creative jewish mom

Welcome to Craft Schooling Sunday!

 

 

Welcome to craft schooling Sunday! After an amazing three or so weeks of Jewish holidays, I am experiencing a huge desire to get crafting, and just hoping that I'll tackle all the post holiday disorder before getting started on that, ha ha. Ah yes, and then there is that committment to get my studio in order, sigh. On the other hand I'll certainly unearth a bunch of supplies that are crying out to be used, so that will be exciting! (Yes, unearth, the situation is that bad.....but i'm just human!)

The features from last week's party are just so inspiring, and I'm sure you'll enjoy them too. Thanks so much to everyone from joining the party, and wishing you all wonderful fall and as we traditionally say after the Jewish holiday period, have a healthy winter!

 Love this adorable crocheted unicorn (with pattern!) from tschi tschi, and these DIY woven coasters from a pretty fix.

Embroidered cork coasters from flamingo toes, and a wonderful and so original luggage tag pillow DIY from pillar box blue.

Recycled Cardboard Tube Owls And A Tree

Here my friends is a simple craft for fall, or anytime really, using the simplest of materials with fun results. One can of course use toilet paper tubes to make owls, but this time around I decided to use a paper towel tube to make tow paper towel tube owls! And that fun tree? I used a really thick aluminum foil tube, one of many I have yet to craft with! So there may just be a whole forest coming soon, sounds like so much fun to me, as I have been a bit craft deprived of late.

This craft is fun to make with younger kids or an idea to give to older kids who can do most of it on their own, and it would also be cute sitting on a shelf in a baby's room, don't you think? Let's get started!

Paper Boats Make Perfect Birthday Party Decorations!

A few evenening ago I was reading a Curious George story to a little family member, and when we came upon the part where he folds up the newspapers into boats, well we just had to make some paper boats of our own. As it turns out this simple origami paper boat activity kept this very active three and a half year old glued to the chair, and he kept asking me to make more and more. He helped a bit by running his little finger along the edges to crease the paper, but was otherwise just plain thrilled to observe the process. Fortunately I was able to sneek in a few photos before he took all his boats home with him to Jerusalem after the holiday was over.

So dear readers, it is always great to have a little paper folding craft to pull out of your hat, and these little boats also make great table decorations for a birthday party, or placed on each plate they could certainly be place markers.......small ones could be great cupcake or cake toppers and the list goes on!

Embroidered Hoop Art From A Child's Drawing

Stopping by for a guest post, (and with great timing on account of our just having celebrated 8 wonderful days of holiday, and now there is big clean up job waiting to be done) which is such a treat since that rarely happens here on creativejewishmom.com, is Maria from sewjewish.com with a really fun DIY that I would love to do myself, and can't quite believe I haven't done it yet! Fortunately I have saved some line drawings from when my kids were younger, so I am not lacking any inspiration, just time really! That said, I'll let Maria do the rest of the talking:

Welcome to Craft Schooling Sunday!

 

 

Welcome to Craft Schooling Sunday! As I am typing this (on Friday afternoon) pots are simmering on the stove and there are many preparations before we usher in shabbat, a special shabbat that is because we will be spending it in the Succah, one of my very favorite places. We gather in the succah for all of our meals, festive ones, at that, and many members of the family sleep in the succah as well, which is a very special experience, and at the least so much fun!

Last week's party was packed with amazing creativity, thanks so much to all those who dropped by to share! And now here are the features from last week's party:

 

 

 

 Lovely soap balls from garden matter, and a fall table mat from olives and okra.

 A felt ball garland is perfect for fall, from lolly jane, and a fun mason jar ring pumpkin from refresh living.

Using A 50mm Lens To Create Artfully Blurred Photos (And My Oribe Gorge In Bloom)

My beloved Oribe Gorge succulent is now predictably in bloom, and the little round pompom-like orange flowers are just too fabulous! As the sun was going down the other day I ran out to our porch with my new 50mm lens to try and capture some of the lovliness! I can't say that I really know how to use this lens just yet, in a predictable way that is, but loving that I can get those really blurred out backgrounds with the foreground theoretically in really sharp focus. I didn't exactly accomplish that here, but thought I'd share these photos with you, as I have a tradition of sharing phtoos of this succulent every year when it blooms!

Interestingly enough, last year I had moved the two pots to another slighly less hot and sunny location, and the plant did not bloom at all, so I'm very happy to see that the yearly blooms have returned, and I will not make the mistake of taking this sun loving guy away from the full hot sun again.

Welcome To My Succah, Just A Little Peak!

Tonight we are ushering in the last day of the Jewish holiday of Succot, a very holy and important day called Hoshana Raba. In our community reading of the Book of Devarim, and the book of Tehillim takes place in the synagogue starting at 2am! The morning prayer service then starts at around 6am followed by a special breakfast in the Succah and then for those up most of the night, a long nap! And then...........because seven days of holy celebrating is apparently not enough, we have another holiday back in our homes, the holiday of Simchat Torah! Here in Israel this is only one day, but elsewhere in the world this is two day holiday, the first day being Shemini Atzeret, and the second day is Simchat Torah.

And then after my house full of guests departs I may just take a few days to recover, though actually what I really want to do right now is to crochet! This need to crochet always happens to me during a time when we are not allowed to make crafts, funny enough.

Ahhh, and my succah this year? I have to say I am quite happy with the results (on account of using many decorations that I made for my son's bar mitzvah) and just wish that I could take better photos of the whole thing. I think this year at some point I am going to treat myself to a wide angle lens, which is really what I need to capture our succah in its entirety, so stay tuned for next year!

Wishing You A Wonderful Succot Holiday!

Above: A photo showing a succah on a balconay in Cannes, france. Photo sent to me by a reade. and I just love it!

This week we are celebrating my favorite holiday, Succot, and I am busier than busier which I why I am only showing up now on Thursday, while the holiday actually began on sunday night! So wishing you all a wonderful and meaningful Succot!

(Yes I am hoping to take some photos of my succah to share with you, but not sure when that is going to happen exactly as our schedule is packed. The succah looks great and a bit different this year, so I will have to photograph it!)

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Welcome to Craft Schooling Sunday!

 Welcome to craft schooling Sunday! Tonight we are ushering in the Jewish holiday of Succot, one of my very favorite holidays that involves sleeping and eating in our temporary dwelling, which is called a succah. Succahs are built in all kinds of places and many folks, especially those outside of Israel, have a portion of their home with a retractable roof such that that space can be made into a succah. We are fortunate to have two porches, one is our entry courtyard, which becomes our eating succah, and our second and larger porch becomes home to a succah that is used for sleeping only.

It is hard to put into words how special the succah feels once the holiday starts, but honestly we have no problem "dwelling" in our succah for a whole 7 days and nights (8 outside of Israel) and I am generally sad to say goodbye to the holiday! Speaking of which, there is still so much to do, so gotta get to it, phew.

Last week's party was full of amazing ideas to welcome fall and to included creativity into your life, and here are just some of the ideas that inspired me,enjoy:

How to distress furniture with vinegar from white lace cottage, and a fantastic cross hatch quilt from flamingo toes, with an equally fantastic art wall and couch, right?

 
Love this felt flower door decor from garden matters, and this sweet crocheted pillow from happy in red.

Accordian Folded Paper Medallions

Accordian folded paper medallions are so simple to make, look great, and may just be the answer to your Succah crafting dilemma right about now? I made around fifty of these medallions in a few sizes and colors and they sure came in handy at my son's bar mitzvah, not to mention that I'm about to decorate our succah with them as well, phew! You can make your medallions as simple as can be, as shown here, or glue a circle or flower shape to the center if you desire, there are no rules and so many possibilities! I'm planning to actually sew these to some of the curtain wall panels in our succah, and assuming there isn't any rain, I'll simply cut them off the curtains and save for yet another occasion.

The main thing is to make them in three colors or more and in a bunch of sizes, and them hang them in clusters that look somewhat random. Need a few tips for making them? Keep reading...