Wednesday, April 15, 2026

I Finally Get To Take Graduation Photos Of My Kid, And I Have So Many Ideas!

This tiny little environmental scientist is about to graduate college!

Neither of my homeschooled high schoolers wanted any part of the cap and gown, pomp and circumstance aspects of high school graduation. They each just kind of... got to a natural end point in every subject they were studying, decided they were done, and went on with other business while I trailed after, saying things like, "Should we do a proper graduation ceremony? No? Maybe just some photos? No? Okay, how about just a pretty diploma? An announcement, at least? No? Nothing? Not a single thing? UGH!"

So my older kid's upcoming college graduation, AND the fact that she has agreed to let me walk around campus with her and take some proper cap and gown photos, is sending me, Artemis-like, over the Moon with excitement...

...which I will, of course, do my best to tamp down to something that appears more like vague interest, lest the kid decide that graduation photos are actually cringe.

She might anyway--that's always the risk with these kids!--but I've upped my odds by purchasing a preschool-sized graduation cap and gown from Facebook Marketplace for eight dollars (my first Facebook Marketplace purchase! I'm what's known as a late adopter), putting it on the dog, taking a photo, sending her the photo, and telling her that on this upcoming visit I am bringing the dog, AND the dog's very own graduation cap and gown, so that they can take graduation photos together.

Dog tax attached, but be warned that it's not a good photo, but more of a proof of concept:


I need to add some black elastic to that cap so it stays on her head, but otherwise, it's totally gonna work, right? Mental note to pack alllllllll the dog treats...

This pic should be super easy to pose, and it would work in a variety of locations. There are tons of steps on the kid's campus, so I could see it happening on any of the endless flights of stairs, or going through some of the decorative gates at the edge of campus, which, my local university has so many of those, too. What is up with colleges and their universal obsession with decorative gates?


Walking away is the best, because you don't have to smile on command!


Just the cap with street clothes is VERY cute. It would also work with her equestrian team gear:


How cute would this be with some of the kid's collection of 5,000 well-loved stuffies?

OR, how about she's walking away wearing the cap and gown, but she's also carrying the most-well loved of the bunch, Diplodocus?

And now I'm off on a tangent imagining a studio photo shoot just for Diplodocus...


I like this idea for a close-up:


This next one is a nice way to show off an iconic campus building, but it does require a lot of room, since the subjects, themselves, are in the middle distance. The kid's campus does have some iconic buildings, but the college is mostly on top of a hill so I'm not sure how much distance you can really get in a photo:


School name visible in the background is iconic!


I don't know how I'll actually take this photo, since I wasn't anticipating putting a tripod and a remote shutter on my packing list... but maybe!


This would be another good photo for a vista!


In this next one, I really like the flowing, open gown, and how it would also show off the steps of the campus library, one of the kid's favorite places and where she's spent a ton of time. I think the cap would work being held either on her head, as in the photo, or down by her side. Not having to look at the camera and smile on demand is a plus:


I bet she's got a favorite bench somewhere on campus, or even just a picturesque flight of steps to sit on. Did I mention that her school has a LOT of steps?


This is the kind of dog content I'm imagining. Basically, take every one of the photo ideas I've already shown you, and then simply add a dog in matching graduation gear!


I thought these three and a half years would feel so long, but now that I'm almost on the other side of them, they were actually so short. It's weird how life keeps doing that, passing by without you noticing. But pretty soon I'm going to pack the car and the dog and drive over to Ohio. I'm going to convince the kid to put on her cap and gown, and then probably convince her to take it off again so I can iron it really quickly (only iron your graduation gowns on warm, because they're polyester!). We're going to walk around her campus, I'm going to take a million photos and ask a million questions, squeeze a million stories out of her about this short, precious time, and I am going to notice EVERYTHING.

P.S. Want to follow along with my craft projects, books I'm reading, road trips to weird old cemeteries, looming mid-life crisis, and other various adventures on the daily? Find me on my Craft Knife Facebook page! 

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Sunday, April 12, 2026

Here's How To Embellish a Hoodie with Fabric Applique


Fabric applique is a popular way to embellish sweatshirts and hoodies. Here’s how to do it!


One of my favorite things about sending a kid off to college is adopting their roommates into my circle of people whom I sew for. I love to sew, but I do not personally need an infinite, always-replenishing supply of sewn goods, so it’s a win-win!

Or, in the case of my kid and her two roommates, each of whom I embellished a hoodie with their school’s name in their class colors, a win-win-win-win!

Embellishing a hoodie or sweatshirt with fabric applique can be a fussy project, requiring careful cutting and precise stitching, but otherwise it’s beginner-friendly. If you can sew a straight stitch and a zigzag and you’re feeling especially patient, you can do this!

Here’s how:

Materials

To embellish a hoodie with a fabric applique, you will need:

  • sweatshirt or hoodie. Use one you already own, or do what I did and scour your favorite thrift shop over the course of a few weeks until the perfect hoodie reveals itself to you.
  • fabric scraps. This is a terrific scrapbusting project, so don’t be afraid to use even your smallest bits.
  • lightweight double-sided fusible interfacing. Pellon and Heat n Bond both make essentially identical versions of this.
  • design tools. For designing and sizing the letters, you could use stencils or go digital with something like Canva, Photoshop, or Cricut Design Space.
  • cutting tools. You’ll need scissors to cut by hand or you can use a cutting tool like Cricut or Sizzix.

Step 1: Design the applique.



I knew what design I wanted for these hoodies, but I wasn’t sure about sizing, so I went old-school and cut out paper templates of the largest features of my design, then placed and arranged them and adjusted them on the hoodies until I found a size and placement that I liked. For this project, the fabric squares that the individual letters will be appliqued to will each be 3″.


After you’ve got your sizing, you can figure out and create templates for your specific fabric applique design. I created mine in Cricut Design Space, picking the font I wanted and then fiddling with each individual letter until it was the exact size I wanted it to be. But you could also do this by hand using paper templates, or by working with a stencil set. There are so many design options!

Step 2: Cut the fabric applique pieces.



I put my Cricut to work for me again on this step, although you could also cut your fabric applique pieces by hand or use a die-cutter.

Whatever method you use, cut one of each fabric applique piece that you’ll need, and cut one of each piece out of lightweight double-sided fusible interfacing, as well. If you cut interfacing with the Cricut, you’ll want to tape it to the mat at the corners, because it doesn’t like to stick to the mat.


If you’re doing something with a lot of prints and fabric combinations, like my applique letters on an applique background, mock up your appliques after you’ve cut them out but before you iron and sew them, just to make sure that everything is the way you like it. I feel like I should have separated the letters by color better on my own project, but I ultimately decided that I didn’t care enough to cut out new letters, lol. But at least by doing a mock-up I had the option!

Step 3: Fuse and stitch any applique pieces together.



My particular project requires that I applique letters to square backgrounds, then applique those squares to the hoodies.

The first step, then, is to get those letters onto their backgrounds! If you, as well, have applique pieces that overlap, do as much of that as possible before you applique them onto your hoodie.


For my project, I ironed each letter to its square, with the interfacing piece I’d cut to match sandwiched in the middle, then I edge-stitched around all raw edges. A zigzag is by far the best stitch to use when attaching fabric applique pieces, but zigzag gets tricky as the applique pieces get smaller, so ultimately I decided to go with just a straight stitch for this project. It will absolutely result in the odd loose thread from those raw edges, but I think that’s an acceptable look for this particular project.

Step 4: Fuse and stitch the applique to the hoodie.



Take all the time you need to place the appliques onto the hoodie exactly where you want them. For me, this meant placing my appliques, then literally leaving it all sitting there until my partner, who’s a graphic designer, could get home from work and double-check them. When it was his turn, he even got out the tape measure to make sure everything was centered and perfect!

When you’re confident that your appliques are perfectly situated, iron them to the hoodie. I was happily ironing away, listening to a podcast, when I suddenly stopped in confusion, stymied about why on earth my appliques weren’t fusing to the hoodie. Was the thrifted hoodie made of some weird fabric that wouldn’t let the fusible interfacing adhere? Yeah, no… I’d actually just forgotten to put the fusible interfacing pieces between the applique and the hoodie.

So don’t forget to do that!


When everything is perfect, stitch these larger appliques to the hoodie exactly the way you stitched any smaller pieces. These 3″ squares would have done great with a zigzag stitch, but I decided it would match better if I used the same straight stitch I’d used on the smaller pieces. I also purposely used thread that wouldn’t blend in with most of the pieces, to highlight the patchwork look.


The finished hoodies turned out just the way I wanted! I love the patchwork look, and my child’s class color represented in a variety of prints. The kid and her buddies had matching, personalized merch to keep them warm on campus this autumn, and in the Spring semester, a younger student joined the friend group, so I got to make another appliqued hoodie in red!

P.S. Want to follow along with my craft projects, books I'm reading, road trips to weird old cemeteries, looming mid-life crisis, and other various adventures on the daily? Find me on my Craft Knife Facebook page!
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Sunday, April 5, 2026

How To Make a Giant Graphic Pillowcase With An Envelope Back

 

I originally published this tutorial over at Crafting a Green World.

Let's say you need a pillowcase. You need it to be organic, because a loved one is going to be mushing her face into it for eight hours every night.

You need it to be soft, because you want your loved one to be comfy so that she gets that whole eight hours.

Oh, and you need it to be awesome, because your loved one is pretty stinkin' awesome.

Using the organic natural flannel given to me by Organic Cotton Plus, I sewed a custom-sized pillowcase with an envelope back for my stinkin' awesome kid. This type of pillowcase works with a pillow of any size, and I'm going to walk you through how to make it.

Once I finished sewing the pillow, my family came together to create the graphic for it. Painting a custom graphic onto blank fabric is pretty easy, and the kids can help! Here's how to do the whole project, step by step:

1. Measure your pillow, and do the math. Your pillowcase will have a French seam on two sides, and an envelope closure with an overlap of 6" in the middle.

First, measure the width of your pillow, and add 1.5" to this measurement for the French seams (each of my French seams is .75"; if your French seams are different, do the math accordingly), and 2" for ease (this is my daughter's pillow, so the pillowcase is a little roomy to make it easier for her to change her linens independently; if you prefer a snugger-fitting pillowcase, allow for less ease).

Now, measure the length of your pillow. Double this measurement, then add 2" for ease, then add 6" for the envelope overlap. If you use 60" natural organic flannel or 110" natural organic flannel, do not include any extra hem allowance to this measurement. You will use the selvage for the inner edge of the envelope, and homemade flannel bias (I'll tell you about this in a minute) for the outer edge of the envelope.

Cut your organic flannel to this measurement.

2. Make and sew the flannel bias trim. Make homemade bias tape that is 4" wide using your favorite flannel print, and use it to trim the cut short side of the organic flannel.

3. Assemble your pillowcase and pin. The beauty of French seams is that you can put together your pillowcase the right way out, so that you can get it just right.

Center your fabric on your cutting table with the right side down, then fold the selvage edge down and over so that it comes 3" past the center. Fold the bias edge down and over so that it also comes 3" past the center going the other way.

Does it look right? Sure, it does! Pin both sides well.

4. Sew both sides using French seams. To make a French seam, I first sew my seam, right sides, out, with a 1/4" seam. I then trim that seam to 1/8", turn it inside out, and iron it (some people iron the seam to one side before turning--I iron after). I sew the seam again, now that the wrong sides are out, with a 1/2" seam, enclosing the raw edge of the first seam.

To do this with the pillow, sew the first seam on both sides, then trim both sides, then turn inside out, iron both sides, and sew the second seam on both sides.

5. Embellish the pillowcase. To freehand a drawing on the natural flannel, first use pencil, which will show up against the cream-colored fabric. I had my partner use this method to draw our kiddo's name and a dragon on the finished pillowcase.

Next, I put cardboard inside the pillowcase to keep any paint from bleeding through and traced the pencil using Jacquard Neopaque fabric paint and a small paintbrush, and I let it dry.

When the paint was dry, I gave my kids Tee Juice markers and let them treat the drawing like a giant coloring page. The Tee Juice markers won't make the fabric stiff like kid-applied Jacquard Neopaque fabric paint will, so it's a better choice for a pillowcase.

After letting the paint dry, I ironed it to heat set it according to the package directions.

My kiddo LOVES her dragon pillow. The flannel is soft and comfy, it's organic so it's safe for little faces (if you're concerned about the fabric paint, just have your kiddo turn her pillow to the blank side for sleeping), and it makes an EXCELLENT canvas for painting beloved imaginary creatures.

Next up? Well, a dragon pillow obviously needs a castle pillow to attack, right? And a knight pillow to save the castle! And a unicorn pillow for the knight to ride!

P.S. Want to follow along with my craft projects, books I'm reading, dog-walking mishaps, encounters with Chainsaw Helicopters, and other various adventures on the daily? Find me on my Craft Knife Facebook page!

Organic Cotton Plus gave me the organic natural flannel for this project, because I can't write about flannel if I haven't let my kids mush their faces into it and tell me if it's comfy!

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Wednesday, April 1, 2026

There's a Tornado On The Other Side Of That Cloud Bank

The older kid recently informed me that Tornado Alley is moving East, and I believe her! I swear that in the past 12 months I have had more near misses with tornadoes than I had in my entire childhood living just adjacent to the actual Tornado Alley--and that includes having my childhood home actually struck by a tornado! 

The kid, who's about to graduate with an Environmental Science degree into Trump's America, might as well get used to foretelling doomsday scenarios, sigh.

Fortunately, everything so far has passed just barely to our north (that tree on the house incident was a derecho, not a tornado), but I want to emphasize how VERY barely. The church just across the highway from us was damaged in a tornado last Spring. Then about six weeks later the local post office was demolished in another tornado. Then a few weeks ago I stood on the back deck to get this video of continuous lightning, one of the warning signs of an impending tornado:


I couldn't tell if the continuous thunder was actual thunder or, you know, a tornado bearing down upon me, but if I was tornadokilled, I at least would have been tornadokilled taking awesome photos of lightning!

That tornado also ended up hitting northwest of us, so we're three for three in misses so far!

Thoughts and prayers that all the tornados continue to pass us by, because I'm pretty sure our insurance will drop us if they have to pay for yet another new roof so close to the last roofening.

P.S. Want to see what other mischief I (and the cats) manage to get up to? Check out my Craft Knife Facebook page for updates!
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Monday, March 30, 2026

Do You Want To Admire All Our Handmade Heirloom Easter Eggs?


Because kid-made or not, if they've survived two entire childhoods of seasonal abuse and they're still kicking, they're heirlooms now!

RIP to most of our handmade stash, which did NOT survive two entire childhoods of seasonal abuse. To be honest, some of those earlier kid-made eggs got covered up by later efforts, so they're possibly still kicking around somewhere behind fifteen coats of paint, some tissue paper, and lots of Mod Podge. I'm genuinely a little sad that all our papier mache eggs that I cut open so we could put treats inside were eventually destroyed, but Easter eggs with jellybeans inside take a LOT more abuse than Easter eggs without!

This is the sole survivor of the papier mache eggs, probably because it's too pretty to cut:

The kids made these in 2013, when they were eight and six. Look at those little hands!

Complete with a Christmas shirt and chipped nail polish for maximum little-kid effect.


We made the felted wool Easter eggs even earlier, when my only big helper was my five-year-old. Her rainbow egg is a masterpiece!

We "cheated" that day and felted these in the dryer because it was cold outside, but felting wool is an awesome outdoor activity for a little kid. Who wouldn't want to spend a warm afternoon splashing around in soapy water?

And look what that tiny artist was capable of just five years later! I think this dragon flying over the mountains is my absolute favorite of all our heirloom Easter eggs:



That was a big year for woodburning, and woodwork in general. A Girl Scout Woodworker badge led to all kinds of projects, from stomp catapults to PVC pipe weapons to rediscovering all their old building blocks--and how they could be painted and woodburned, too!--to the set of woodcarving tools that the Easter Bunny left them just a couple of weeks later.


I'm pretty sure this galaxy egg was a pandemic project when EVERYTHING was galaxy-themed:


We've also got galaxy Christmas ornaments made that year, and I feel like there were a lot of galaxy food attempts. I don't think any of them particularly worked out, but in the process we all ate a lot of activated charcoal, so at least we got our systems all cleared out. Not the worst thing during a pandemic!

This hot glue embossed egg was a proof of concept more than anything:


I LOVE how it turned out, but for some reason we never made any more?

The big kid and I later used that same technique to make potion bottles for Halloween, though, and we made several that I still pull out every year.

And then there was the mandala year--


--which may have been the same year we discovered novelty painting?


I display this every year, but in my mind it's still unfinished because I want a big white star there on the blue. Maybe this year!

One year I was SO excited about the idea of simply using wood stain, but then when I made this first one I thought it was super ugly:



I actually really like it now, though? I wonder if I've got any different colors of wood stain kicking around out in the garage that I could try...

This year, my partner jumpstarted each kid's personal collection of heirloom Easter eggs with an egg that he painted for each of them and put into the care packages we sent to them at school:


Just between us, we're at the point with care packages where I'm wary of putting something I made into them lest the kids complain--I apparently "do too much," which I'll just tell you in case you ever think of saying that to someone else is most directly translated in the ears of the recipient as "You are too much," and the people it's told to don't feel real cool about it.

But joke's on them, because now if I want to send them something handmade I just make their father do it. They're obsessed with their father, so they inevitably love it, and I'm fine being the power behind the throne.

Now, off to puppetmaster my way into a grad photo shot list that the big kid agrees to because I've manipulated her father into acting like each pose is his idea...

P.S. Want to see what other mischief I (and the cats) manage to get up to? Check out my Craft Knife Facebook page for updates!

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Saturday, March 28, 2026

This Is How You Hand-paint Wooden Easter Eggs


These hand-painted Easter eggs are just as fun as the plastic ones–but they’re beautiful enough to keep forever!


It can feel almost impossible to avoid plastic Easter eggs. They’re cheap, they’re pretty, you can put treats in them, and they are EVERYWHERE. I don’t have a blanket hate for plastic eggs–I'm happy enough to thrift them!–but the world does not need more brand-new plastic *anything*, and there are so many other meaningful, eco-friendly options that are just as fun and a LOT more beautiful.

Such as wooden Easter eggs!

Some of the wooden eggs in my current Easter stash are a full 15 years old, and those eggs painted with the little-kid techniques of my then 5- and 7-year-olds are honestly even more precious to me now than their more recent creations of galaxy, Captain America, and shark-themed eggs.

Whether you’re a little kid or all grown up, the technique for hand-painting wooden Easter eggs is super accessible. Here’s all you need, and how to do it!

Materials


  • wooden Easter eggs. I’ve always bought all of my unfinished wooden eggs from Casey’s Wood Products in Maine. If you check out their online store at just the right time, you can even get lucky and find second-quality wooden eggs for cheaper.
  • primer. This is an important first step in painting unfinished wooden eggs. Any kind of primer will work, as long as it can be used on wood. I often use the same Zinsser that I use for my walls, but I also really like Rustoleum’s Paint+Primer spray paint when I want a base coat that’s not white.
  • paint. Again, nearly any kind will work! I use primarily acrylics, as oil-based paint is a Whole Other Thing that I have no desire to mess with. House paint works great, especially the little 8-ounce samples that you’ve definitely got on hand if you dither as much about wall colors as I do. Craft acrylics and artist’s acrylics are both terrific, and paint pens are indispensable for detail work.
  • paintbrushes.
  • (optional) sealant. If you’ve got polyurethane sealant on hand, it’s perfect for making these painted wooden eggs shiny and impervious to damage. Mod Podge is less resistant to damage, but also works. But if you don’t mind eggs that aren’t shiny, acrylic paint doesn’t actually need to be sealed. Sealing the egg also means that you can’t repaint it later, and a LOT of my stash of wooden eggs have been painted and repainted and repainted again. Not every wooden egg painted by a 10-year-old has to treasured forever, ahem!

Step 1: Prime the unfinished wooden eggs.



This is a simple first step that will keep your beautiful hand-painted embellishments from soaking into the wood.

Using the primer of your choosing, give each egg one or two coats, then let it cure for the time recommended on the primer’s packaging.

I keep a lot of paint on hand, so my favorite time-saving technique for these eggs is to use a spray paint plus primer to give the eggs their primer and their base coat simultaneously. This is perfect for my galaxy eggs, for instance, which are black with galaxy embellishments, and my Captain America egg, which is mostly red. If you plan to paint wooden eggs as a family or kid activity, it can also be nice to start off with eggs base-coated in a variety of colors. It’s a fun little boost to creativity!

Step 2: Paint the wooden eggs.



This is where you can really let your creativity prevail! There is no limit to how you can paint an Easter egg, whether it’s abstract or hyper-realistic. I’ve got all kinds of abstract Easter eggs, several galaxy ones, two that look like the Jaws movie poster, one for every Avenger, more rainbow eggs than you’d believe, and as of this Easter, one wooden egg painted for each of my kid’s colleges, already tucked into their Easter-themed care packages (along with these treat-filled paper Easter eggs!) and wending their way across the country to them.


It’s a matter of personal preference, but I really like to use house paint or craft paint for larger areas, artist’s acrylics for more detailed areas, and paint pens for the tiniest, most specific, or most accurate details. You can add infinite layers and additional details as long as you let the layer beneath dry first. Use masking tape or stickers as stencils or to tape off areas, and make your own templates by drawing very lightly with pencil directly onto the surface of the egg.

When you’re finished, don’t forget to sign your artwork!

Step 3 (optional): Seal the finished Easter egg.



The only tricky part about polyurethaning or Mod Podging these Easter eggs is that you have to let the paint fully cure first, then let the sealant fully cure again before the finished Easter eggs are ready to roll. In a pinch, I’ve been known to collect up all our newly-painted eggs after Easter and polyurethane them before putting them away for the season.

These wooden Easter eggs are sturdy enough to last for an entire childhood’s worth of Easter egg hunts, and after that, you’ll love seeing them on display. I’ve got my favorites of our painted eggs sitting on my coffee table in my kids’ childhood Easter baskets, and I’ve only cried a few times looking at them.

Summer break can’t come soon enough for me!

P.S. Want to follow along with my craft projects, books I'm reading, dog-walking mishaps, encounters with Chainsaw Helicopters, and other various adventures on the daily? Find me on my Craft Knife Facebook page!

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