A Week’s Worth Of Arts & Crafts With The Pink Pom-Pom Project - Supplies Provided By Westcott

A Little Square is a a modern take on the local charity shop by providing fun new contemporary children’s clothing, accessories, shoes, gifts and toys directly from the current markets! What sets A Little Square apart is they have a charity called The Pink Pom-Pom Project (PPPP) which is a crafting for emotional therapy initiative.  We are thrilled to share Alex's post!

Last month we were busy, busy, busy at The Pink Pom-Pom Project! December was all about making gifts for family members. It is especially amazing as our wonderful friends at Westcott donated and sent over boxes of fabulous cases of scissor caddies for kids, scissors for adults, hobby knives, cutting pads and loads of fun crafting supplies to help us craft with the local underprivileged kids and cancer survivors we work with on a weekly basis.

One of our token crafts in December was the Lavender Sachets made with beautifully designed fabrics from some of my favorite textile designers Jennifer Paganelli, Tula Pink and Heather Bailey. They are all best known for their ornate florals in bold, bright colors – absolutely beautiful and very cheerful. Dried Lavender can be tricky to find but we carry it at our retail store, a little square, to make sure everyone gets to make these lovely hand-made gifts.

Our week started big! Monday, December 1st, we headed to The Cardinal Shehan Center and afterwards Wakeman Boys & Girls Club in Bridgeport, CT. The kids get excited when they see us coming around the corner with big bags of crafting supplies. Each week when we leave, I never tell them what we are going to do next, it’s always a surprise - so the excitement builds as the day comes around!

Angelaria, a little 10 year old girl, from the Wakemen group was so excited and in awe she did not have to share scissors with any of her co-crafters. The scissor caddy saved my life! Tyrell, an 8 year old boy, could not wait to make a Lavender Sachet and give it to his mother for Christmas. The smiles were all priceless. I even explained to the children how to make these at home, very simple, and even using a dried bean or rice and perfume to act as the missing Lavender. It’s going to be a beautifully smelly Christmas indeed.

Tuesday we went to The Child & Family Guidance Center to craft, but this time was very special. We usually only work with the grandchildren from The Grandparents Raising Grandchildren group. This time we included the Grandmothers. This is a unique group as the parents of most of these children, from toddler to teens, are not involved in their lives…at all. Many times, we get jaded teens uninterested in the crafting. However, we use arts & crafts as a means of emotional therapy and usually within 15 minutes, they stroll on over with half-cocked smiles!

Wednesday, we headed over to the ‘Ladies’ as I refer to them. They are a wonderful group of cancer survivors at The Whittingham Cancer Clinic at Norwalk Hospital who have been meeting for over 19 years. Their ages start from about 70; I am the youngest in the group and also happen to be the teacher, so I catch the most flack! Ora, the leader and the longest surviving crafter in the group, had never made a Lavender Sachet and really appreciated the smell and how soothing it was. Olga, usually the ‘reluctant crafter’, went crazy and made 5, but also declared no one was getting her gifts because they were too beautiful to give away!

Thursday, The McGivney Community Center kids came to The Pink Pom-Pom Project and work with our sewing teacher, Marie, and learn the ins and outs of sewing. They get to use their very own machine, cutting pads, scissors, thankfully donated all by Westcott. We go through supplies like crazy and it was nice to see they all of them had their very own equipment to work with! Very refreshing.

Fridays are left for arts & crafts research! Since we started working with kids and cancer survivors 2 years ago, the challenge has been to keep everyone’s interests going. We pride ourselves at The Pink Pom-Pom Project for originality and creativity, there’s never a day I am not on Pinterest and scouring the internet for unusual crafting projects.

I especially get a kick when they actually work, revealing pride through the biggest smiles around the universe!

Hope you had a Happy Smelly Christmas!

How to make a Lavender Sachet

Supplies:

• 12”X12” piece of cotton fabric
• 6”X6” fabric of choice
• 12-18” inches of ribbon
• Glue gun with glue sticks
• 1 small dinner plate
• 1 small can top
• 1 pen
• 1 pair of Scissors
• 1 needle and thread
• 1-2 cups of dried Lavender

Instructions:
Plug in your glue gun and keep in safe place. Take the dinner plate and place over 12” of fabric square, trace and cut out. Do the same with can top over the smaller piece of fabric. Now you have 2 circles of fabric.

Next, thread your needle with about 3 feet of thread, pull through when each end meets, tie double knot for strength. The stitch we use is a gathering stitch by sewing and following the edge of the circle until the needle meets where it started. Slightly tug on thread, this will form into a small little bag, or Sachet. Repeat on the smaller circle.

Fill the larger circle with dried Lavender. Once full, sew shut by closing edges. Sew it tight and tie off. Take the little circle and close, there is no filling for the ‘top’.

Once both circles are closed, take the smaller one, or the top, and glue gun it to cover the closed sachet and Voila! A Lavender Sachet! The ribbon is for decoration. We usually take a little bow and tie one on the top, and some people tie them around the sachet.

Happy Crafting!!!!