Here are some pillow cases I made for our outdoor "couch" (really just a outdoor lounge chair with throw pillows pushed up against the side of the house).  

They are made from scrap pieces of fabric, ribbon and really cheep muslin that I screen printed and embroidered.




I like the gnome one, but it doesn't really match the others. I may end up making a different pillow case for that pillow and keep the gnome one as an extra.

For some reason I've been making a lot of aprons lately, ever since I did the worth your while apron swap.  Her are some pictures of one I made from some linen I found at a thrift store and a Japanese tenugui dish towel.

I decided that it needed a sea creature on it to go with the wave pattern on the fabric.

Oh, wow!!  What the heck is it made of?

I think it is self hardening clay, but correct me if I'm wrong jamesdean.

Here are the pictures of the mobile I sent A_patchwork_orange.

It is a moblie of a flock of flamingos made out of watercolor paper.  She said she liked birds and pink so I figured flamingos would be perfect.

Here is a close up of one of the flamingos.

I hope they are happy in their new home.

Sorry I've been really flaky about posting pictures of the mobile that jamesdean sent me.  The top part of the mobile broke a little bit in the mail and I still haven't managed to fix it but you can't see the damage too much in the pictures anyway.


Here are some pictures of it hanging in my garden.

Also I was supposed to post pictures of the one I sent A_Patchwork_Orange because she been super busy and wasn't going to get a chance to reassemble it and take pictures for a while.  If I get a chance I'll post some pictures I took before I sent it off later today.

I think h_pets360's camera is still dead so I thought I'd post pictures of the things I sent her since she only got to post one preview picture of the whole package together.  

I screen printed a dish towel with a screen of two little owls that I actually designed long before I heard about this swap.


I hand sewed and embroidered this owl stuffie/pincussion


I made this wristlet with Japanese owl fabric that I found at a tiny Japanese fabric shop not too far from my house. Oh, and I embroidered the little owls in the corner.


My personal favorite thing I made was this apron.  I actually made another one first when we were waiting to get our swap partner info with yellow fabric instead of green.  But I decided I liked it so much I couldn't give it away.  So when I found out h_pets360 really liked green I made her another one in green.  I used the same owl screen print as on the dish towel.  The tie is made from this vintage mushroom ribbon I found at a thrift store in Idaho and the pockets covered in owls are made from a Japanese tenugui tea towel from the Japanese dollar store in Gardena, CA.

Sorry I didn't post pictures earlier.  My computer at home has decided not to work again so I had to upload pictures at work.  Here is the great swap package that h_pets360 sent me.  Hum where to start.  
 
First a skirt with very cute owls hand painted on the but pockets.  

A needle case with an owl appliqued on the front.  Something I definitely need since my boyfriend keeps finding needles all over the apartment.

A really nicely made crocheted zipper coin purse that had two of the cutest owl buttons I've ever seen in it.

A decoupaged owl journal

A tank top with tons of sequins and a little felted owl

A sewing machine cover that my sewing nook really needed


And a owl calendar that I'm already using and the cutest owl cross stitch kit that I can't wait to try.

Thank you so much h_pets360 for sending me so much great stuff.

I have gotten really obsessed lately with tenugui Japanese hand towels lately.  Here is a link to the wikipedia entry on them. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenugui I bought this book about them at a little Japanese language bookstore in LA that has the most amazing pictures of them and random crafts and things to do with them.

http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E3%83%8F%E3%82%A4%E3%82%AB%E3%83%A9%E6%89%8B%E3%81%AC%E3%81%90%E3%81%84%E6%A1%88%E5%86%85-%E5%90%9B%E9%87%8E-%E5%80%AB%E5%AD%90/dp/4309280110/ref=sr_1_2/250-9065393-9649008?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1181237949&sr=1-2
They are 35 by 90cm cotton towels that are usually printed with really cute patterns.  Most of the patterns in this book are probably only available in Japan but I have found some I really like at some of the Marukai 98cent stores in LA.  
Here are some dish towels I made from cutting up and piecing together different prints.  



And here is an apron that I made for the owl swap round 4 that my partner received already so I think It's ok to post pictures here.  The bottom pockets part is made from a tenugui with tons of little owls printed on it.  I actually made a yellow one first that I decided I loved so much I couldn't give it up so I made a green one for my swap partner.  

I have made a few other things using tenugui but mostly bags and other non housewares things.  They are definitely great for making kitchen stuff though because they are so absorbant and easy to clean.  

I made this octopus screen using the faux screen printing meathod http://community.livejournal.com/craftgrrl/3674467.html but I'm not sure I like how it turned out.  

I used the octopus from the center of the drawing I made for this print

I made in a screen printing class but since I was using the faux meathod at home I could only use one color.  I'm not sure if I chose the right areas to be red vs. white.  What do you guy think?

I was driving around today and saw this sign for a cafe that I just had to stop and take a picture of.  I though you guys might enjoy it.

I guess tecolote means owl in spanish.

My boyfriend and I just moved into a new apartment and I finally finished setting up my craft stuff.  At first we had been looking for a two bedroom so that we could have a separate crafting room for me/office for him but that ended up being out of our price range in the area where we wanted to live.  

So we got this one bedroom that I love but it has very little storage or wall space to put dressers or storage bins.  My boyfriend had this closet door shoe holder from his old place that we didn't really have a place for at our new place but decided that hanging on the back of the bathroom door it made a great place to store and organize my fabric stash.

Here is is in relation to my tiny sewing nook.

I like being able to see my fabric and have it close at hand without being in the way.