5 Scandinavian Crafts

Lately I've been doing a little reminiscing. So, I decided to do a little roundup of some of my favorite Scandinavian-themed crafts that I've made over the years.

One of my all-time faves has definitely been the tomte tutorial! I made this sucker almost 4 years ago (get out, how does time do that?!)

Next up are these super easy + fun glass magnets. You pick out what you want them to say! I [obviously] chose Swedish words for fun.

And for all the babies in your life, this tutorial for how to stencil using freezer paper is fun. You can stencil anything you that can cut out, and ironing the freezer paper onto the onesie makes a nice clean line. It's basically the poor-mans version of screen printing.

These ornaments have been one of my favorite Christmas items I've made! I love that I got to incorporate my mom's old cookie stamps into a craft. And they're super cheap to make to boot.

And last, but certainly not least, is the Scandinavian ribbon headband tutorial. I love making these for the craft fair I do every winter here in Los Angeles. They're fairly quick to make, and the options are endless with all the fun ribbon out there in the world!

So there you have it, folks! 5 of some of my favorite Scandinavian-themed crafts I've made through the years. What are some of your favorite Scandinavian crafts that you've made?

Headbands

Just wanted to pop in and show you all how the headbands are coming along!

 

Here are some of the headband designs I have made so far:

All of my ribbon for the headbands I either been bought on Etsy or my mom has found at various Scandinavian stores over the years (thanks, Mom!). I backed them with a solid color ribbon and add elastic to loop them together.

My favorites are the Dala horses on blue and the red hearts with blue flowers and green vines. After all of the craft fair craziness I will post a tutorial on how to make them!

Hope you're enjoying your weekend!

Staying warm

Everyone seems to be talking about "snowpocalypse" so I thought it only fitting to post about ways to stay warm this winter season.

Tip numero uno: wear a hat. You've probably heard the old saying that you loose 90% of your body heat through your head, too bad that's not true. Although I don't know the exact percentage of body heat lost, I do know it's important to wear a hat to keep your little ears from getting frostbite.

Ryan and I went to Nasu (a small mountain town in Japan) last weekend where the snow was piled high and the temperatures below freezing. Luckily, we had hats. Well, mine isn't technically a hat but it did it's job. So much so that I wanted to try making one.

I bought some fleece and got to sewing! I used my green knit one to make a pattern then cut, sewed, and added the rolled fleece flowers for a little decor.

What I love about these head wraps is you can wear them when you have a ponytail in. I usually am wearing a ponytail so these are perfect for me. But you can definitely wear them with your hair down too, it's a win-win.

I also love the button closure, I think it adds a little cuteness to the whole thing. What's also great is they are wide enough that it feels like you're wearing a hat, not just one of those ear bands that always slide off and don't keep you very warm.

The rolled flowers were super duper easy to make. I'm sure there are tons of tutorials floating around on how to make them if you google "rolled fabric flower". I just used 1/2" wide strips of fleece, twisted and rolled it into a flower shape while using hot glue to secure it as I went.

I made a couple extra so I used one bigger one to make this headband, ta-da!

Stay warm, stay safe and drink lots of coffee!

Mr. Glue-gun

I bought my very first glue-gun about a month ago.

Meet Mr. Glue-gun, the lean, mean gluing machine:

It was an impulsive buy. I usually try to avoid impulsive buys by telling myself that if I don't have a project for it, I can't buy it. I didn't have specific purpose in mind for Mr. G, but thought any self-respecting crafter should own one. Plus, it was only a dollar.

Then today while I was trying to think of crafty things to do I thought about projects I could do with Mr. G. And this headband idea came to mind.

It was so simple! I had all this leftover felt from the Dolls for Haiti project and found a plain, black headband at the dollar store. I cut out gray and white petals out of the felt, and similar petals from mesh. Then just glued it on a circular piece of felt which I then glued on the headband.

Viola, finished! (please pardon my super shiny forehead here, it's the flash...I promise...)

Job well done, Mr. Glue-gun.

I've linked this post to Just Something I Whipped Up over at The Girl Creative.

Frizzy hair and headbands

I don't know about you, but whenever it gets muggy and humid outside my hair starts to do crazy things. Even on the days when I actually do my hair, the humidity does a good job of un-doing it. Needless to say, I love headbands. They keep my frizzy mass of of hair out of my face. And really, what more can you ask for?

I mentioned earlier that I bought a new Japanese craft book about hair accessories and I gave one of the patterns a go. At first, I thought it turned out too wide, but it's growing on me. I love that it's reversible and works well if my hair is down or up.

I ended up shortening the length of the main section by 3 inches to make it tighter around my head. My first attempt left it falling off my head. Now I just need to try all the other cute ideas in the book and see which works the best!