Tutorials

How to Make Nostalgic Waxed Moravian Stars

  If you long for a simple, old fashioned Christmas like the ones from long ago, this is a wonderfully nostalgic craft to learn.  These traditional Moravian stars are made from strips of paper wov...

Make a Crepe Paper Flower Instead of a Bow! Vintage Style DIY Gift Topper

With Mother's Day coming up, and wedding season back this year, you might be wrapping some lovely gifts this spring!  A few years ago I designed these giant crepe paper flowers for a friend's wedd...

Making Vintage Style Clothespin Dolls! 1960s Kitsch Craft Project

 Today I'm making these retro ladies, inspired by some clothespin dolls my mom picked up at a holiday bazaar in the 1970s. I like the quaint look of the long dresses and hand-drawn faces. For this...

Braided Bread Dolls with Hard Boiled Egg Faces

Today I am creating a pair of lovely braided bread dolls inspired by a baking project I did with my mother when I was small. I can't remember now what kind of bread we used then, but I do remember...

Vintage Craft: Tissue Paper Festooning! DIY Easter Garland Tutorial

This tissue paper festooning is part of my vintage craft series: wonderful projects found in vintage craft books brought to life!  I collect vintage craft books, and flipping through them I always ...

Spun Cotton Spring Birds with Coffee Filter Bonnets and Ruffs

I love combining spun cotton with pipe cleaners. It immediately makes a decoration look vintage!  For these happy spring birds I picked out paint colors that matched some pastel pipe cleaners, and...

Make a Crepe Paper Flower Fairy - DIY Craft Tutorial

These whimsical flower fairies are made of some of my favorite materials: spun cotton, crepe paper, and pipe cleaners!  I had some extra-skinny pipe cleaners that I used for the arms and legs, but...

Giant Paper Flower for a DIY Wedding Backdrop - Craft Tutorial

I recently had the chance to make some wonderful large crepe paper flowers for a friend's wedding.  They were to be part of a backdrop installation, so we needed to make a lot of flowers that fil...

Plants on Pink Easter Eggs - Painted Spun Cotton Eggs

  Today I'm making some handpainted Plants on Pink Easter eggs!   These fun eggs are inspired by the @plantsonpink Instagram sensation.  There truly is something irresistible about that combinatio...

Speckled Spun Cotton Easter Eggs DIY Tutorial

In this tutorial I'm making speckled spun cotton Easter eggs.  These are so darling.  I did a similar project last year, but this time I've added a coat of clear glass glitter. You can paint them ...

Paper Mache Easter Egg Diorama

So I kind of feel like this is the year of the diorama. I'm pretty much obsessed with them at this point. This paper mache Easter egg diorama would make such a lovely display on a side table or bu...

Tutorial: Spun Cotton Quail Eggs

I love the look of quail eggs, and I love all things made of spun cotton, so here I'm combining the two! These spun cotton quail eggs would make the most wonderful spring decorations. They would b...

Retro Spun Cotton Birds

These adorable retro spun cotton birds were inspired by some Christmas ornaments that were made in Japan in the 1950s.  I've sold a bunch of them, and they often came in blue, teal, and white.  Th...

Tutorial: Crepe Paper Easter Baskets

Lovely crepe paper Easter baskets! These frilly pails look lovely grouped together for a centerpiece, and make sweet packages for gifts.  Imagine walking into work and seeing one of these on your d...