My New Old Sewing Machine

I scored this vintage machine off of freecycle a few weeks ago. It is incredibly heavy and luckily for me came with the original manual. I took it into a sewing machine repair shop to have them service it and clean it up and it runs like a dream.



A made some bibs and a placemat on it so far. I'll be selling these at a friends' yoga studio, with the money saving up towards funding a community gift through Plan Canada.



Lastly, a silly snack we made plenty of last month for Halloween. Banana ghosts: add 3 chocolate chips to half a banana for an eyes and a mouth. Easy-peasy.

November Embroideries

Here are some of the things I've been working on.

Small cloth napkins to tuck into Jr's lunchbox. Bunny in a ghost costume by Craftblog.com.au. Teapot and the barrel of monkeys from Sublime Stitching. Racecar and driver by Blackbird Jr.



Bear pattern from Badbird

Elephant pattern from So September



Another Badbird pattern







Works in progress: a Polo shirt and more cloth napkins. The napkin with red marker on it is how I get Jr to draw a picture and then I embroider over it and the marker washes right out. That picture is of a pirate ship and an island with a treasure box and palm tree.

Scooby Pants FAIL

I was working on these Scooby pajama pants for a birthday party this weekend and was near finished when this caught my eye on the selvage:



FAIL. Not only a pajama fail, but a learn fail as I did this one before, bought a bunch of flannel for PJs only to realize it could not be used as sleepwear once I brought the flannel home. They could be used as regular pants but they'd be a bit um, loud.

Now I need to think of something I can use cut-up scooby pajama pants fabric for.

Easy Children's Clothing

I just love this Lazy Days Free Skirt Pattern from Oliver & S. I made this skirt for our dress up clothes and it was such a hit I made another with the same fabric for a toddler friend, with a matching doll-size skirt. Expect to see many more similar skirts from me, I love the pattern.



I also used this tutorial from Handy Projects and a store bought t-shirt to make Jr some quick summer pjs from the Bot Camp fabric.



Once familiar with the patterns, each of these projects could be done in under an hour. Which means more time to read or indulge in Weeds and True Blood, my current preoccupations. How sweet were Jessica and Hoyt??

Embroideries and Salad Faces

A row house for a swap




2 versions of a free pattern from Andrea Zuill. The blue one is a gift for a friend, the pink one is for me and I am going to do some quilting around it to make it into a wall hanging.



I use a lot of cloth totebags, but I hate advertising on them, so I've been covering up the ads with pieces of fabric.





What I did with some of the bot camp fabric



For lunch this week we made salad faces with cream cheese on corn thins and assorted toppings. Inspired by Mollie Katzen's Salad People.



this one is a salad alien, by Blackbird Jr



A little surprise Jr and I made for Mr Blackbird

Fabric LOVE at The Fabric Worm

I want the entire stock over at The Fabric Worm.

Amy Schimler's Forest Friends



Bot Camp by Michael Miller



Lecien My Folklore Spice



Some of the stacks are just begging to be made into quilts. Sigh.. if I didn't already have quilts coming out of my ears!



More owls, these ones by Alexander Henry.



Heather Ross' Mendocino. So pretty..



A selection of blues with a rocket theme.



I am having a hard time deciding what to get! Jr also digs the Bot Camp so we'll start there and see what else I can't resist.

I Made a Play Campfire

Blackbird Jr is currently clamoring for "white and brown pretend marshmallows". I even offered that we could pretend to cook REAL marshmallows that he could eat later, but he wants play ones.

I used red corduroy with orange and yellow felt for the flames. The large flame is stuffed with stuffing with poly pellets on the bottom to make it stand and the small flame has wire armature so you can shape it.

I used some scrap wood for around the flames but I'd like to collect some sticks on our nature walks to use instead.

Quilted Wall Hanging

A holiday gift I remembered to take photos of, unlike most everything I've sent out.







and a gift from a friend through an Ornament Swap- a cozy cup of hot cocoa! Blackbird Jr thinks it is the height of hilarity to pretend to offer it to people as he believes we do not realize it is fake until we attempt to drink some.

Crafting Catch-Up

A new doll, made in a swap for some knitted dishcloths.



A shirt for Blackbird Jr where I embroidered some pictures he drew. He drew him in a racecar for the front and the 2 of us in a rocketship for the back.






Kitchen teatowel, made with sublime stitching patterns from my lovely friend, A.



And more shrinky dinks! We've been having lots of fun with them.

Embroidered Baby Quilt

A baby quilt I made from the book Doodle Stitching. You can see more photos of the quilt, including progress shots in my flickr set for the quilt.

The whole quilt. It took me about a month to sew and embroider. I really love the pattern and would like to make another one sometime.



details:









Matching shoes and bib

Sewing Space in a Closet

I love this. One day I want to set up an office-type space (computer, stationary stuff) in a closet. I've always loved small cozy spaces and used to love playing in my closet, playhouses or tree forts. I think I've passed that on to DS, who slept in a laundry basket of blankets (really) for months when he was 2. He always wanted to fall asleep there and would crawl up in it to nap. I'd take him out after he fell asleep and put him back in his bed, but he'd just snuggle up in his basket happily to fall asleep.

Sewing space from Lovely Design

Pretty Pretty Fabrics

I bought these packs of quilting squares from Fat Quarter Shop just to make doll quilts for the dolls I've been making. Because it's not like I have a couple dozen old baby quilts lying around or anything.

Doll

I made a doll this last week, the first I've made in a long time. She was made with this pattern from Wee Wonderfuls. I love the little buns in her hair.

Fabric Teapot

This is adorable. I just picked up a small enamel teapot for Blackbird Jr at the reuse centre, but everyone expect to get one of these as a christmas present.



Tutorial via Ric-Rac- Teapot Tutorial