Wardrobe Wednesday

This is the second week that Clare has had this wardrobe wednesday thing going on, and last week I really wanted to join in because I was actually wearing a half decent outfit due to having to go to work. So this week I had planned to make an effort to join in, however being up all night with a very sick baby does not leave one with a lot of energy to make an effort for anything. So this is my "staying at home with a baby who has swine flu, but we might have to pop to the supermarket later" outfit.

 

I suspect a certain three year old has done something to the camera, because even in the fairly decent light of day I still get a shockingly blury photo, but I do not have it in me to take hundreds of self-timer photos to try to get it perfect, so please use your imagination.

Not a very exciting roundup, but here goes:
Boots - the warehouse (I love these boots and have them in black too)
Knee-highs - foodtown
pants - thrifted I think
top - the warehouse

I promise to try a bit harder next week :)

Latest Creations

I’ve been a bad blogger, I totally forgot to post about this wonderful package that arrived a few weeks ago. This was the giveaway prize that I won from Moose & Bird, and it is lovely. So lovely, in fact, that I am reluctant to use it in case I ruin it’s loveliness. Even the packaging was lovely, wrapped up in a vintage sewing pattern with cute little tags and tied with lace, yum. I have yet to find the perfect project to convince me to use the gorgeous lace and buttons. Little princess was convinced that the pin cushion was meant to be a pillow for her teddy, but I was not giving it up, so I may have to make her something similar to make up for it.

Recently a friend who I haven’t seen for a couple of years had a baby, and I was completely unaware that she was even pregnant because I haven’t been spending much time on facebook since I  discovered the world of blogging, so to make up for it I thought I had better make a little gift package for her new little man.

I made a Scotty dog rattle, which “barks” when you squeeze his nose, out of some nice cuddly fleece, some baby leg warmers using this tutorial, and used some of the left over fabric from the socks to appliqué an X onto a vest. Another baby with X as a first initial, and yes it’s the same name, so from now on whenever I make something for X#1 I will just make another one for X#2.

I’ve been trying to get my pattern for the scotty dog in the right proportions, because the first one I made a while ago was way too skinny, then I made this one

But the fabric was too stretchy so it looks very stretched (a bit like a scotty/dachshund cross). This one is also a rattle and was going to be the gift for X#2 until I decided to make one that coordinated with the rest of the gifts. After I made this one little princess wanted it, and got quite upset when I told her she couldn’t have it, so I let her pick fabric for her own doggy.

  I think her choice of fabric was great, and the proportions are finally looking about right. She named him (because a purple floral polka dot dog CAN be a boy) Sizzles, after the dog from Charlie & Lola, her favourite program at the moment. She does a perfect Lola impersonation, with english accent and all.

This is a pretty shocking photo, taken at night in bad lighting, but this is part one of my “here comes the sun” swap. I think it’s safe to show this, because my swap partner doesn’t know who she is getting a package from (I think), because I don’t know who I am getting a package from either, it’s all a bit of a mystery. Anyway, after I spent hours browsing the web trying to get inspiration I finally decided on a button necklace, and I haven’t made one like this before but one of my craft groupies showed me how a while ago. I couldn’t completely remember how to put it all together, so I just fluked it a bit, but I think it turned out ok. It’s wearable, and I think the colours definitely say “spring”, but because I am not entirely happy with it I have decided to make something else to go with it.

All these swaps are great fun and very challenging to come up with an idea that is relevant and suitable to your partner. I have had to ditch quite a few ideas just because they are not suitable for sending overseas, which is a bit of a bummer. But it’s nice to have a reason to craft :)

At my house

This must be the first day I have had to myself for about 10 months. Having both kids in daycare at the same time is great. So what do I do with a day to myself?? Go thrifting of course!!

I had to go into town anyway to take back the wig hubby hired for his costume, so that gave me an excuse to visit the two op shops close to town. These are the goodies I bought home -

More vintage linen and doilies (because I obviously haven’t got enough already, only a whole suitcase full), a little crochet blanket, a retro print metal tray which will make a great magnetic notice board, an oval box which I will decoupage and use for storing some crafty supplies, a few bags of random craft stuff like lace, ribbon etc, some bits of fabric, a couple of cute dolls dresses (although these are more for me than little princess because she prefers her dolls to be naked and takes the clothes off them immediately if I put clothes on them), and a few vintage-ish books, two of which (raggedy anne and the cookie snatcher and Leo the lop) I remember owning as a child, the other one just had really cute pictures.

While we are on the subject of thrifting, here are some things I have found lately that I haven’t posted on here yet.

A pile of pillowcases, mostly vintage.

  More pillowcases, with gorgeous roses.

A lace edged under skirt for little princess, and also for me to copy to make more, because something like that has got to be fairly simple to make, right?

Some fabric/fabric items.

A vintage plastic tray and a bag of buttons.

And this very cool children’s book, great story, great pictures, great concept for a preschooler who loves balloons.

The rest of my day (all 1.5 hours of it before family gets home) will be spent planning some things to make for my swap partners. I can’t believe I have joined three swaps in a week, but they are all so fun I just couldn’t resist. I think the colour swap will be the easiest, but the one I have to send first is for the “here comes the sun” swap, and I have no idea what I am going to make for that. Better get thinking (which means blog surfing until I find something or have a brainwave).

Head over to Lou Lou’s to see what's happening at other houses today.

I’m back, and this is what I’ve been doing

Not that I have been anywhere, just busy hanging out with my mummy and working part time.

This seems to be the time of the year when there are a lot of birthdays happening, so I have been making things to give. I am really enjoying making gifts this year instead of buying them, not only because it is saving us loads of money, but because it really feels better giving a gift that is handmade. And it means I get a crafty fix without loading my house up with more stuff that I have no use for and no space for.

So last week we went on a little road trip to the middle of nowhere to visit my cousin and her 2 (almost 3) littlies. We haven’t seen them since Christmas, so I thought some handmade gifts were in order, especially with her little man turning one in a couple of weeks. Her little miss 2 got one of my elephants (Annabelle), Little man got this robot

Personalised with an X because that is his first initial. I was up ridiculously late the night before visiting making this, because I don’t have a lot of “boy” things in my stash, and I have misplaced my unpicker which I was desperately in need of for this project, because sewing late at night is not a good idea.

For baby due next month I gave the taggie hedgehog (shown in the same post as the elephants), which I added a rattle to.

This Friday just gone was the night of the function in which we dressed up as Sweeney Todd and Mrs Lovett. It was also the birthday celebration of a friend/fellow crafter, who adopted my dead sewing machine and had it fixed in order to learn to sew. I had mentioned that she really needed a pin cushion if she was going to sew, so when trying to think of something to make for her gift, pin cushion was one of the options. I still have boxes full of tea cups and saucers left over from the tea party, and I had planned to use them to make pin cushions, so that's what I did.

I even decorated some pins with beads and things to go with it. I very loosely based it on this tutorial, but I’m not one to follow instructions for crafty things.

Want to see what we looked like???

The photos are pretty bad, because it was night time…..

Prepare yourself…..

That’s two photos put together, in case you are wondering why it’s out of proportion. I am actually over a foot shorter than hubby, not a giant.  We couldn’t get a photo together because we had no-one to take it, but there was a professional photographer at the function so hopefully we will get to see that. What do you think, did we pull it off??? This is what we were going for -

A delightful book giveaway

You can enter to win this lovely book here, but hurry, today is the last day to enter.