Colored Pencil Case

My birthday just passed and this hand crafted colored pencil case was one of my gifts!

I have such crafty, talented friends (many of which have not been mentioned on this blog and thats crazy... I need to start writing about them more often)!

My friend, Emily, made this for me... and I love it! I wanted to hang it on the wall in my office because its so colorful and fun, but that defeats the entire purpose of it being a convenient travel case for colored pencils. So now it sits in my backpack waiting to go to an outdoor concert tonight - hooray hand crafted gifts, hooray art, hooray summer :)

Thanks Emily!!

And like I said, all you crafty friends will get recognition soon enough!

Tie Dye Experiment - Success!

I tried a new tie dye technique for the first time the other day, and was surprisingly happy with the result!

Usually I do the basic tie dye patterns - swirls, circles, etc. Once I tried a peace sign using a sewing method, which turned out fine.

This time I used a method outlined here. This tutorial is specifically for a heart shape, but you can adapt the technique to any shape, like I did with this mandolin t-shirt for my dad's father's day gift!

First tie dyed, then added the black fabric marker details after the shirt was washed.

Experiment with your own shapes! It looks like simple designs will work best, along with contrasting colors for the inside of your shape and the first ring around it. I don't tie dye that often...but I am excited to see what other shapes will work well this way! More instruments? Animals? Typography?? We'll see...