A Piece O’ Cake Gift Guide — Updated 12/1

Thanksgiving is behind us, and it’s time to turn our attention to the festivities ahead. Here is your updated gift guide with special deals, stocking stuffers, and new ideas.

Find gifts for all ages, for quilters and crafters, and for those who enjoy life in other ways. When visiting pieceocake.com, hover your mouse over Shop in the menu bar at the top of the page. Then hover over The Gift Shop. You’ll see “Gifts for Everyone” and “The Gift of Sewing” with options listed below each.

Gifts For Everyone:

Stocking Stuffers is NEW in Gifts for Everyone. It includes an assortment of small gadgets, scissors, nail files, and other useful and delightful tools and trinkets.

Then Butterflies, Beetles, and Birds! Created and produced in the Netherlands, Assembli Kits are made with paper passion. These eco friendly, sturdy paper kits can be found in Europe, and in a few museums here in the US—and at Piece O’ Cake!!!

They are made from high quality paper, and each comes with a stand that sits on a surface or can be hung on the wall. Assemble more than one and display them together. This is a fun activity for kids and adults! They are neatly packaged flat, and slide easily into a stocking 😉.

“It is the sweet simple things of life which are the real ones after all.” Gingiber Tea Towels + are next in the list.

You’ll find quality tea towels, aprons, art prints, pouches, stickers, and even a small and pretty blank notebook to uplift and encourage.

Stacie Bloomfield, founder of Arkansas-based Gingiber, creates inspiring, bold, art with vibrant colors and unexpected patterns, printed on towels that actually dry your dishes and hands!

I appreciate the density of her pretty patterns on tea towels; they hide stains, and in my kitchen that keeps the tea towels in circulation longer. They also make perfect little gifts to bring to holiday dinners and parties. Make it fancy! —wrap a festive Gingiber tea towel around a bottle of wine or sparkling cider.

(And don’t forget there’s a Tea Towel Deal —buy 4 get $8 off your order— discount applied automatically at checkout.)

I’m committed to wrapping gifts this year with reusable, sustainable cloth—these tea towels, maybe a scarf, or yardage from my stash. I made a quick how-to video for this art of wrapping. In Japan it’s Furoshiki, and Korea it’s Bojagi, and you’ll see at least one comment from a South African where they’ve been doing the same for generations.

Now we come to the very best presents for little ones. eeBoo Puzzles + includes two carefully chosen games this year. One can be uproariously noisy and funny, the other more quiet, pretty, and thoughtful. Both are winners of the Oppenheimer Gold Best Toy Award!

Sloth in a Hurry is an extra-hilarious version of charades. This fast moving improv game is eeBoo’s current best seller.

Memory games are so important for developing brains, and not bad at all for our more fully developed brains as we get older 😉. As always, eeBoo brings the high quality cardboard pieces that really do feel nice to touch and hold. This particular set has the sweetest artwork we’ve ever seen. Woodland Memory & Matching Game is filled with forest fauna and flora, lovely colors, and finished with a luxurious copper colored gilding.

And yes, puzzles! eeBoo makes our most favorite puzzles. They commission well loved artists, use sustainably sourced materials, and create high quality pieces with minimal puzzle dust. All of that really matters, and impacts the touch and feel and enjoyment these puzzles bring. This year saw some of the best puzzles yet!

Absolute best seller, and our favorite of all time, The Alchemist’s Home, was joined this year by The Alchemist’s Orchard. Both display a modern family co-existing with friendly ghosts, and both home and garden are filled with charming details, myriad creatures, and happy plants!

And then there are the Blackwing pencils and accessories, plus a NEW special eraser deal! Read on to discover.

When you hold a Blackwing pencil, feel it pressed onto paper, it can ruin all other pencils 🤣. Seriously. I deeply love these pencils, how they feel and how they write. Give someone you love the joy of Blackwing.

I carry 3 graphite types (plus one more, limited edition): Soft/Matte for drawing and sketching, Firm and Extra Firm for fabric (lightly!), writing, and sketching (and 2x Extra Firm, limited edition, for the same).

Choosing can be daunting, so we have brought back the Graphite Sampler Set (shown above) that includes 2 each Matte, 602, and Extra-Firm Natural pencils plus the versatile One-Step Sharpener.

I personally have all three Blackwing sharpeners, and use them. If you need more information, my video comparison can help.

Blackwing periodically releases limited edition pencils. These Volumes come with themes and stories, and are very pretty pencils. We have a few that are now unavailable elsewhere. Browse here.

Blackwing’s pencil accessories are effective, sleek, and make life easier, and they are an affordable treat. The Point Guard is a cap that protects your sharpened pencil tip, and also protects your drawer or bag or purse from marks. Blackwing’s Handheld Eraser is a bit magical, my video explains more.

The NEW deal: We double-bought the Handheld Eraser Replacements and you win! We are giving away a whole 3-pack of these magical replacements (which can be used without the holder) with every Blackwing purchase over $35. This deal will last as long as our supplies do. That’s a $10 value!

To get the deal, you need to have at least $35 of Blackwing items in your cart, AND ALSO, in addition to that, one set of the Handheld Eraser Replacements in your cart. But no code is needed, automatically you’ll see the discount pop up as you check out, and the Handheld Eraser Replacements will be FREE.

You will find my YouTube videos all over the Piece O’ Cake store: short, sweet, and helpful. Just like walking through a shop, when you have a question, I’m there. Click here to find all Blackwing products.

Take care of your skin! LoLo is for everyone, and is especially good for crafters and quilters.

We have been faithful fans of LoLo Body skincare for many, many years now. The quality ingredients and LoLo’s formulation create moisture bars that soak in crazy quickly, allowing you to touch fabric, or grip a door knob, and not leave a residue. Because they include beeswax, the moisture is held in through multiple hand washings.

LoLo’s Cuticle Intensive is a little stick that does a fantastic job of keeping our cuticles happy and not catching on materials we are working with. They also make a Moisturizing Soap, which actually leaves your skin more moisturized after washing.

I asked LoLo for a thread conditioner, and Thread Tamer was born. It works just exactly how I want it to, and customers sing its praises. LoLo makes the most lovely subtle scents with all natural ingredients, but if you’d like unscented, choose Plain Jane in any of their products.

The Gift of Sewing

The whole Piece O’ Cake site is full of great gifts for quilting, crafting, and sewing fun! Going back to the site, look under Shop, The Gift Shop, The Gift of Sewing, then Gifts & Handcrafted Notions to find an assortment of gifts, that include handcrafted sewing boxes and notions by woodworking artisan friends.

This is the “aisle” with all kinds of beautiful and unusual gift items, click look around!

Jacquie Klassen, my friend and woodworker extraordinaire, is bringing us new boxes, both Sewing Boxes, and Pencil Boxes. The Pencil Box With More is back for Christmas and includes a free Point Guard —Yay!

For the do-ers on your list, these next items are perfect gifts that take the cake! 😉

Not just any embroidery kit, cozyblue’s kits are uniquely beautiful, and come with everything in the package needed to create a hand-embroidered hoop project. Gorgeous.

Last, but definitely not least, give the gift of organization. Find quality Yazzii organizers and bags, Meori organizing boxes, and more!

I hope you’ve enjoyed wandering through Piece O’ Cake with me. May this season be happy and bright for you and yours.

Show and tell: Lorna’s Vine…

Tracy May wrote to say that she finally finished her Lorna’s Vine quilt. This is her third hand quilting project; slow but steady.

She made her quilt with all re-purposed fabric.

Well done, Tracy! And thank you for sharing your lovely quilt with us. I hope you stay snug and warm beneath it for years to come :-).

Aunt Millie’s Garden Show and Tell

Julie Edwards sent me this photo of her newly finished, very pretty quilt that features a block from Aunt MIllie’s Garden as the center medallion.

Julie wrote:

This quilt was a round robin and completed by multiple people in 2015-2016. I belong to an online FB group, and we do swaps and other quilt alongs often. I completed the center block and then sent it to another quilter, she completed a border on that quilt, and off it went to someone else, etc. until it was completed and returned back to me. I finally quilted and finished it in January of this year. 

Round robin quilts are always interesting and this one is no exception. The borders don’t overshadow the block at the center, the focal point of the quilt. Very nice!

Thank you, Julie, for sharing your quilt with us!.

If you are interested, you can find the Aunt Millie’s Garden ebook here :-).

Simply Delicious Show and Tell…

Margaret Heller just finished her Simply Delicious quilt—it’s amazing!

From Margaret:

I followed the techniques taught in your books, except for the grapes and raspberries. For them I modified Karen Kay Buckley’s techniques for Perfect Ovals by laminating the front and back of the template (put the number of the template on the back side). Then I gathered the seam allowance of the grape or berry around the template, starched it/pressed it, and removed the template when it was time to sew it to the block .

I substituted blocks from the Beautiful Berries pattern for blocks from Simply Delicious so all the blocks illustrated my favorite fruits.

It was custom machine quilted by Christy Gray. (And she told me it’s the last custom quilting she will do.) I’m grateful that she quilted it for me; I doubt otherwise it would ever have been finished.

Thank you, Margaret, for sharing your lovely quilt with us all and I know you will enjoy seeing it hang in shows.

This quilt was one of our blocks of the month and the patterns are still available in a downloadable format. If you are interested, click here to find the Simply Delicious epatterns.

Thread Tamer Fix + LoLo Testimonials

We love hearing from you when you let us know that you love something and also when you have an issue to resolve. Lee was the first to ask about this:

“I love my Lolo thread tamer, but I have a question. After several months of use – there’s a distinct thumbprint – it feels like the product is dry and a little gritty. Is it just time to replace it?”

Lorna talked to Kismet at LoLo who offered to replace the Thread Tamer but also suggested gently warming and stirring. Lorna relayed that info and here is what Lee did!

“So you can pass along to others, I ended up melting mine down on a candle warmer and adding some more extra-virgin olive oil. It’s worked perfectly since then.”

Thank you so much, Lee, for sharing! And it’s good to know how to keep LoLo’s Thread Tamer supple, no need to replace.

I did something similar to make a very small container of Thread Tamer to travel with. I carefully warmed up the original tin until I could scoop some out to put into a tiny little jar. That’s just one more idea to add in.

More about Thread Tamer from Marie: “I’m so glad I purchased Lolo thread tamer. Received today and immediately tried it.  What a difference as I’m sewing. Smooth, no tangles.  I absolutely love it!!!
Thank you for recommending a great product.”

For your body, you will love LoLo Bars (a moisturizer in a convenient bar), Cuticle Intensives (love these miracle sticks!), Soaps, and LoLo Feet. But don’t just take my word for it…

From Cathy: “I ordered the LOLO bars and LOVE them. It works so well on my split finger tips, I can stitch!”

Cathy also said that it’s amazing how after applying, LoLo doesn’t rub off on the wool or the thread she’s working with. She went from needle-turn appliqué to wool because of eyesight problems. Wool appliqué is “so forgiving,” she says, enjoying her afternoon hand sewing ritual.

Hand sewing is a calming focus when the world might not be calm. I’ve enjoyed evening hand sewing for decades. It’s what we do.

Click here to see all the LoLo.

Show and tell: Steve’s Birds

Marie Szlachtianshyn sent a photo of her Steve’s Birds blocks to date. They are wonderful! I’m glad that you are enjoying sewing the birds. It is true that the little feet and eyes can be a challenge—but you are handling that challenge very well!

Look close and you can see that Marie’s blocks are not sewn together yet. If you are following my layout, you can’t sew them all together yet because this is not a quilt that sets together in rows. That’s not a bad thing! Try out sashing ideas as the blocks accumulate but know that, as you make more blocks, your idea of what is the best sashing fabric may change.

Click here to find Steve’s Birds Block of the Month.