Handmade Christmas

With only 10 days until Christmas, it's crunch time!! That doesn't mean you can't find a few moments for some handmade gifts. We have more than a few Modkid ideas for your gift giving.

Why not add a simple yet sweet applique to a tshirt or make one into a stuffie? The Acorn Valley applique set have several options to choose from.

Speaking of stuffie, the Mod Owl is perfect for little ones. The front pouch pocket is a nice spot to tuck a special treat. 

The Jewelry Roll makes a great gift for any traveler. 

Who doesn't love accessories?!? The Metro Clutch is super chic, and the Scarf Trio pattern is completely free!!

The Travel Art folio allows any artist to create on the go. 

Include Patty's coloring book for extra delight. 

If you are looking for a gift for a fellow maker, Patty's latest book, Patternless Sewing, might be just the thing. No sewing required!!

Free Paw Stocking Pattern

Patty has created the perfect pattern to make those furry family members a special treat this holiday season. And, it's free!! Sew your favorite pet a stocking or use it for certain sports team fanatics. You can download the free paw stocking pattern here. We know you love a good last minute project!

And don't forget the coordinating free Elf Stocking Pattern!!

From all of us at Modkid: Merry Christmas!!

Give Patty Young / Modkid Designs This Christmas

Patty gave us a great gift round up with her Black Friday post. I'm back to round out your shopping list with a few more items that don't require sewing! Let's take the opportunity to spread a little Modkid cheer!!

Nuvango offers several of Patty Young's designs for your techie friends. Tough cases and ultra-thin skins for iPhones (any model... even the super old 3Gs!) protect and personalize precious cargo with a wrap-around design. Add a free matching wallpaper, too!

You can even personalize a laptop or game console.

How about outfitting a reader you might be giving as a gift?!?

For the non-techie, Nuvango also offers greeting cards, stretched canvases, and framed art prints.

Do you have a crafter or scrapbooker on your list? These paper collections featuring Sanctuary, Rendezvous, and Just My Type from Momenta are just the thing to keep them entertained.

Zazzle.com also offers a selection of unique gifts from coffee mugs to skateboard decks.

You can also find the perfect wrapping for a gift or two!!

Finally, from child to adult a little color play is always a good idea. (Playful Designs)

Hope you've seen a few ideas for loved ones on your list this year! From all of us at Modkid, we hope this season is merry and bright!

Last-Minute Gift Ideas

The Holidays are fast approaching (only 7 days 'til Christmas! Eeeek!) and at this time of the year I always find myself scrambling for last-minute gift ideas. If your friend, family member, teacher or student is the crafty type, we have some great ideas for gifts or stocking stuffers. Did you know we always ship within 24 hours (business days only)? So, if you buy in the next day or two, there is still time to get these goodies in by Christmas!!

Cutest Stocking Stuffers EVER! only $6.95

Our best-selling products on our website are these adorable designer pin tins! They come in two styles, Splendid Spears and Spade Parade, and each tin has 100 colorful, glass-headed pins designed by yours truly...

http://modkidboutique.com/SplendidSpear.html

http://modkidboutique.com/SpadeParade.html

Our Designer Pin Tins are available on our website now, so stock up for the Holidays... these are perfect for stocking stuffers, teacher gifts or for your sewing group gift exchange! :)

For your Scrappy Friend - $10.00

Do you have a friend who loves to make scrappy quilts or applique tees? These oversized bags are filled to the brim with sizable studio scraps from all my fabric collections! You will receive an assortment of bits & pieces of fabric inside a clear bag that measures approximately 6"w x 12"h x 4"d... perfect for appliqué projects, covering buttons or small crafts.

There are two types of scrap bags... Woven Bag (quilting cottons!)

http://modkidboutique.com/ScrapBag.html

And Knit Bags, including an assortment of cotton interlock and cotton/poly/spandex jerseys.

http://modkidboutique.com/KnitScrapBag.html

Ribbons, ribbons, ribbons! $14.95

These ribbon sampler packs include 2 yard cuts of assorted jacquard ribbons from my Lush or Grand Bazaar collections. These are great for embellishing skirts, purses or jeans. We also use them for belts, lanyards, keyfobs and purse handles! 

http://modkidboutique.com/kits.html

For the bookworm in your life. $24.95

What do you give the one who loves books and sewing? A copy of my book, Sewing MODKID Style, of course! It comes chock full of information on sewing with knits in addition to 20 projects to make for girls ages 2 to 10. It is hard-cover and spiral bound so it'll lie flat on the table and all patterns come full-sized inside an envelope on the inside front cover.

http://modkidboutique.com/SewMK.html

And patterns, of course! $4.95 - $14.95

Our Micro-mini patterns make great stocking stuffers at only $4.95!

We have 60+ paper sewing patterns on our website:

http://modkidboutique.com/patterns.html

And 17 PDF pattern on our Etsy store. Our PDF patterns come as a downloadable files, which can be opened with Adobe Reader and will print on standard letter-size paper (8.5" x 11").

https://www.etsy.com/shop/modkid?ref=l2-shop-info-name

 So, hurry, don't delay, cause Christmas is just a few days away!! Do you need a cute and MOD stocking to put all these stocking stuffers into? How about using our FREE pattern for this adorable Elf Stocking, found HERE.

http://babylock.com/holiday-projects/

Elf Stocking FREE PDF Pattern



When the folks at Baby Lock asked me if I'd like to participate in their blog round-up of “Snappy Holiday Projects.”, I was thrilled and flattered. They said it should be something that will fulfill that “OMG I need to come up with something fast!” feeling we all get during the holiday crunch, and I knew exactly what I was going to design! This whimsical Elf Stocking has been in the back of my mind since last year, but I never had a chance to sew it up. Now, I had the push to get it done. And now you can too with this FREE pattern you can download off the Baby Lock site. Just check out all the amazing projects you can make from these talented blogger friends!! You can seriously make something cool for everyone on your gift list!



Just like our adorable Owl Stuffie Pattern we featured last week, this one comes as an 8-page downloadable PDF document. Print it at 100% (no scaling) right to your desktop printer. No need to enlarge the pattern... it has been tiled so all you have to do is print, cut, tape and sew! Step-by-step sewing instructions, detailed diagrams and photos are also included in true MODKID fashion.



Here's another close-up of the stocking. We sewed miniature jingle bells to the points of the cuff and curly toe, but you could add anything from your stash... pom-poms, buttons, ribbons, whatever your heart desires! These are perfect for using my new Textured Basics fabrics (shipping this week!)



Have fun making your Elf Stocking! And please let us know what you think of the pattern. We would love for you to add photos to our Flickr pool. :)

Find this pattern and many others HERE.

Happy Holidays!

A winner and new products from MODKID

Hello, all! First off I want to thank you all for entering our GenerationQ Magazine giveaway. Your comments were all lovely, as usual, but we had to choose one winner, so we used the random number generator and this time... it's lucky number FIVE!!

DianeY11:17 AM

Love this magazine! I have the first 2 issues and plan to buy this one when I find it online. Seems none of the few quilt shops in Hawaii carry it! It would be cool to win a copy. Thanks for the chance

Congrats, Diane! Looks like we'll be sending this mag to sunny Hawaii (wish I could come with!!) Please email your mailing address to Emalee at egrambo@modkidboutique.com and she will get your magazine to you right away.

So... on to exciting new projects! At Quilt Market, I had an extensive conversation with the amazing Carla Crim (a.k.a. The Scientific Seamstress) and although I had [several times] claimed that we don't do PDF patterns, by the end of our meal, she had me convinced that this was the thing to do (that tricky girl!). This led to a conversation with Kim of YouCanMakeThis.com and now we are excited to announce our first PDF pattern!

May I present to you... MODKID MOD OWL STUFFIE! We made a few of these last year as Christmas presents to my girls, nieces and friends. They were such a hit that we decided to test it out as our first PDF pattern.



This adorable Owl pattern is available now as a download at:

• Craftsy
• You Can Make This
• Fat Quarter Shop

The pattern is $7.95 no matter where you purchase it from (choose your favorite site!) and it comes as an 8-page downloadable PDF document. Print it at 100% (no scaling) right to your desktop printer. Not need to enlarge the pattern... it has been tiled so all you have to do is print, cut, tape and sew! Step-by-step sewing instructions, detailed diagrams and tons of photos are also included in true MODKID fashion.

In addition to the PDF patterns (yes, that is plural because we have some more in the works!), we also have some new offerings in the Silhouette Online Store. Check out these adorable shapes you can download and use for cards, scrapbooking, party invitations, gift tags and so much more!



And this is not all. I have some amazing projects to share with you in the coming weeks. So, please check back here often to see all the fun little goodies we have been working on at the MODKID studio!

Happy Holidays, friends!

Thinking back and looking forward

We hosted Christmas at our house this year, which meant that all of my family from Florida came up and all of Jon's family from Chicago-area came down... luckily not all at once, so it wasn't super crazy (just a little). :) This was the first time in years that we had all of my family together under one roof -- well, actually, the first time EVER, if you take into account that our newest member is only 4 months old -- so we took this opportunity to try to get a nice family picture.

We all gathered at MODKID HQ late on December 22nd (after celebrating my sister's birthday), turned on the self-timer, and tried to get serious for a photo. Here's a look behind the scenes at our attempt to get everyone to stand in one spot, look forward, not close their eyes and smile for the camera (easier said that done, when you have 10 people ranging in ages from 4 months to 69 years!)



Of course, the kids behaved properly and did what they were told... can't say the same for the adults.











This one was almost perfect but baby Natalie was looking down and a few of us were looking, hmmmm... not so enthused.



So, with the help of my BFF (Photoshop) I took a face from here and another one from there, put them all together and... voila!



I drove my parents -- the last remaining guests at our house -- to the airport yesterday so now it's eerily quiet and a tad sad, so I'm trying to keep myself occupied with the piles and piles of work that awaits me at the office. Forgive me if you've sent an email that I haven't responded to yet. I promise I will get to it this week... or next!

I am really looking forward to this year. It's going to be a year of firsts in so many ways. This is the year I become a published author... YIPPEE!!! (and speaking of that, I didn't forget that I still owe you guys another book sneak peek... I'm working on it!). This is also the year in which I offer my fabric designs in more than one new exciting substrate... DOUBLE YIPPEE! (more on that soon, soon!) And lastly, we hope this is the year we grow our company beyond our wildest dreams. Ohhhh... we have so many plans and so many aspirations. My imagination goes non-stop!

I thank you all for your support in 2011 and I wish 2012 is the best year EVER for you too! Now, get back to work!! :)

Happy Holidays and a Prosperous New Year!

From the MODKID team to all of you!!

This 'n That

I've been immersed in the studio working non-stop on some pretty exciting new projects that I hope to share with you soon. Was meaning to blog about First Fridays last week, but time got away from me. Funny how that happens around this time of the year. But then a couple more exciting things happened yesterday and today, so now this is going to be one of those hodge-podge kind of posts, like this one from a few months ago.

We were so thrilled to be featured in our local newspaper, The Pantagraph, yesterday. They did a two-page spread on Modkid HQ, myself, Jon and Emalee... pretty much everything you ever wanted to know but were afraid to ask about my life, background, how we started the company and how we make things work. If you're not local to Central Illinois, you can catch the article online here.



It was in the MONEY section, so I hope that's a sign of good things to come. ;)



There's Emalee with one of her designs and Jon showing off the ribbons in the warehouse.



Then, this morning, I get a tweet from my good friends Kim and Kris, from The DIY Dish, saying that the segment we taped back in September at The Creative Connection Event is finally up on their site. I share a Holiday craft that has been a tradition in my home for a few years now. I hope you check it out. I am incredibly honored to be in the same segment with the amazingly talented Kim Stoegbauer and Susan Branch. (!!!)

Here's a link to the video on You Tube or you can go directly to The DIY Dish and watch it there.



Finally, I wanted to share some images I captured from our December First Fridays event, because it was beyond my wildest dreams... from the wonderful window display design to the adorable little girls modeling MODKID dresses and accessories to the swarms of visitors -- old friends and new faces -- who stopped by. It really was an awesome evening!



So that the girls wouldn't get bored just standing up there with nothing to do, we gave them some glittery paper, funny-shaped scissors and had them cut snowflakes out. Boy, they LOVED this activity!



Just look at the concentration! Love those faces! :)



The girls waved at the passers-by and made everyone smile.



As more little girls came to the studio, we'd throw a MODKID on them and let them stand up there with the others.



The girls even got a surprise visit from their favorite jolly ol' man.



They told him they were very nice this year. Hmmmm... we'll see if he believes them.



Thank you to my sweet friends, Nikki Barr and Anna Snyder for letting their sweet and beautiful daughters be the MODKID Girls for that evening!

Up next.... book sneak peek #3! Stay tuned...