fathers day

Happy Fathers Day to one very 'awesome' Daddy...you make our world spin round!
And in the words of Grace:
Thanks for giving us good big kisses and cuddles.
And thanks for getting Maeve when she cries because it hurts my ears a lot.
Thanks for getting the flies too, because we don't want them on us. Thanks for smacking them off the window.
Thanks for taking us for a drive in your car if Mummy smashes hers up some times.
Thanks for all your good prayers,
Love Grace

*photo thanks to my little bro

tag it

A very easy way to label your handmade clothes. Using a plastic letter/number stencil paint the size you want onto some white fabric, iron it to set, cut them out and sew them on. I used Permaset fabric paint and it works great. Mine are rather rough and splotchy, but I like them like that.

dye play

At 11pm a few weeks back (for some unknown reason) I decided to have a play around with the fabric dyes. This might have been ok for someone who actually knew what they were doing, but for me it was only my second attempt at dying...and not a good idea. I wanted to dye a few pieces of wool flannel and while I was at it threw in some white stretch knit, that I had cut into pieces months ago to make Grace a shirt. Here it is all sewn up and she kind of looks like spider woman. Its the same pattern as this white shirt.



Then I thought it would be fun to dye a white floor length dress (from a bag of hand-me-downs) for Grace as a princess/dress up outfit. This was a big hit and she has been wearing it everywhere...much to my embarrassment (its the kind of thing you hope no one asks if you made it yourself). I hung the dress over the laundry sink to drip dry for the night, which was fine apart from the fact that half my cloth nappies were sitting in the sink. I now how a crazy collection of pink speckled nappies.



Then I received this amazing hand dyed shirt in the mail from the very talented Sara! It totally put my efforts to shame and made me appreciate the amount of skill that goes into a good dye job. A true artwork- thankyou Sara!

felting

When we had our holiday recently, we went to some very fun country markets where I was able to pick up some hand dyed wool and wool roving. I am desperate to learn how to felt properly, but for now I am just happy to make these little balls. Grace and I had a go at it last week and I really enjoyed it. Grace found it a bit to hard to get the wool to felt, so she mostly played with the water and made one big mess. We are hoping to make a few more of these to thread on string for jewelery.
Here's how we did it:

You will need
- wool roving
- big bowl or sink full of warm/hot soapy water
- lots of patience if your kids are joining in

Tear off a small amount of the wool (a few colours together is nice) and put it in the water. You need to use lots of friction, so rub the wool together in your hands, and keep rubbing and rolling it until it forms a ball. Keep your water hot and add more soap to the ball as you are rolling it in your hands if it is slow to felt. The finished ball should be fairly hard.

$3 dress

I finally got around to sewing this dress for Grace on the weekend. I think the warmer weather sent me into a bit of a panic, as she has no summer clothes and I have so many I am wanting to make. I am rather tight when it comes to spending money on kids clothes as I look at them in the shop and think...'I could make that for a 1/4 of the price blah blah blah', you know how it goes. So I pretty much never buy them clothes and when the need arises I get sewing like mad. So this was some sale fabric I got a couple of months back for $2/meter. My kind of bargain. I am not the biggest pink fan, but I do love cotton voile, so I was sold. I really like the pattern too from Ottobre summer08. Pintucks at the front, sweet frilled sleeves, ties at the back, twirly skirt and one very happy little girl!

its a play dough kind of day

When I dressed Maeve this morning, Grace said "she can't wear that, they are not sunny morning clothes!". No, your right Grace...navy is no good for a sunny day, but it certainly suits the mood of dark skies and drizzling rain. We spent the morning out, but this afternoon is perfect weather for staying in with a warm, fresh batch of play dough. Do you like Grace's beautiful bride?

summer boys clothes

Here's something you don't see everyday...well especially at our place- boys clothes! I made these a couple of weeks ago to send to a little boy, in exchange for one of his mum's amazing hand dyed creations. Very excited about this swap! It was so nice to sew something simple that didn't involve frills or gathering or lace or ribbon...you get my point. It took me ages to decide what to sew, as I feel a little clueless when it comes to boys. I had summer boys clothes on the brain and even asked Luke one morning if he wanted summer boys clothes for breakfast (meant to say porridge), sad really!



I also had this homeless shirt sitting around the sewing room, so decided to send it as well, and stenciled the plane on the front. I cut the stencil out of contact and then stuck it on the shirt and painted in the gaps. It worked really well. I've never tried that method before...has anyone else?
Good for one off designs.

country break

Since its been so long between posts, I think I have some explaining to do. We have been on a good break visiting both sides of the family, mums, dads, brothers, sisters...in fact we saw them all in the space of a week which is pretty amazing! For some reason I thought we would have internet where we were going, but no. Probably a good thing. I also left the sewing machine at home, so that was nice too. I finally finished off Grace's ugg boots...hmmm...winter is nearly finished too. I ended up hand sewing them which was rough on my hands, but I could not get the machine to co-operate.

Grace and I did some window art together which was so much fun! She drew the pictures and I painted them. They turned out really well. We currently have a few peacocks that need finishing too.

We stayed in a farm house with Luke's family that has a beautiful waterfall and creek. The girls had fun tadpole hunting.

Maeve drank so much creek water...and maybe some taddy's?

We had a bit of a bonfire happening, lots of marshmellows.

And fire writting from my sweet husband!

apples for inda

I just cant get enough of this fabric, the red, the green, the apples! This is just a simple long sleeved T-shirt I finished for a beautiful baby girl- Inda. I couldn't help but add the red snap to the back...oh how I love red.

pin cushion swap

I recently took part in a pin cushion swap over at crafty mamas and here's what I made. This first one I made out a napkin ring from the op shop...I have about 8 of them left so I might do a tutorial on them later, if I get around to it. It's really quite little, but a nice size.



I ended up making a second one for my swap partener Lisa, as I thought the first one wasnt very exciting and wouldnt really hold that many pins. So I found a tutorial off the net and came up with this one. I was lazy however and sewed by machine, not hand. I used some red and navy wool that I recently dyed (some people should never touch fabric dyes, I am one of them...that is another story). I also used some of my favorite vintage floral and polka dot fabric.


And here is what I was sent from Lisa! This super cute little cushion with some felt and ric rac- I love it!


And this colourful one with a beautiful big flower and butterfly on top. Thankyou so much Lisa! I have put them straight to use. One can never have too many good pin cushions.