Craftside

How to fix ironing mistakes from the book Tailoring: The Classic Guide to Sewing the Perfect Jacket

Ironing or pressing can be one of the best things to happen to a garment -- or you can totally mess it up. Well, Tailoring: The Classic Guide to Sewing the Perfect Jacket to the rescue! Check out this page from Tailoring that includes a bunch of tips on fixing pressing errors.

Like these tips and want more great info on how to sew a finely tailored jacket? Then I bet you will love:

Tailoring: The Classic Guide to Sewing the Perfect Jacket

from the

Editors of CPi

Tailoring is the complete photo guide to sewing jackets and coats. Written by sewing professionals, this book teaches the trusted, proven methods for sewing tailored jackets with impeccable details and perfect fit. Written for the intermediate sewer who wants to move on to more challenging projects, this book ensures success with detailed, step-by-step instructions, more than 400 photos, in-depth discussions about products and how to use them. Tailoring offers guidance for every aspect of tailoring a jacket: fitting and pattern alteration, fabrics and tools, interfacings, interlinings, seams and finishes, hand stitches, collars, pressing, topstitching, shaping shoulders, setting in sleeves, sewing pockets, vents, and making perfect buttonholes.

 

Crafty Links and Judi Ketteler interviews Jennifer Worick with a giveaway of her book Simple Gifts

Over at Judi Ketteler's Blog Sew Retro there is a great interview with Jennifer Worick where they talk about how to put together book proposals. Along with the very insightful interview there is a giveaway of a copy of Simple Gifts: 50 Little Luxuries to Craft, Sew, Cook & Knit.

By

Jennifer Worick

Heartfelt + handmade = the perfect gift. In Simple Gifts, Jennifer Worick offers step-by-step instructions for creating easy and inspired handmade gifts that won’t break the bank. Learn how to stitch a wine bag for your favorite foodie, sew pajama pants for a tried-and-true friend, roast coffee beans for an office pal, or felt a ring for your sweetheart. Also included is Jennifer’s helpful, witty advice on choosing the right gift for anyone -- man, woman, or child -- and how to wrap up your present with style.

From a sweet knitted apron to a hand-embroidered handkerchief, personalized note cards to soothing natural lip balm, a quilted baby blanket to a manly wooden toolbox, these heartfelt, handmade gifts are certain to wow and touch your loved ones.

Now onto the crafty links:

Stefanie Girard's Sweater Surgery
How to make a fallen soldier uniform pendant.

Regarding Design

A great post about color and fashion called The Color Collective"

Mixed Media Artist
Have you ever heard of silk fusion or silk paper? It's amazing stuff!

Hosting a Successful Giveaway on Your Blog
Craft Buds shares some tips for handmade bloggers on effective ways to host a giveaway, including how to set the rules, find new followers and work with sponsors.

Eileen - The Artful Crafter
See how to make zero-calorie fortune cookies for your next party. Hint: they're made in the craft room, not the kitchen.

Crafty Princess Diaries
The Jane Austen Society becomes sensible ans sensitive to stitchers at its next convention.

Carmi's Art/Life World
Carmi has a special post honouring an artist's passing.

About Family Crafts
Check out the graduation quilts Sherri designed and made for her kids.

Father's day sale and two free heart clip art images from the book and CD 999 Logo Design Elements

I "heart" my Dad! And with Father's Day fast approaching, card-making is in order. So I thought I'd share with you today two of the graphic elements from the book and CD 999 Logo Design Elements: 999 Design Components You Can You to Create Logos. I love this double heart and the crackle finish heart. I am not sure how I am going to use them, but they are my starting off points.

 

Feel free to download these clip art hearts and use them to make something cool. Want 997 more clip art images? Then grab yourself a copy of 999 Logo Design Elements.

 

999 Logo Design Elements:

999 Design Components You Can You to Create Logos

By

Daniel Donnelly

999 Logo Design Elements features 999 different logo elements provided to readers in vector format. Each logo element is a distinct and stand-alone piece that offers designers the capability to develop hundreds of thousands of logo variations on themes. The elements include swooshes, ovals, boxes, arrows, geometric shapes and hundreds of creative parts that can be pulled together to create original logo designs.

Featured throughout the book are examples of logos and identities built with elements from the book. A CD-ROM containing all 999 copyright-free, vector-based logo elements is included with the book.

Daniel Donnelly has authored and designed several books for Rockport Publishers. He is the owner of In Your Face + Co., and the Chair of the Digital Art and Design department at Butte College in Oroville, California.

Pop on over to Qbookshop to see more inside 999 Logo Design Elements by hitting the "Google Preview" button.

And as stated in the title, there is a super sale going on at Qbookshop, and as I have always touted, nothing beats a book for a gift!

Whatever Your Dad Likes to Do,
We Have a Book to Help Him Do It!

Need a Father's Day gift idea?
Our Father's Day Shop is now open and has plenty of suggestions. Or find a great deal for yourself during our Memorial Day Clearance Sale, where more than 300 handpicked titles are a whopping 60% off.

When you're finished shopping our clearance sale, take a look around the rest of Qbookshop.com, where more than 4,000 additional titles are 25% off,  including Bestsellers from Rockport Publishers, Quarry Books, Walter Foster, Fair Winds Press,  Voyageur Press, Cool Springs Press and others! You don't have to tell Dad what a great deal you got!

These sales don't require a promo code—the sale price is listed on the book page.

Be sure to tell your friends! Whether their passion is Indy 500 auto racing, home improvement, history or sports, their Dads would love a book for Father's Day, too.

Like any good deal, our clearance sale won't last forever.  It ends at midnight CT on Tuesday, May 31!

 

 

How to make pretty doll hair with yarn from the book Cloth Doll Workshop

This page from Cloth Doll Workshop shows a great technique on how to make doll hair. I have lots of pretty yarn and it got my wheels turning on how I could use it to make hair, specifically wild plumes of fun on my plushies.

Like this tutorial on how to make doll hair with yarn? Well then I bet you will love:

Cloth Doll Workshop

By

elinor peace bailey

Patti Medaris Culea

Barbara Willis

Patti Medaris Culea, elinor peace bailey, and Barbara Willis are three of the leading doll artists and teachers in the country. They are also friends. Each of these artists has her own distinct approach to the design and development of a cloth figure. In this book, each artist's process comes alive through their choice of fabrics, sketches, simple patterns, and skill-building variations. The book is oriented toward beginning doll makers, but offers unique variations and embellishments to please even more experienced doll designers. Two introductory chapters cover basic materials and techniques. Each artist's chapter includes step by step illustrations, instructions, and patterns to make a complete doll, plus variations that create completely new figures. Readers are treated to full color photography and a look inside of each artist's workspace. A gallery of additional creations by each artist, along with commentary on each work completes the collection. This is a must-have book for any aspiring or experienced doll making.

elinor peace bailey is a trained artist, and discovered stitchery as she was raising her family. She travels and teaches, has designed fabrics, and has worked as a creative consultant for several companies. She is the author of Mother Plays With Dolls, and The Rag Doll From Plain to Fancy.  She has self published books, quilt patterns, craft projects, and dolls, which she sells online and through quilt shops.

Patti Medaris Culea combines her love of silk and dyes by creating extraordinary fairies, mermaids and other one-of-a-kind dolls. She has a full-line of cloth doll patterns and her work has appeared in books, magazines and galleries. In demand as a teacher, she travels throughout the world. She is the author of four books on doll making, all by Quarry Books.

Barbara Willis is a doll artist and teaches doll making in many parts of the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and England. Barbara's work has been widely published in magazines and her dolls have been included in special exhibits, galleries, and books. She resides in Northern California in the San Francisco Bay Area. She is the author of Cloth Doll Artistry (Quarry Books, 2009).

 

Explore Tad Carpenter's creative process from Drawn In: A Peek into the Inspiring Sketchbooks of 44 Fine Artists, Illustrators, Graphic Designers, and Cartoonists

Today's post is brought to you by the word "THINK." Isn't it such a great word? This page from the new book Drawn In: A Peek into the Inspiring Sketchbooks of 44 Fine Artists, Illustrators, Graphic Designers, and Cartoonists features the sketchbook page of Tad Carpenter. What I took away from this page was the idea to pick a word and then sketch it out using it in different sentences, kind of like when I type in one word to my iTunes and I get all the songs with that word. It makes for some really interesting play-lists!

Click on the page from Drawn In: A Peek into the Inspiring Sketchbooks of 44 Fine Artists, Illustrators, Graphic Designers, and Cartoonists to enlarge and read a bit about Tad Carpenter's creative process.

And if you are like me and love to see other creative people's sketchbooks and read about their inspiration and process for creating what they make, you will surely love this book:

Drawn In:

A Peek into the Inspiring Sketchbooks of 44 Fine Artists, Illustrators, Graphic Designers, and Cartoonists

By

Julia Rothman

and

Vanessa Davis

Artist sketchbooks offer a glimpse into private pages where artists brainstorm, doodle, develop and work on ideas, and keep track of their musings. Using a variety of media from paint to pencil to collage, these pages can become works of art themselves. They often feel fresh and alive because they are first thoughts and often not reworked, capturing the artist's personalities along with glimpses of their process of working and inspirations. Drawn In: A Peek into the Inspiring Sketchbooks of 44 Fine Artists, Illustrators, Graphic Designers, and Cartoonists shares large full-color images and profiles each of the high-profile, amazingly talented artists that discuss their sketchbooks and how they use them. It shows how artists use these journals to document their daily lives, produce their initial ideas for bigger projects, and practice their skills.

Julia Rothman is a pattern designer and illustrator located in Brooklyn, New York. Her pattern designs can be seen on products for companies such as Urban Outfitters, The Land of Nod, and Garnet Hill. She has her own line of letterpress stationery with Hello Lucky, office products through Galison, and a wallpaper line through Hygge & West. Recently, Julia finished up a new pattern for Victoria's Secret which they used on their new Tease for Two beauty products. Her illustrations can be found in The New York Times, Cosmopolitan magazine and on a poster displayed throughout the New York City's subway system as part of the MTA Arts for Transit program. Articles about her work have been published in Paper, City, Blanket and Tokion magazines. Visit her blog Book By Its Cover at www.book-by-its-cover.com.

For more of an inside peek, pop on over to Qbookshop and hit the "Google Preview" button!