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For many of us, our home is the center of our life. It is the place where our families meet and mingle, where we share our meals and share our dreams. So much more than just a space to live, our homes offer us a place of comfort, nourishment, and love for us and for our children.

In Handmade Home, Amanda Blake Soule, author of The Creative Family and the blog SouleMama, offers simple sewing and craft projects for the home that reflect the needs, activities, and personalities of today’s families. As Amanda writes in the introduction, “As a crafter, I’m always looking for the next thing I want to make. As a mama, I’m always looking for the next thing we need—to do, to have, to use—as a family. The coming together of these parts is where the heart of Handmade Home lies.”

Filled with thirty-three projects made by reusing and repurposing materials, all of the items here offer a practical use in the home. From picnic blankets made out of repurposed bed sheets to curtains made out of vintage handkerchiefs, these projects express the sense of making something new out of something old as a way to live a more financially pared-down and simple life; lessen our impact on the earth; connect to the past and preserve a more traditional way of life; and place value on the work of the hands. Also included are projects that children can help with, allowing them to make their own special contribution to the family home.

More than just a collection of projects for handmade items, this book offers the tools to create a life—and home—full of beauty, integrity, and joy.

Projects include:

  • Papa’s Healing Cozy: This hot water bottle cover becomes a simple way to offer comfort to a sick child
  • Baby Sling: A simple pattern for an object that offers so much to a small child—refuge from the world and a place to lay their head next to a parent’s heart
  • Beach Blanket To-Go: Repurpose old sheets to create the perfect picnic blanket for special outdoor meals
  • Cozy Wall Pockets: A creative solution for storing a child’s small treasures


Handmade Home: Simple Ways to Repurpose Old Materials into New Family Treasures by Amanda Blake Soule | Publication date August 11, 2009 | Trumpeter Books, an imprint of Shambhala Publications | ISBN 978-1-59030-595-9 | Paperback original | 208 pages | 8 1/4 x 9 3/16 |$21.95|

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Reviews & Press

Handmade Home Events

  • Saturday, March 20, 2010:
    At 1pm - meet & greet and booksigning event.
    at Gibson's Bookstore in Concord, New Hampshire.

Handmade Home Errata

  • Please let us know if you find any errors in the patterns! We'll be sharing them here.

About the Author

  • Amanda Blake Soule is a mama of four. She lives in Portland, Maine, where her days are spent plotting ways to avoid laundry, dishes and mopping in favor of knitting, sewing, baking, playing with her children, and sitting by the shore.

    Amanda created SouleMama.com in early 2005. There, she - and SoulePapa, too - share tales of their family adventures nearly each day. In 2008, Amanda's first book The Creative Family: How To Encourage Imagination and Nurture Family Connections, was released.

    She is pleased to release into the world this latest creation - Handmade Home. Born of a love of family, home, the earth, craft and a bit of old-fashioned DIY, she hopes the book will inspire others seeking to include touches of heartfelt handmade in their homes and lives.

    Her third book, The Rhythm of Family: Discovering a Sense of Wonder Through the Seasons was written with her husband, Stephen, and will be published in the Summer of 2011.

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