Halloween CARDBOARD haunted house made from cardboard boxes

This weekend my son and I had a blast making this little halloween center piece out of Saltine crakerbox and Gram cracker, and granola boxes. 

First we contructed the house by taping the boxes together using masking tape.

We drew where we wanted the doors and windows would go.

 The turret was made with a granola box and cutting the corners to make the roof. The flag was made from scrapbook paper and a toothpick. The little sign says "God Bless Our Home" I found this at a craft shop and glued it on at the end.

After the box was taped and windows and doors cut out. We painted the house with gesso and black acrylic paint mixed together. Then when it dried we added the shingles. I LOVE THIS FORSTER WOOD SQUARES! They are amazing balsa wood little squares that snap so easily to any size you want. We used elmers glue and a brush and put them on the roof. Once all the shingels were glued and dried we glued popsticle sticks on for the slats on the sides of the house and framed the house with the popsticle sticks. I had to cut the sticks with a sharp tool. Then we repainted the house, and dry brushed it with the white gesso to get the weathered effect.


Supplies. Popsticle sticks from 99 cents store. Toothpics and the Forster Wood squares. You can use anything to decorate the house once you are finished. Make your own trees and even lanscape it.


Yay finshed and and can't wait to put on our table!

A Stitching Odyssey's SIMPLICITY 5489 -#vintage pledge

I was so excited this summer to come across A Stitching Odyssey's blog! If you haven't seen Marie's blog it is an amazing treat! She is an incredible garment sewer. I immediately followed her on blog loving and wrote to her to see if she would be interested in sewing something with my Cherie fabric collection. It is a great advantage to be a fabric designer and be able to write to people and tell them you want to send them free fabrics! But not everyone I write to says yes. Some people have very busy schedules and they turn down free fabric. But to my wonderful surprise Marie said yes!!!!! And I hope to keep a friendship with her. She does very inspiring work as you can see. See full post and her blog here: 

A STITCHING ODYSSEY.

She  hand stitched my bow to the left back opening and affixed a press stud / snap fastener to the other side.

Like with most original vintage patterns, I had to make a lot of alterations to get this baby to fit. The bodice was drafted for very different proportions to my own (broad back / shoulders and a side boob), but as usual the waist fit just fine. I'll cover the alterations in a different post, but suffice it to say that I'm pretty happy with the fit I managed to achieve."

 " Onto the back detail...*swoon*! Simplicity 5489 is a relatively quick and easy make, but the bow took me forever! It's by no means perfect, but it's cute enough to be honest. It's one thing tying the perfect ribbon bow on a gift and quite another doing it with bulkier fabric. Next time I'll probably narrow it a tad...and practice tying bows in the meantime of course!"

My second favourite detail Simplicity 5489 has to offer is the skirt. I love how flattering an A-line shape can be, skimming the hips (aka muffin tops) without the bulky waist of a gathered skirt. This pattern offers the best of both worlds though, with gentle gathers either side of the centre front skirt. I think the reason I find slimmer skirts appealing is that I personally find them easier to dress down to fit in with my less-than-glamorous lifestyle.