kattitudes

Love love this necklace and we have made literally multiple variations on this theme. Various stones and with all types of metals including different karats of gold. This is such a simple necklace and it looks good on everyone. Our only design tip that we give with this necklace: do not make the chain too long, as the stone needs to sit as the base of the neck. On the other hand, do not make the chain too short because when your necklace looks like it is choking you to death…well, that is not a good look on anyone. You want the stone pretty much at the base of your neck, not getting lost around your belly button.

There is one word of warning that we will give you based on our experience. If you will notice on this necklace, we have placed a red circle over the light colored stone. That circle is where the briolette stone is drilled and the sterling silver wire is threaded through. With most the lighter stones that we have used (amethyst, topaz and citrine to name a few) we find that as the stone moves naturally on the necklace, the silver naturally tarnishes right at that pivot point and you end up with two very dark points in the stone. Nothing a little quick cleaning will not get rid of, but it is something to be aware of if you make this necklace from sterling silver (which many people will end up using).

You can see how easy the twist of the metal wire is to attach to the chain and how the briolette stone has been threaded onto that wire. With practice, you can get the hang of making those twists and you can whip out necklaces like this in literally about five minutes. Talk about assembly line gifts! You could make an entire set for all your bridesmaids. Or pick up different stones and make a rainbow of necklaces for a very special friend (or keep them for yourself. We would never tell.)

Materials Needed:

* 1-1/2 yards red gimpe braid
* 1-1/2 yards of red satin ribbon for bow (if you do not tie bows well, purchase a pre-tied bow)
* 10 packages of red ribbon roses
* Heart frame (this project uses a 7 x 7 inch frame)
* 1/4 yard of red satin fabric
* 1/2 yard of batting
* Glue gun with plenty of glue sticks
* 1 inch cabone ring

Cut batting to same shape as frame and glue to frame. Cut satin fabric 2 inches larger than frame, but do not cut the center from the fabric. Lay fabric on work surface, right side down.

Lay frame over fabric, batting side down. Begin gluing fabric to outer edge of frame. Glue small sections at the top, bottom and sides of heart first, then go back and continue to glue rest of fabric. (Fabric will gather and wrinkle, but will be covered later with backing.)

Cut center out of heart fabric, leaving one inch extra around entire opening. Clip fabric every 1/2 inch around opening, staying 1/8 inch from the frame (these cuts will be your gluing tabs). Glue each tab to back of frame. Repeat directions to cover back board of heart, omitting steps for center opening.

Glue red gimpe braid to edge of each heart starting at top of heart and continuing around entire edge (tape the ends of braid to prevent raveling). Glue front and back sections of frame. Remember to leave the top edge of the heart open to allow for picture insertion.

Glue roses to entire front of frame starting with the outside edge to the inside edge and then fill in the middle. Start and end gluing at the point where you will eventually glue your bow. The bow will hide the area that is not covered by roses (see the photo). Tie a bow with satin ribbon and glue to frame. Glue tassels to bow and glue cabone ring to back for hanger.

Materials Needed:

* 2 yards red polar fleece (60 inches wide)
* 1/2 yard white polar fleece
* fusible web
* scissors (now is the time to dig out those craft scissors with the fancy edges you bought 3 years ago and haven’t used yet)
* iron

Making fleece blankets seem all the rage now, and although I’ve seen some lovely examples, for the most part, I really do not care for the tied fringe look. Reminds me too much of 1970’s macramé. Just icky and in fact, exactly the type of icky that I started Kattitudes.com to avoid. This blanket, however, is a little different in that you control the edges yourself with your fancy craft scissors. Although this blanket was originally meant for a Valentine’s Day gift, it could easily be adjusted for any other holiday or occasion.

Confession time. In making this blanket, I dislike the fringe edges so much that I took the time to whip through and put a blanket stitch around the edges of my blankets instead. I significantly prefer the look and the blanket stitch is amazingly simple. Eventually I will include a section on embroidery and simple stitches and I will update this page to reflect the sewing choice also.

Trim the selvages off of the red polar fleece. Cut “fringes” all the way around the fleece: done by cutting about 2 inches into the fabric every 1/2 inch along all 4 edges. (By the by, this is a lovely time to put to use all of those craft scissors with the scrummy lovely shapely edges that cut in an interesting pattern).

Fuse one side of the fusible web to the wrong side of the white fleece. Leave paper backing on. Cut heart shapes out of white fleece. You can use a pattern to cut the hearts, but remember the appeal of a homemade look. Fuse the heart onto the right side of the red fleece.

It is the end of summer and fall is finally on the way. The heat of summer finally broke here in the southern United States and we are actually almost thirty degrees cooler today than we have been for the last week. Unbelievable, but wonderful for those of us that prefer it cooler. However, we still have a need and a desire to see the beauty of the summer season and all the hard work of our garden season. If you have any wonderful rose blooms still available, or if you have dried blooms available, this might make a wonderful gift from your garden.

Materials Needed:

* 1 shadow box (purchased)
* Dried rose buds or dried rose blossoms (amount depending on size of purchased shadow box)
* Glue gun and sticks

To make assembly easier, keep the shadowbox flat on your workspace until ready to hang.

Prepare roses by cutting off entire stem. Starting on one side of the shadowbox, glue roses to backing. Working in rows, slowly fill shadowbox, taking care to fill as tightly together as possible.

If desired, alternate rows with alternative color roses or even alternative dried flowers.

We have done fabric covered boxes in the recent past, but there is just something about velvet that really spices up a project. The nap on the fabric catches the light just so and makes everything so beautiful that you just want to touch it.

The ribbon and trim on these boxes are simple to add, but really make the project pop in the details. And because of the relative size, it would not be that expensive to purchase additional trim to finish off boxes like this. In fact, you could most likely just keep the end pieces and scraps of ribbon trimmings from other projects and mix and match to make a fun and festive hodge podge of season appropriate colors and celebration.

Boxes like these could be done for any holiday, any birthday, event, occasion or everyday use under the sun. Autumn colors for Thanksgiving. Red white and blue for a patriotic theme. Pastels for some beautiful Easter basket replacements. They could be used for storage, for your jewelry, for your sewing kits, for your office supplies or for bathroom beauty works. Pack one with new baby supplies. As with so many ideas on Kattitudes, you are limited only by your imagination.

I am still not sure if I am a fan of the leather look or the not, but regardless of my feelings about leather, I know that there is a large call for leather in jewelry accessories.

As a note, this particular piece has been made, not with leather, but with a fabric (often satin) cord. I prefer the leather. I find the fabric cords like this snag something wicked, unless you can get your hands on some waxed cotton, which actually is not that difficult.

If you have not yet learned the tricks to wire wrapping, you definitely need to sit down and spend some time practicing. There are so many jewelry pieces that depend on wrapping to attach pearls (and usually briolette cut gemstones) to jewelry. If you do not have access to jewelry quality soldering equipment, or if you just like the look of hand wrapping then you just must. There is nothing else to it.

I will spend some time going over the seventeen billion websites that have instructions for wire wrapping (there are SO many out there! Some are drek and some are decent) and give you a quick review of those I think are worth your time and those I think are a waste.

The trick to this particular piece is the ends. You need crimp end pieces. Not ribbon crimp ends, because those simply fold over, but crimp ends that are round metal beads, sealed closed on one end, but open on the other and allows you to feed the ends of the leather into a small cup. Once all the leather ends are in there, you just do as the name suggests and crimp the metal closed, thus trapping all the leather pieces together and holding the bracelet together. Make sense?

The pearls have been attached to the leather by wire wrapping, but in addition to being wrapped to the leather, the leather thong pieces have then been tied in knots around the wire wrapping, thus effectively double tying the pearls in place. This keeps the pearls from sliding up and down the leather thongs, anchoring them specifically where you choose to place them.

All in all, this really is a lovely piece. The nice thing about pieces like these is that you can find leather and pearls (or whatever beads you want) in a wide variety of colors, so you are literally limited by your imagination. You could use pink leather and turquoise pieces in place of the pearls if you wished - something along those lines. This piece really has a lot of potential. You could mix and match so many beads, stones and pearls on a wild mix of different colors of leathers intertwined with chains. So much potential! Give it a shot!

Jewelry pieces are some of my favorite gifts to make and give. Jewelry is just a wonderful expression of your personality and the personality of the person for which you are making your pieces. Handmade jewelry is so hot right now, and popularity only ever goes up.

These particular earrings are very easy. A couple of headpins, a few pearls and a rectangular cut or cushion of pink jade. The pearls and jade are put on one headpin, and the other headpin is bent to make the physical piece that goes into your ear. There is the little tricky part of twisting one headpin on the other and maintaining the integrity of the loop, but once you do it a few times, it becomes a habit, you are good to go.

Now, supplies. Outside out of the computer, I have been training as a bench jeweler and jeweler designer, so I do have access to super secret extra special jeweler supply houses. Because of that, I am working on stocking my Kattitudes store with some of the more frequently used jewelry findings.

However, my first and best supply house is still eBay! Yes, as much as I hate to admit it, some of my best pieces come from eBay, so keep your eyes out for good bargains.

As with any other shopping situation, you have to know what you are looking for and what is a decent price and what is a rip-off. But for the most part, as long as you are not paying forty dollars in shipping for a single pearl from China, you can find some gorgeous pieces, parts and findings there.

Remember these adorable bride and groom looking chocolate covered strawberries?

Well, take it one step further by making chocolate covered bride and groom apple wedding shower favors. A double dip in a bath of melted chocolate, after a dip in a bath of white chocolate and you have the cutest looking wedding couple, ready for enjoyment right then and there. How fun!

Are not these just too cute? This is a great time to use up those fabric scraps that keep accumulating in our craft closets.

While these particular examples of fabric covered boxes are Easter specific, the concept can be used for so many different occasions.

Just do a little planning ahead, you can sit in front of the telly with some plain brown boxes and your bag of fabric scraps that you have gathered from old clothes you love, leftover fabric from other crafts you’ve sewn and embellishments that you are tired of tracking.

Then, in cool comfort (or warm snugginess, depending on specifically from which side of the world you are reading), you can use your favorite glue and cover boxes for your office, filing, clutter (but we want to eliminate clutter, not find new ways to store it), accessories, adornments and other whatnots.

You can prepare wrapping in advance of the upcoming holidays - maybe make a few Christmas themed and put them with your Christmas storage when you are done.

Finish a few with birthday greetings and you have a prepared handmade presentation, which is so hot right now!

People are going wild for handmade items. Pieces are selling at unprecedented numbers. Putting your special touch on the gifts you make really seals the deal as far as how great your gift looks.

People are buying boxes like this just for decoration, but I always like to try to make everything multi task.

Handmade gifts are appropriate in any given holiday season or for any occasion under the sun. You’ll find all types of gifts to make here, including jams and jellies and other kitchen presents, gifts made with flowers, handmade jewelry and even just assembly line gift ideas (larger gifts assembled with different bits and pieces).

• Potpourri (explanation and instructions)
• Epsom bath salts and variations
• Herbal Bath sachet
• Bath bomb balls
• Smells of Christmas potpourri
• Blackberry jam
• Pumpkin Apple Butter
• Good morning basket with cinnamon oat pancake mix
• Oriental vinegar
• Raspberry (or Strawberry) Vinegar
• Jalapeño jelly
• Rosebud candleholder
• Peanut Brittle - Ole Fashioned recipe
• Microwave Oven Peanut Brittle
• chocolate covered spoons (with variations including butterscotch, white chocolate, and cinnamon)
• almond biscotti
• gingered biscotti (with white chocolate)
• cappucino biscotti
• biscotti with chocolate chips
• Rosebud basket
• Instant Russian tea
• Ginger scented pecans
• Rose Covered Frame
• Romantic Picnic Blanket
• Homemade Caramels
• Rose Tree Topiary
• Rose Covered Pillow
• Rose Petal Votive Candle Holder
• Rose Cologne
• Rose Wreath
• Rose Shadow Box
• Ribbon Roses
• Rose Pomander
• Moroccan Dry Rub for Meats
• All Purpose Dry Rub for Meats