[camps, crafts and a...]

So I've been a busy, busy bee this past month. In between a number of illustration projects, preparing for a move and trying to keep my littles entertained in the California heat, I've managed to squeeze in a 2-day, day camp that I just happened to be in charge of planning and carrying out. The camp was for girls ages 8-11 and I couldn't have asked for a more ideal age range or group of girls. This age is the most common demographic for which I do much of my illustration work for and I love it. These girls are not jaded, are full of life, ready and excited for the future, are amazingly resilient and willing to see the good and beauty in everyone and everything. In short, I love these girls and had a fantastic last couple of days.

We did a number of crafts and activities on the first day including sewing 20 minute tote bags (thank you Jordan for being the power house on that one!), cooking calzones, sweet rolls and cookies, making scrap paper notebooks, creating rolled felt flower hair ties and yarn flower head bands and much much more!

It was such a treat to see how each girl would light up when seeing her creation come to life and to realize just what she was capable of. I also really loved seeing a sea of flower adorned heads bobbing up and down throughout the camp and most every girl proudly brought along their newly sewn tote bag to the field trip on the second day. All in all it was a great success!

Now that the camp is over, we have loved having the tote bag around here as well. It makes the perfect library bag for little A.

On our bag we varied a bit from the Purl tutorial and used an old elastic belt for the handles (which worked great!) and then I added the stitched "x" marks where the handles are attached.

I was also fond of the illustration that I created for the camp flyer and thought I'd offer a print variation of it for you in the shop! Enjoy!