Vintage Quilt Revival helps you utilize traditional quilt blocks with contemporary colors and fabrics to create pieces that could rightly be a part of the "traditional made modern" movement. In this book, you'll find: 22 quilting projects, including 19 traditional quilt blocks, and ranging from fullsize quilts to a pillow, table runner, bag, and zipper pouch Hints and modifications for adding a fresh twist to vintage designs A touch of quilting history that adds context to the included projects Use of a variety of quilting techniques, including piecing, blasting, quilting, and binding With Vintage Quilt Revival , there's no need to give up your love for traditional quilting stylesjust bring in a bit of modern flair

    It is the place where our families meet and mingle, where we share our meals and share our dreams. So much more than just a space to live, our homes offer us a place of comfort, nourishment, and love for us and for our children. In Handmade Home, Amanda Blake Soule, author of The Creative Family and the blog SouleMama.com, offers simple sewing and craft projects for the home that reflect the needs, activities, and personalities of today’s families. As Amanda writes in the introduction, “As a crafter, I’m always looking for the next thing I want to make. As a mama, I’m always looking for the next thing we need—to do, to have, to use—as a family. The coming together of these parts is where the heart of Handmade Home lies.” Filled with thirty-three projects made by reusing and repurposing materials, all of the items here offer a practical use in the home. From picnic blankets made out of repurposed bed sheets to curtains made out of vintage handkerchiefs, these projects express the sense of making something new out of something old as a way to live a more financially pared-down and simple life; lessen our impact on the earth; connect to the past and preserve a more traditional way of life; and place value on the work of the hands. Also included are projects that children can help with, allowing them to make their own special contribution to the family home. More than just a collection of projects for handmade items, this book offers the tools to create a life—and home—full of beauty, integrity, and joy. Projects include:    • Papa’s Healing Cozy: This hot water bottle cover becomes a simple way to offer comfort to a sick child    • Baby Sling: A simple pattern for an object that offers so much to a small child—refuge from the world and a place to lay their head next to a parent’s heart    • Beach Blanket To-Go: Repurpose old sheets to create the perfect picnic blanket for special outdoor meals    • Cozy Wall Pockets: A creative solution for storing a child’s small treasures

    In Draw Your Day, Baker guides you through her inspirational practice and provides guidance for starting your own. Part instructional guide and part encouraging manifesto about how making art--even art that's not museum-worthy--can make your life more mindful and meaningful, Draw Your Day is ideal for both seasoned artists looking for fresh inspiration, as well as aspiring artists who need a friendly nudge to get started.

    Now, in her much-anticipated first book, embroidery pioneer Jenny Hart brings her sublime designs to everyone. Expanding on the offerings of her Stitch-It Kit, Sublime Stitching offers all the instructions, tips, and hip patterns needed to create hundreds of stylish projects. Perfect for stitchers of all experience levels, this charmingly photographed book includes simple directions and inspiring project ideas for stitching up jeans, handbags, neckties, baby bibs, and more. Best of all are the entirely original, ready-to-use iron-on patterns bound in the back. Jenny has included all sorts of delightful designsfrom cheeky margaritas and maracas to classic teapots and cupcakes. These patterns are easy to remove after using, and a cinch to store in the handy pockets on the inside covers. Believe it or not, each pattern can be used up to nine times. Now that's sublime.

    They offer viewers rich, visual inspiration. There is a fascination with these revealing and often beautiful pages of self-exploration and personal expression. Journals offer a tantalizing, voyeuristic view of an interior life. Journaling has seeped into popular culture in a big way and this collection provides a wide array of ideas, techniques and themes to inspire and inform mixed media and journaling enthusiasts.This is the first book to offer examples of over 1000 journal pages in one eye-catching, visual format. Artists can embrace and experiment with this medium and will benefit from this rich collection.

    Inside Inner Excavation, author Liz Lamoreux will be your guide, along with eleven inspiring artists, as you discover more about who you are, how you got here and where you wish to go. Prompts and exercises will show you how to express who you are through the photos you take, the words you write and the art you create.Find encouragement and fresh ideas in these pages as you:Uncover prompts to use your senses for exploring and capturing where you are in any particular moment.Tap into the poet's voice that's whispering inside of you, even if you've never written poetry before.Be given permission to spend time "Delving into the Quiet," being still and listening to the mindful voice inside of you through meditation to create a balance in your daily moments.Bring words and art together in self-portrait expression that is as layered as you are.Take a fresh look inside today; become inspired, through Inner Excavation, to see more than the smiling reflection in the mirror.

    She is a thread artist. And in Crafty Chica's Guide to Artful Sewing, she'll show how to harness the power of her fearless kamikaze sewing style–just dive in and give it 100 percent. Here you'll not only find out the nuts and bolts of sewing, but learn to have confidence to blaze your own sewing trail with confidence and flair. (And sprinkle of glitter!) The Crafty Chica is here to bring out the thread artist in you. Whether you can hardly sew on a button or are already threading bobbins like a champ, Kathy's got a project just for you. From place mat totes to embellished skirts, Crafty Chica's Guide to Artful Sewing proves that you're in charge of your sewing machine, not the other way around. With these 30 fun fabu-low-sew projects to carry, wear, and use around the home, you can leave the ordinary behind and channel your own Crafty Chica within.

    The author instructs in coil, slab, mold, and pinch techniques to produce pots, bowls, vases, tiles, and other decorative pieces. She also advises on acquiring basic tools, mixing and preparing clay, and using coloring agents. Newcomers to pottery crafting will especially appreciate her tips for making projects easier to accomplish, such as use of a hairdryer at regular intervals for drying out too-wet clay, and easy methods for keeping clay soft and pliable. Step-by-step color photos with detailed captions guide handcrafters through each project from start to finish. Many photos are of the cutaway type to show correct hand positions for controlling the clay, both inside and outside the form. Here's the book that takes the mystery out of handbuilding in clay, demonstrating each step in the pottery-making process. More than 400 color photos.

    With over 30 crochet patterns on the menu, there's something here to please every palette. In addition to snack items that can be stitched up in a flash, you'll find: patterns to plan a meal for breakfast, lunch, dinner and even dessert; basic crochet techniques to get you started right away; and short "ingredients" lists to make finishing an item quick and easy. Whether they're play food for the kids or fun projects for you, you'll love increasing your daily fiber intake with Tasty Crochet!

    The decorating magazines and TV shows never seem to talk to you. So what? With some attitude, know-how, and a lot of your own style, your place can be transformed into a fabulous Shangri-La, a swanky venue fit for living and entertaining well. Pad: The Guide to Ultra-Living is filled to bursting with hip, affordable projects for every room in the house and shows how to use basics like lighting, plants, mirrors, and paint to enhance even problem areas. Numerous testimonials from real people with real living spaces demonstrate how a little spaces demonstrate how a little spunk and individuality can overcome the limitations of the average urban dwelling. Offering a complete lifestyle package, Pad has instructions for building your own home bar, ideas for party themes and recipes--and even collateral hangover cures! This total living guide will have your place all spruced up--and the envy of guests--in no time.

    Pretty cool! The popularity of these resins for jewelry making has soared with the introduction of easy-to-mix, low-odor products, ideal for crafters. Now best-selling author Sherri Haab shows how to put the miracle of modern technology to work making necklaces, bangles, bracelets, pins, earrings, and rings. Projects range from simple to sophisticated, from Bakelite-style heart pins to faux amber earrings to glitter gem bracelets, from scrimshaw bracelets to cloisonné pins to transparent resin necklaces backed with gold leaf. Packed with tips on tools, supplies, finishing, and creating special effects, including ideas on combining resins with polymer clay, The Art of Resin Jewelry is a beautiful and practical introduction to an exciting craft.

    Christi Johnson offers unique patterns inspired by botanicals, animals, numbers, the cosmos, earth elements, zodiac signs, and mythical beasts, for novice or well-practiced crafters to combine into talismans with personal meaning. Johnson’s folk art style is vibrant and unintimidating and provides a framework for bringing spiritual elements into physical form.

    Keep Playing. Keep Creating. In his previous books Steal Like an Artist and Show Your Work!, both New York Times bestsellers, Austin Kleon gave readers the keys to unlock their creativity and showed them how to become known. Now he offers his most inspiring work yet, with ten simple rules for how to stay creative, focused, and true to yourself—for life. The creative life is not a linear journey to a finish line, it’s a loop—so find a daily routine, because today is the only day that matters. Disconnect from the world to connect with yourself—sometimes you just have to switch into airplane mode. Keep Going celebrates getting outdoors and taking a walk (as director Ingmar Bergman told his daughter, ”The demons hate fresh air”). Pay attention, and especially pay attention to what you pay attention to. Worry less about getting things done, and more about the worth of what you’re doing. Instead of focusing on making your mark, work to leave things better than you found them.Keep Going and its timeless, practical, and ethical principles are for anyone trying to sustain a meaningful and productive life.

    The focus of Zentangle is on the process of creation, rather than the end result. The beauty of Zentangle is that there is no right way or wrong way. If you can draw a line and a circle (perfectly or not), you can Zentangle. Zentangle is an art concept that is engaging, approachable, and fun enough for someone who has never picked up any art tools or created a piece of art, yet is still meditative, productive, and creative enough for an advanced artist to enjoy. While many popular Zentangle books share tips, inspiration, and final artwork, there are few that break down Zentangle into a step-by-step process. Structured to be part instruction, part inspiration, and part doodling, The Art of Zentangle will first demonstrate how to create Zentangle art by showing intricate patterns broken out into several steps. After artists have warmed up and are ready to give it a try on their own, they’ll be invited to practice creating their own Zentangle designs on the beautifully designed blank pages of this inspirational sketch journal. A short gallery of final artwork and several inspirational prompts are included in this comprehensive introduction to the new, inspirational world of Zentangle.

    With over 101 of the most popular, interesting, and indispensable tricks for working with acrylic-each with its own step-by-step demonstration-there is literally page after page of acrylic instruction and inspiration for readers to discover. A gallery of finished art at the back of the book will show readers how to combine different tricks to use in their artwork offering them real-life applications for acrylic techniques.