New Year Countdown : A Crafting Report

Oooh! Time is passing us by fast and I've so much to post about. Sorry for the lack of blogging but I'll do me best these last 2 days to blog about all that has happened, craftwise and Nigelwise of course. So for today, I'll be posting about some special birthday doorgifts for my brother in law who celebrated his 60th birthday last month. I made keychains, tissue holders & softies for the guests. And all in the shape of a schnauzer! His favourite pet dog - named Francois!!

I drafted a template based on a photo of Francois and had it printed on a large sheet of cardstock.

I looped 2 grossgrain ribbon to fit the loop on the brass latch and sew a small square piece of PVC leather on the base.

Fold the PVC square and sew across to secure the ribbon. I love sewing on PVC, there's simply no fraying and it's quick because the stitches are larger than usual.

I made a batch of these keychain latches and set aside.


Cut the template. Cut PVC sandwiched pieces together and to secure the template onto the sandwiched PVC I simply used cellophane tape. Make sure the PVC is right side out on the both sides. There is no inverting for this little patch.
Place a key latch into the middle of the template to measure.

Now for the tricky part, I start by sewing around the template at the back of the neck of the dog...(I do this because I want to hide the knot which I'll make when I finish sewing around the dog with a simple ribbon bow.)

The back of the neck is also where you'll sew and secure the key latch in between the 2 sandwiched PVC piece. You have to sew this in first and it'll secure the latch to the PVC pieces as you sew around. When sewing around, it's good to avoid sewing the card template, we're reusing this unless you want to cut many many templates for this.

The finish sewing piece. I reused the template since it doesn't matter if it's torn after awhile, you only need the shape to keep you sewing neat. The first piece was the hardest, but as you go along you'll discover the stitches required to make a neat turn and so on.

See the shape of the dog? Secure the stitching on both sides by tying at least 2 knots here.

See what I mean? The knots will stop the thread from unravelling later.

Cut neatly around your sewing, careful you don't cut the ribbon latch.


Use a wee puncher for the eyes and voila!!!!

Tie a matching ribbon around the neck for collars. That's how you hide the beginning and end of your sewing (remember the knots?).

Now for the tissue holders...I made a batch of this beforehand, they're easy peasy (you'll find a lot of tutorials on tissue holders) and in matching PVC and ribbon. Now to embellish these lovely tissue holders...
I cut these little dogs one by one. Yes, I printed these template onto sticker paper (thanks Usha for the stickers!!!) The sticker template keeps the template secure onto the PVC as you cut around in detail.

Punch a tiny hole with a needle for eyes and I used super glue to secure the dog to the edge of the tissue holder.

I even gave the dog's ear a little fold. A dot of glue should secure the ears neatly. Aren't they all cute??? I didn't even have time to take pictures of the softies I made. Sorry for that, I wanted to but totally lost track of time as I had only less than a week to complete the whole entire set.



This was a little crocheted coin pouch I made for Aqma from the Kosmo Newspaper. She did a write-up of my blog last month.