honeyflake

lax

 

this photo was taken two and a half years ago. it was january 2010. we were at the american museum of natural history... and margaret gravitated towards this display. it was filled with some of the coolest sports gear on earth.... handmade native american lacrosse treasures!!! i'm pretty sure this was margaret's first interest with anything related to lacrosse and little did we know that the attraction and connection she showed then would grow and stick around...

 

that spring we found a lacrosse clinic for girls margaret's age, which would let her get familiar with the basics of the game... and without much hesitation, i broke out my own personal ancient lacrosse treasure — my wooden stick from my high school girls lacrosse days!!! awesome. turns out, my old stick is much closer to those in the museum display case than what the girls play with now... we found this out when we went to get margaret set up with her own personal gear from this century... her first stick, googles and a mouth guard. as i remember it, we held off on getting the store-bought nylon bag for the stick and i saw this as my opportunity to bring a little bit of the hand-made quality back to the sport... i did not whittle a new stick or fashion some deerskin into a ball, but i did gather up some chunky bright zippers and repurposed blue canvas fabric and sewed m.a.g. her own stylish, monogrammed, lacrosse bag... 

  

she was quickly ready for the field. ready for some scooping, passing and catching. we practiced a lot together — me with my old-school stick and margaret with her fancy new pink stick. she kept at it and in 2011 she signed up for several more of these clinics where there was plenty more scooping, passing and catching practice... building skills and experiences and making many new friends along the way.

and now we're here in 2012... and she's now gone from learning the basics to a new season of real team games. real uniforms, real big fields and real referees but at this age there are many modified rules for safety. quite honestly it is adorable and so much fun to watch. two years into it and the fancy blue bag is still holding up, keeping her gear together from practices to games. and that spark that was ignited back at the museum display is still there — i'm sure i saw it today as she cradled down the field in a fast sprint... passing cheering fans, coaches and teammates...

let's go number 3!!! (not to be confused with "let's go number 5!" which is what we cheer on saturdays at her soccer games) can you tell i love this game? i do. and i am thrilled to see margaret growing to love it too.

green, blue & green

 

sometime in the spring, cousins on chuck's side of the family will be expecting their first child. of course this type of news is always exciting and well, always a great reason to happily create a few new handmades. new little gifts to box up and send along to welcome the new arrival. not being sure if i wanted to knit or sew—i went with both... getting all sorts of inspiration from my blue fabric stash, blue yarn stash and some easily found patterns. in the end, the final projects sprouted from materials that i already had on hand, some even thrifted (certain fabrics and buttons) or made from recycled materials (the yarn) making this a very sweet eco-green, blue and green, baby gift, which i love as much as the wee, teeny-tinyness of it all. 

i had some recycled fiber yarn left over from margaret's tunic. just enough to make this seamless baby cardigan. so very adorable to see this one come together. {ravelry link}. the vintage avacado green buttons were a final addition to this knit. they have had a presence in my button collection for a while — originally picked up second hand in the thrift store's craft section and it was great to find a project to use them on.

two side-tying baby kimonos! the free pattern can be found here at martha stewart's website. these only require fabric, thread and some bias tape (or more fabric to make your own bias tape). all of which i had plenty of, so these two shirts came together quickly.

 

and lastly, a little fabric ball for the fun of it. made from fabric scraps and stuffed with 100% natural wool. again the pattern is free and online.

and there you go... a very green, blue and green themed baby gift. ready to be shipped off to greet a new little person. 

 

one more holidayish post

homemade gifts. they are so much a part of what the holidays are around here. objects that are quiet and thoughtful, that through their making, fuel our creative spirit at the same time. this past year, there were a couple that i very much enjoyed making as much as i did giving and i'd like to share them here with you... the ones whose process during the december days brought true comfort and joy. the first was something in multiple, made for my nieces and nephews (and margaret too) — custom, personalized rubber stamps. i don't remember how or when we came up with the idea but we had a ton of fun creating them.

while the main production work of creating the actual stamp was done by a stamp company, we set out photographing everyone and then did a bit of photoshopping work... turning each shiny, happy face into a nice simple, contrasty image (at times this was a bit tricky... to get it just right for each person). once they were looking good, the picture then got embellished with a cartoon-like blank thought bubble or speak bubble (intentionally left blank, to be filled in later by the stamper themselves — oh, the open-ended potential...). one by one each personality came through, and we laughed... and they were ready to be uploaded for production...

we prepared some simple packaging...the personalized drawstring bags above. i sewed a set of six up one afternoon with some natural cotton fabric and cotton twine and tucked each finished stamp inside with a stamp pad to start them off. i hope that they do continue to provide smiles and laughter as they get used. fun gifts for some very fun kids.

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each christmas there is at least one handmade by us gift for margaret, from us. this year one of those was a checkerboard. the idea here is so very basic and classic. one time we came across a checker board at a coffee shop and started playing a round with margaret and realized that we did not own one of our own... so the intention to make one was set. we eventually got around to it this christmas. with some heavy canvas-like cloth and an old pair of denim jeans the gameboard was created. this gift was mainly done by hand sewing, while sitting around the tree. it was a nice slow process. backstitching square after square. 

 
the game pieces are just wooden discs — half were painted with a watercolor paint wash and are stored in a drawstring bag. ready for a game or two when needed. and there have now been many rounds of checkers since. loving the clinking of the wooden pieces, the frayed denim boxes and the thrill of a triple jump!

it is nice to finally share two of my favorite holiday projects now that they are no longer secret surprises... (all that curious portrait taking and mysterious scraps of denim make a bit more sense now to my loved ones, i'm sure.) the gifts are given and the happiness that comes from creating for others —and cherishing the process — remains.  now onto the new year!

decking the halls with plaid

 

due to a little fabric splurge back at the end of november, december proved to be the month of flannel (and a little wool). looking back at the photos i took over the past month and the projects that we had going on, plaid seems to have worked it's way into everything. and for christmas? i'd say that's seems pretty ok. 

plaid sighting #1. that's right. my family and i all sporting our matching wintery comfy pants. for real. i think back to chuck and i fifteen years ago, and i'm pretty sure if you told us someday we might be posing around our christmas tree in matching pj pants we would have laughed non-stop at the mere thought of it... and now, low an behold, here we are, all suited up for the season. but i have to say, it really just sort of happened. so not as planned out as it looks...

 

once i had that soft fabric, i remembered the pattern in this book for the pajamas for everyone — and well, we all found ourselves wanting a pair. the first two pairs came together pretty quickly at the beginning of the month, but the third pair (mine!) was held up because i had plans to use the reddish fabric as a backdrop a little at-home-christmas portrait of margaret (plaid sighting #2)... once that was done mid-december, i could then go on and sew up the final pair.

 

and that non-plaid wool that came home with me from mood? that was turned into a dress for margaret. for that i used a japanese sewing pattern from girly style wardrobe. i loved that pattern and i hope she's able to wear this dress for a while. it is so simple and the wool is very soft & drapey. but i'm getting off topic of plaid....

 

for a non-sewing project that i started at the beginning of the month, the plaid made a nice custom cover for this year's december daily that i'm working on.

as christmas approached, and everyone had their pjs to wear and dress to wear, journals to work on, etc... i put what was left of the fabric away except for the scraps. surprisingly (really? at this point probably not so surprisingly) they too found their way into some last minute christmas cheer efforts.

when margaret announced that she wanted to make cards for 27 of her closest friends? and i wanted them to be easily and entirely made from materials we had on hand? a little card stock, sharpies and plaid...

 

and finally, on christmas eve, wanting to fancy-up a few simple fabric gift bags that i sewed up for chuck's gifts? frayed edge plaid bows. 

and that's it i think. the same fabrics for many different projects in one month... thanks to you for scrolling through it all... it is nice for me to see it all here grouped together and reflect a bit on these december crafty moments and the moments that passed in between. and just for the record,we do laugh a bit when we look around and realize that we're all decked out in matching family plaid pjs.

tracing, pinning and cutting

 

its beginning

not even thanksgiving yet, i know, and i can see that its beginning to look, well i wouldn't say "a lot like", but maybe "a little like christmas". i'm really not jumping ahead. i promise. i'm not one to start rushing through the thanksgiving holiday — its always been one of my favorites, just food & family — but i just know how soon the urge to start the season's handmade creations can kick in. so in preparation, i started stocking up on a few fabrics...

or should i just say a few plaids (and one non-plaid). yesterday, i headed out to some stores in midtown, specifically in search of some quality, merry, stripey goodness. it pretty much only took a couple of stops to find all that i was looking for... i found the two soft flannels at b+j and the two wools at mood. 

with my mission to stock up on plaids complete, i took a bit of extra time to wander around a bit. and you know, there were plenty of signs there too that winter and it's holidays are just around the corner — and up above... looking up i caught a glimpse of the glass globe getting prepped for new year's eve!! yeah, thinking about 2010, that's a bit rushing ahead for me. so, i snapped a photo of the calm, mid-day, non-countdown, illuminated moment and carried on... just picked up my stride and kept heading toward the subway... with yards of warm plaid in tow of course.

autumn wool

sometime ago, back in november 2008, i met up with erin in nyc... our autumn day included many city stops including a visit to the craft section of kinokuniya book store. i picked up a japanese sewing book (ISBN 978-4-579-11194-7) with lots of children's pattern's, basing my selection on the following project... a sweet, textured, warm-as-oatmeal-on-a-fall-morning-wool skirt with suspender straps...

all inspired (and armed with a new sewing project) we left the bookstore and moved on for our next adventure... mood fabrics (a fabric store where bolts of great fabrics are stacked from floor to ceiling). i probably spent longer than i realized pondering the tweeds and wools, but eventually chose one... and then a huge bolt of the softest drapey wool was unfurled on the cutting table and i asked for about a yard and a half...

so, right... hmmmm, all this was almost a year ago... i guess it just took a while for this project to get going. but finally, at the end of august 2009 this skirt rose to the top of my to-do list and i was able finished it up for margaret last weekend. right in time i suppose for fall's nearing arrival. 

a pocket

growing up, we had a little felt pouch. it was shaped like a tooth and it's purpose was to hold our newly fallen out teeth so we could place them safely under our pillow for the tooth fairy. as soon as margaret's first wee pearly white began wiggling i started to remember that pouch. i wondered what we would use to place her tooth under her pillow when that time eventually came. and i thought i had plenty of that time too. i leisurely sketched a few ideas here and there. i thought about it...  some little pouches out of felt, fabric, paper... some shaped like teeth, some like little envelopes, some like pillows... and to my surprise her tooth came out much quicker than i expected! and we were pouchless! so while she got ready for bed that night, admiring the new space in her smile, i quickly stitched up this simple little holder. we considered attaching some really loud bells and zippers so that when the tooth fairy came it would wake margaret up and she would see her, but then decided that simpler/quieter was better. and considering the time restraints, simpler it had to be. so it ended up as a small, flat sewn page with a rounded pocket that held the tooth just as it needed to. and now it is waiting for the next little loose one that seems to be on it's way out too! thankfully, we'll be prepared.

mmmmmm.... patchwork

finished up two more patchwork squares this week for the one quilt project. one for maitreya's green/white/black "m" theme quilt. i loved mixing type and fabric for this one. i experimented with a huge (921 pt) lowercase black fabric m (in one of my favorite go-to fonts), cropped off the patchy 'page'. the other square was for sarah's quilt, made up of some great fabrics in natural colors. she too had some type going on in the fabrics that she chose, can you spot them cropped in there amongst the linen and stripes?

now i'm ready to really focus on which fabrics i'll use, which direction i'd like my quilt to go in and then work on getting everything out to the group soon!!! 

sew

this week i was able to finish up another square for the one quilt project . this one for amy. here is a glimpse from the beginning sketching and planning (lots of measuring) to the final detail of some woodland inspired embroidery (before settling on the mushroom there was lots of woodland image researching - including this foggy critter)...

(side-by-side: january's vintage flour sacks & denim square next to february's red and white woodland theme)

next up... i get to finally dig in to sarah's wonderful bundle of natural hued prints for a little more patchy-ness!

many quilts

orange fabrics from beth.

since the onequilt project began many many months ago, my mailbox has received bundle after bundle of amazing little fabric swatches. each one chosen by a different member of the project with their own wonderful vision and personal style... natural linens, orangey cottons, vintage flour sacks, crisp reds, etc... it is always very exciting each time i've received a new package. turns out, no matter how eager i was to create a newly sewn square with these materials, i somehow let them slide, and have now found myself quite behind! so lately i've been organizing. and sewing. and completing a few new quilt squares to mail. woohoo. 

 lighthouse from a sweet linen bundle for rashida.

catching up with nanette's denims & flour sack.

planning my own fabric bundles - still in the sketching phase

and as for my bundle of fabrics? the ones i should have sent out to all? well i'm quite behind on that too. let's say it is very much in progress. very much in progress from sometime in spring!  i had some pretty grand ideas — including the whole family, since it will be for the family room — which i'm still trying to work out... above which you can see... hopefully that will finish up soon too. if all goes as invisioned there will be some silkscreen or perhaps stamping and some lovely hemp fabric... but the fabric printing process is is still evolving so well have to wait and see what actually unfolds. it might take its own turn and end up as something completely unexpcted... until then, i've got a few completed quilt contributions to mail out.

in the works

its friday! currently we're in the midst of a bit of last minute party preparations. a party this weekend to celebrate turning six. party time is quickly approaching and the house is full of activity — for instance, right now chuck is working on burning the silkscreen... the butter is being brought to room temperature on the counter for baking... limbo rock has been purchased and downloaded from itunes... and i'm going over my checklist every few seconds. (it should be an interesting friday night — and hopefully a very fun saturday afternoon.) happy weekend to you!

just a few little somethings

we recently had a few friends celebrate their "birthdays" (one turning six and the other just newly arriving) and we felt that their special days were a call for some homemade sewing goodness. for the friend turning six, we knew that she adored dolls and clothes. with that in mind, i wanted to create something in the way of a matching set, one for her and a duplicate in miniature for her doll... skirts, bags, i didn't quite know... then some inspiration popped up in a few different places along the same lines (what was the universe trying to say?). i came across a pattern for a headscarf in weekend sewing and then also saw a few girls headscarves here... so listening to the cues i was receiving, i chose some fabric from what i had on hand and used the sewing instructions from the book (just shrinking them down as needed) and ended up with a matching set of headscarves perfect for the sunny spring days ahead... we then packed up this sun inspired gift with a little pack of sunflower seeds to up the sunshine factor. 

and then there was some news of a new little one's arrival... 

when it comes to crafting for new babys, i think the trouble there is more what not to make, rather than what to make... there are so many fun small things to create. i had a few ideas i wanted to work on, and kept coming back to this old favorite. it is a baby kimono, from martha's old baby archives. i think it originally appeared in 2002, right when i was expecting margaret... i so vividly remember working on a few of these for her on the floor of our apartment that autumn... 

for this one i chose a simple linen with some yellow cotton trim. while i remembered working on this pattern so vividly, it is hard to remember how small size 0-3 months really is. (so tiny!!!) this pattern still works up as great as i remembered it to. i hope our new friend loves it too.

a few happy little somethings for some happy little birthdays.

crafty holiday memories

so the new year has rolled in. the house is in order... bringing a fresh sense of calm and space here. mmmm... love that. we're back to our normal daily rhythms. the pace is so very different from just a few weeks ago. remember the holidays? the excitement? the comfort? the joy? the creating? the knitting, sewing, journaling and whittling (oh yes, at our house this year there was whittling)... it's sort of strange how one minute it's here and the next thing you know the sounds of the season playlist is giving way to all rebel rockers... i don't know, perhaps its just the pine-withdrawal talking, but how about a little handmade gift retrospective for the gift-giving season of 2008? sound ok? wonderful... 

let's see. i think i began with the knitting. several surprise pairs of toasties knit... different colors and yarns for different people. i wanted to blog about some of the wool and this pattern back in december, but then that would be it for the "surprise" factor. so here they are just before being given...

i loved working on this knitting pattern from leslie each time around...

 

ok, next... remember i mentioned last month how i was very inspired by some of the toy crafts in living crafts? chuck and i both loved their cover idea of making this hobby horse simply out of a pair of socks, wool and a fallen branch. margaret has always wanted one of these, so chuck gave the project a whirl. (this was where the late-night whittling came in. some pre-christmas night's i felt as if ma and pa ingall's had just moved in and replaced us.) here's the finished horse (aka: old paint).

then of course there was some handmade from santa and the elves. for margaret there was this knitted organic wool doll sweater. looks like they too were inspired by the same magazine (downloadable pattern designed by waldorfmama).

(apparently he loves his sweater so much that he hasn't taken it off since the 25th). now to close out this little (not-so little?) crafty review... there was a new santa-made supply of doll clothes. (pretty sure he got the patterns from this book). a couple of simple dresses and pants for margaret's wee friends. 

well, thanks for coming along on this holiday recap. the end result of an ever evolving list of creative ideas/to-dos during the month of december. hope you've enjoyed seeing some of our projects (be sure to check out the links) and here's to the spirit of christmas crafting big and small.... 

 

panda cam

common name: giant panda
order: carnivora
family: ursidae
genus and species: ailuropoda melanoleuca
habit: temperate broadleaf and mixed forests
location: currently found spending post-halloween days
around the yard amongst a pile of autumn leaves.
panda facts: they're big. they're bears. they're black and white. they're bamboo eaters. they're... ok, that panda you've just caught a glimpse of up above? truthfully, not a real panda — but let's not say that too loudly. when she's wearing this year's halloween head-to-toe disguise that we sewed up out of some old faux-fur (leftover from college—its purpose was a non-reflective backdrop for several photography class photo shoots) and has her nose painted black (a little corn starch+corn syrup+flour+food coloring), she's a panda. a bamboo wielding panda who was more than happy to be captured on video for our very own mini-version of the panda cam which we fell in love with while doing our costume research... check it out!

ghosts of halloweens past

this week we brought our box of halloween goodness down from the attic. inside there are a few random pumpkin themed trinkets, minimal decorations, and a growing collection of margaret's past homemade costumes. magical wearables of all sorts from the past re-emerged in their own special halloween parade. there was...

2003's dragonfly
2004's mermaid
2005's fairy
2006's organic banana
2007's pirate

it is wild to look at the dragonfly from her first year, when she was so small i didn't even have a need to sew feet/legs into the suit, and realize how much she has grown... who knew that these costumes would be such a marker of time? of course seeing these creations had me returning to my scattered photo archives to dig up some pictures of margaret wearing these get-ups out and about. in the spirit of this spooky holiday season, i thought i'd share them here, sort-of virtual-halloween-parade style. each time i look at them i think i change my mind about which one is my favorite...  the shiny quilted mermaid? the silly crawling dragonfly with the really, really long tail? the walking, talking mid-peel organic banana?

in the meantime both chuck and i are once again working the needle, thread and preliminary sketches this week to put together 2008's disguise... whew! we're close. it pretty much just needs a little velcro and hemming and then she'll be ready for the tricks and the treats.   

diamonds and diagonals

after many measurements and trims on the 60°angle, i finished up another square for month three of the one quilt project. this latest one is headed down to australia to leah. she sent out white cotton along with a generous supply of scraps from the same color family (as you can see, i received some great greens). can't wait to see how this ends up in its final quilt.

long sleeves for autumn

remember the stack of fabrics i stumbled across at the thrift store? well, i had some time to sew a little something with it a few weeks ago. something for margaret. something for the early autumn days when tank tops nor sweaters will do... a lightweight long-sleeve shirt. 

i closely followed "pattern l" from this japanese sewing book, which included a small front pocket, a flower embellishment made from coiled fabric, a front, a back and sleeves. puffy long-sleeves no less. flowy long-sleeves to cover little arms on crisp seasonal days — so they can comfortably go about their business of collecting acorns, climbing trees and giving hugs.

touch of grey

now just look at that! who turned off the color?  hmph. today's crafty update is apparently brought to you by the color grey... and i'm liking it an awful lot. i feel as if striping away the bold patterns and colors really make the textures stand out so much more — hence the close up of textures today. fabric & yarn. i'm finally getting the chance to work on my quilt block for the 2nd month of onequilt. i love the neutral fabrics meg has chosen for us to work with this time - i now just need to sew it all up and finish it...  and for those sewing needle-free moments today there were some knitting needle moments with yet more grey — the sweet new grey wool. can't seem to put this project down. i think i might actually be able to see a sweater shape taking place. yay for that. yay for grey. now if you'll excuse me i've got some lovely hue-less fabric scraps that need piecing... sing it jerry.

thrifted for threads

during a quick trip to a local thrift store, over in the back, near the afghans and many crewel kits, i noticed a cardboard box filled with some old fabrics. lots of sweet and slightly dated cotton florals and ginghams. i sorted through the stack and chose a few to bring home (see above) where they were washed and refolded. (they turned out to be larger than i had thought). the more i looked at these second-hand-time-warpish calicos, the more they actually started to grow on me. and then you know, the project ideas soon came to mind. a lining for a bag? a possible fall skirt or shirt for margaret? perhaps something from here? of course, it is all still in the mulling about phase, but if this daydreaming continues, i have a feeling that something of the sort will be added to my project list soon and hopefully these rescued remnants will be turned into something new. eco-crafty-fun.

pieces

• dorie. one quilt. cool fabrics. in the mail. 

• saturday. living room floor. stack of library books. 

• coffee cup. bit of afternoon rain and thunder outside.

• page 281. 505 quilt blocks. chapter entitled "traditional". "linked squares" block.

• streaming the newport folk festival. jakob dylan.  acoustic/electric references. she&him. rain there too.

• measure fabric. trim fabric. sew. iron. one practice square. 

• measure fabric. measure fabric again. trim fabric. arrange on floor. trim more fabrics. sew. iron.

• one final "linked squares" square to send off to dorie for our first collaborative quilt.

 

he's a little bit cotton, he's a little bit wool, he's called basil

and there he is. officially complete. sewn, stuffed, dressed and ready for play. for the longest time, i've wanted to try and make a doll like this for margaret... for some reason or another — perhaps not having the time, maybe not quite knowing where to begin — i just wasn't getting around to it. well, ok, unless you count marley. the simple little doll i made three years ago for her out of an old baby onesie and some floral remnant i had in my fabric box. (the pattern was from an issue of martha stewart kids - something i saw and dropped everything to whip up. that type of project.)

yes, marley works as a doll, he/she gets his/her share of tea party invitations, blanket swaddles and carriage rides around the house... but i knew there was a lot more to the whole dollmaking experience and i still really wanted to give it a try. so this summer i picked up a kit for a handsewn doll with a pattern for the head, body, limbs and clothes, fabrics and a hair wig, figuring that might be a good starting point. 

so for a handful of summer days and nights my attention went to creating this new little friend. sewing and forming even arms and legs. shaping and stuffing the head. attaching the head to the body. un-attaching the head from the body and reattahing it (this time facing forwards. yes, of course, facing forward would be much sweeter). making thread allude to eyes and finally turning some bamboo fabric into a wee bunting (i strayed from the pattern for the clothes and did a little improv as best i could on a bunting instead of the shirt and pants the kit provides). before i knew it he was done ready to join margaret's world of fun and activity... actually she had him off my craft table and into her world of play before he was technically completed – which is really the best part of this dollmaking experience. simple and sweet.

gearing up

so now that the tent pole is all fixed and taken care of, we are gearing up for a few more camping outings this summer... today, in preparation of these adventures, i created a little piece of important sleeping gear for margaret. her own patchy pillow. just like the ones i made for chuck and i for a summer road trip to maine six years ago. same size, same style, just a few years later...

these are the original two camping pillows, which have worked out really well — they are small enough to pack in the car without taking up too much room, they are big enough to be comfortable, we don't have to bring our bed pillows out into the woods, and they're patchy. having only two pillows for a family of three was ok for the first few years, but now a third one is needed for sure...

this morning i selected a bunch of fabrics and let margaret go through them. she sorted them and arranged them and chose ones for her pillow and ones for her doll's mini-pillow. this was a very exciting part of the process. 

lots of mixing of patterns and colors. fabric everywhere. when the piles were sorted, i did a wee bit of editing and began to cut the squares... and then sewed and sewed until our pillowless camper had her very own creation to rest her head. zzzzzzzzz......

edited to add: the final pillow *stuffed* pillow size is about 25" x 12". these patches started out 5" square and i used about a 1/4" seam.

happy happy fun hat

sunshine and butterflies... little bits of summer goodness which inspired this season's sunhat that i made for margaret a few weeks ago.  a hat that has become known here as the "happy happy fun hat".

this fringey brimmed hat pattern came from one of my japanese craft books. in the book, it is originally done in a simple, natural linen but we (margaret and i) decided to change it up a bit and go for a fun print. the butterfly fabric was something i purchased back in the fall and have been waiting to use... it worked out nicely for this hat — the busy pattern nicely disguises all the bumps and puckers due to the nature of being *hand made*. ahem.

 

even though summer has not quite officially begun, this sunhat has been out and about many times already and i'm happy to see that it fits and is holding up well... and that there is a whole season ahead of us for some happy happy fun.

anchors away

a few months back, i signed margaret and i up for a craft swap. the blue box went out to our swap partners months ago and here's a glimpse of all the sea worthy loot that we sent...

margaret's underwater mermaid/sea creature scene that we cut up into a puzzle and tucked into a paper envelope. a cd of whale sounds in some custom cd packaging...

a glove bunny - adorned with his own anchor scarf. sewn by me, stuffed with wool by margaret. i wanted to give him an eye patch however margaret didn't want him to scare the other animals at his new home - so a scarf it was.

a close up detail of the fabric pirate mask and whale tee. i loved making this mask with mainly just some linen and a bandana — i hope to make a few more of these in the future...

it was fun to work together on this project. the whale/pirate theme had us pretty inspired (margaret loved listening to the whale chatter cd while we worked and learning the differences between an orca and a humbback whale). thanks again molly for organizing miniswap 3!

bon voyage...

our miniswap three box filled with crafty surprises finally set sail, on its way to our partners! safe travels little blue box.

new knitting sack

so i've been wanting a bag for my knitting for a while. a hand-made tote of sorts specifically for carrying around my knitting projects with me from place to place. it hasn't really been a top priority because i've been able to get by with any old bag that holds the yarn and supplies. but when i received confirmation that i'd gotten myself a ticket to be a part of the martha stewart show's audience of knitters (yes really, an audience full of knitters while the show gets taped), sudddenly "sew a new bag" bumped itself up to the top of my to do list.

the making began with gathering some linen, cotton, embroidery thread and a pattern from this book. a truly simple tote with a basic circle bottom. so simple, it didn't really matter that i couldn't translate any of the japanese instructions. seemed just the thing for carting my wool, needles, etc... i followed the pattern pretty closely, but decided to add the circle embroidery on the pocket and add the inside lining. this morning it was completed and i was very excited. just in time to stuff it with all i'll be needing for tomorrow's martha adventure!

holiday warmth {revealed}

can you believe it is possible to still be posting a holiday related post? its true. with our out of town trip last weekend and other goings on this week, we're still trying to clean up, organize and move forward around here. taking down lights today. putting away the last of the decorations. assimilating all the new toys into new homes. listening to some music and drinking some coffee in between... and now that almost all the gift giving is complete i can finally share some of the little handmade creations that were being secretly worked on throughout december. (so many times i wanted to post about these, but in the name of secrecy and surprise i held back) oh, and i can share two little surprises that i received as well. one thing i noticed about these creations is that there is a running theme (planned or unplanned i'm not exactly sure) of warmth. take a look...

warmth to hold. a little wool woodland mushroom that i needle felted for margaret one night. this ended up in our advent calendar.

warmth to wear. this turned out to be the season of hats for me. with two little ones for the dolls and two grown up ones for chuck and my dad. (i used the same pattern that i used in the summer, with a slight variation).

warmth to swaddle. the already mentioned doll quilts that came together without much of a plan...

more warmth to wear. a scarf. for me. "made by" margaret. unbeknownst to me, she stashed away a super long fabric scrap from a project i was working on (another gift that i forgot to photograph) and she presented it to me on christmas morning as a scarf. for me. i was pretty proud of this of course, and wore it all christmas day.

more warmth to hold. my other handmade-by-margaret surprise. a sweet, slouchy, super-sized, mug cozy for my tea and coffee. again, invented by her, on her own. she used another fabric scap and gluestick to whip this up. clever. and it makes me smile.

so that is some of top-secret craftiness that was going on behind the pre-holiday scenes here, in addition to the not-so-secret, produced in multiple quantity projects like the cards, the kids' silkscreened shirts (which i'm not showing yet because i've got 2 boxes that still haven't been mailed to their wee little out of state recipients), the cookies, etc... whew! looking back, that's quite a bit of elf-like fun and activity for one month (and really i do enjoy all the opportunities to create). no wonder we're moving a bit slower than normal around here. glad i could finally get a few details of these handmade projects out there. now its back to corralling pine needles.

birds of a plaid feather

flocking together on my table this morning.

these guys are all sewn up. just waiting for me to finish my coffee and to decide where to hang them. on the christmas tree? or on their own table-top bouquet of twig-like branches like they did in the book...

the advent of advent

brrrr! i went up in the attic this morning (where it is suddenly "see your breath" cold) to hunt for the advent calendar — a string of felt-pocketed flags i embroidered up a few christmases ago with some wool felt and the help of my good friend akzidenz-grotesk. luckily, and how often does this happen, it was right on top of the first box i opened. sweet. perhaps that was good planning by us when we packed everything up last year? or perhaps just good luck. well, anyway, its down, but not yet strung up. hopefully today it will find its way up along the windowsill, where the pockets will wait to be filled with a small something each day of advent, which begins tomorrow. yes, tomorrow. let the merriment begin. and happy weekend too!

hatching ideas

i'm thinking... i'm planning... i'm list-making... and while i don't have all my ideas for this year's holidays figured out (like the cards, the gift making, the minimal decorating that happens here, the cookie recipes, the family visits, etc... these details are all still up in the air, being thought out, and for me that's ok and pretty much right on schedule) i've happily enough gotten inspired and started some spontaneous christmas crafting. the kind that doesn't have to be done for any other reason than, well, just because 'tis the season. fun. i started on the bird ornament project from last minute patchwork and quilted gifts. thinking, you know, who couldn't use a little flock of bird ornaments to really say holiday cheer? i sat on the floor, without the pressure of any deadline, in the silence of the post-thanksgiving weekend and began mixing some linen, plaid and solid fabric i had in my fabric box. ah, its a start. a start to a happy season and to the fresh ideas that are inspired each year at this time. a start to a season filled with many moments — planned or spontaneous — to create and enjoy.

cool, collected and calm

a little collaboration in aromatherapy between margaret and i. we went out on a cool day. collected up some lavender sprigs from the yard. then stitched up and filled up some new calming eyepillows for each of us. i hope to get a chance to use mine in my yoga practice, while in the savasna. margaret is using hers a lot to get her dolls to relax. i think they like it. i know i do.

mama's brand new bags

must. stop. making. bags.
i'm pretty sure it has now safely passed, this little bag making phase/obsession i just went through. it started when i checked a new craft book out from the library only a week or so ago... i was immediately drawn to the zip pouch project. so i tried it asap. with some simple fabric i had on hand and a .30¢ zipper from a craft store the first stripey bag came to be...

after that one was done, i started in on a second. this time playing around with adding a ribbon like the book suggested...

then came another, and another, etc... i was completely focused on making these bags as if i had nothing else on my to do list. it reminded me of the summer in the 80s when i spent all day and night cranking out friendship bracelets, or that winter semester in college in the 90s when we sat around the dorm and sewed up hair scrunchies like there was no tomorrow. um, yeah, this time it was zippers and bags. i started to get fancy and i tried beading the fabric before i sewed it together. (this beading was a great craft to keep my hands busy at the playground while margaret swung on the swings - since they are no longer required to give pushes to my independant swinger any more)

i also noticed patterns for these bags popping up in several other places as well. at the purlbee and in another fabric craft book, slightly different than how i was doing it but generally the same project. i tried out adding an additional outside pocket. adding patchwork.

the possibilities seem endless. mixing fabrics and notions. but there needs to be an end. at least for now. i didn't get around to executing all the ideas i had, but its time i shift my focus elsewhere (hello real priorities) and break out of this bag making whirlwind... so right, ok, i think i'm good, put the patchwork down and step away from the zippers... step away. from. the. zippers.

i ♥ n y

the little yarn shops.

the little fabric shops.

and all the little stops along the way.

w is for wednesday

w is for wale.
from dark evergreen wide wale to light soft pink thin wale with several other wales in between, the various corduroys from my stash seem to have me inspired lately. it's a bit surprising because these guys are far from new, most of them i've actually had for a pretty long time... for instance, i recall a specific bulky corduroy buying spree back in the fall of 2001 at a mid-town nyc fabric store... that is where the mustard yellow and navy blue cord came from (there was also a dark maroon that i think i used up last fall for a knapsack). the evergreen piece came from my grandmother's attic a while back. and then there are scraps from clothes — that beige swatch (try to say that 5 times fast for laughs) in the photo is from a pair of my brother's old cord pants. so yeah, lots of different wales right now sitting next to my sewing machine...

w is for white beans.
this afternoon found me sitting down to shell a pile of cranberry beans from our csa with margaret right by my side. as with most kitchen activities, she enjoyed this task so much i let her take it over in full force — inspecting each white and sometimes red-speckled bean, one-by-one as they came from the pods... she was quite happy to do this herself, and i was quite happy to have the help, and chuck was quite happy to eat them when he came home.

here today

• zippers
• warm chai tea
• acorns
• sewing with coduroy
• nature smart
• bathing suits? (yes still warm enough to enjoy a beach trip in our suits, to have lunch on the blanket and play in the sand)

location. location. location.

i absolutely loved this month's tie-one-on theme from the minute i read it: local pride. i loved thinking about our town and our space in this world and then letting those thoughts be the inspiration for a new home-sewn apron. at first there were thoughts of our state bird, state colors, etc... but i kept coming back to our beach and the atlantic ocean. (surprised?)

i started thinking about all the time we spend out there strolling the shoreline looking for treasures and had a vision of a beach apron, with the perfect pockets for collecting. i sketched something out and began sewing back in august. i had pulled out all of the light, beachy, white and off-white fabrics from my fabric boxes. a bunch of them were actually some old torn/stained tableclothes that belonged to my grandmother, great-aunt, and great-grandmother — and seemed quite ready and waiting to be repurposed. unable to choose just a few, i ended up patchworking small swatches from them all together making a large front pocket (for the clamshells, driftwoods, etc...) then, behind the big pocket is a little slim white pocket for the small, don't-want-to-lose treasures (seaglass, beachglass, seaglass, you get the idea...).

wearing an apron out on the beach felt just right. it blew in the wind, i could brush off my sandy hands right on my hips and the pockets functioned as they were meant to. (chuck actually was the only one of us to find a piece of green beachglass this particular day and he was kind enough to let me just "hold onto it" for him in the white top pocket)... the tie-one-on deadline for submissions was pushed back from august until october (whew! not sure i would have had it done in time otherwise) and that is when all the local-inspired aprons will get compiled into a photo gallery. i'm so looking forward to seeing all the amazing hometown creations...

many

...while sewing today

...from the csa today

...baked up today

sew summer

torn between my pile of fabrics and the sunny beach, today i was lucky enough to fit in a little bit of both. (a little more beach time than sewing time though, i think) i'm somewhat excited to have located my rotary cutter and to have begun a new project....

all dressed up

this weekend we prepared for and celebrated easter. there were holiday traditions old and new.
saturday we colored our eggs, baked some cupcakes and made margaret a new spring dress. it all came together and by sunday morning. margaret woke to find that yes, the easter bunny had been here and as he did every year since i was a kid, he had hidden an egg in her new easter shoes... (and if we had big living room drapes in this house as my parents did in the 70s i would have hidden one under there too to further keep traditions alive)

something untraditional that i did was to make margaret her easter dress. i'm not sure when i decided to do this, or how i even arrived at the final dress. it all sort of just happened organically, just one thing leading to another and a dress unfolding in the process... i originally had been planning to make the dress out of some vintage material i have been holding onto - big green and yellow flowers, probably old curtains - which i thought was very springlike. so i picked up some green cotton for the inside lining. when i got home i realized that the new green cotton matched the green on her new shoes. so i decided to scrap the flowered dress idea and let the green fabric stay on the outside of the dress. switching gears to now make a simple green one. maybe with a cool pocket for holding easter treasures? so in trying to match the shoes, i pulled out some natural colored antique linen (which my grandmother and aunt had just stumbled across and given to me -apparently it was my great grandmothers that she had gotten from italy, perhaps something she even brought over here with her). it was really hard to cut into that linen, so i cautiously embroidered it first, took a deep breath then cut out the pocket... the rest of the easter dress came together quickly,the front, the back, the hem, etc... finishing it off with 2 vintage greenish buttons in time for it to be worn on sunday with the new shoes. (once the beet colored egg was collected) it was so nice to have discovered the old family materials like the linen and buttons to include in the process of this dress. they just made it a bit more special and sentimental, and for a day of traditions and family what could be more perfect?