The MOULI Salad Maker!

I have been considering the purchase of a food processor, so I could start making Sunshine Salad again. (Grating carrots with a hand grater is a dangerous occupation for me.) I had to go up to New Albany recently to pick up a repaired ring. When there I always like to visit a couple of consignment/jumble shops. At the first one I found the most amazing little gadget, probably from the 1950's, in it's original box, the MOULI Salad Maker. For $8 I thought I could afford to take it home and try it.

Starting with fresh carrots from the Farmers' Market, wash, scrub, trim ends. Set up the Salad Maker and give it a whirl. I chose the medium shredder disc, slipped it in, attached the handle, and grated several carrots in no time. It takes a little elbow grease to hold the paddle down.

Grated carrots, a few grapes cut in half, and Jello quick-cooling......

In the 'frig' for an hour or so...........

Pls. note on the lower shelf a product my mother loved, and which will make the Sunshine Salad taste even more delicious....Cool Whip!

The MOULI Salad Maker with the other four blades:

The finest blade can be used to shave ice! More possibilities.

I just happend to borrow this little recipe book from the library, and there are many interesting recipes for shaved ice deserts!

Pretty Stuffed Peppers

We love to eat. And when we eat out with friends, what do we talk about? Food!! Farmers' markets are everywhere now, thank goodness. During the summer months we get close to overdosing on vegetables, if that is possible. Very few trips to the supermarket are needed, as we can buy most ingredients at our Farmers' Market.

Peppers are so pretty, the Bosts always have a colorful variety of them. For this dish, all the ingredients were found at the Farmers' Market: peppers, cherry tomatoes, herbed goat cheese, and whole wheat bread.

Preboil the peppers until slightly tender. Cube slices of whole wheat bread and brush lightly with olive oil and toss with fresh or dry herbs. Bake the croutons until crisp. Toss croutons, goat cheese, cherry tomatoes and more herbs in a large bowl. Stuff the peppers with the mixture. Bake for approximately 1/2 hour. Mmmm, so delicious.

The flowers also came from the Farmers' Market.

A Button Display

Some buttons are just too pretty to be used on clothing, stored in a closet. I wanted a way to display some of the buttons I have collected, mostly new buttons, some vintage and antique. Here they are hanging from the 'Forget-Me-Not' shelf in my studio, in honor of my sister, who loves forget-me-nots. The doll is holding a photo of Carolyn taken a long time ago, at Pleasant Valley Wildlife Sanctuary in Lenox. She is shrugging her shoulders in the photo, as if to say, "Don't forget to take me home with you!"


To display the buttons I tore a strip of canvas fabric, glued a little piece of cardboard to the back, made two holes with an awl, and strung a ribbon through the holes. Each button was either sewn to the canvas, or the shank was pushed through the fabric and held in place with a piece of toothpick.

Love the Hana-Ami Flower Loom!

I love all the cute notions that Clover designs for knitting, crochet, sewing, quilting, etc. I recently discovered the Hana-Ami Flower loom and I love, love, LOVE it! Firstly, it is just adorable how they managed to package six different loom sizes in one compact kit! And the flowers are so sweet, on a pin, as a hair ornament, etc.

Here is a pin I made with mohair and boucle yarns. The pompom in the middle was made on another clever Clover tool, the tiniest pompom maker!

To make the flower into a pin, simply glue felt to the back (I used two layers) and attach a pin back.

I originally found the Hana-Ami loom because I was looking for small weaving looms. I did an internet search for small looms, and this wonderful website came up that is all about flower looms, past and present, with lots of instructions for lots of different flower designs.

Weaving on the loom takes a long time, simple flowers are much faster!

I'm not weaving in all those ends......glue is my friend.

Another pin with beads in the center:

I tried using a sparkly yarn, but the flower is kind of floppy (attached to a headband):

The beautiful hollyhocks outside my studio door:

I went to a wine and wind evening at the knitting shop. About 15 ladies, and one gentlemen, spent two hours playing with the Hana-Ami looms. There were a lot of good suggestions for using them: decorate flip flops (use plastic cording, or plastic raffia), baby blanket & sweater, use to decorate gift packages, school colors, wind two or more colors at a time.

'Yarn Bombing' Headbands

The knit shop owner did some yarn bombing with the kids at the Boys & Girls Club and asked me to help with it. I came up with the idea of 'yarn bombing' headbands and adding a little yarn flower, pom-pom or other decoration.

The kids really liked it, the little ones and the older girls too. Even a couple boys made headbands, for their girlfriends of course.

They are quick and easy to make. We used fabric covered head bands, which I found at the dollar store (six in a pack for one whole dollar). First thing I do is drop the ball of yarn on the floor (a basket would work too). Take the yarn tail and hold it down with your thumb at one end of the headband. Start wrapping the yarn, and wrap over the tail. When you get to the other end, thread the yarn onto a tapestry needle and go back under several wraps. You can also just use glue, which we did at the B&G Club for speed.

To add a little interest to the band, go back over it with the yarn in both directions, making large cross-stitches, as on the band below.

The yarn flowers were made with the Hana-Ami flower loom from Clover. The headband below was wrapped in a vintage ribbon, with mohair flowers made on the Hana-Ami loom.

Some firemen were visiting the B&G Club, and one of them made a pretty headband for his wife! The others watched but weren't game for crafting a headband. They were good sports, though!

You can wrap all kinds of yarns around the headbands, and I have experimented with using different yarns in the Hana-Ami loom too. Here is a ribbon type yarn.

Lastly, a pretty rick rack using the flower loom.

Beaded Button Brooches

We did the first part of a two-part beaded button brooch workshop at my EGA chapter Saturday. I think it went pretty well. If anyone has any questions or anything, please e-mail or call me.

Here is a brooch I made out of a keyhole I found at a flea market in France three years ago. I made the pin in the same way I make the beaded button brooches. I miniaturized a photo of Lulu taken at Elizabeth Park Rose Garden in Hartford, about 90+ years ago. When my sister and I went to France last year, Lulu went with us in the form of a pin!

Here are a couple diagrams for some of the beaded edgings I have used on my beaded button brooches. There are many more diagrams on my Flickr photostream. Students can click on the picture of the beaded cat button (on the right) to go to the Flickr photostream.  When you get there, click on the set "Beaded Button Instructions."  Here you will find a 3-page handout of directions, plus diagrams for all the beaded edgings I have created. You can download the instructions, diagrams and pictures and then print them.

The button below was the second one I made after learning the technique from a Bead & Button article. (My technique is pretty different, and all the edgings I use were created by me.) The small buttons are called "calicos" and were made in the mid-19th century. There is a nice article about them in Bead & Button magazine online.

Here is a beautiful reproduction Czech glass button:

Library Craft Circle - Pin Weaving Workshop

Pin weaving is a simple way of creating a small woven piece without the use of a loom. It is weft faced weaving, that is, the warp thread will not show on the finished design. A design is created on graph paper and taped to a piece of foam core board. Pins are placed at the top and bottom of the design. A strong warp thread (waxed linen) is wrapped taughtly around each pin in a continuous motion. Weaving of the weft thread is done with a tapestry needle. Weft threads can be nearly any fiber, but for small pieces embroidery floss and pearl cotton work very well.

Here are a few websites to see examples of pin weaving for inspiration. Needleweaver.com has many examples of needle woven necklaces! Click on each artist to see more photos of their work. Most of these designs are more elaborate than a beginner would start with, but there are lots of ideas if you wish to continue with pin weaving. There are also lessons on this site; I did not follow these directions so they differ from mine.  Note: above link no longer works, but I found LOTS of inspiration boards on Pinterest by searching "needle weaving" and "pin weaving."

An earlier article in Threads Magazine featured needle woven fabric inserted onto purse fronts. Very lovely, they are woven with heavier threads.

SIMPLE (and fun!) HOMEWORK BEFORE WORKSHOP: To start your design, you will need graph paper, 5 squares per inch. You can find graph paper on-line through Needlepointers.com.

This needlepoint website has a page listing places on the internet where you can find free graph paper. I used the second link listed and was directed to a site that lets you create all kinds of graph paper. There is a form on which you specify the number of squares per inch, it should be 5 squares per inch, or less.

When you have printed your graph paper, decide how large or small you would like your woven piece to be. On your graph paper draw borders around an even number of squares to accommodate your design. Do this several times on the page. Ten or 12 squares is a good size to start with. For my finished piece, above, I blocked off 10 squares. Here are my sketches (you should be able to enlarge the sketch by clicking on it):

You will be placing pins at the top and bottom of your design. At the top of each sketch, I like to number and make dots where the pins will be inserted later. If there are ten boxes, there will be 11 pins. So I number the dots like so:

5 - 4 - 3 - 2 - 1 - 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5

Repeat at the bottom of the box. However, the pins at the bottom will be inserted between the vertical lines of the graph paper, therefore, only 10 pins will be used. I also number these dots, omitting the zero.

In the boxes you have drawn, make several sketches. You are not confined to the box shape; as you can see on my sketches -- and ones on the Needleweavers.com site listed above -- I sometimes went outside the border. It is simply easier, for a first project, not to go too wild.

Color in the sketches you like, and add beads to the sketch. Helen Banes, in her book “Beads & Threads,” says that beads are a focal point for the design, that is something to keep in mind when placing the beads.

The “don’t do like I did” section! On my first piece I changed colors at the top and bottom edges:

Not a good idea. When the piece comes off the board the sections will not stay together (just at these top and bottom edges). I realized this would happen before I removed the pins. It was easy to fix, though, so that could be an option if you really want color changes at the top and bottom. Here is how I fixed it. With the finished piece still attached to the board, I removed the first pin on the top right and wove a new length of weft thread through each of the warp loops at the top, removing each pin as I came to it, and adding a bead between each loop. This held the top edge together and also added a decorative row of beads. Repeat at the bottom.
Supplies for class which I will provide
(kit cost approx. $5):
Foam core board, 1/2 inch thick
Tapestry needles, small to large
Pins
Waxed linen for warp

Supplies students should bring to class:

Graph paper (please see website above to print your own graph paper) PLUS bring your finished sketches
Embroidery floss or pearl cotton
Beads (with large holes preferred)

Things you will need to finish your project, probably after class:

Beacon Fabric-Tac
Ultrasuede for backing
Pinback (to make a brooch), or beads & beading thread (to make a necklace)

All the supplies students are to bring to class are available in Oxford. Wal-Mart has a good selection of beads, including ones with large holes (please look at the hole size before you buy), and other jewelry making supplies. The Fabric Center has a good selection of embroidery floss and also Beacon Fabric-Tac.

Here are some glass beads I picked up at Wal-Mart which have holes large enough to pull 2 warp threads through:

Please bring your finished sketches, beads and embroidery floss to the workshop on March 28, at 6:00. If you have any questions, please call me (number in phone book).