Button flower hoop

I love buttons. You know that don't you? After I got the family button collection from Aunty Jill back in July last year, I was determined to make something to send her and say thanks. I have been wanting to try making some button flower hoop art. There are so many fun things that can be made in embroidery hoops :-)

One day over the summer, I was looking for something to do. Something fun. This is what I came up with. I love how it has turned out. I think I need to make one for myself actually.

As you could expect, I haven't finished it. I need to finish the back off. (Hopefully, I will get that done before July rolls around again.) I can't wait to package it up and post it off. That will be another project complete then.

Owl sleep masks

I think I might have mentioned a while ago that I am an Aunty again. Hooray for being an Aunty! I was trying to make a secret sewing project for my new nephew but now that he is a month old, I have pretty much given up on that project. You never know though. Perhaps I will revisit it with fresh eyes at a later date.

Anyway, I wanted to put together a gift for my sister-in-law that would be useful particularly at the hospital but for later as well. Something that is nearly impossible in hospital (and after you go home) is resting. You certainly don't get rest in hospital. I thought some kind of eye mask would be a great idea. It could be worn to block out the light and might give people the hint that rest is needed.

I found a tutorial for making and owl sleep mask. My sister-in-law likes owls so it seemed like a good idea.

I made the grey one for my sister-in-law and the pink on is for another friend who has just had a baby too.

They turned out really pretty. Even if that pink one is only "mostly" done, it still looks good. It felt good to make them. And so quick. I don't know how practical they will be but I like fun things. The way my family has been lately, if I have managed to do any crafting or stitching I have grabbed it with both hands!

Buttony deer head canvas

While the kids were sick, I was desperate for some kind of crafty break. I haven't really had much time lately on the crafting and it is really sending me crazy!

I sent the kids outside to play and get some fresh air, then I set to work. I don't know if I have mentioned this before but I am completely addicted to Pintrest. It is just the way I would like to view the internet. I found a great picture on there of a button covered canvas making a picture of a deer head. I thought it would make a great addition to my deer head wall in the office (which only has one deer head at the moment).

I had a canvas, buttons and I was given a big container of mod podge for my birthday this year. I googled deer head patterns and came across this one for a cushion cover (now also on my to-do list). I printed it out and traced it onto the canvas with pencil. I went over it in black marker and then got to the buttons.

I think I'd like to make another one, in reverse, but with only brown buttons. That would be fun. It was a nice quick craft and I am a fan of that!

I showed it to Tim and he described it as "interesting". Ha! I don't think he quite understands my fascination with the deer head. I think they are just so weird and ridiculous and that to me is a perfectly good reason to have it on my wall. Get it? 

I have so many things to post... Tomorrow is Echidna Day again. Can you believe it is 12 months since the last one? I am hoping we will get to go on an adventure for it... but it will depend on the weather a little. The kids have been creating a few echidna type things today that I will have to get pictures of. Hopefully, I will have some pictures to post of the day at the start of next week. Until then, have a great weekend.

Deer head making and other catastrophes

Well. We have hit October. I managed one post in September. That is fairly poor isn't it. September was a pretty crazy month here one way and another. I am hoping October is much more straight forward.

I will be playing catch up for a bit, so many things have been going on!

Here's a quick run down on life up to now.

- Amelia had her Broncoscopy at the start of September. This is a routine procedure for CF she has each year to check the condition of her lungs. We thank God that this year's was uneventful unlike last year's.

- Amelia turned 4.

- We had a clinic visit to the big building for Amelia's results. Everything came back clear and she is as well as can be expected. Thank you God again.

- Esther developed a cough which got worse and eventually affected all of us (except Amelia!!!). Esther had weeks off school and we finally found out, after 3 trips to the doctors, it was whooping cough! That is a horrible condition and if you can be immunised against it or need booster shots, do it. We were in isolation for a week! After the whole family had a course of some really yukky antibiotics we were no longer infectious and could go out again! Esther and Ellamay are still coughing but it has improved a lot fortunately.

- School holidays with sick kids! Need I say anymore about that?

- Squeezing in a little bit of me time crafting to make a few random and quick projects to try and keep my sanity! The deer head photo above is one of those projects. I started that about a 3 weeks ago and it is still in that same state of mid-craft. I did actually finished a couple of things which I will be sharing soonish :-)

- We just welcomed to the world a new nephew. I have been working on a stitching project for him but it is probably too ambitious for me to be doing at the moment. It has already had a change of design once, it might need a second just so I have some hope of finishing it before he is a teenager.

So there you have it. Really, everything has been ruled by the kids lately. Esther and Ellamay were given a clean bill of health by the doctor yesterday so they will be off to start the new school term on Monday. HOORAY!!! It will be a "just you and me" day with Amelia at home. I have a terrific friend who has offered to have Amelia on a couple of days next week just so I can get some extra kid-free time and try to turn my house the right way up again. My friend is the bees knees.

I hope to get back to some kind of regular posting in the next few weeks but we shall see.

Matchbox house and doll

As I mentioned in my post here, I am trying to cut down the mid-craft pile so I can start some new projects. I have actually managed to do some stitching of late. Oh my, it does drag on! I try to do some stitching at night after the kids are in bed but that is not working because I keep falling asleep! I decided I needed to get back to stitching during the day. I do find it hard to be motivated when the kids decide they need to do sewing at the same time. Sigh. Oh well. It is actually what I want. I want them to be interested and learn about sewing. Can't have it both ways I guess.

This is the first matchbox house that I have almost, just about, nearly completely finished. This one is just about the same as the one I found on the this post here. Oops! I didn't mean to do that. I tried to change things a bit for the next two I made. Which I don't have photos of yet because - not finished yet.

I created a tiny felt doll to go inside the little house too. So that means I have to make 3 tiny felt dolls to go with the 3 tiny houses. I have also now made 3 tiny quilts and have prepared 3 tiny pillows. The tiny possibilities!

Esther, Ellamay and Amelia all seem to think these are pretty cool. So do I actually. Wish I could get away with wearing one. Soon I will have to find some ribbon to tie them with. And get some photos of the kids with them too. I really like matchbox crafts (remember the camera for Esther and Ellamay's birthday un-party) I will have to find some more crafty ideas. I was excited to find you can buy blank matchboxes from the craft shop back when we made the cameras and now I have restocked the supply so bring on the matchbox ideas.

Penguin foot cozy

This is what a foot cozy might look like if the world was ruled by me. Actually, it's a cheap black beanie that I got with visions of turning it into something ridiculous to cheer up my sister-in-law. She had broken her toes in a quilting accident (it happened at the time of quilting and was quite unrelated, but it makes a good tale). She had to sit with her foot up and couldn't do too much. So I made her a foot cozy to keep her foot warm and to give her a giggle.

I used some felt and buttons and the penguin foot cozy was created. Hopefully, that foot is well and truly on the mend. How's it feeling, Rachel? Now the foot cozy will just be another silly thing I made because it's fun to be silly and bring smiles.

Currently in the Mid-Craft pile

Currently in my mid-craft pile is the following:

- Matchbox houses with dolls (above - inspired by this one)

- Rosette headbands for the kids that I actually started before school began in January!

- Felt hair clips. I always have some felt hair clips on the mid-craft pile.

- A secret gift for my new baby nephew, due in October. I hope it turns out like it is in my head.

- Crochet. I want to finish the granny square I am working on and then start on some new things.

- Dresden plate. Still haven't done that one. Sigh.

- Cushions. As above. Sigh.

Things I am trying not to start:

- Notebook holder for myself. I have the perfect fabric ready to go...

- Button flowers. Something like these.

- Felt eye masks.

- Button embroidery hoop hangings.

I just have to cross off some of the mid-craft list so I can start on some other fun stuff. I am bored of what I am doing already. :-) I have a low attention span for projects. If they can't happen fairly constantly and quickly, I really shouldn't start them in the first place.

What's on for your week? I am going to try to stay out of the rain and try to achieve some decluttering and some crafty stuff too. And hopefully some more blogging.

Dresden Plate

A couple of months ago, I signed up to receive a newsletter that I came across on one of my regular reads, One Crafty Mumma. It is called Teapot. You can read all about it and sign up for it over here.

The first issue included a tutorial on making a Dresden plate. I have seen these around but didn't know what they were called and they are always in the more traditional quilting colours. I like bright and colourful these days. It seemed easy enough and seeing it in more modern patterns made it look more appealing so I decided to give it a try.

I printed the templates and traced up the wedge pieces. Half of the pieces of fabric are from my new stash. The other fabric was from dresses the girls used to wear (like in this cushion cover I started) and some was from my mum's vintage stash.

Once I got going it came together really quickly. I numbered all the pieces so I wouldn't get the order wrong.

This photo is not as bright as the real thing. I really like this colour combination. I am actually using it for the colour inspiration for Esther and Ellamay's new room. I might even make this into a cushion for their room. Maybe.

I haven't finished it yet. Everything got busy at home right after I got this far and I am still trying to get back to it. I would like to make another one of these too. With all the hand stitching involved I found it quite relaxing.

I bought some really awful cushions on sale a few weeks ago for only $2 each just so I could use the inserts out of them. I really should get on with the cushions again. Now I have them I shouldn't be making excuses about them. You know except for all the other stuff I am mid-crafting :-)

Have a great week.

Call him Art

It was my younger sister's birthday the day before Esther and Ellamay's. She is an artist. She is at university studying fine arts. Least I think that is what the course is called. Anyway, she is an artist. So for her birthday I made her a notebook and pen holder. It needed something else though. Here is what I made for her last year. We kind of have a running moustache thing. So I found out her favourite paint brushes and then turned it into a him. Meet Art.

He took me quite a while to stitch. Too many lengthy breaks in between. Anyway, I quite like him. I stitched on the face last and he suddenly had some personality then. Thankfully. I was terribly worried I was stitching him in vain and he would be neither funny or friendly.

I love the texture of his bristly hair. And the moustache of course. :-)

Cushions

Do you like lots of cushions at your house? I like them. I don't like how much they cost for the pretty ones though. Especially with small children around who play with them, fight with them and spill stuff on them. As I mentioned in this post, we are planning some renovations come Spring time. This means a few pieces of new furniture. Goodbye green, blue and brown check lounge suite, hello modern dream charcoal modular suite. I have been reading up house magazines and spotting all the handmade ideas that can be thrown into the mix to soften the modern look I am after.

Back to cushions. We have some on our couch. They are the ones that came with it. They are green, blue and brown check just like the lounge suite. Blerk. I have always meant to make some new covers. We have had that thing for over 11 years now and I still haven't done it. (That didn't even make it to the mid-craft pile!)

Renovation planning is a little boring without action. So I am going to make cushions. I bought this book for myself for Mother's Day and have decided to make cushions out of it. It uses free motion stitching on applique. A more modern way to applique than I learnt way back when I learnt to sew at school.

It is so divine. When I look at the pictures, I almost believe I could just sit down and whip up one of these in no time. Of course, I know I don't actually do that. Maybe one day, if I could sit down at my sewing machine and work with it regularly... I might remember which settings do what and I wouldn't have to teach myself all over again every time I used it. :-)

This is the first cushion I would like to attempt. So pretty.

Here is what I have done so far. I have chosen all the fabric - an old pillow case, 2 of the kids old dresses and some fabric from Mum's stash. Not a bad effort really.

I even went to the sewing machine shop and bought a new foot for free motion stitching. The woman that served me lectured me on the fact that you don't use a free motion foot for applique. I didn't like her. She did show me how to do free motion stitching though. So I guess I like her a little bit. :-)

This is some fabric I bought on a trip to Spotlight recently. It is all meant to be for cushions. It looks so pretty on my shelf. I would like to get the sewing machine out sometime in the next week but then I was saying the same thing last week.

I am mid-crafting a few things at the moment. Some to do with the birthdays that are coming up in our family and some just because I suddenly had an idea. I will have to get some pictures taken so that I can post what has been keeping me so busy. What are you up to at the moment?

Bunny ears

I like to stitch things. Especially felt. There is something very satisfying about it. Probably that for the most part the projects I make with felt should in theory be quick turn around projects so I should feel like I have achieved. This is the latest of these kinds of projects. The kids have, in the past, had the big bunny ears on head bands that seem to flood all the shops in time for Easter. I decided to make them some that were a little more understated.

I had in my mind what I wanted to make and hoped it would work out. I printed off a bunny outline from a kids colouring page and cut it out. I folded up the face of the bunny and used it as a pattern for all the felt. After I stitched it all together, I sewed the ears onto hair combs. It was fiddly but satisfying :-) I think maybe they might have worked better if I had sewn them on the other way around. I'll know that for next time I decide to make this kind of thing.

The kids have been wearing them around in the lead up to Easter. I have been tempted to make some for me. Maybe not. I will just stick with last year's hair accessories. I will have to try to get a photo of those up. Have a great day.

Green spotty skirt

I am in recovery mode at the moment. I had a terrible migraine at the end of last week so I have been sick and suffering all weekend. I am really over feeling so off too. Today I am pretending not to have any headache at all (even though there is still a little head soreness going on) and I am trying to be useful. Tim took care of me and everything else while I was sick so today I am trying to achieve some things around the house.  I am on a break at the moment though :-D

During the last week, I have been sewing. First I made Amelia's green spotty skirt from the fabric she had claimed in the previous week. It is such an easy skirt to make. It took me under an hour but I am sure it could be made faster if I didn't have another pair of hands helping me. It turned out great. Amelia tried it on when it was finished and didn't want to take it off.

She is such a poser! Do you recognise the birdie top I made last year? I still haven't attempted anymore of these tops. Like everything, it's on the to-do list still. I also made Esther and Ellamay a skirt each last week (photo's to come) and another notebook and pen roll holder. Not a bad effort for my week I thought. Not sure that the momentum will continue now that Tim starts back at work tomorrow :-(

Here are some photos I had to share. I bought a cheap remote for my camera and so Amelia and I had a play with it. I took the one above. (That's me with Amelia, by the way. *Waving*) I still have my glasses on after finishing sewing the skirt.

This one Amelia took of herself. You can see the remote in her hand. She thought it was fantastic to be able to take photos with Mummy's camera and not even touch it. I thought that was good too. It's such a heavy camera for a little girl to hold. We walked around the yard together and she would just stop and point the remote at the camera and start jumping around and posing. Most of the photos were pretty blurry but it was fun. Maybe I will get in some photos more now.

I guess I had better finish up. So far today I have only managed a little housework and I have baked some brownies. There is still lots to do before bed time though.

Have a great week.

New notebook and pen holder

Here is the latest project I have been working on. My new (hopefully improved) notebook and pen holders.

Actually, I am calling them notebook and pen roll holders. Does that make sense? Now that I have typed that it kind of looks like it's a holder for notebook and pen roll's. Hmm... Oh well. Maybe you can see what I am getting at when you look at the pictures.

When I made the notebook and pen holders for Esther and Ellamay's birthday's last year, I followed a couple of tutorials I found but mostly just made it up as I went because I wanted the notebook to be held in a different way. The way I made the last ones only had space for ten pens too. I had bought packs that had twelve pens. My solution to this last year was to leave out the grey and the dark blue pen. I figured they would use the other colours more and they could have the extra pens if they wrecked any of the ones they had. This time though, I decided I would make the holder have enough spaces for the full set.

I measured and figured and made a pattern. I wasn't really sure how it would end up but I didn't let that stop me :-) Once I had finished the sewing I put in the pens and notebook. It didn't look right just having it folded in half so I just folded the pens on top of themselves to put it away and think about it for a while. I kept coming back to it and decided that it looked pretty cool they way I had packed it up. So there it was. I attached the button and smiled. A finished project.

I made two pretty quickly (aka: over a couple of days - I had help from Amelia you see) and have two more cut out ready to sew. I now have an excuse to go and buy some more colours of this fabric. The little girl who received the pink one loved it which makes me happy that I persisted with the project and that it didn't disappear into the mid-craft pile (as so many projects often do). And Esther and Ellamay told me that everyone in their class wants one now. It looks like I will be getting a lot better at sewing these too :-)

Meanwhile, don't you just love pretty pens all lined up. I do. Stationery is lovely. I think I might add one of these for me to the list. I deserve one too. What colours to make it though?

Ready to sew

This is some of the fabric I am using to make the new notebook and pen holders I am working on for upcoming birthday's. So pretty. I hope to go back to buy some more this week. I have been so productive making things that I really need some more. :-) Well, almost. I don't usually make things so quickly when I buy fabric. Usually it sits there until I can think of what to do with it. There was lots of colours and I want to buy more. And thread. I never think to buy matching thread. Amelia has claimed the green spotty fabric for a skirt. I guess that is on the list with the other stuff to do.

I will post the notebook and pen holders in the next couple of days. Have a great week.

Cardboard box kitchen love

I love a bit of love for my blog. More on that in a minute. 

I have been a bit absent lately because we have had lots going on. Esther and Ellamay both went to hospital for a day to get grommets in their ears (finally! YEAH! They have had trouble for years) and so there was a little bit of stress leading up to that and then the recovery time afterwards. Also, I am on a mission to help our house lose some serious weight. We are approaching Autumn and with every season I get frustrated with our little house and try to get rid of stuff. Of course, in the past it has been thwarted by lots of other things. Mainly because I am easily distracted by all the pretty things I can make. This time though I am determined to achieve. So far, so good. I am losing interest though because I haven't made anything exciting for a while now. I am having creative with drawl.

Anyway, back to the blog love. I was pretty excited to find that my box kitchen has been featured alongside eight other very cool play kitchens. I have been featured on Craft Gossip before for my play farm fences. That was quite a while ago now. I have just been thinking about making some more things for that set again. Ideas are always stewing while I am doing other things. Go on over to see the other cool kitchens that are featured. I do love a play kitchen :-) Much more fun than the real thing :-)

Also, if you would like to see the first cardboard box kitchen I made, you can see it here. As we live in a small house, with only a corner of the living area for playing, the play kitchens only stay as long as they are played with and then out they go. Now that the weather is cooling down and we will be inside more, it looks like it might be time for a new one :-)

Needle books

How do you store your needles? I have a pin cushion that use to take care of them but I was having trouble with little people pushing the needles right down into it. Frustrating, but again one of those things that I remember doing to my mothers pin cushion so it makes it hard to be too cross about that. :-) (Sorry Mum). This felt cloud is what I have been using lately. Although it looks kind of cute (to me anyway) it wasn't really doing the job. I have wanted to make some kind of needle book for a while now and even had a couple in the mid-craft pile (recently culled).

Since the three girls are now sewing with real needles, we are going to start working towards making up a sewing set for them while improving their sewing along the way. Good idea, don't you think? I searched flickr looking at all kinds of needle books that might be easy for kids. There were lots of great ideas and this one isn't exactly kids beginners level but the girls had an idea for what they wanted. Mostly, it had to be quick. I had seen this tutorial for a child's sewing kit a while ago, which includes a pattern for a needle book and pin cushion and thought it would do the job.

Mine is the pale blue, Amelia's is green, Ellamay's is purple and Esther's is the pink ballerina. Sticking with our regular favourite colours. Everyone got to sew the line in the middle of their needle book. I know that's not much but when there is three little girls all wanting to do theirs at the same time, you have to go with what works easiest.

They all did a pretty good job with the sewing machine. I am hoping to get Esther and Ellamay back on there some time soon to make some little bags. We have been dreaming up all the other things we need to make or buy for their sewing set. We aren't going to make the sewing box that goes with the tutorial at the moment, though I would like to try it some time.

This is the inside of my needle book. By the time we got to sewing my needle book, some one had fiddled with the sewing machine and the tension was wrong (again!). True to form, I didn't stop to try to fix it. Waste of time. It takes me forever to get it sorted out. I am an impatient sewer (sewist? Sewing type person? Whatever the word is).

I will have to get some photo's of the latest stitching the girls have done. They are pretty proud of it. Little felt hearts that turned into cushions for their Barbie's and little felt rectangles which have become mattresses for the Pony house. They want to start doing things that are more advanced. I might set them up with an embroidery hoop next and have them just do lines of stitching and perhaps learn some new stitches. They think using a hoop for stitching is a very exciting idea.

Tim's birthday

We celebrated Tim's birthday last week. We made a mower cake. Tim loves to mow the grass. He has a collection of mowers (I think that is kind of funny). Anyway, I came across this idea for father's day cupcakes and thought we could use it for the cake. The kids iced it and then attacked it with forks to make it look like grass. I made the mower from a fun size Mars bar, a few M&Ms and a piece of licorice.

So glad you were put on this earth all that time ago. :-)

Old dresses into new messenger bags

I know I said I was going to do a post about the Crisis being one now but I got side tracked. I might get back to that some other time (I might not too, knowing me). Anyway, here is a project that I was madly unpicking clothes for.

I have wanted to get Esther and Ellamay a messenger type bag for ages now mainly so they could carry their asthma medication with them anywhere they went. I wasn't keen on buying bags because the ones I had seen were too big, too small, too ugly, too poor quality or too expensive. (Or all of the above). I decided to make some. I can make things and they are much nicer than the bought ones (sometimes). I had problems then trying to find a bag that was right and easy enough for me to make. Then I came across this great tutorial for a messenger bag using old jeans. YEAH! The tutorial has the size of the fabric at 26x10 inches and I changed it up to 28x11 inches and increased the length of the strap also.

The three girls all had some dresses that they had grown out of. They really were too worn out to hand on but I couldn't just throw them away, they were so nice. Making them into bags was perfect. So here you are. Esther and Ellamay wearing the dresses (I think they are about 4 years old here).

Esther's new bag. The design on the flap was on the bottom of the front panel of her dress.

I love the owl.

And here is Ellamay's bag.

I used the lining from the dresses to line the bags too. Though there wasn't quite enough from Ellamay's dress so I just used extra from Esther's. Her dress was a wrap around dress so there was more fabric in it.

Here is Amelia wearing her dress. This dress was a size 0 and she is only 8 months old in this photo.

And here is Amelia's bag. Her bag turned out a little bigger than the other two because I was trying to get the two front pockets on the front flap. And because the dress was only a size zero, I had to use a lot of other fabric to make up the rest of the bag.

I made a pocket inside them and because it was funny to me, I sewed in the tags from the dresses. :-)

I am feeling quite proud of myself for actually getting them done. The kids love them and have been using them just like I hoped. Thank you Tim for taking the kids out on the weekend so I could have a sewing day. :-)

I wouldn't mind making a bigger version for myself. I will just add that to my list of possible sewing projects (that is a long one). Not a bad start to the year. January hasn't even finished and I have completed a project. Or is that three projects. Yes. Then I really have achieved.

Have a great week.

Cardboard gingerbread houses

Last Christmas, I saw lots of ideas of making glittery houses for Christmas decorations. Small round cardboard tube houses, paper cup houses, grand cottages cut from paper and card. I really liked the ones that had lots of windows and a little LED candle inside. Pretty. This is what I came up with for us to make. We made some last year and we have finished some more for this year.

Cardboard gingerbread houses. I used the dimensions for the fabric dolls house and cut the pieces out of scrap photo mat board. It's great for this project because it is so sturdy.

The pieces are all stuck together with tape. I made a window and opening door at the front. The back panel, was cut 1/3 of the way across. Does that make sense? So it has one wide door and a small door. Then the back wall opens out so the inside can be played with too.

The girls painted them brown (not a very good gingerbread colour - but that is all I had) and then once they were dry they decorated them with foam stickers.

And these are the little gingerbread men I made (in the girls favourite colours) to live inside. I made them last year too. I traced around a cookie cutter and decreased the size until it was the right size for the houses. I used 2 layers or felt for these to give them a bit of thickness. The kids are having great fun playing with these. They line all the houses up so they can be neighbours and go over to each others houses for tea. It's very funny.

Sleeps til Christmas... 2!!!