Holiday Handmade Craft Fairs in NYC

The holiday season has reignited my desire to be crafty! So many gifts to make and craft fairs to attend. I'll be selling my handmade bags at the DBA Craft Fair for the first three Saturdays in December from 3 to 8 PM. Stop by this East Village bar, have a beer, and do some holiday shopping!

NYC has more craft fairs than I can keep up with! Here are some I'm considering attending this holiday season (stolen from Brooklyn Based and Etsy Labs):

PS 29/PS 8 Holiday Gift Fair and Pie Social this Saturday December 5th, in Cobble Hill, where staffers at Food & Wine will judge a fundraising pie contest and Rooftop Films will screen children’s films while mom and dad shop.

The Handmade Calvalcade, this Saturday December 5th, has over 50 New York artists, designers, crafters, and Etsy sellers bringing their handmade creations together for this one-day shopping event.

The Bust Holiday Craftacular, this Sunday, December 6th, has handmade wares from over 200 vendors, including handbags, jewelry, and clothing.

3rd Ward’s Handmade Holiday fair Dec. 12 at 195 Morgan Ave: along with over 120 vendors, there are free workshops like DIY Printing and freebie-filled totes for the first 300 in the door.

Brooklyn Indie Market Dec. 12 & 13, designers will donate 10-15% of their sales to Brooklyn Community Housing

The Brooklyn Lyceum’s Holiday Craft Market Dec. 19 & 20 promises original gifts for the last-minute shopper.

Fabric Stores from San Francisco to Seattle

My husband Ameet and I just returned from an adventurous trip - we spent two weeks in San Francisco, and then took a road trip north along the Pacific Coast, through the Redwood forests, Crater Lake, Portland, and Seattle. This part of the country is so beautiful. We did lots of sight seeing, visited friends, and ate amazing food. In each town we went to, my husband would search for the best restaurants, farmers markets, and food co-ops...and I spent my time finding the best fabric stores. I know - such a fabric nerd!
In San Francisco, I absolutely loved Peapod Fabrics (pictured above), a tiny little shop in the Sunset. Check out the owner's blog - lots of great pictures and inspiration. I also spent some time exploring Stonemountain & Daughters in Berkeley, a huge fabric store with all types of fabrics and classes throughout the year.

We arrived a little late in Ashland, OR (home of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival), and as we wandered around town, I was sad to find this very cute fabric store (Fabric of Vision) was closed for the day! But I peaked through the windows and it looked adorable inside.
In Portland, another fun shop I found was Bolt (above), which is conveniently located right next to a yarn store in the Alberta Arts District.

Our last stop was in Seattle, and I just a had a few minutes to stop by Stitches. If I return to Seattle, I'd also love to check out The Quilting Loft, which we drove by, but didn't get a chance to stop.

DIY wedding project - table runners

Two weeks before my wedding, I got a little overly ambitious and decided to make table runners for all 26 tables and then a few extra for the bar and gift table (yes, we had a big Indian wedding!). I got inspired by another bride-to-be who was a little smarter than me and finished hers five months before her wedding. It was quite the project. Not difficult at all, but really tedious and time consuming. But I think they turned out beautifully.

I searched for good fabric for a week, and found this one at an upholstery store in the fashion district that was going out of business. I had to buy 18 yards of fabric! To make the table runners, I cut out pieces that were 9' long by 12" wide, making a total of 30 pieces. Then for each table runner, I folded over each edge twice (about 1/4" for each fold), ironed over the fold, and then stitched along the edges.

**Picture courtesy of Lotus Ryan.

Blog Word Cloud

My friend Mentha shared this cool web program with me called Word Clouds that create a visual representation of a story or a news article. She created the one below for my blog. The most commonly used words are the largest - I like how fabric sticks out in mine.

You can generate them on this site: www.wordle.net.

Buttercup Bag

My sewing machine has been lonely for the last couple months. I'd forgotten about her. I've gotten lost with wedding planning, but I was inspired again this week to make something. I found a free pattern for a pleated handbag and had to make it! I'd been wanting to learn how to do pleats for a while, so this was perfect - and it turned out to be super easy.

The pattern is for the Buttercup Bag, posted on the blog Made by Rae. The explanation she has is clear and simple. The only changes I made were to make the bag larger by blowing up the pattern 129% and adding interfacing to the lining fabric and handle to make it sturdier. It's lovely! Check out the flickr pool for even more inspiration.

Martha Stewart Loot

Today was another one of those days when I was loving living in nyc. This morning Sacha, Joan and I went to see the Martha Stewart Show! It was her first ever all craft show, and Rosie O'Donnell was her guest - which you know means lots of free stuff! Martha just published her new Encyclopedia of Crafts, which has loads of ideas, pictures, and instructions for all of you crafty people out there. Enough inspiration to last a very long time. Other fun give-aways included a hot glue gun (oh, the possibilities!), glitter, and a Michael's gift card!

A little inspiration...

For the past year, every time I've wanted to sew, I've had to drag my sewing machine and supplies out to our dining table and then drag them back when I was done. Didn't help much with motivating me to sew. So I finally found myself a little corner in our 1 bedroom apartment and set up a table and all of my supplies. I get so excited when I walk by it now. My sewing machine is always staring at me, inspiring me to sit down and start sewing!

I got so inspired over the past few days that I made 3 fun projects.

I modified this Amy Butler Swing Bag Pattern to make this cute reversible bag. I love the fabric that I got at Brooklyn Mercantile, which is conveniently one block from my house.

My ipod has been getting all scratched up in the bottom of my bag, so I wanted to make a cover for it. I found this great ipod tutorial on Made by Petchy, which is very easy to follow. I replaced the ribbon with some velcro and also changed the dimensions of the fabric I cut to 12" x 4" because I have a larger ipod. My sister-in-law Nina got me this beautiful fabric from Japan.


Finally, this makeup bag project had been sitting in my sewing pile for a while because the zipper had broken while I was sewing it the first time. I ripped out the old zipper and put in a new one. I also used a tutorial I found searching through sewing blogs - such an obsession with sewing blogs.