May and June Catch up

Okay, once again I haven't written in ages, so here is a quick picture tour of what I've been doing on the crafty front. I don't feel as though I've been very productive, although I don't have pictures of everything so I've done more then this! I'm not going to write much.



Here is some of the matroyshka fabric that I screen printed sewn up into pants for my toddler. I also made the top - my own version of a peasant top, in Sandi Henderson fabric - love this design in yellow and wish I had more of that fabric. I made these clothes when my toddler was this age, but now they've been handed onto the bub I just had to take a pic. I love her in all red. She's wearing a minky fleece hat, a frottee jacket (Ottobre pattern), a cotton velour dress (my pattern) and recycled jumper wool pants/nappy cover, along with red fleece booties (that never stay on). She looks so snuggly. It may not be fancy, but it's one of my favourite outfits for her now that it's winter.

A screen print that I did for my daughter's classes' education week performance. I didn't do the design - I just printed it ...

... on a heap of t-shirts.

These tees were for the boys. I didn't get a pic of all the girls' t-shirts, but there's a pic further on of the girls' whole costume.

This pic is jeans that I made for my boy, and also a plain white tee (not very exciting). Jeans are hemp denim, and Ottobre pattern. Tee is organic cotton.

This is what the girls wore for their costume. I printed the tees and added a bit of elastic down the bottom to make them a nicer shape. The sun design is mine - super-simple. With help of other mums I sewed up the skirts. Thank goodness I didn't have to shop for the fabric and all the other bits and pieces too - sewing them up was easy. I also made the leggings just for my daughter. All the girls supplied their own leggings.

This is my first try of this sort of screen print. I just did about 1&1/2 metres of it to do a peasant skirt for my toddler and a dress for my bub. My plan is to do lots of mt of this print to make curtains for my dining room. I drew the design and did the printing.

This is the biggest piece of embroider I've done. It looks a bit wonky and it is a bit wonky! I didn't want it to look perfect because I wanted that "freehand" look, but I think it would have been better if it were a little neater. It is going to be part of a handbag.

This is the fabric that I printed to make up the rest of the handbag. It is hemp/cotton muslin, dyed with fibre reactive dyes, then screen printed using a couple of kirigami shapes - ie paper cut-outs - as the design. I only printed about 1/3 mt of the fabric for this, but wish I'd done more as I'd love a skirt made out of it.

I did print this for a skirt for myself though. It is using the same screens, plus one other, but uses much stronger colours on undyed hemp muslin. I think I would have preferred the colours to be more similar to each other - perhaps pink, red and something else.

But I like it much better now that I've sewn it up into a skirt for myself! I think it will be better in Summer or Spring, rather then with black stockings underneath.

I also printed this paisley design (my drawings) on some hemp/cotton muslin. As usual I dyed it using fibre reactive dyes and love the shade of blue that it turned out. That's one of the great things about dying fabric, that can also be one of the bad things. Because I'm at the stage of trying out all the colours, and not of trying to repeat them, the colour that eventuates is always a surprise. I do keep careful notes though so I should be able to get something similar if I want to repeat them in the future.

You can't see the paisley design very well here. I love drawing paisley. It's easy, and it's fun to fill with different patterns. Hardest bit is chosing which ones to use (and finding the time to do them).

So these are pants for my daughter. They're just super-simple, beach/lounge pants.

I love how this turned out. It's a screen print - I did quite a few of them. You can't really tell here, but it's about the size of an A4 sheet of paper, printed on hemp/cotton muslin (of course, although I've pretty much run out of the lovely thick stuff now until I can get some more). It's to cut out and sew together to make a simple mini-cushion. I'm thinking of selling these as craft panels. What do you think? I have some other designs in mind too.

That's all for now. I've also made a couple of peasant tops for my bub and a few other things. And I've almost finished crocheting myself a scarf. I'll post pics when I get to it.

Finally tried some screen printing

This is the first print that I did. I drew the dolls that the print is based on. The fabric is a hemp/cotton muslin that I dyed using fibre reactive dyes.

I cut out the patterns pieces for the garments before printing so that I would print the right amount in the right places - decided it was better then just printing the full length of fabric that I dyed. This also meant I could curve it a bit for my skirt, which is cut with a bit of a curve. So this picture shows it all laid out on the table to dry.

I sewed up my skirt first. Will add pics of the other garments sewn up later. Those pictures are still on the camera.

This was the second screen print I did. The picture is a freehand drawing based on one in Lotta Prints, by Lotta Jansdotter. Fabric again is hemp/cotton muslin, dyed using fibre reactive dyes (Procion).

Out of it I made a dress for my bub. Here is the front ...

a close up of the print ...

and the buttons on the back. I got to adding the buttons really late at night, and realised I'd forgotten to buy matching buttons. Looked through my button collection and found these! I don't think I could have found a better match if I'd searched them all at the fabric store.

I also made pants for my toddler.

I sewed these up in time for them to wear to Easter gatherings, but didn't have time to sew up the matching tops that I'd imagined. Fortunately, my bub had a yellow top, so that worked well, but not the toddler. So again, late at night (most of my sewing happens late at night) I found a plain hemp t-shirt (undyed) already made that she had and printed it with the birds print in purple. I did it in a rush and using different inks to the other ones (a bit thinner), so the print isn't quite as clear as the print on the pants, but it was ready for wearing with the pants the next day.

Here's a pic of my two little girls wearing tops that I put pics up of in an earlier post. Just didn't have a modelled picture then.

And finally, to finish up, some food.

A delicious strawberry and rhubarb pie.

And more bread. This is the same sort as is in the last few bread pics. I've been making this as our main bread now for quite a few weeks. Just wanted to show off this loaf because look ... it looks quite normal from this side.

But out the other side ... a blow out!


Still tasted super-delicious, especially hot.

One of my favourite dresses

Just here quickly to post a pic of one of my favourite dresses for my bub. I've posted a pic of it here before, but it wasn't modelled so you can't really tell how nice it is. Hopefully I'll be back later with an update of all the crafty stuff I've been up to lately - not as much as usual, but a few different projects.

Matching ... I know it's corny ...

But they love it! My older daughter, who I made the gingham top and black shorts for, asked for a matching set for the toddler.

And here are some much more simple clothespin doll people. These ones are better for the little kids to play with - to pop into my handbag or the pram for keeping them occupied when we're out.

I painted the solid parts of ten clothespins, thinking that it would be a quick job and then I could add the detail the next day. It took AAAAGES. I've only added detail and varnished these four. Hopefully I'll find some time to do ther others soon. I have big plans for them - as parts of a couple of other projects.

Tonight I'm dying fabric while doing a bit of washing sorting. I'm at the stage where I just have to keep resetting the washing machine and waiting - unfortunately, as always seems to happen, it has ended up still with a while to go and it's getting very late.

There's be beeps. Better go reset again. I have big plans for this fabric!

Here are the girls!

Okay, so when I say, "Here are the girls", I don't mean the banana bread that you first see in this post! You'll have to get to the end of the post to see the girls.

Although the last thing I wrote was only a couple of days' ago, it was photos that were downloaded onto my computer on about the 13th of February. I've just downloaded the photos that I've taken since then, so here is yet another catch up (before we get to the girls - which is really today's crafty contribution).

I've done a bit of baking. Used up some bananas in my quick banana bread - to be sliced and frozen for adding to school lunches for the following week or two. I'm trying a new method of breadmaking to keep up with all our bread needs. I already make all of our bread - which I've done for years, but this is a new method from the book "Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a day" - which I love. It is delicious bread and it really is very quick. It's much easier to fit into a busy schedule. I've even used the method for pizza dough.

After working out (and making lots of times lately) a vegan (ie dairy and egg free, and of course no meat) version of sticky date pudding which is really delicious, I decided to see what a self-saucing sticky date pudding would be like - just because it would be so quick to make. So here it is. Not a very exciting photo I know. Tastes good, although not as good as the other one. I would still make it perhaps for a super quick family treat dessert, but would generally stick with the other version I think.

We finally dug up all the potatoes that have been growing in our potato patch for the past few months. We got less then I had hoped for, but still a good crop considering that the plants died early from sun burn. And now, we have a lovely, almost weed-free, area for planting into.

We also dug up some piddly little garlic bulbs that also got too much sun, and planted some beans and beetroot in their place.

I made a long sleeve peasant top for my 21 month old daughter. I just made it up and ended up adding elastic in the shoulder, which looks much better. The sleeves were just too big before that. The fabric is from Sandi Henderson's lovely collection.

Made light mauve leggings to match.

So after really, really hot weather, we had some cold weather when I was stuck searching for nice warm clothes for the little girls that would fit. That was why I started on the long sleeve top and leggings. Then it started getting warm again, and my 7 yr old has been in need of more shorts for a while, so I made her and my 5 yr old son some simple, plain black shorts. Made my son's shorts longer and added extra patch pockets on the sides. I don't think I took a photo of them so you'll have to wait to see them. Here are my daughter's shorts along with a variation on a pillowcase dress for her top. I think it turned out nicely.

And now, back to bread. The photos are in time order - just incase you're wondering why we're jumping back and forth. I made lots of bread between the last pictures and this one, but this is the first one with a bit of wholemeal flour in it. I'll have to gradually try substituting more and more wholemeal - this one tasted good.

And now, finally onto the girls! This is how my dining table looked for a couple of days (did pack it up in between each time, but kept getting it back out). I took a bit of a sewing break, to do some painting, and made a little collection of clothes peg dollies. Love how they turned out!

Here they are, waiting to get dressed (and have arms added too actually).

And here is a collection of cute little dresses.

This is a group shot, in they're current resting place - in front of the glasses in our dining room shelf. Close-ups to follow ....

These dolls were great fun to make. I wonder if I can make a living out of making little peg dollies??? I imagine by the hundredth one I might be saying something different though!

It was fun doing some painting again, so I do have plans for a couple of other painted things and also some fabric printing. Stay tuned!