I don’t have to browse yard sales.  I get creative ideas from the customers who stop by ours.  I often ask them what they plan to do with the items they’re purchasing and gain some wonderful ideas:

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1. Beads for various crafts and for school projects
2. Buttons for Christmas stockings, fabric art, and decorating boxes.
3. Old tins to decorate in a variety of ways
4. Canning  jars for drinking glasses, to decorate for pen holders, to use as vases.
5. Old table cloths for collecting and to cut for fabric art.
6. Crayons to color paper and coloring book pages for gift wrap.
7. Broken jewelry to recycle into new jewelry
8. Children’s board books to use for altered book projects
9. Keys for mixed media art
10. Spools with and without thread for art projects
11. Old lunchbox to decorate as a memorabilia shadow box
12. Jeans and denim skirts for tote bags
13. Small boxes to use for fairy houses

What do you do with the items you collect at yard sales?

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Thursday 13-Creative Ideas from Yard Sales

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Here are 13 that seem interesting:

1. Yo-yo maker
2. Mini quilt display stands (shaped like room dividers)
3. Needle sharpener
4. Compact travel sewing machine
5. Seam ripper and thread cutter combined
6. Pre-wound bobbins
7. Buttonhole spacers
8. Bendable sewing machine mini light
9. Sharpener for rotary cutter blades
10. Lazy Susan spinning carousel for holding thread
11. Wax pastels for enhancing landscape quilts
12. Rotary cutters to prepare fabric for hand stitching
13. Easel caddy for sewing/quilting tools

What are some of your favorite tools and gadgets?

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Thursday 13 – Sewing/Quilting Gadgets

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1. Pine needle baskets
2. Old chairs with crazy paint jobs
3. Paintings on old windows
4. Hand painted pots & frames
5. Torch work glass beads
6. Origami
7. Kiln formed glass
8. Lace making
9. Turned wood
10. Creels
11. Sculpted candles
12. Forged silver jewelry
13. Silk creations and scarves

Have you ever made any of these?

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Thursday 13 – Unique Crafts to Consider

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You may work in nature related themes in your fabric art.  Share with us something you’ve done in this area, whether it’s an original pattern or a traditional one.

1. Butterfly Quilt
2. Dresden Flowers
3. Blazing Star
4. English Flower Garden
5. Grandmother’s Flower Garden
6. Honey Bee
7. Maple Leaf
8. Ocean Wave
9. Palm Leaf
10. Spider Web
11. Strawberry
12. Sunbeam
13. Wild Goose Chase

What else can you think of?

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Thursday Thirteen -13 Nature Quilt Patterns

1. Binding
2. Feather stitch
3. Batting
4. Mixed media
5. Blind stitch
6. Calico
7. Quilting bee
8. Embellishment
9. Felting
10. Stitch in the Ditch
11. Grandmother’s Garden
12. Yo-yos
13. Batik

Of course, there are many, many other quilting and fabric terms.  However, it’s interesting to see how much we know when we see various words and ideas used in this art field.

What are some you’d add to a list you’d make?  Were there any you didn’t know here?

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Thursday Thirteen – 13 Quilting Terms

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(From your knowledge of American history, do you recognize these patriots’ names or the event?)

1. Clay’s Choice
2. Lincoln’s Platform
3. Little Giant
4. Old Tippecanoe
5. Union Square
6. Union Star
7. Whig Rose
8. Democrat Rose
9. President’s Wreath
10. Alexander Hamilton’s Quilt
11. Burgoyne Surrounded
12. Yankee Pride
13. Fifty-Four-Forty-or-Fight

Do you have favorite patriotic quilt patterns…those of yesteryear or today?

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Thursday Thirteen – 13 Patriotic Quilts

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Here’s a collection of thirteen:

1. Bud and Rose Wreath
2. Cactus Flower
3. Flowers in a Pot
4. Wild Rose Wreath
5. Rose of Sharon
6. Rose Petal
7. Star Flower
8. Peony
9. Prairie Flower
10. Kansas Sunflower
11. Mexican Rose
12. Triple Sunflower
13. Tulip

Do you have any favorite floral patterns you’ve made as a quilt or other craft?

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Thursday 13 – Floral Quilt Patterns

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Mysteries are my favorite reading, whether they’re for children or for adults.  I also enjoy mysteries that take place in actual settings, so I can learn more about other parts of the country and the world.

Do your youngsters like to read mysteries? Here are a few mystery books to check out for the youngsters (tots through teens) in your life:

1. The Boxcar Children Mysteries
2. Boxcar Children Graphic Novel Mysteries
3. Joan Lowery Nixon (author) mysteries
4. American Girl Mystery series
5. Ghost Cadet
6. Mysteries by Carole Marsh (Historical & geographical settings)
7. Mysteries by Beverly Lewis
8. The Undercover Kid Mysteries
9. Hardy Boys Mysteries
10. Mystery Kids Mysteries
11. The Adirondack Kids Mysteries
12. Mysteries by Mary Downing Hahn
13. Spine Chiller mysteries

Do you have favorite kids’ mysteries or authors?

Post from: Blisstree

Thirteen -13 Kids’ Mystery Books

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Thursday 13 – Take a look at star patterns with the names of states.

Have you made any star pattrns?  I made the Missouri Star  in a quilt for a customer.  It was a lot of work, but was a lovely quilt in the colors the customer chose.

My daughter created the Ohio Star in a wall hanging for her grandmother’s room in assisted living.  Her grandmother grew up in Ohio.

1. Ohio Star
2. Missouri Star
3. Lone Star (Texas)
4. Iowa Star
5. Tennessee Star
6. Virginia’s Star
7. North Carolina Star
8. Kansas Sunflower
9. California Rose
10. Indiana Puzzle
11. Kentucky Rose
12. Rocky Road to Kansas
13. St.  Louis Star (not a state, but a well-known city)

 Have you made any of these…or ones named for other states?

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Thursday 13-Quilt Patterns with State Names

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What types of embellishments are there?

1. Beads
2. Buttons
3. Charms
4. Scrapbook stickers
5. Handmade fabric buttons
6. Pieces of wood
7. Decorated CDs
8. Foil
9. Artificial flowers
10. Keys
11. Advertising buttons on pins
12. Postage stamps
13. Rubber stamping

Do you have any other interesting embellishments that you use? How do you use them?  What are your favorites?

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Thursday Thirteen-13 Embellishments