The Craft Carnival

It's always been a dream of mine to put on my own craft show. It'd have an indie crafts vibe and be right here in Miami.

When I started Handmade Miami with Frances, Julie and Vanessa, we often talked about this and putting a show together ourselves. Well I am happy to say that finally our dream is becoming a reality.

Along with Handmade Miami, I'm proud to present the Craft Carnival!! This is gonna keep me pretty busy til November, but it's definitely a labor of love.

I hope you can come out and join us. And if you want any information about vending, sponsoring or buying an ad at the Craft Carnival, check out our website theCraftCarnival.com.

You're the crafty one...

... so can you help me with this?

This is something I hear from people a lot. Luckily, I most of the time it's something I can totally do, so it's no problem to help.

This time the question was asked by one of my co-workers. She asked me to make a dress for a mini-dressform she had bought. She was gonna use it as a decoration for a quinces. Cute idea, I thought. So I told her this shouldn't be a problem, but when did she need it? She told me the next day! I was busy making the Handmade Miami aprons, but she was really wanted it, since the quinces was a spur of the moment thing, and she wanted to make it special for the birthday girl.

So I took home the dress form ans tried to formulate a plan. I decided to make it a cute strapless dress, that looked like something a teenager would wear to a party.  A couple of seams on the machine, and then a combination of hand stitching and hot glue made the dress come together. Then I added a brown stain ribbon to tie the colors of the party together (brown and pink) and give the dress a finished look.

This little dressform (which is actually a jewelery stand) is going to be used as a kind of guestbook. There will be little tags where you can write your wishes for the birthday girl and then hang them on the hooks at the bottom of the skirt. It's such a cute idea!

I was slightly amazed at how easy this idea and the actual execution was. I work well under pressure I guess. How do you like my first foray into tiny dressmaking?

Summer Cousins Pool Party

Last Saturday night was the cousins get-together I was hosting at my house. I'm so happy to say it was success, even though there were a few bumps along the way.

The day started out great, the sun was out and shining. I cleaned up the pool area and then came inside to chill a bit before the cousins started arriving. My brother, Richard, came over a bit early to help me set up the new canopy we had for the pool. We started to pull out the new pop up canopy and the rain began. At first it wasn't that bad, but then it really started coming down. We went back inside with the canopy only half up. When the rain subsided a bit, we went back outside to finish putting up the canopy. I didn't want it to get broken due to all the water accumulating in the half up canopy. So we were able to get it up, but the rain kept coming.

The cousins started arriving, and the rain kept coming down, so we gathered in the kitchen and talked while munching on the snacks everyone brought. A little while later, Angel, my other brother, let us know that the rain had stopped, so we moved the party outside. We all grabbed the snacks and everyone got their bathing suits on and we were able to enjoy the pool. And I even got to pull out the cute lanterns I had bought to decorate the canopy with.

It was so much fun and really the first time my generation of the cousins had a party just for us. I spent all day receiving calls from moms and grandmas asking if this party was really going on (somehow they doubted us... LOL), but it did and it was great. We totally need to do another cousins party soon!

It's been a month?

I can't believe it's been a month! I'm sorry to my very few readers. But I've been crazy busy. And the heat. I have to blame the heat, it is the middle of summer after all.

I can now officially say that my fab group Handmade Miami is putting on its very first craft show. It's called the Craft Carnival! It will feature some of the most awesome indie crafters in South Florida, along with food, games, raffles and even a DIY table so you can make and take your own crafts! It's being held on November 5th at the Miami Elks Lodge from noon to 5pm. I'll be posting tons more when the date gets closer.

It seems like the Craft Carnival is taking up so much time, but I'm also juggling planning a new party. I'm hosting a baby shower for one of my best friends, Kristina. She's having her second baby, a little girl, so we're getting ready for her by showering her with gifts. As usual I'm doing a LOT of DIY for this shower, but having so much fun doing it. I can't wait to post all the pics when I'm done.

And tonight I'm hosting a little pool party/get-together for me and my cousins. I wasn't gonna do any decorating, but now I'm thinking up some simple decorations to make and put out by the pool. I'll definitely post these when they're done.

I hope everyone is staying cool this summer!