me hearty eye patch tutorial

I was going to make super hero heart masks for all the kids in my daughter’s class (like this fantastic one), but they were fussy and each one was taking way too long. My daughter and I came up with the eye patch idea together. An hour later I had whipped up 17 of them. Super fast, super easy, good for girls and boys (and grown ups too), and not full of sugar. Eye patches arrrrgh the best!

materials:

• felt, 2 3in squares per patch
• 1/8in wide elastic, 16-18in piece per patch
• straight edge

1. Cut two 3in squares of felt for each eye patch you are making. Then cut a heart from one out of each two squares: if you are making 5 eye patches, you started with 10 squares and now will have 5 hearts and 5 squares.

2. Take a heart and place a straight edge (I used an envelope) across the middle. Then tilt the edge 1/4 inch up on one side and 1/4 inch down on the other. Make a tiny mark on each edge. This is where the elastic will be attached to the patch. Really you only need to mark 2 or 3hearts. After that you can just eyeball it (ha!). No really.

3. Place the marked heart on top of a felt square. Cut a piece of elastic so it’s 16-18 inches, smaller for smaller people bigger for bigger people.  Sew 1/8 inch from the edge all around the heart, inserting the elastic where indicated.

4. Trim away excess felt, holding the elastic as you cut (so it doesn’t get cut, silly).

5. That’s it! No go make 20 more because Valentine’s day is tomorrow! Here are a few awful pirate puns you can use:

Will you be my matey?

You arrrrgh my Valentine!

I want to capture you, Valentine!

Yarrrr the best!

I treasure you!

I’d walk the plank for you!

Ahoy, me hearrrrty

an adorable little step stool for the bathroom: “Wash hands and face and do it well when you step on this carousel,”

a basket I know full well I don’t need,

and some gold shoes. gold! shoes!

The idea (and pattern and color scheme) for this potholder came from Martha Stewart. This whole potholer thing started because I needed to respect the work I do in my home. Martha Stewart seems to have abandoned that cause.

When I pick up her magazine these days, there is not a lot of substance in it. My back copies of Living have survived many basement clean ups–and subsequent trips to the dump. When I get one out to read I always discover some in depth article about cleaning cloths, or glue, or the mudroom. That is only a sampling from February back issues.  The magazine didn’t used to cater to hipster whims, but rather to a wide swath of people who would like their daily chores recast as an art they can refine. Granted Martha Stewart can get a little crazy, but all in all she has taken homemaking to a higher level of sophistication.

She may have failed me as a homemaking superstar, but she makes nice potholders. It is just a simple log cabin block, quilted. I eyeballed the measurement and it came out pretty nice.

I’d love to know your opinions about Martha and her empire, because I know you’ve got some.

That last potholder grew out of a need for mindfulness in my life. This one, on the other hand, was sewn out of jealously. If you follow the lovely Kayanna on instagram (@junecraft) you already know about the amazing quilt she’s making. Every other day or so another quilt square sewn in bold colors and milky pastels would pop up on my feed and I would freak out. I mean look at this!

Quilting is not my strong suit, but the block was too pretty to pass up. Freshly Pieced has a fantastic tutorial on how to put this block together. She also has a template to print out that you sew directly onto so everything comes out perfectly. I did not print it out (as you probably can tell). The finished quilt square was much too big for a potholder, so I cut the pieces much smaller. Why I didn’t just shrink the template too is beyond me. The lazy man works twice as hard–and stays up sewing late into the night.

This kind of quilt square is incredibly fiddly, but also immensely satisfying when it comes together. In the future I might even have the urge–and possibly the patience–to make a whole quilt. My scrap pile would like that time to come sooner rather than later. Or maybe I could go into the potholder business, because–just so you know–it’s pretty much potholders from here on out.

I made a bunch of potholders recently. I thought this little project would help me get my sewing mojo back and also make the kitchen a more welcoming place.

My intention was not so much “buy a cute and funny little scrubbie so washing dishes is SUPER FUN!!”  I’m trying to respect the job it is I do. Motherhood, housekeeping, much of anyone’s time really is errands and tasks and doing the damn laundry again. We’re told, especially as young mothers, that scheduling “me time” is supposed to erase the stress and monotony of our daily chores, but forced relaxation isn’t going to change the fact that there is laundry to be done.

It’s not that I’m horribly uptight and unable to relax–most evening you will find me on the couch–it’s that all of these things are a huge part of my life. I can’t put them all in the category ” things that need to be done before I can live my real life.” Some people, as Stephinine said, “border […] on poetry when they write about doing laundry or mending clothing.” I will never truly feel enlightening scraping oatmeal out of the bottom of the pan, but I can respect my roll as a caregiver and bring some joy to the tasks that come with being a mother.  My gnarly ass potholders told me my job as a mother was secondary; this silly star potholder says otherwise.

On a completely different note, elsie marley now has its own Facebook page. I know lots of you use Facebook to keep up with blogs, so now you can follow me there too!