Crafting – Jen Maan in Amman

Day of the Dead Sugar Skulls

Day of the Dead Mexican Sugar Skulls

When we used to live in Orange County, California, my sister and I (and later Raj), would occasionally make the trek up to Olvera Street, the oldest part of downtown Los Angeles, via the train. It was an annual trip at the end of September that signaled the beginning of Halloween decorating season and an excuse to buy Day of the Dead items. If you’ve never been to Olvera Street, you need to go. It makes a great day trip to eat authentic Mexican food and to stroll around cool and hip shops full of Day of the Dead figurines, sugar skulls, and lots more. A few years back, I tried to find a local shop or bakery in Virginia that sold sugar skulls and/or Pan de Muerto (Day of the Dead bread), but with no such luck, I’ve had to create my own.

Making your own sugar skulls is really easy, but it does take time and LOTS of granulated sugar. I only made four large skulls and two smalls ones and used 5 pounds of granulated sugar for the skulls and 2 pounds of powdered sugar for the Royal Icing, but your hard work will pay off AND they last for years!

Sugar Skulls

Ingredients

5 pounds granulated sugar
1/4 cup meringue powder (a must; it helps the sugar stick together)
3 tablespoons of water

Directions

Mix all of the ingredients into a large bowl using your hands until all of the sugar is moistened. It should feel like wet sand.
Pack the plastic sugar skull molds (I purchased a small one at Sur la Table and a large one online) firmly with sugar, using a straight edge to scrape the back of the mold flat–I used a piece of cardboard for this.
Tip sugar out of mold and place on a flat surface to dry overnight.

Royal Icing

After the sugar skulls have been allowed to dry at least overnight, prepare Royal Icing recipe to piece the two halves of the skulls together and to decorate them.

Ingredients

2 pound bag of powdered sugar (7 cups)
1/2 cup meringue powder
2/3 cup water

Directions

Mix 2/3 cup water, 1/2 cup meringue powder and 2 pounds of powdered sugar with an electric mixer until icing peaks (about 9 minutes).
Mix icing with food coloring.

colors — I use Ziploc bags with tips for decorating.

Making Your Skulls

My molds are made of two pieces, a face and the back of the skull. With the plain white Royal Frosting, add a small amount to each half and place together, wiping away any excess that comes out of the seams.
Decorate your skulls using sequins foil paper (I ordered this online as well)

tinwrapper — The foil that I used to fill in the eyes and to cover up mistakes I made when decorating.

Crafting, Decorating

Mummy Loves You

Mummies are not generally considered cute…unless they adorn your home during Halloween season, doing yoga, riding a cast iron lamb mold, or sitting atop your mantelpiece.

Here’s an inexpensive and quick project that you can whip up in no time. After your first one, you will probably find the need to make numerous others to accompany your pack of mummies.

All you need is floral wire, white cloth (or rags) torn into strips, and your imagination.

1. Make the armature out of wire.

2. Wrap in cloth.

3. Shape the mummy to your preference.

4. Display and smile.

Crafting

Day of the Dead/Halloween Decor Garland

I have been restraining myself from decorating for Halloween until October and since we are just about there, I thought I would share my latest creation. The garland isn’t really new, more like ‘upcycled’ from when I was living in Amman (when I was in the throes of skull making mid-March due to Halloween withdrawals), but because I lacked access to a craft store, or basically any store that had DIY supplies, the finished product never really did much for me and so it made its way into a junk container. As I was rifling through my junk containers, I came across it and decided to give it another chance. To make this garland, here’s what you do.

Materials:

various shades of felt
embroidery floss
sequins
pillow stuffing
felt balls or glitter balls

Directions:

1. Create a pattern on card-stock.

2. Outline pattern onto felt and cut out.

3. Embroider each skull’s face–I am a beginner embroiderer so I was limited to back stitching, French knots, and chain-stitching (I think that is what it’s called), adding sequins, beads, or any other design elements.

You have to add cha-cha to the skull's — You have to add cha-cha to the skull’s

Close-up glam shot #1 — Close-up glam shot #2

4. Blanket stitch the two pieces of the pattern together, leaving a little bit open to stuff with pillow stuffing, and then sew it all up.

If you are not sure how to blanket stitch, Google ‘blanket stitch’ and you will find countless videos and tutorials that will teach you–that’s how I learned. I love this stitch–it’s so versatile.

5. Using a needle, add felt balls or glitter balls (I found these at Michael’s in the Halloween section in all colors) in between the skulls and hang up. It’s that easy!

Here are a few more close-ups of the garland. Enjoy.

Crafting, Decorating

Felted Valentine’s Day Garlands

My newest fascination is with wool felt balls. Why? Because they are adorable, inexpensive, and make my home festive. I bought 200 in multiple colors just before Christmas to string for garland for the tree. I loved the garland SO much that I decided to purchase more in Valentine’s day hues.

I ordered the felt balls online from TaDaaStudios and I have to say, the packaging is adorable.

I strung up a few shades of pink with white and hung them in the kitchen…

Side view of the garland draping on the bakers rack

…and on the menu board…

…and I can’t help myself, so I’ll share with you AGAIN, my fabulous felt Valentine’s Day calaveras (skulls) from last year–though I couldn’t do them justice being housed in Amman.

…and since I’m on a roll, I’ll just add one last Valentine’s day touch in the kitchen…another embroidered tea towel.

Happy pre-Valentine’s day and stay tuned for my next Easter garland.

Crafting, Decorating, Living in Amman

Cross-Stitched, Handmade Christmas Stockings–A Year in the Making

With my underwhelmingly open schedule while living in Jordan, I had lots of time to bake homemade bread almost daily, make Greek-style yogurt, read, exercise and craft. A lot! Here are two fine examples of what my idle hands were able to stitch in record time. Normally, such projects would take countless months to make each one; not so in Jordan. I did both of these stockings in about two months. I’m not a skilled sewer, unlike my highly gifted mother, whom I managed to convince (connive?) that no one else would be able to sew the final products nearly as well as her. I think they turned out spectacularly, even better than I imagined with lining, piping and all.

Raj’s is sewn on a tan linen, and mine is sewn on an off-white, extremely fine Irish linen.

Alexandria, Baking, Crafting

Sugar Cookies from Halloween & Day of the Dead’s Past

I’ve been living without a functioning kitchen now for over FOUR months now. This means no cooking and no creative outlet. Since I cannot bake or cook or do much else creatively speaking (because everything is on its way from Jordan and isn’t set to arrive for months), and given that I’m at home from work due to the storm, I searched through my pictures of Halloween’s past to reminisce about the beautiful cookies that I could have been baking and decorating if I had a full larder and was equipped with my cookie making supplies.

get-attachment.aspx — Inspiration? Jack Skelington

76013_170030603023979_5577559_n — Dia de los Muertos beauties–my personal favorites

photo-27 — I wish I had a friend like me who bakes and distributes cookies for holidays!

In case you’re inspired enough to want to bake, here’s the recipe for the cookies and the icing:

No Fail Sugar Cookies

Preheat oven thirty minutes before you begin. (This recipe makes a lot of cookies, so I usually cut the recipe in half or save half of it to freeze and use later.)

Ingredients:

6 cups flour
3 tsp. baking powder
2 cups butter
2 cups sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp. vanilla extract or desired flavoring (I like almond myself)
1 tsp. salt

Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs and vanilla. Mix well. Mix dry ingredients and add a little
at a time to butter mixture. Mix until flour is completely incorporated and the dough comes together.

Chill for 1 to 2 hours (or see Hint below)

Roll to desired thickness and cut into desired shapes. Bake on ungreased baking sheet at 350
degrees for 8 to 10 minutes or until just beginning to turn brown around the edges. This recipe
can make up to 5-dozen 3” cookies.

HINT: Rolling Out Dough Without the Mess – Rather than wait for your cookie dough to
chill, take the freshly made dough and place a glob between two sheets of parchment paper.
Roll it out to the desired thickness then place the dough and paper on a cookie sheet and pop it into the refrigerator.
Continue rolling out your dough between sheets of paper until you have used it all. By the time you are finished, the
first batch will be completely chilled and ready to cut. Reroll leftover dough and repeat the process! An added bonus
is that you are not adding any additional flour to your cookies.

Royal Icing

Makes 3 cups of base consistency icing

3 3/4 cups sifted confectioners’ sugar
3 T meringue powder
6 T warm water

Beat 4 to 5 minutes
By hand, stir in optional flavorings and desired tints.

Add 8 T of warm water if you want flow consistency.

Crafting, Decorating

How to Avoid Doing Chores–Take Up Embroidery

The trio of fabulousness…
(which will be even better once I sew the pompoms along the borders)

I am busier than ever, yet find myself carving out minutes here and there to work on my newest favorite hobby–embroidery. Before you feel sorry for me and ask me how many pounds I’ve put on or how many cats I’ve adopted since returning stateside, you need to check out the website Sublime Stitching. As the website states, “This ain’t your gramma’s embroidery.” Do yourself a favor. Check it out. Now!

{I’d like to add that I was in Anthropologie today (I’m VERY busy) perusing the tea towel section and I have to say, I was not even TEMPTED to buy one of their $34.99 towels because I think mine are equally as adorable–although for $12.99 in the sale section, my heart did skip a couple of beats, but I passed them up. Imagine ALL of the money I’m saving by making my own!}

I happened upon Sublime Stitching’s website months ago while I was trolling the Internet aimlessly (as I did all day long in Amman). I fell in love with her whimsical and charming patterns and ordered a few last month as a prize for myself. I started with a kit, which included a hoop, floss, scissors, a tea towel, and needles, and also ordered a couple of additional patterns: Dia de Los Muertos and Bon Voyage, plus a couple more towels.

Here are my first attempts–and keep in mind, I’m newly minted in this art, so my stitches are BASIC–nothing fancy (yet). I’ve included the pompoms below that I’ll be sewing along the borders once I get my sewing machine back (it’s still in Jordan) just to show you how much cuter they’ll be after the addition. (Can they get any cuter?)

Here’s the progression:

Project number three from a world traveler

I ran out of out of towels last night and I’m almost out of floss…BUT I CAN. NOT. STOP. So I bought some more SUPER cheap towels at Ross ($3.99 for FOUR! What a bargain) in cute colors AND I checked out (as in borrowed from the library–saving even MORE $$$) Jenny Hart’s two embroidery books from the library today. Flipping through the pages, I’m spying some cupcake and pie patterns that I’ll be incorporating into my next masterpieces.

The books that I’ll be buying. I wanted to be sure that I wanted them.

Crafting

Christmas in Amman in April

Summer weather has finally hit Amman, making my days much happier and enjoyable. I’m still constantly searching for things to keep me busy but given my sorry lack of crafting supplies, I’m limited to what I have on hand, which isn’t much other than felt left over from my calaveras phase. I searched online for felt ornament inspiration and found a treasure trove of ornaments to recreate.

In five days, I’ve managed to crank out an ornament each day. Here’s the menagerie so far:

This is my first one and still my favorite. You can pay to download the pattern from this blog: http://rosylittlethings.com, or you can make up your own template, like I did, adjusting the coat to your tastes. (I didn’t have any little buttons like the inspiration piece, but I did have small pearl beads. I’m loving the little wire hangar that I fashioned out of floral wire).

Here’s the second one. Again, the inspiration came from the same site as above (http://rosylittlethings.com). It’s a deer in case you couldn’t tell–the upper right black dot is an eye and the dot below the eye to the left is a nose. After I finished it, I asked Raj what he thought, “Oh, it’s an elephant!” was his reaction. (Not what I was looking for!) I admit, the perspective of the eye and nose are a tad confusing at first glance, but once you see the face, you get it.

Moving onto ornament number three, it’s a polar bear and the inspiration? You guessed it, the same rosylittlethings.com. He’s cute, but not my favorite. I think he turned out too small.

I was especially proud of this one…that is until Raj’s inquiry, “Is that a donkey?” In case you can’t tell, this is no donkey, but a schnauzer (like our dog, Shanti). I really liked the eyebrows, but Raj said the eyes were “too small.” (I should know by now not to solicit opinions). I found inspiration for just about every dog breed except schnauzers, so I was forced to create a template for this one on my own.

The final ornament, a Matryoshka doll (Russian nesting doll), I found on a blog, My Sparkle, http://mysparkle.blogspot.com/2010/11/matryoshka-doll-ornament.html. Complete instructions and a pattern are on the blog, free. I love how she turned out.

Since we didn’t really celebrate Christmas properly this year (we were in Egypt and our Christmas tree was left behind in storage), I’m anticipating a HUGE Christmas next year to make up for the lost celebration (along with ALL of the other holidays that we didn’t get to celebrate like Valentine’s Day, Easter, Halloween, Thanksgiving…).

Crafting

Blizzard Crafting–Spring Calaveras Garland

Two weekends ago, Raj and I were trapped in the house for an ENTIRE weekend. Suffering from a serious case of cabin fever with nothing to do, nowhere to go and an empty larder, I searched high and low for something/anything to make. Here’s what I came up with…a springtime garland of calaveras.

Here are some pictures of the BLIZZARD. Perhaps the word blizzard is a tad hyperbolic, but there was snow on the ground for two days–a blizzard by Jordan standards.

Back to crafting. Calaveras (skulls, more specifically, Day of the Dead sugar skulls) make great decorations year round, right? I think they do, but know many others think that skulls are creepy, best relegated to Halloween decor. Regardless of your take on skulls as decor, I have TOO many hanging around our house in Amman (does this reflect my state of mind?) so I made these lovelies with the intention of giving them away to my sister who complimented the Valentine’s Day one’s.

Let’s take a moment to acknowledge what a NICE and GENEROUS sister I am. Remember the handmade doll that I bought for Nicole in Petra? (See picture below.) In response to comments that the doll on the left (the less cute of the two) should go to my sister, Nicole (known as NTP on comments) posted, “Why don’t you ask (your commentors) who the nicer sister is?” Sounds kind of snippy, huh? Maybe she doesn’t deserve the doll OR the garland? It’s so difficult being the younger, prettier, nicer sister…(j/k…a little).

The doll from Petra en route to Nicole (aka the less cute doll).

Unlike the Valentine’s Day garland, this garland is made entirely of female skulls (not a moustached one in the bunch) in softer hues of felt (due in part to the fact that I was running low on black floss and ran out of black felt). I’d like to keep this strand as well as the doll; I mean they’re both part of a collection now, but in keeping with the generous sister that I am, I’ll part with both.

Crafting, Decorating

Crafting for Bored People: Valentine’s Day Calaveras (Sugar Skull) Decoration

Valentine's Day Garland Hanging on Bookshelf

It’s amazing what I find myself doing these days just to stay busy. Can I blame it on reading Amy Sedaris’ Simple Times, Crafts for Poor People? Probably not, although I do owe her a debt of gratitude for comedic relief. I’m the kind of person who NEEDS to do something at almost ALL times, driving Raj crazy with my manic drive to complete each new project in as little time as possible. (This is what type-A’s do when they’re NOT working. They put ALL of their energy into something, anything trying to forget that they have nothing to do.) Whether I’m watching TV, relaxing, or just talking to Raj, I like having something to work on in my hands. I’m still baking and cooking, but as you can imagine, that gets dangerous–being faced with cookies, cakes, and stashes of sweets haunting you ALL day, each and every time you set foot into the kitchen. So…in the past few months, I’ve revisited crafts that I haven’t done since junior high school (i.e. cross stitching) and have taken up some new ones, a la felt garland making, or whatever you want to call this. This is what my life has become–craft central.

My latest project involves my affection for all things Day of the Dead–which has nothing to do with Valentine’s day, but who cares? I made this Valentine’s Day Sugar Skull garland out of felt, which I imagine hanging on the mantle of our (as of yet, non-existent) house back in DC. (It somehow doesn’t look as good hanging from the bookcase here in Amman, in a place that isn’t all abuzz in Valentine’s Day decor, as I imagine it will look back in the US.) The garland is comprised of eight calaveras (skulls): four moustached males and four flower bedecked females with nine hearts in between the skulls. Prior to this project, I didn’t know how to embroider, but look at me now. I’ve mastered chain stitch, blanket stitch, back-stitch, and French knots.