages for my niece from her friends and family. These messages she will then open and read at her party. (3) make a special gift box for invited guests to drop their envelope presents. The idea of the box is so small presents are kept in one place only. Their might be a 4th task which is to create paper buntings to adorn her marquee. A marquee will be setup as the party is going to be held only at their place of residence. They have this big wide lawn which is good enough to accommodate her guests.

For the invites, I have come up with a gown-shaped card which opens up for the details of the event. The gown would be coloured white with a pink ribbon belt and a pink single rose to be adorned on the shoulder. Although her color theme is pink, she decided to have a white gown and instead use the color pink only as an embellishment of the gown.

The size of this invite is about 17cms in height and about 8cms wide (widest point of the lower section of the gown). The card below is a prototype of the invite.

The printing of the details of the event in the inside panel of the gown-shaped card is a bit tricky but can only figure out how to do the printing when the details of the event are finalized plus I might throw in a couple of pictures of the birthday celebrant.

So there you go. My first project of ‘my creative journey – week 3’.

The saga will continue.

Creative Life Week 2 - Decision Making

It is only week 2 of my creative life for the next 52 weeks and am already wondering what is going to keep me motivated to keep this project going. Haha! Anyway, I have decided to go for 2 projects for the next 52 weeks.

First project is something that I am going to do regardless of whether I was going to opt for a creative life for the next 52 weeks or not. Dress A Girl Australia is a charity work am doing very close to my heart. Last year I did a couple of daily sewing marathons running for 28 days each making pillowcase dresses for the less fortunate children around the world so I could have more dresses to distribute in addition to the donations I was receiving from the community. This year, my goal is to make sure I sew 2 items a week (a pillowcase dress for a girl and a pair of shorts for the boys) for the next 52 weeks. This will be in addition to any sewing marathons I would decide to hold anytime during the year. What this means is that for the year 2012, Dress A Girl Australia is assured of 52 pillowcase dresses and 52 pairs of shorts from Soft Treasures. The materials will be coming from the heaps of pillowcases and bundles of fabrics I have been receiving as donations to Dress A Girl Australia. This is my personal journey which I started April of last year and I hope to continue on for as long as I have pillowcases and fabrics to make into dresses. There will be other exciting activities that Dress A Girl Australia is planning to create in 2012 to make a difference in this world and make this world a better place so watch out for it.

My second project is what I would call my creative journey. Become creative or find and create projects for the next 52 weeks. As I have said I have never done this before but I am willing to take on the challenge and see what I am capable of and where my limits are up to. Although limited only by one’s imagination, I know the the possibilities of creating are endless.

What a very busy year I have ahead of me. This is really going to test my stress levels. Don’t forget that in addition to these journeys I do have a full-time job from Monday to Friday which I also enjoy and commitments to family and friends….but bring it on !

Creative Life Week 1 - Planning & Preparation through Art Prompts

What motivated me to challenge myself with this new year's resolution?

With the number of write-ups I have been reading from different craft and mixed media books and magazines endorsing a year of creativity as a new year’s resolution, this prompted me to participate on this year-long project. I used the term participate because there is possibly a lot of crafters and hobbyist all over the world doing their own version of this project on their own or in groups. I have been known to have great ideas to craft or to handmake among family and friends but they always stayed in my head, felt happy that I have thought and talk about it. This time I am willing to take the risk or the challenge of actually doing them. 

For this very reason, this is the jar that is going to help me attain my goal for 2012. I am going to call it my Art Prompts jar. I printed the label from a writeup in a Cloth Paper Scissors magazine who is recommending a year of creativity as well.

On this jar will contain ideas of what to create in a particular day or week for a whole year. Where would these ideas come from? Everywhere. Every now and then, if I think of something good to create or see good ideas from craft books or magazines, I would write it on pieces of paper and drop on this jar. On days and/or weeks when my mind would go blank for ideas, I would pick one from this jar. Wouldnt that be great as a motivator?

Everything and anything I do will be posted on this site. This fabric journal would also help me throughout the year. 

So I guess it is time to start my year of creativity. It is time to rock! :-)

Site makeover

Site makeover is going on in softtreasures.com website. An automatic checkout will now be available once the changes are completed. Checkout payments will be processed via paypal only. If you prefer to make a bank deposit payment, then you will still need to let us know by sending an email to softtreasures@bigpond.com. Provide us with the details of the item you are intending to purchase and quantity. We will then send you an invoice with the bank details for deposit payment.

Two new sites are available for anyone to visit :

Sarisari Webstore - site to buy real handmades, real treasures to keep. This time you can stop wondering if someone makes them, wish that someone really makes them? 'handmades by softtreasures' ...products of Soft Treasures' creativity.

or copy and paste the URL below -

www.sarisariwebstore.com

Dress A Girl Australia - site that sells all items donated by family, friends, small business shops, mums who love crafts to Dress A Girl Australia to help raise funds for postage to dress the less fortunate children around the world.

or copy and paste the URL below -

www.dressagirlaustralia.com.au

For more information about Dress A Girl Australia, please visit

http://dressagirlaustralia.blogspot.com

or send an email to

dressagirlaustralia@gmail.com

Check out these two interesting sites. You may find something that you will like.

A creative life in 2012

Last week I blogged about a new project which I will be undertaking and will be running throughout the year 2012. So here it is – I am intending to live a creative life for the next 52 weeks. A daily creativity would probably be pushing too much so I will just go for a weekly creation. Even with the weekly goal it would already be a real challenge considering the number of things I already do but I will try my very best to achieve it. I know what am capable of doing in my working life so this time I would like to see and experience what am capable of in the world of creation.

The first week has already passed but I needed last week to think of what I really wanted to do, check out all supplies I probably would need as I want to make use of what I’ve already got at home. Also I want to document everything I intend to create regardless of whether I finish a weekly project or not.

Last Christmas, my sister gave me a fabric-covered journal which I referred to as my ‘Dress A Girl’ journal. In this journal I intended to capture images of all the things I have made or done for dress a girl. I have decided that I will be using the same journal for my 52-week creative life this way I only maintain one log. Having too many logs to update will bring out the procrastinator in me. I wonder what the journal would look like at the end of the year. Hahaha! Knowing myself, 52 weeks is a long way to go to get inspired to do something or rather always inspired to do something but only in my head.

So come and join me in this creative journey challenge. Please feel free to send me a message or post a comment and show and tell me what you have created for yourself. This is another journey in my life for the next 52 weeks and honestly I don’t know where it will take me or what the results would be but am sure I will be enjoying every minute and having fun doing it.

Happy New Year and Welcome to 2012

Happy New Year everyone!

Its been a while since I made my last posting. I have been very busy both at work and with my charity work Dress A Girl Australia. I know this is not a good excuse. I did a Christmas charity drive for Dress A Girl Australia for 500 dresses by Christmas and this took most of my spare time away from Soft Treasures especially on the last 3 months of 2011. Most of the handmade projects I started for Soft Treasures were left unfinished. Even my garden 'Idriess Place' has been forgotten.

But the good news is that I was surprisingly very successful in the Christmas Drive. As of Dec 25, 2011, I had on hand 337 dresses and am still receiving dresses and these were for parcels posted before Dec 25. The other good news is that am back to take care of Soft Treasures’ handmade needs. Although my customer service was still par excellence during the time that I was kept busy with Dress A Girl Australia, I wasn’t able to come up with new products. None of the items I had on my list were released for sale but they will be in 2012.

I have lots of good things in store for 2012 for Soft Treasures so come back often so you wont miss a thing. New products, new charity drives, new website (the current one I have is kind of rubbish when it comes to checkout) and a new group in Facebook called ‘Lets Do Craft’ for a new project I am intending to do which will last throughout the year and everyone is invited to join in. I will be talking about this new project of mine in my next blog so watch out for it.