SODA-lighted you were my teacher! (Take 3)

For the last two years I've made can koozies for teacher appreciation week, and they have been so well received I did it again:

This year I used I2S Fancy Circle Small (the 2.5" size) on the koozies. The little SODA-lighted tag is a free printable I found last year on the Tammy Mitchell Designs blog. I love the little play on words sort of appreciation gifts. :)
Ms. Snyder is a big Phillies baseball fan, so I used blue and red and baseball ribbon:

 For Mrs. Williams I used this cute owl ribbon that has been in my stash forever waiting to be used on a Springwood Owl project, and paired it with a pink koozie:

 They were a hit!

SODA-lighted you were my teacher!

This year's teacher appreciation gifts:

I used 8CP's Two Color Script on the koozies. The little SODA-lighted tag is a free printable I found last year on the Tammy Mitchell Designs blog. I love the little play on words sort of appreciation gifts. :)

Gifts of Appreciation

This week is teacher appreciation week in our county. An idea I saw on Pinterest inspired my first gift:

Isn't that SODA-lighted tag so cute? You can get here. I attached it to this can kookie I made for Annaliese's teacher in their school colors. I used Embird alphabet #7 for the text.

For Dashiell's beloved Ms. Martha I made a casserole carrier. She had admired mine at Thanksgiving, but I ran out of time at Christmas to make her one, and completely dropped the ball on getting it done for her birthday.

The chef hat and utensils design is from Embroidery Library. I used Embird Alphabet #8 for the text. The border design came from Dee Giles.

(And with this I am out of all the red placemats I bought in 2007. I have a pair of green and a handful of ivory left. I'll be so sad when they are gone, I haven't found a good source for these at the same price.)

A friend of Carlin hosted our family for the weekend. I had never met his friend's wife, but wanted to take a little something as a gift. Knowing that they had a 19 month old son, I figured a Stay-Put towel would be appreciated. :)

Not knowing what their kitchen looked like I selected a neutral fabric (thanks Joy!). This time I placed the monogram on the fabric instead of the bottom corner of the towel. The H is Brass from 8CP.

 I also wanted to make a little something for their son. Daddy is such a big fan of the Flash that I figured PJ already had a shirt (I was right!) so I made this tote bag. I digitized the symbol myself (for personal use only) and added his name with Mandi from 8CP. 

I love being able to create personalized gifts to say, "Hey, thanks!" :)

Teacher gifts

Annaliese has had such a good school year so far, and I wanted to give a token of our gratitude to each of the adults that have helped give her an excellent start to her education. In addition to her classroom teacher, I made something for all her special area teachers and the principals.
For the women, I made a Quilted Key Fob from DigiStitches. I used my newly purchased Embird Alphabet #14 for the text. The school colors are turquoise and white and I think these turned out nice! I put their name on the front:

And the school name on the back:

Since the key fobs are a little too feminine for the men, I stitched water bottle koozies for them. The art palette for her art teacher was a freebie on Sew Forum, and I added his name with Embird Alphabet #8.

For her PE teacher I took the whistle from an Embroidery Library basketball design. As I rotated it around to figure out how I wanted to position it, I realized it looked like a "J" -- perfect! I added the rest of the text the Charles font from 8 Claws and a Paw.


In addition to the key fob, I wanted to do something extra for Annaliese's classroom teacher. Since I had stitched a hand towel for Thanksgiving, I decided to do a winter one as well using her name flake.

All the gifts were delivered this morning. Whew! That's a nice thing to check off my to-do list! :)

Dewzies

What's a Dewzie you ask? Why, it's a Mountain Dew Can Koozie!

Carlin and a couple of his friends at work are big Mountain Dew fans. Their shared love for the beverage has inspired much silliness. They call themselves the Dewk Boys (homage to the Dukes of Hazard, I think) and they each have a wacky nickname. Maybe one of them will comment later as to the meanings, if you even care. :)

As a Christmas gift, Carlin and I decided they needed personalized Dewzies. Using this Mountain Dew font (which actually looks more like the older logo than the current one), I asked Kathy to digitize their nicknames, which I stitched on the front:

I used Embird Alphabet #2 to stitch "Dewk Boys" on the back:

Here are close-ups of each koozie, I mean Dewzie, design before they were sewn up. The first is for Mr. Carlin Trammel:

Kristen's gift order

Kristen ordered some key chains and koozies to give as gifts to Madison's teachers, as well as some other friends.
I used Embird Alphabet #33 for the keychains with full names. The "B" initial is Embird Alphabet #21, and the "J" initial is Embroidery Arts Empire Monogram -- that's my favorite one -- I might have to make another for myself!

I used Embird Alphabet #8 for Aaron's koozie. Kathy helped me by digitizing "Gym Force" for me. We were attempting to emulate their logo, but didn't know what font they used. Kathy used the font "FM College Team" which is a decent match.

Something for us!

About three weeks ago I attempted to do something for Annaliese since she had the stomach bug -- I thought I would stitch a shirt for her to cheer her up. I bought this new-at-the-time applique set of ponies from Designs By JuJu. Annaliese helped me select which ponies she wanted, what fabric to use, etc. Then I sat down to stitch them. As I was stitching the basting stitch, I goofed and got the carriage out of alignment, rendering my machine unusable until I could get it repaired. ARG. Then I got a slew of orders before and after I got my machine repaired, so just last night I finally got to a point where I felt I could squeeze in something for my daughter! (Which I am sure is the primary reason Kathy gave me the machine in the first place...)
So here's her new pony shirt. Well, actually a unicorn in this case.


I also had planned to put a different pony on a pink striped shirt. Of course her first question this morning was "Where's the other shirt?" but I'm hesitant to stitch two long sleeved shirts now that it's March in FL... It's time to move to short sleeved shirts!

And while I was at it, I actually made something for myself! I've been meaning to stitch a water bottle koozie for myself since Kathy gave me some in... AUGUST. I had just enough time before bed last night to do it. I used the Whimsy Dot font from Five Star Fonts. I decided to try variegated thread for the big J, although it doesn't show up well in the picture. I'm not sure what I think about it... I'll probably stick to a solid colored outline in the future.

"Perfectly Personalized"

Earlier this week in a comment Tiffany eluded to another one of my recent projects that I haven't posted yet... koozies that she ordered for her husband who is currently deployed. Here's a quick picture of them:

"This is not beer." apparently the natives wonder what the Americans are drinking. This is to clear things up. :) I used Embird Alphabet #2.
"Here's to Uncle Mickey..." I have no idea what this means. Just an inside joke that AJ would appreciate. I used Embird Alphabet #8.

Tiffany said, "Aaron received his Valentine's Day package the other day and called me up laughing hysterically about the koozies. He thought they were just wonderful and the khaki and brown one nearly put him into hysterics. He said the colors were absolutely perfect because they match his desert camoflague uniform and that the other guys all got the biggest kick out of it, too. So thank you! That made for a wonderful care package!"

That's the best part about being able to do this -- gifts that are perfectly personalized. Monograms are great and all, but being able to make creative gifts that are thoughtful and truly appreciated by the receiver, bringing joy to all... what fun!!

Merry Christmas, Brice!

Brice, my nearly 20-year old brother, is into music and Celtic stuff. I had nothing appropriate in my design stash, but thanks to lovely designers on Sew Forum, I found a couple to use relatively quickly!
First is a travel mug insert. I used a tribal cross design and added his name with Embird Alphabet #33 (using an envelope to make it slanted). It was perfect -- he loved it!

Second is a can koozie (ignore the Princess sippy cup... can you believe there isn't a pop can in our home??). I added his name with Embird Alphabet #2 (again in an envelope) to the guitar design.

Happy Birthday, Elaine!

Today is our preschool director's birthday. I work with her in the office, and every morning around 10am she has to have her daily can of coke. So I made this for her. Kathy digitized her name with Font Engine and a cola font. I did the back with Embird Alpha #2.


She LOVED it, and I already have orders for two more!

UPDATE:
Here are the two that I did for Carol to give as gifts (the backs are the same as Elaine's).