Lately I’ve been social in the real world, but silent in social media. This is what I’ve been up to.
I planned an evening at home, with a few friends that I’ve known for years. For the first gathering of girlfriends, I planned a simple craft.
Here’s to renewing old friendships and forging ahead with new relationships in crafty style. My Fall craft night was held prior to Halloween, so I decorated the house for October. The food had a definite Halloween influence too.
The theme was centered around Halloween, winter and Christmas. The project I chose was a candle mat. A candle mat is like a mini quilt but not intimidating for a non sewing person. It’s a great little project when you are trying to get your friends to sew with you.
Baby steps!
This is how I got started.
I picked a few digital designs and stitched them out on 100% cotton pre washed fabric. I used cream and grey fabrics that were light in color and reminded me of coloring book pages.
The light color would work well when we added coloring to the fabric. My guests had a choice of a Halloween theme or a Christmas/winter theme.
In order to mimic old-fashioned coloring book pages, I outlined the designs in black. I chose black 40 weight thread to stitch out three digital quilting designs. The plan was for my guests to color the mats with crayons then heat set the colors.
Paper towel is placed over the candle mat and pressed with a hot iron. Pressing is an up and down motion while ironing is a circular or back and forth movement. We press so we don’t move the wax color.
After the mat was colored each guest hand-stitched the binding to the backside of the mat.
The finishing option for the candle mat was to add glitter spray.
The glitter added a bit of holiday glow.
The spray is a fine mist of tiny glitter adhesive.
I had a large box set up in my garage so the mat could be laid inside and the glitter sprayed while inside the box. That kept the aerosol fumes outside and contained any extra sparkle.
When you combine great food, new & old friends, sharing ideas, and crafting into a Holiday event, everyone has a blast.
Crafting is also a great ice breaker when bringing new people into a group. Since I usually teach a skill or two at every gathering the conversation stays positive and the atmosphere is creative. I have the opportunity to try out new recipes with willing taste testers. They give me honest feedback which is another bonus of longtime friendships. I cant wait until the next time we get together.
Through The Ivy Covered Window 