How do people find time to blog every day?

I don't know how so many people seem to get so much done AND still they manage to blog about it regularly. I don't seem to have time to blog and sew in the same evening. I keep trying to do quick updates, and not write much, but by the time I crop the photos it's getting late.

Look at this blog - it's one I use to visit quite a lot. When I first started visiting it, there were SIX YEARS of posts, with almost one post a day!!! It's a food blog, so just about every day they took a picture of their dinner and wrote about it. How do you do that?!

Anyway, here is another round of pics. I may not write much then for a few days (we'll see).

Here's the tee I made for myself. Excuse the dreadful pic.



Here are a couple of little needle felted cups I made for our play kitchen. My 2 yr old has been playing with them since they were made. The first (with the heart) was a bit thin but I've added more wool since taking these pics. I was rushing a bit when I made them so I'm sure they could be a lot better - more wool and then felted more would be good. The star one is already a lot better then the first one.

This is a little needle felted bunny. It's in brown wool because that was the best that I had, but it means that the features don't photograph well. It was fun to do. Now I want to make a whole host of animals. The two pics look quite different colours but that's just how they happened to turn out - it is the same bunny photographed on the same table. Remember, I'm still just practicing with my felting - I've only made a very few things - in fact, 3 birds (well, 2 big birds and a nest of 3 babies) and the cups (and the balls, but they are a completely different technique) before these bunnies. I am not completely happy with the bunny - it isn't perfect, but I still really like it, and it was fun. And best of all, my daughter likes it.

Trying to decide if the pink had can go with the cherry dress. Hmmm ... might need to make a few more hats!

The felted bowls - you saw them prefelting - when just knitted, in a previous post. These have been through a hot wash and dry twice, and then dampened and shaped over containers, then left to dry for a couple of days. I have the next size up knitted ready to wash, and the next are on the needles but not with much knitted. Not sure if I'll do these again, only because I have too much other knitting to do. I do really like them, but they are just a lot of work. I will be really pleased when I have the whole set done though.

First two pics are the group of three - waiting for three more to make up a rainbow stacking set for the kids' play shelves.

This is just a set of two that will go in the play kitchen. My daughter has already been using the smaller one to serve me pretend soup (and lots of it!).

And a denim skirt for my 8 yr old. Ottobre, 1/03, #21. She asked for a denim skirt - I was thinking of something using lovely quilting fabric, but this is what she wanted. I think I'll still make her a fancy fabric one, but just after I get the summer basics all done for all the kids (and maybe even something for me and my fella).

Just thought I'd throw in a pic of our pizza. I don't think the picture does it justice. It was a simple one - mostly to just use leftovers. It used the dough that I've talked about before and shown pics of before - that you just keep in the frig ready to use. I love it - so quick. Sometimes I make a quick pizza before school for the kids to take for lunches, it's so easy. The school one is particularly easy because they only want cheese and tomato paste!

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.

I may not have written, but I've been sewing

After getting into a good habit of regular posting, I've taken a few days' off. School holidays and people coming and going here has meant I just haven't had much time. I have still been trying to get stuff done. It's just been a little slower then I would have liked.

I've been working on nappies. My toddler needs a new set (she has fitteds with woolen covers for night time, and they still fit fine, but when we go out I like all-in-ones or similar, and this is what she needed). In the last post I had made one nappy to try out and it was great, so I had to make a lot more.

So ... I took a day or two cutting them all out. That was probably around the 16th and 17th. (I had a day of housework before that too.) Then there were lots of snaps to apply before sewing could begin. That was on the 18th.

On the 19th I finished 4 nappies - 2 purple ones that have beautiful soft minky PUL for the outer, and 2 pink ones that are a crushed velvet PUL.

On the 20th I finished sewing the rest of them, but then had lots and lots of snaps to apply. I did some of them yesterday (the 20th), and today I finished the rest of them - seven nappies completed. All of them are minky outer with a hidden layer of PUL.

Here's a close-up of just one of the nappies.

I know that nappies are a fairly quick thing to make, but things have been so busy here that I haven't had big periods of time to sit down and just sew. I've had to snatch moments of time here and there. The result is that it has taken days just to get these done.

Combined with the one trial nappy that I made earlier, and two that I've bought, that gives 14 nappies. Fourteen nappies should be plenty.

My arms are aching from all of those snaps.

In the past week I've applied 308 snaps, or if I count the trial nappy also (on the 14th) that's 336 snaps.

Tonight I also made a singlet top for myself - another quick project.

Before Christmas I made myself an A-line skirt, which I love, and a t-shirt to match. The t-shirt is quite nice - little cap sleeves and a gather-y bit at the bust (like the singlet), but the fabric has already started to look a bit scruffy, after less then a month of wearing it. It was also a little loose to start with, so now its looking a bit daggy all round. I also prefer singlet tops on these hot days. Finally I got around to making myself one.

I'll wear it once or twice, and if I like it I can make myself a few more in similar styles.

Here is a pic of the skirt that it is to match. I made this before Christmas. I didn't take a pic then and just took this one now, without ironing the skirt. When I get around to it, I'll replace the picture below with a better one.

Next on my list - another pair of undies for my son and one for my oldest daughter, t-shirts for the kids, and most urgent, I have to think of a present for a nephew for this weekend. We already gave him a pencil roll for Christmas, so it can't be that. Most birthdays I make him some shorts. Hmmm ... will have to think about it.