The Rain is Back

I have good news: Foster has been adopted! Foster has been the recipient of MyPalPeppy's fund-raising efforts for several weeks now, and I'm glad to see this lovely, happy dog has found a new home. Especially since he is a senior dog, and often these older dogs are not as adoptable as younger ones. A special thanks is due to all MyPalPeppy customers--15% of every sale goes to support these rescue efforts. 

Our next little "virtual adoptee" is another senior special needs pom named Nikki:

This is Nikki. Isn't she a beauty?

Someone out there needs this little dog as much as this little dog needs that person! I can attest to the blessing that pets can bring into our lives. God uses them to give comfort, friendship, and healing. I've seen it in my own life, and in the lives of others. 

There was a man with a small business in my community who had a darling little black and tan pomeranian named PJ. This man was a strong Christian, but after a serious car accident, the trauma caused him to fall into a deep depression and have panic attacks. Then his family got PJ for him. He credited that little dog for saving his sanity, and told anyone who asked how the Lord had used that little fur companion in the healing process. Later this good man developed terminal cancer, and once again, PJ was there to help him through to the end, and to comfort the family afterward. 

The love and companionship of a pet has the potential to be a great blessing, which is why I think of Peppy's little Etsy shop as a true Christian ministry. There are many, many ways to show the love of Jesus.

"He prayeth best who loveth best all things both great and small..."

--Coleridge

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Of course, a pressing need right now is disaster relief for the tornado victims in the Oklahoma city area, and we don't want to forget these folks. 20% of the profits from MelmacParadise this month will go to support relief efforts for these families through Samaritan's Purse, so if you've been thinking of purchasing something in the shop, this would be a great time to do so. I've also got a sale on, so there's another incentive. Just type in "BNS2013" at checkout to get your 15% discount. If you're unfamiliar with the work of Samaritan's Purse, you can check out their website here:

http://www.samaritanspurse.org/article/oklahoma-tornado-response/ 

 

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Wet-weather-as-usual is back for us after a remarkably lovely spring season thus far. It's slowing up our woodcutting efforts, but it's also keeping me indoors and making me tackle the gargantuan upheaval I call my sewing room, so it's probably a good thing. I can't work on a single project while my room is piled high with fabric, yarn, patterns, etc. Ghastly job! I can't believe how quickly that room can degenerate into total chaos.

However, I did finish up a couple of tiny projects recently, and I promised to show them to you, so here they are. 

I started with this, originally a vintage letter holder. When I found it, the spring that would have held the envelopes was missing, and since I'd had no success locating another, and since there was a tiny chip in the figurine, I decided to give repurposing a try.

Inspired by the many gorgeous examples on Etsy, I set out to turn this steed into a pincushion. 

 Now I wish I could tell you I did a lot of careful measuring and making of patterns and such, but that would be fantasy. I looked for and found a gold-colored velvet fabric remnant, hacked away at it after eye-balling the cavity on the figurine's back, and hand-stitched a sort of blobby-looking, more-or-less cylindrical cushion, stuffed with a bit of polyfil fiber.

I then wedged it into the cavity, seam-side down, and assessed the fit. You can see the difficulty--there was a decided gap on each end where the spring would have been attached. A little doohickey inside the cavity prevented the cushion from squeezing up tight to the edges. So........

I shelved the project and gave it up as a bad job for a few days. 

It kept gnawing at me, though. Eventually I popped in to the fabric store, saw some nice fat gold braid, and bought a bit to experiment with.

When you use this braid, be sure and tape the cut edges or it frays like mad!

A bit of tweaking and pushing and prodding resulted in what I thought would work. The first piece of braid was cut and attached to the edge with white craft glue. With the velvet cushion wedged in to hold it in place, I let it dry. Then I worked the same magic on the back of the saddle area, put a little more glue in the bottom of the cavity, inserted the cushion, and voila!

 

I now have a fun and presentable little pincushion to keep handy for emergency craft impulses, and to save me from hunting from room to room for my regular old stand-by pincushion, perpetually misplaced.

I had so much fun with this, I decided to try another pincushion. This one was easy; it required merely a small canning jar, a puff of fiberfil, jar lid and ring, and craft glue. 

I put the fiberfil on the lid, covered it with a scrap of cute calico print cloth, pulled it tight and glued down. I trimmed away some of the excess, added the ring, and here is the happy result:

T

This was an idea I'd seen on Pinterest, and it was so simple! It took all of 5 minutes to make. With the fabric glued on, the lid won't screw down as tightly as it originally did, but it still grips and the neat thing about this design is, I can keep other little sewing necessaries in the jar itself.

If I can do this, I know you can! What vintage items have you repurposed? Please share!