National Sewing Machine Day

Today, June 13th, is National Sewing Machine Day! If you have on clothes that you didn’t hand stitch together, thank Elias Howe, Isaac Singer, and other sewing machine inventors. If you want a creative, relaxing, productive hobby, try sewing. Especially consider an old treadle machine, if you’re just wanting hobby sewing, rather than becoming a clothing seamstress. If you are a seamstress or creative, or love sewing machines or antiques, take a browse through my collection. And enjoy a little Soul Care! Here are my ladies. Each picture has a description under it. My current fave to use lately is… Continue reading

Matchbook Pocket Folio Tutorial

I’ve got yet another style of “pocket” tutorial for you today! I think I could do a different style every week for a year—actually much longer, and still not run out of fun and unique ideas. In this project, we’re going to create several gusseted pockets, and put them together, accordion style, in a Matchbook Folio. These are reminiscent of accordion files to me—only miniaturized! And so much cuter! These folios are great for organizing small ephemera, snippets, tags, or paper scraps, or for filling with those things or other goodies to give to others. I used book pages for… Continue reading

Triple Pocket Altered Envelope

What can you do with a business sized window envelope and a digital printable? Make this beautiful Triple Pocket Altered Envelope! Plenty of pockets for Journaling Cards and Tags of various sizes. Note those tabs, from a post earlier this month. Watch for video tutorial. Coming soon! Beauty from Ashes! Make some every day. And enJOY! We want to see what you make! Subscribe and comment here. Join one of my Creative Communities a share a picture there: Freely Whole Creative Community at MeWe or Facebook, or follow me on Instagram @freelywhole and tag me #freelywhole Living Coram Deo &… Continue reading

Soul Care and Giving

Sometimes our creating isn’t just for our own soul care, but to also bring joy to others. “With the same comfort you’ve received, comfort others.” The thing with creating not exclusively for our own joy/ soul care/ therapy is that we can then get pulled back into overthinking, over-functioning, overwhelm and stress. The opposite of the reasons we are creating. But we want things to be “nice” and “perfect” for others. What to do? What to do? One solution is to keep your creativity for your own expression, not for giving nice handcrafted gifts. But many of us want to… Continue reading

Bank Envelope Double Pocket

I see a lot of different envelope pockets made for Junk /Eclectic Journals and Traveler’s Notebooks. But I’ve never seen any made from bank envelopes. That’s the type of envelope we seem to get the most of around here, so I wanted to have a play and see what I can do with them. I’ve come up with a few designs, and today’s post and video introduce you to the first. A Double Pocket, that can become a Triple Pocket when added to a journal page. These pockets are super easy to make, fast, and require very few supplies. If… Continue reading

Cards from Printables

It’s rare that I make cards with print-outs. I’ve got too big of a stash of patterned papers; and I love inking, stenciling, stamping and die-cutting. But occasionally I have a design in mind and printables are the perfect option. It’s still a satisfying creative endeavor, but usually quite simple to actually make. Find, size and print the images. Cut them out. Yeah, that’s the tricky part. There’s a reason I hate fussy cutting. I can’t do it. No matter how much I try and practice, I can’t get a smooth cut. Therefore, my Brother Scan ‘n Cut is a… Continue reading

Creative Play

This past weekend, my kids were all busy elsewhere and I was looking forward to some Creative Play time. I have some projects I’m wanting to work on, but I really just felt like playing. No end envisioned. No completed projects to figure out. No real thinking. Just play! Making it a perfect time to work on backgrounds! It’s been a while since I’ve pulled out my Dylusions acrylic paints. I love them, but my go-to is usually ink pads, rather than paints.So, out came the acrylic paints.Paper towels/ dried out baby wipes, rewetted.Mixed Media cardstock.A few stencils. And the… Continue reading

Psalm 143 Bible Journaling

Do you spend much time in the Psalms? One purpose of God’s Word is for it to be a comfort to us. But we don’t usually turn to Leviticus to find that solace. In times of deep distress, we perhaps can’t even think where to turn. In that turmoil, we may just open the Bible anywhere and hope that God speaks out, but this Bible roulette may have the opposite effect. Or maybe we just freeze, and don’t turn anywhere—abandoning God’s Word, that’s he’s given us to help us. Crying out to God in our trials with our words is… Continue reading

Relaxing with Creativity-Envelope Pockets

Time to celebrate! After I finished making Christmas gifts and January’s birthday cards (posts still to come), I was ready to turn to creative play to relax rather than for need. I’ve been playing with making 3 different types of pockets. These can be used in journals or as stand alone pockets for sharing with others. Being creative doesn’t require being a talented or skilled artist. Making beauty from ashes is for everyone, so Grab your supplies and join me on this journey. The first style, that I’ll share today, was inspired by Linda Israel’s January Challenge. A Paper Sack… Continue reading