Today I undertook my first toy drop through The Toy Society. If you’ve never heard of them before The Toy Society is a world-wide collective of toy makers – of varying skill levels– who make toys and leave them as gifts for perfect strangers. The project was started in Australia in June 2008 by a local crafter, Bianca, as an attempt to create a ‘something for nothing’ experience for anyone who discovered a toy. What started as a small personal project has now spread around the world and become known as a Random Act of Craft. I decided to make…
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I am really enjoying making things for my little one. He has a great bedtime routine which means by 7 we have evenings to ourselves and I can get my sewing out! A couple of weeks ago I started on some simple tshirts which I finally finished: hedgehog giraffe dinosaur jellyfish I bought the tshirts and followed a simple pattern from Sew Hip magazine. Each animal is decorated with some colourful ric rac and the name of the animal embroidered. I didn’t enjoy the freehand embroidery (they look a little too like a child’s handwriting!) but I love the finished…
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So last night I tried one of the projects on my to-do list – an embellished tshirt for my little boy. I followed an old pattern from Sew Hip magazine. It was pretty simple consisting of an applique motif decorated with colourful ribbons for the mane and tail. I was excited as this was my first time using fusible webbing and I have plenty of other projects I want to try using this. Everything was going well until I managed to melt the ribbon on to the iron not once, but twice! I removed the gunk with a paste of…
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I have been busy making hexagons for some time. It’s the kind of craft project you can do when you have 5 minutes and I’m trying to make some every evening. I even managed to take some away on our recent holiday. I didn’t realise quite how many fabrics I had – there’s plenty of scope for all kinds of patchwork projects in a variety of colours 🙂 I’m making the hexagons the traditional way using English paper piecing. Some are big, some are small, and I am planning to use them on some Christmas presents!
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I seem to have lost my crafting mojo recently. It’s probably due to a lack of ‘me’ time which is natural with a new baby. However, Edward has gone to bed at 7 since we brought him home from hospital and I don’t feel the need to collapse on the sofa after he has gone to bed as much as I used to. So I recently picked up my sewing machine and made a new bib for him from some lovely fleecy fabric. complete with milk stains! It’s not the best thing I have ever made but it was practical…
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Taggies are cute comforters for babies, often made from two different fabrics and edged with ribbons. Edward received a lovely taggie from Claire and at 5 weeks he is very into holding, grabbing and pulling, so this was a perfect gift. (This isn’t a great photo of him in action – but doesn’t he look cute?!). When he is relaxing we make sure to put the fleecy red side of the taggie for him to look at. It is so cute to see him gazing at it from his bouncy chair. I have high hopes of making some items such…
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Today I received an exciting parcel from Megan at Maximum Rabbit Designs who was my partner in Claire’s Pincushion Swap. Megan likes buttons, felt and all things vintage as much as I do 🙂 The parcel was beautifully contained in a round box, decorated with button stamps and plenty of space for a photograph – no guesses for whose picture I will be putting in there! The pincushion has been made from vintage fabric embroidered with flowers. Megan also included some vintage buttons, threads and some of her ‘button’ cotton reel stamps. I can’t wait to try it out for…
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I have been working on my pincushion for the swap hosted by Claire. I was inspired by one of my favourite craft books and got to try French knots. It’s all finished way ahead of the deadline next month which is good. I’ve decided to take a small bag of sewing in my hospital bag tomorrow – just in case I have some spare time!
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Here’s the parcel of goodies I’ve prepared for my partner as part of the Spring colours swap on swap-bot. We had to send 5 items in green, light blue and pink colours so I’ve chosen felt squares, stickers, buttons, beads and some handmade items too. I hope she likes them! We met up with our NCT ante-natal class for a delicious lunch at the Junction Tavern today. It was so nice to see everyone although it felt very strange telling them our baby will be born on Thursday. I still haven’t got my head round the fact I’m going to…