Handmade Hostess

by Kelly Lee-Creel, Rebecca Söder

In this book, Kelly and Rebecca have captured the heart of social gatherings for special occasions—expressing your love for family and friends in the DIY spirit of decorating, baking, and sewing. Discover how easy it can be to plan and create stylishly themed parties for all ages without breaking the bank. Have fun stitching and crafting creative décor projects along with matching party favors for your guests…plus, each party theme comes with its own signature dessert recipe. Dozens of sewing and no-sew projects for all skill levels, ranging from chic and elegant to festive and whimsical.

Genres: Crafts, Reference

160 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 2013

About the author

Kelly Lee-Creel is an author and fabric designer.

Kelly was a video game producer with a secret crush on fabric design and pattern making. Lots of hard work, much grace, and many adventures later, she is now pursuing her design dreams full time. She loves writing, crafts, decorating, and photography -- and blogs about it all on her web-site, everkelly.com.

Reviews

[Kandice]

I think Martha Stewart would be overwhelmed by most of the projects in the Handmade Hostess. While reading this book, I was getting stressed out by the amount of time and money I would spend putting together a quaint party. The majority of the projects are adorable, but some seem pointless. Like the little stuffed pet rat for your Mad Science party; it looks exactly like the one you can buy at IKEA for a buck.

Instead of using this book as a tool for hosting the perfect handmade party, I saw myself as a guest attending a beautiful event in which I would spend the better part of the evening calculating the amount of time, money, and lost sleep the hostess sacrificed for her guests.

Overall, I applaud the authors for their creativity as I haven’t seen some of their projects surface on Pinterest yet… However, I think their intentions were to create a how-to guide, but it came off as a look-what-we-can-do-better-than-you-but-go-ahead-and-try-it-anyway-bahahahahaha journal of sorts.

[Melody Lankford]

This book is pretty enough to be a coffee table book and I have found that it makes a nice hostess gift for friends who enjoy life's simple, beautiful pleasures and take pride in adding those "special touches." The images in this book are visually appealing and I still like to flip through the book before I entertain for inspiration. The projects are at varying skill levels, but the ideas can be easily adapted for those of us who have limited time and/or skill (both in my case!).

[Mckinley]

Checklists, schedules, projects. Starts with Christmas and follows the calendar year for Valentines Day, etc. with other events (bridal showers, etc.) mixed in 13 total. Crafts and decorations and recipes. Lots of do-able ideas.

Liked the idea of frosting a sugar cookie as a letter.
Along the lines of Martha Stewart.

[Nancy]

Some very cute projects!