Fresh Baked Pi Onesie (Cutting Files for Silhouette Now Available)

Pi Day is just a couple days away.

Here's Anson's little onesie he wore last year when he was just over a week old.

I LOVE freezer paper stencil for making near professional quality personalized T-shirts...but cutting out the designs by hand can be a pain.  Still I haven't been lucky enough to get my hands on a Silhouette yet, so I keep cutting my designs out with a razor blade.

Overdue Readers' Feature

I never know when I've REALLY had a good idea until later when I start seeing which ones were good enough that you all use the ideas to make your own.  It really makes my day when I see all your projects, so I just had to show them off a bit. 
It's been a while since I posted my free pattern for a T-shirt dress, so I was really surprise and WOWed when I saw these three that Naomi from Work Your Mommy Magic whipped up for her daughter...and I thought the reason she needed to make them was really cute...but you'll have to click over to her blog to see that.

This is making me want to make a few more of these for my girls, now that the summer is getting warmer.

It was such a nice surprise to be browsing through Emily's blog at More from the Moore Family and see this post about the Valentine shirts she made her boys.

And as long as I'm on the subject of freezer paper stencilling.  My friend Leah at 1 Mommy Many Blessings made up her own pattern and made this cute shirt from the freezer paper tutorial.

Then as I was taking a peak at my blog traffic, I noticed people clicking over from Be Crafty, Be Creative, Be Cute.  I clicked over thinking I'd see one of my projects featured...but WOW!  Instead I saw that she'd actually made these herself! 

She made these in less than a week after I posted the tutorial for the Front-Facing Shelves.  I'm seriously impressed and I love the little Dr. Seuss quote, she added. 

And you know it made me smile when I saw these pop up on The Rabens Family on Pi-Day.  (Tutorial for making the Mini-Pudding Pies is here.)

We had a great Pi-Day at our house.  An added little bonus was the email I got from Jen of Which Craft? who celebrated her first Pi-Day after seeing our mini pies.  I love how their pi symbols stand up out of their pies...and that we're spreading nerdiness one family at a time. :)

I also love how Michelle at A-Tisket, A-Tasket adapted our Lucky Mantel Idea into a fun paper and pastel part project.

And I got another little surprise when I saw these shelves on Craft Spotter.

If you've used one of the tutorials from Helping Little Hands, I'd love to see pics!  You can reply to this post...or reply to the post you used...or just send me an email at polly.helping.little.hands (at) gmail (dot) com, so I can include you in my next Readers' Feature.

Look How Awesome YOU all are...

Can I just tell you that it makes my day to find out that someone was actually inspired by something they saw here and used one of my tutorials.  I love getting an email or comment with a link or pictures showing me what you made.  Or sometimes I have to be sneaky and I find out about your project because I noticed someone clicking over from your blog and then I'm blown away by what I see.  It's especially inspiring when one of you takes my ideas and makes them even better, so that I want to copy you. 

Here are a couple of examples...

Liz on Married with UFO's has been cooking up some awesome felt food.  She's made a bunch of things that I never did...like cookies. 

Hand-Me-Down REHAB Readers' Showcase (Finally)

It's well past time to get a showcase post up.  I'm actually pretty embarrassed that it's taken me so long to do this.  I've been showing off so much of my stuff, it's time to show off all the great stuff you all have been doing and were kind enough to link up.  I guess I put these posts off because it can take a while downloading the pics, uploading them again, and then making all the links.  I always love it when other bloggers feature my ideas, though, so I want to return the favor.  Anyway...sorry guys...thanks for sticking with me!  If I've featured your link, feel free to grab a featured on button from the sidebar.

As anyone knows who's been on this blog lately...I love applique.  I also love these linen pants on Kojo Designs and how the trim matching the shirt applique really brings the outfit together.

Quadruple Heart Applique Giveaway WINNER!

Congratulations!  The Random Number Generator chose comment #4 left by Miss Muffin from Muffins and More as the WINNER of the Quadruple Heart Applique giveaway.  Pretty appropriate since she won by leaving this comment this comment:

Well, I would love the applique! And you taking about it not being perfect makes me feel really ... well ... you should see my first applique


http://muffinsnmore.blogspot.com/2010/04/neckerchief.html

I am really happy with the heart but the "K" ... oh well ... it makes me want to write "first applique ever" all over it so people will no and think "Oh well, it was her first time ..."

So please take a minute and head over to her blog to let Miss Muffin know what an awesome job she did with her own first ever heart applique project.

It Makes My Day...

...When readers make comments or I see I've picked up a new follower or two.  Thanks guys!  You're the best.  Especially those of you who come back day after day and week after week to see what I've been working on.  I'm working on a little surprise to make YOUR day soon.  I just have to figure out the best way to execute my plans.

And it REALLY made my day when I got an email from some ladies in Denmark who made my fabric roads!  Wow!  What a compliment!  It's so flattering to know that not only did they like my idea...they took the time to actually make it...And I have to say theirs are even better than mine.  I love some of the modifications and upgrades they did. 
(Hint, Hint...If you ever use one of my ideas I'd LOVE to hear from you and see pics!)

Anne emailed me these pictures of a mudpit.  Her son drives his car into it and then has to go to the car wash.  (Also notice how she attached velcro tabs, so the roads will stay together better.)

And she made these T intersections.  She also made some of the parking spaces in her roads big enough to fit some of her son's bigger trucks.  What a great idea!

Her friend Christina made these roads.  You'll want to stop by her blog to see all the pictures of her set (This takes you to a translated version.), but I LOVE how she added the stop lines to the roads.

You know what else makes my day?  When I go to join one of my favorite Linky Parties, like My My Crafty Weekend on Until Wednesday Calls and discovered that she featured one of my favorite projects from the week before.  Thanks, Melissa!





And of course it also makes my day when one of my projects appears on another blog like One Pretty Thing.  Thanks, Rachel!  (And I'm about to let you in on a little secret.  Don't tell anyone I told you this...but if you have a great project on your blog, don't wait for it to be "discovered."  Go ahead and email her.  She's super nice.)

And as a final note, I got a cheery little email last night saying that Sweet Pea's Very Hungry Caterpillar Cake would be featured in the "Sidebar Spotlight" on Somewhat Simple for the day.  (You'll have to scroll down pretty far to see it on the left.)

So go make a blogger's day and leave comments when you see something you like.  Happy Thursday!

Felt-Food Cook-Along Readers' Showcase #2

This post is long overdue.  I was surprised when I did the first one at just how long it took to put together a "highlights" post, what with clicking on all the links, downloading and then uploading the pictures and attaching the links (especially since our computer is on the slow side.)  Anyway, there were a lot of deserving projects that were linked up, and I wanted to highlight some of them.  If you have a felt food project of your own you'd like to share, add it to our linky list at the bottom!

Shelley Inspired shared her loaf of bread and a tutorial for it.  This reminds me that I really should make one of these, especially since we make so much homemade bread around here. 

Felt Food Cook-Along Readers Showcase

Thanks so much to everyone who has linked up to share your fel food creations!  They're so great, I thought I'd take a break from showing off myself to show of your stuff...because it's even better.  Then to let you know what's coming, I'll share my secret to the blueberry muffins and later we'll be doing some bread and sandwich fixings, minature canned food (not felt, but sooo cool), bananas, carrots, strawberries, pancakes and fixings, and more (but not necessarily in that order.)  Please keep linking up your awesome projects down below!

I love how Miss Muffin on Muffins and More made these felt Valentines cookies.  She did some great detail work including using French knots for sprinkles.

Jamie at Pure Joy made a pizza with a ton of cool accessories.

Counting Coconuts has a great idea for combining felt cookies with numbers.

Angie on Treasures for Tots as a lot of great ideas for felt food...and a lot of them are No-Sew versions if you want something super simple.  I've successfully used instructions for several kinds of pasta and she makes some really awesome Pop Tarts.  I love how she used the beads for the sprinkles.  Be sure to check out all her links!

If you're looking for more no-sew options, Pink and Green Mama has a no-sew pizza to share...

MiaMoo Designs has a fun idea for Valentine's Day candy hearts.

You should also check out the cupcake on Camp Slop made to go with her daughter's Pinkalicious costume.  (You've got to click to see the costume.)  We love Pinkalicious around here and have done our own activities with it after being introduced to it by Christianne on Little Page Turners.

And last, but certainly not least..."i make stuff" has an awesome felt carrot tutorial. So awesome in fact, I'm almost done with four carrots made using her printable free pattern with detailed instructions, so they'll be getting their own post sometime soon.  If you go to her actual blog post, it has links to some other awesome felt food she's made.  Definitely worth looking around. 

Finally, keep those links coming!  If you've got felt food to share, we want to see it.  I'm reposting the same MckLinky here, so just keep adding links and when we have enough, I'll do another highlights post.

If you're looking for other places for felt food inspiration, Keeper of the Cheerios has a great list of free felt food patterns.  Felt-o-rama also has a great list, and One Pretty Thing just had a Felt Food Round-Up (featuring some of my stuff...wow!  I feel so famous. :)  Rachel on One Pretty Thing has also done some felt food round-ups in the past, so be sure to look back at her archives.