Teal Jacket

This is my new favourite garment and a very silly "look here I am taking a picture of myself in a mirror" pose. It is made of boiled wool blend. I literally took it from the sewing machine and put it on and we have not been separated but for a day of cleaning. What no whole days of cleaning at yours? Not that I am cleaning like that all the time, but when I am in my creative frenzy the cleaning tends to slip from my mind and we go two, maybe three weeks without cleaning. And then I suddenly notice the dust bunnies, grime in the bathroom, bits on the living room rug. This time of the year elfing business is at its busiest.
We have had lots of snow, so some time has been merrily used in three-way snowball fights, sledging and building snowman.

Anyway, I started off with an Ottobre pattern from 5/2008 magazine. In the end I had adjusted rather a many details and after listing them to Elf husband he said: so you re-designed it. The jacket is unlined and works as a cardigan, but I foresee it being used as a spring jacket too.

First the changes you would not be able to see; I added a layer of fabric to the front opening and collar area to give it a bit more structure and made the armhole considerably roomier. This is my gripe with Ottobre patterns. We seem to have very different ideas of what constitutes an armhole. I got caught in this again and despite making the armhole up to next size, it was not enough, so ended up adding extra ovals under the arms, where they hopefully cannot be seen. I should have made a muslin, I know.

I also changed the front pleats from being scrunched up style to little individual pleats and that pleases me to no end.. The sunshine(!?) during the photo session washed the colours out rather well, so this detail looks almost black and white.

I used the pocket pattern as it was, but did not add the velvet band on the stitching on the pockets. I like them as they are and used a double top stitching instead.

Sleeves were extended to full length and added a cuff. The pattern had 3/4 sleeves, but I find them cold in the winter and I especially loathe them in jackets used outside. I find it is too much of faff to match my indoor clothing, which would be peeping from the sleeve with the jacket.

In the end I also went with two buttons instead of three, just because it looked nicer in my eyes and allows the jacket open to a slight a-shape, which I like.

So here is another shot of the whole jacket, the true colour is the colour of the sleeve and the cuff picture. All the others are despite photoshopping washed out in colours in various degrees.

Baby Quilts

This year there were three babies born, whom I felt I wanted to gift with a quilt. Here are two of them, the last one is almost there and hopefully the baby will get it as a Christmas present. I have been shamefully slow to get these together, on the other hand the boy baby's quilt would not have had a name on before now, as the parents did not reveal his name before the Christening. The poor nephew of mine, who was the first of the three to be born is still waiting for his.

Baby Alyssa's quilt has many pink colours, unusual for me to use as I don't much like pink in my house or clothing. I must say that in the end I was quite loving it and wanted to keep it!

Mainly because I just loved the owl fabric

and the polka dot binding,

not to forget the back of the quilt that is made of sew together Edwardian piece of curtain or something. The handiwork is beautiful as you can see.

Baby Filip's Quilt was made of shirtings and old sheet to keep it lovely and soft.

There is just nothing to beat cotton, which has been washed many, many times in softness. I used the same polka dot binding, which lifted the mood of the quilt.

I thought that  rather make it like this than putting "baby" materials in it as it might lengthen the use of the quilt. Little boys often protest if things are too "sissy" in my experience, especially when they have big brothers around. I created a Scottie(?) dog playing with a ball with his embroidered name on the back as there were no pictures in the patchwork materials.

There will be one more quilt here, maybe first after the Christmas and maybe one day I will make one for myself as well!

Snow and cards

We have been snowed in! Well, actually we can creep out in our Land Rover, but the roads in this part of the world are not awfully safe at the moment. I am happy with the snow, because I don't need to go anywhere, we have plenty of food and there are shops at walking distance. I find it really cosy with candles lit and doing crafts and my elfy business.

At Elf son's school they have a tradition to have  a postbox at the school and all the children send cards to each other. Now this school is minute and everybody has something to do with everybody. this means that he needs/wants to send cards to ALL the children and ALL the staff. As he is not the greatest writer, even short messages tax him a lot and writing 30 cards is a total no-go area. To offset the printed message inside, I encourage him to make the cards himself. It cannot be too time consuming as he is a boy who won't make 30 same/similar cards or different for that matter. I don't think that I would have at his age. So this is what we made today, for children:

 for adults a different card colour

I think it was a rather good effort. I cut the cards for him with the guillotine and he attached little wooden Christmas figures on the front. We had a choice of three figures and three punches as you might figure out from the pictures. Elf son had a go with the decorative punch, but had to give up as it was too hard going. Even I had to resort to tricks to be able to do it. We produced all 30, so now we just need to plan what to write and get the message printed. I think I scanned his handwritten message last year, might do the same this year.

Have you made any cards? My own cards are not done yet...

Stationery and Shameless Self Promotion

This pretty CD case contains files for my friend's new stationery; business cards, compliment slips and letter paper. A while ago she saw my new business cards, which I designed by myself. She was just running out of her stack, so she asked me to design new ones for her. She wanted to be able to print her own stationery as and when needed. She also liked the idea of having a design made for her. Her business is dance, drama and storytelling, so the theme went with it.

She had also asked for greens and blues as the dominant colours. Otherwise I had free hands.

The pictures suffer a bit from that I printed on normal paper rather than card and thick paper, but you get the idea. I must admit that it is easier to design for a person whose personality I know and these felt right for her. Luckily she agreed! So I as you might guess I am open for new commissions...

Baking and Canning

It is that time of the year again. The projects that  take my time cannot be showed, so there will be an excess of baking and such on the blog. I will try to think other things to show as well and at the moment I still have a couple of things to show.

On Thursday afternoon waiting for the Elf son to emerge from the school one of the other mums asked me what my son had decided to dress as on Friday. I had the feeling of Alice being sucked into the Wonderland, falling, falling,  falling...I had just got over the costume producing and organising the son's week while he was starring on the big stage AND produced the viking costume blogged about previously. It was of course "Children in  Need" Friday, which I had been informed about in good time, but had promptly forgotten.

My luck was in though. Elf son did agreed to be a viking, so the costume had another run with an added woolly waistcoat, which we already had. The other mum did remind me about the cake stall as well, so I went home and made the macaroons in the picture. This is my "quick to make, tastes good and can be packed to impress" coconut macaroons. As  it was, they had sold very quickly, which just proves how much the packaging and presentation matters.

I have beavered away with my pile of baby presents this weekend as I have a queue of them and feel bad about beginning the production of Christmas gifts before I have cleared the work in progress. I will show the results when I have finished and the recipients have got their gifts.
On the kitchen front I took the better late than never attitude and produced eight litres of apple chutney, here all in the jars and ready to go for maturing in our storeroom.

Please forgive me this disgustingly brown post and use of flash. It is annoying that there are very few windows of nice sunlight at the moment. I promise to have more colours in the coming ones.

Vikings

How did this happen? It was just Halloween and now it is the 15th? I am sure somebody or something has accelerated the time recently. Now, vikings...after the great performance at the local theatre as the King in Cinderella, my son needed a viking costume. His school is doing lots of practical history activities letting the children to cook over open fire, re-enacting viking and Anglo-Saxon meetings (wars?) and so on. The children have been encouraged to come in viking clothes and a letter came home with suggestions how to make them.

Elf son has clearly cottoned on that he has a mum who can "make", so there was no end to his wishes as what he needed.  I made the tunic and a wrap. Last Friday I pushed myself to produce the helmet in the evening well knowing that I would not be able to do it on Sunday after I was back from weekend in Edinburgh. I left the father and son to produce a shield for the brave viking warrior and when I came back he had not only a shield but an axe too.

Sunday evening the viking was still pestering for arm rings. I just could not muster the energy, but have now thought a way of doing them, so I might surprise him later this week. I will show how to make them, if I get around to it. In our case all the paraphernalia needs to be weather resistant as they play outside.

Happy Halloween

This is our pumpkin. I carved it according to Elf Son's wishes and scraped enough of the flesh to make a delicious pumpkin pie. In search of recipes on the net I noticed that all the recipes were calling for canned pumpkin, even the American ones! I could not believe it- we tend to make a pilgrimage to the supermarkets after the Halloween to buy some cheap pumpkins, because they disappear from the shelves as soon as the afore mentioned day is over. People don't obviously use pumpkin any more.

We made these bats as well. I cut a whole lot for our kitchen wall and Elf Son cut the ones for his room.  I got the idea from Dana and like her I am not much of a fan of coffins and plastic Halloween decorations. The bats on the other hand look rather nice and were good fun to make with Elf Son. I was pleased that he wanted to cut bats for his bedroom as scissor work and the required fine motor skills are challenging for him.

Yesterday evening I went out of my kitchen door and was about to get a heart attack. There was a ghostly Nessie in my carport. I had parked my plants from my polytunnel under the carport and wrapped them in horticultural fleece. There was a stiff wind flapping the fleece in a wormy manner and the car park lights were casting an eerie orange light on this monster. It was one of those split second moments when I almost screamed, but realised very quickly what I was seeing. Here is a hazy picture of my monster.

Believe me, it was far more scary in person as it was the movement which actually tricked me. Have a Happy Halloween!

Red and Polka Dots

I absolutely love the autumnal red of the rose hips and the strong green of the stems together with the turquoise glass vase. I have been revelling in reds lately. Our dining table have been decked in this:

It is not there anymore as it was not intended to be used as a table cloth. It is wax cloth from IKEA and I bought it for protecting the table when Elf Son gets crafty with glue etc. I had to try it and could not resist letting it be for a while as our round table resembled a toad stool!

For a while ago I had a stall at a health fair and as they also had crafters there I took some of my things with me. I wanted to do something new and it needed to be quick to produce, so I made a box full of Suffolk Puff pins. I love them myself and as I didn't really sell them, I might as well use them myself. My poor friends and the family are bound to be gifted with them in the coming season.

Otherwise I have not been very crafty, just sewn some costume bits for Elf Son's upcoming theatre performance. He is doing the Disney Musical "Cinderella" at the local Theatre and is casted as the King. Otherwise I think he has chorus parts along all the others, so there is need for all sorts of "basics" such as brown trousers, black leggings, white collarless shirt etc. The bits I have needed to sew or adjust from thrift finds are not exciting enough to show.

On the home front I got my act together to hang up this picture by Mandy Pattullo, which I have blogged about here and framing my blog picture to accompany it.

Here is rather a bad picture of the wall.

Can you see the little wooden clown on the other side of Mandy's picture? It continues my polka dot theme nicely:

I love its worn looks. I originally bought it in a thrift shop in order to give it as a baby gift, but decided that I could not part with it!

Autumn Dress

My crafting can be in a very small place at the moment, but I did manage to liberate a Sunday afternoon to sew this dress. I have been using it a lot. It reaches just under the knee and can be used as a dress or a tunic. I used a pattern from Ottobre Autumn/Winter 2008. The sleeves have been adjusted from gathered and short to straight and longer. The armhole and the sleeve needed to be made bigger as well, it feels as if the pattern has not been enlarged in this area going up the sizes. I can attest that size 6 arm hole is very different from size16. Although I might just have really fatty over arms. Even when I was a skinny minny, the armholes seemed to be a an issue.

I like the pleats on the front

and the yoke in the back with the centre seam

Now this is a little competition to my family: Can you identify the fabric? (Don't look down yet!)

Yes, that is the curtain which was in front of the coats and shoes in my Grandma's flat. I always liked it and grabbed it, when nobody else wanted it! I get quite a kick about this fact, especially when people are paying compliments to me about my dress. ; )

Sniff, sniff atchiooo....!

 Ok, I am a bad blogger, if you have an award for it, just send this way. First we went on summer holidays and then all the school starting business took me by surprise. It is as if it never had happened before; the search for shoes, the PE kit, the sandshoes...and the whole thing getting back to the routine was as if I had never tried it. Now that everything should be smooth and running I went and got a bad case of cold. I told this virus when I felt it coming that a) I don't do colds and b) September was certainly not the time! The virus was not impressed and I have been languishing in my bed the best part of the last week and am still not OK. I am up and doing things, but the batteries are not quite charged yet.
 My crafting has come to a halt too, because of all the above mentioned, so I will show you a couple of things I managed to squeeze in during the holidays.

I had seen on the net a nice idea for an "extra draining board". I am apologising, because I cannot remember at all, where this might have been, just telling you that this was not my original idea. Of course you can use any towel for the job, but this one is a dedicated one and I got to cram some delicious fabrics in it. In this way I can see them every day in my kitchen. The back is made of an old handtowel, which I did not use any more.

We were visiting my family in Finland and my sister S had just given birth to a little baby boy H. I was talking to her about baby clothes before I went (or actually even thought about going) and she was saying that she needed a few more pieces, so this is what I made. It is all made from thrifted cotton sweaters and t-shirts. The only new thing is the buttons.

The little niece L, who got the rag doll in February had also her second birthday. This time I had not had any time to prepare as our decision to go was made two days before the departure. Luckily Grandma had a great project, which I could help with! She had dug up my sister A's old doll's bed and bought a baby doll. Now the bed needed bedding, which was sweetly made out of little L's dad's aka my brother's old baby cot sheets.

That was the present as Grandma had imagined, but us being two to dream up things, we did not leave it at that. I thought that the baby needed a change of clothing

Then I thought that if the little baby was invited to a party, it would not suffice to wear PJs or rompers, so I made a dress and a shirt.

And while I was sewing all this Grandma was busy with knitting. I would have never stretched to those mini-socks and very much doubt that I could have been bothered making a cardi either had it been only me...

I had a closer look at the packet where we had liberated the doll from (I hate those ties all the toys are strangulated with in order to stay in posh boxes with see-through fronts) and noticed that the baby was a bathable one. So of course we had to provide her with a bath towel.

Yes, the binding doesn't bear close inspection. At this point Grandma's machine and I were not on friendly terms. The simplest piece in our collection did take most effort. And just because I had time in my hands I had to make a little shoulder bag for the dolly's clothes.

It was very well received present indeed and the most pleased were the BIG BROTHERS! It was so funny to see how they were changing the baby doll's clothes. So there you are, my summer crafting and nothing really achieved in this month. I have so very many projects waiting that I have decided that I am NOT allowed to buy a new project before I have made a sizeable hole into my supplies. Buying is only allowed if I need something to finish one of the pre-planned projects.


I must say to my own defence that I did re-decorate my workroom and tidied all the work related draws and shelves, so it feels really lovely to get to work now!