Make It Easy to Travel with Needlepoint!

It’s summer and that means vacations. Needlepoint can be a wonderful and relaxing activity during long hours waiting in airports and riding in a car. Here are some tips, adapted from my book, NEEDLEPOINT TRADE SECRETS to help make stitching on vacation more enjoyable.

Embroidery Sewing Machines - What are Your Choices?

The variety of embroidery sewing machines is amazing. There is no stitch or pattern that sophisticated modern machines can't perform. But how do you find a sewing machine that is best for you? Let's look at what is currently available on the market and compare best embroidery sewing machines.

Tips For Organised Card Making

Card making is a hobby that I really enjoy and along the way I have picked up a few tips that may be beneficial to other fellow crafters.

Creating Embroidery Patterns By Freehand

Have you thought about all the new designs that are on the shelves and just who is the one that puts them there? Most human beings are curious about these things because of human nature. People have the frame of mind for searching endlessly which is very tiring when it used for styles of a contemporary fashion.

Tips on Producing A Stunning Patchwork Quilt

A patchwork quilt is made by piecing together quilt blocks in order to create a specific design. However because of the advances in the techniques used for producing quilts (quilting) a person can now choose just how they actually put these pieces of material together.

Choosing the Right Type of Magic for You

Some magicians perform every single card, coin, mental, stage and street magic trick there is to know. However, most focus on a single area of magic. With so many types of magic out there, which one is right for you?

Family Coin Collecting - A Great Home Activity For All

When I brought the first bags of wheat backed Lincoln pennies home, I didn't know if the kids would be interested, but they dove in and really had fun. It was like a treasure hunt and the blue Whitman collection folders, like I bought for children, are almost exactly the same as when I was collecting coins as a kid.

Wood Turning Lathe - Is Bigger Better?

Wood turning lathes seem to be machines on steroids some days. They are getting bigger and more massive all the time. This is likely in response to two trends in the wood turning world. First is the response from manufacturers to a tendency among turners to make bigger and bigger pieces. Second is the prevailing idea that bigger is always better in almost every part of life. Sometimes it is just not so.

Wood Turning Bowls - So Common We Forget They Are Sophisticated

Bowls have been part of the human existence since we began to hold things and want to keep them. Wood turning bowls has been part of life ever since someone realized that a piece of wood could be hollowed to hold water, food or other treasures. Some of the first indications we have of wood turners are pictures of Egyptian turners on the side of pyramids where one turned wood while another made the wood move with a bow. They were making bowls.

Tips When Planning To Buy Rubber Stamp Materials

One of the many reasons rubber stamping has grown in popularity is the flexibility and variety involved in choosing and using rubber stamp materials. Anyone can become intimidated when purchasing rubber stamp materials, here are a few helpful suggestions that can make it easier.

Christmas Robin Tea Cosy Knitting Pattern

The cheery Christmas robin is no stranger to cold bleak winters. He knows how to keep warm and he will keep the teapot warm too. The festive robin novelty Tea Cosy is quick and easy to make and adds Christmas cheer to the kitchen or breakfast table, he also makes for a very unusual gift. The full instructions of how to make a robin tea cosy are here along with a link to a photograph of the finished tea cosy.

What Makes An Easy Crochet Pattern? Learning to Read Crochet Patterns

Crochet patterns can look confusing at first. However, once you understand how a pattern works, and become familiar with the more common crochet stitches, you'll find reading crochet patterns one of the easiest aspects of crochet.

Machine Quilting - Tips To Get Great Results

Quilts made using a sewing machine generally don't have the same high quality repuation as handmade quilts. But machine quilting can actually make for a quilt which is more visually dramatic than those made by hand. The tension of the stitches enables a person to make more extreme peaks and valleys within the quilting than would be produced when doing it by hand. Plus it is actually a lot quicker to produce a quilt by machine.

Crocheting For Beginner - Tools and Tips To Get Started

If you are learning how to crochet, there are some things to consider that will make your crocheting experience easier and more fun. In addition to hooks and yarn, there are also several other tools that you should consider getting before you start a crochet project.