We already decided to only leave the house for essentials this weekend, like liquor and toothpaste, so we were thrilled to stumble upon one last 'best of' list for 2007. Craftster, the hub for all things handmade has compiled the most comprehensive list of the best craft projects from 2007. A bonus of this forum-based site is that most crafters post step-by-step instructions and photos for making the projects they list. We're bookmarking this......

So maybe you didn't have time to make any of your gifts this year. We didn't do so well in that department either. But that doesn't mean we're not going to wrap our store bought presents all pretty and fancy-like. You don't have time for that? Well here are some honest gift tags you can print out on card stock and tape to your to presents. Just click on the image below for a......

Craft blogs are full of inspiring handmade gift ideas this month, here's a round-up of some of our favorites. Ornaments are quick and easy gifts to make, plus they can be used year after year, and if they're sweet enough they may even stay out long after the tree's down. We love these yarn ornaments on Craftster which we first saw on Craft. Three simple supplies are all you need, yarn, an old ornament......

If you haven't made it to the Curiosity Shoppe yet, what are you waiting for? It's one of our new favorite shops on Valencia Street. After having an e-commerce site for a year we were thrilled to hear that owners Lauren Smith and Derek Fagerstrom were setting up a brick and mortar spot in our fair city. Not only do we adore the choice of products for sale in the shop, we're big fans......

In case you missed the packed ReadyMade party last night or were too distracted by all the cute people and free drinks to actually get any holiday shopping done here are some more events where you can spend some money and get your buzz on. Tonight Post-Postcard 11th Annual Small Format Art Sale The LAB 2948 16th Street @ Capp 1-7pm Free Originally starting out as a postcard show, the LAB now invites artists to......

The DIY cool kids are having their holiday bash tonight, and you, yes you, can get in on the action. We like ReadyMade parties because of all the style tips we get by gawking at all the hipness that surrounds us. The holiday party is especially great because local merchants, makers, and creative people hock their wares for the first two hours. It's the perfect place to pick up a unique and cool present.......

Intimated by Martha Stewart? Of course you are. But Apartment Therapy has a nice round up of Thanksgiving Table settings they found on Flickr. These are worth browsing for some last minute inspiration. ...

This lifted our sad, oil soaked hearts. The Craft Gym will be hosting their 2nd annual Craft-Off competition this Friday. Following the model of Iron Chef, there will be a secret 'ingredient' revealed to teams before the 30-minute DIY battle begins. A random assortment of craft supplies and tools will be available for teams to use in the creation of their creative masterpieces. Prizes will be awarded to the winning team, who will be......

No not Plushies, you perv. Softies. Who doesn't like watching cute handmade creatures come to life? Created by Andrew Moran and yours truly. Happy Friday.......

If you missed the great piece on decor stores that also act as galleries in yesterdays SF Chron be sure to check it out here. Anh-Minh Le does a great job of profiling some unique shops that support local artists and crafters. And as if shopping in these stores wasn't enough, this weekend presents itself with some great excuses to visit. Folklore: Drawings and Paintings by Diana Fayt Tonight! 6:30-8:30pm Candy Store - 3153......

If you've been using that awesome crafty google map of San Francisco you have Leslie Yang to thank. Leslie is a member of the San Francisco Craft Mafia, and runs Feisty Elle where she sells her sassy handmade accessories. Craftwork recently talked to Leslie about running a small business in San Francisco, the community here, and some of her favorite local crafty spots. How long have you been running Feisty Elle? I started Feisty......

View Larger Map Talented local designer and fiber artist, Leslie Yang of Feisty Elle, created a Google Map marking favorite local crafty spots, from boutiques that sell handmade wares to yarn and art supply stores to craft museums. Email her at Leslie at feistyelle dot com if you want to add to her list. And be sure to check out Leslie's beautiful selection of accessories available for sale on her website. Leslie is also a......

Ever think of starting your own crafty business? Want to meet a bunch of people who have, including a local author who wrote a book on the topic? Or maybe you just want to surround yourself with booze and cute people? Whatever your flavor, head downtown to 111 Minna tomorrow night for the book-launch party of Craft, Inc. by Meg Mateo Ilasco. The party is being hosted by Rare Device, a hip housewares store......

With a crafty event happening every day this weekend there's no reason to stay inside, so take your pick or hit up all three of these excellent events. The American Craft Council presents its annual exhibition & sale of contemporary crafts, the largest juried craft show in the West. More than 250 artists show unique designs in home décor, furniture, fashion, jewelry & more. American Craft Show Fort Mason Center Bldg A 8/10-12 Fri&Sat......

We wanted to make a matchbook out of our July fast pass. We saw the pictures in our head and everything, how fitting, right? Well, that project will have to wait for another month, because our friends over at Readymade Magazine sent us some very cool Shrinky Sheets and we couldn't wait to rip into them. We may be crafty, but our drawing skills didn't graduate too far beyond fourth grade, which is one......

Looking to do some crafty shopping or have something you've been making that you want to share with the world? Here are a few ways to get your fix. Modern Times, one of our favorite independent bookstores in the city, will be hosting their first ever craft fair in August and there's still time to register to sell your crafty goods. For up to the minute registration forms and info check out their myspace page. When: August 11th Noon-8pm Registration deadline: August 1st We've already told you how much we love the SF Craft Mafia, meet them for yourself and do some crafting with them on August 12th at Stitch Lounge. The event will feature DIY activities, including jewelry making, clothing customization, and cupcake makeovers. ...

Oooh, we love giving stuff away -- and this one's for the dedicated craftster/stoner crowd -- the good folks at the hip DIY local publisher Chronicle Books want to teach you how to build your own bong. Duuuuuuuude! Namely, we've got a copy of the book Build This Bong to give to one lucky winner, randomly selected by the '-ist contest machine -- you can learn how to build a bong or hookah out of......

Once a month we're going to start giving you a crafty idea for what to do with the previous month's fast pass. We're calling it '"Muni Makeover," but we're totally open to a title change, so let us know if you have any suggestions. Also, we know lots of people who have done clever things with old BART tickets, fast passes, and bus transfers. If you're one of them, send pictures of your projects......

Who needs the Sopranos when there’s the San Francisco Craft Mafia? That’s right, we said craft mafia. You got a problem with that? We hope not, because this group is taking over the city, organizing crafters of all stripes, helping to build up a community and a movement that’s showing no signs of slowing down. The first Craft Mafia was formed by three crafty business owners in Austin, Texas in 2003. The women came......

We know you're inundated with craft fairs these days. And while we're not complaining either, once in a while we want something a little different, which is why we're excited about the Maven Fair happening this Saturday in San Francisco. Maven Fair is described as an urban design and craft fair devoted exclusively to promoting the work of women artists, with a special emphasis on emerging women of color designers. The fair promises to bring innovative, quirky and exquisite goods, one of a kind jewelry, housewares, baby goods, accessories and clothes and judging from the sneak peak of what will be on sale they aren't lying. Could we pull off wearing this eyehand necklace? We're not really sure, but we love the weathered look of it and it's so very different than all the charm necklaces we're seeing around these days. We're also fans of these bingo bobby pins, made from vintage bingo playing pieces, created by the organizer of the fair you can also by them at her online shop, The Weekend Store. But maybe you just want something simple and pretty for mom? Looks like there will be lots of simple and pretty in the form of earrings, necklaces and tote bags. Maven Fair is this Saturday, May 12th from 11am-4pm at 1021 Sanchez street. ...

While we should have been writing this post we spent a little too much time getting lost in the fabulousness that is Naughty Secretary Club. We suggest you head on over there and reward your desk sitting butts by taking advantage of their annual Administrative Assistants Week sale happening from April 22-28th. Everything on the site is 25% off. And they've also just added over 100 new items. Just in case you needed another distraction today. And if anyone wants to buy our desk sitting butts anything we're totally in love with the blue beehive ring. We all know about Wikipedia. But now us crafters have our very own wiki (can anyone say that word without feeling the like comic book guy from the Simpson’s?) to turn to. Craftacular is just getting started but it's striving to be a great community driven site, which includes not just definitions but also knowledge, patterns, and resource links. You can start a new page, edit an existing one or offer up a tutorial an original pattern. Pretty neat. So are these Microscope Slide Brooches we found by Robin Beam while spending some time on Craftacular. ...

Alison Gordon -- crafter of WonderlandQ (http://www.wonderlandq.com), co-organizer of Bazaar Bizarre and Sampler Contributor Relations super hero very recently faced a medical emergency. Like many other independent artists and crafters, Alison is without health insurance....

We're tired. The kind of tired you can only get from walking a trade show floor. If you've never been to a trade show imagine a mall full of things you actually want to buy, things you just need to have. And just when you think your feet are ready to give out, your over stimulated brain gives them one last push to walk the never ending floor. This is how we felt last night when we got a sneak peak at the Bead Expo, one of the largest consumer bead shows in the country- right in our backyard for the entire weekend at the Oakland Convention Center. We settled on a fine loot of vintage beads, pearls, chain so cheap we don't know how we only bought a yard's worth, tons of charms and lots of beads we know we don't really need but couldn't pass up for the price. We had wholesaler badges, but it didn't seem to matter at most booths, except for the one where we were told some wire we were looking at was $64 a spool but then when our badge was seen the price went down to $32, we didn't need wire that badly. If you are a wholesaler you can buy in large quantities and get a great discount at the show, but the public is also welcome and the prices are still great. ...

We know this is very Martha Stewart of us and we'll admit maybe we were a little brain washed on our recent Jet Blue flight, where we got to watch hours of Martha on direct TV (and how excited are we that Jet Blue will be flying out of SFO starting May 3rd? SO excited), but holidays are a great excuse for some crafty activity. So pull out the ugly wicker baskets and peeps. Truth be told we were never huge fans of oversized chocolate bunnies, but we're coveting these faux ones from Jek in the Box, looks like there are only a few left in her Etsy shop, but these would also be really fun to try and make. ...

In the spirit of the plastic bag ban we thought we'd weigh in with some of our own suggestions. We think CNN's Glenn Beck needs a new dress. Maybe when he sends all the plastic bags he's so sweetly collecting for San Francisco we can knit him one. The Craft blog always has what we're looking for and that's where we saw this amazing 1950's dress knit completely out of plastic grocery bags, wouldn't it just be darling on Beck? The dress was made by Cathy Kasdan, she created it for her thesis project and we encourage you to read her explanation of it on the Craft blog. Craft also has links to some fantastic tuturials on how to make yarn out of plastic bags you can read about them here and here. You can also read a great tuturial on how to crochet with plastic bags over at Craft Central . And because the things people have created out of plastic bags are so impressive (and we're still a little jet lagged from our trip back east) we thought we'd stop typing and just give you some pictures of what we found. . . ...

We just saw The Science of Sleep, please don't fault us for it. Please don't tell us how we're oh so late in mentioning this brillant movie. You'll just ruin the high we still have from seeing it. We loved every second of it, the characters, the cellophane water, the music, but most of all we couldn't get over the craft of it. We do mean to give a nod here to the amazing Michel Gondry, but really we want to talk about the woman behind the creatures that brought the dream seqeunces to life, Lauri Faggioni. How have so many people talked to us about this film and not mentioned Faggoni's creations? Her birds, ponies, and plush typewriters? No matter, we're just thrilled we know about her fabulous fiber art now. The Science of Sleep got our minds racing in so many ways, we thought about how nice it was to see craft used in film, how essential it was in creating all the many surreal layers of the movie. But after watching the little featurette on Lauri Faggioni in her studio, talking about all of her projects, we sort of got obsessed with the idea of making creatures and stuffed phones ourselves, and then we did some digging for more inspiration. Here's some of what we found. Flock of mini-chicks created and photographed by Stephanie Barnes of Little Birds....

We got lucky this weekend. Not like that. We got lucky because one of our dear friends gave us a fantastic pair of black leather boots. The boots are brand new, never been worn, tall ones that go up to our knees. We've wanted a pair of boots like this for a while. But we have big calves (ok, this is where it gets weird, because I have big calves and I know for a fact that most of the SFist staff doesn't. Really, I've seen Matty Matt and Rita and Jeremy in the flesh, and not like I was really looking, but they all seem to have very normal sized calves, maybe even tiny ones). We bring the size of our calves up because, instead of denying the very cool boots our friend gave us, instead of turning them away and saying, oh those boots won't fit us, we took one look at them and thought, hey we can run those puppies through our sewing machine and alter them and make them fit just perfect. Which is exactly what we did. And we were so proud of ourselves that it got us thinking about all the other stuff we have lying around that we don't use anymore but could probably turn into something very useful with some cutting or gluing or altering. So this weeks post was inspired by those black boots and our very sweet friend who gave them to us. What follows is a sort of laundry list of ideas and resources for turning old things into new ones. Although it's not a unique concept, the craze to make recycled crafts is more popular than ever. If having a green issue of Vanity Fair is what it takes to get the main stream into the idea of 'going green' again, we'll take it. But for those of us who make it a point to always live resourcefully, no matter what Newsweek is telling us, there are some great new craft books that feature projects with a green angle. Re-Creative has 50 projects that can all be created from 'trash', cast-off, or found items. We like what we're hearing about Danny Seo's new line of books called Simply Green, which teach people how to make eco-friendly gifts and party decorations. Although Craftivity isn't entirely centered around recycled craft projects, it does have some great ideas for reusing cast aside items, including moth eaten sweaters. Image from Needles & Pens ...

Need a place to spend that tax return you have coming your way? Sore subject? We haven't done our taxes yet either, but we plan on spending our hard earned cash at some of these online boutiques, all of whom support small independent businesses and crafters. We've made a list of some of our favorites for you, so when you do get that fat check (we're being optimistic) you won't even need to leave your bed to spend it all. Etsy is like the biggest craft fair you've ever been too, but it's all online, so your feet won't get tired walking the stadium size market. Everything for sale on Etsy is handmade, and each seller has their own sort of storefront where they can post new items they've made and set their own prices. You can spend hours searching through the items for sale on Etsy, and you'll be able to find just about everything from hand crafted wooden headboards to a San Francisco penny necklace. We're thinking of showing a little SF pride and buying this jet set journal. Penny necklace from artisticprostitution's Etsy shop...

We may be crafty, but that doesn't mean we don't enjoy spending hours in front of a TV with some good video games once and a while. We'd love to tell you that we spent most of our childhood knee deep in crayons and paper mache, covered in finger paint, but we grew up in the suburbs of Jersey and in-between trips to the mall we played video games. Zelda, Mario Brothers, Pitfall, Pole Position, X-men, we like to think those pixilated masterpieces influenced our crafty minds. Sure, we can get with some Wii, but when it comes down to it, we prefer 8 bit graphics. So we were thrilled to see this crocheted Atari set on Craft's blog yesterday, and even more giddy when we saw the TV with Pitfall on the screen. We did some digging, and found some more art and crafts inspired by video games we thought you should see. What a wonderful marriage of two things we love. The amazing crocheted Atari above and the TV below were both created by Christine Domanic. As Craft mentions in their post, Christine also has an Etsy shop and starting in May she will be doing custom orders for any Atari game you'd like to have crocheted. Pretty fantastic. ...

Want to know how we spent our sunny Saturday afternoon? It involved some good friends, white wine, and lots of beads. We wanted to craft and enjoy the summer weather we were having, so we dragged our city feet over to the East Bay for a beading party. Not only was it warmer on the other side of the bay, but our friends over there have a nice big yard perfect for crafting in the sun. We brought our bins of beads, stopped off for some supplies on the way, and had a lovely afternoon. When you bead with friends not only can you swap beads and supplies, it's also the perfect time to share skills and teach each other different techniques. Start with an easy project like a necklace or drop earrings. We know that lots of people don't have time to make their own jewelry, but after you learn how to make a pair of earrings you'll never look at store bought ones the same way again. Once you get some basics down, you can make those $50 earrings for about $5, and feel proud showing off your handy work to everyone. We've been buying beads in the city for a while now, so we thought we should share some of our favorite places to get supplies. We'd love to hear about your favorite spots to buy beads, so feel free to leave comments with any places we didn't list and may not know about....