Stash Rehoming

Now I know that I mentioned in an earlier post that one of my main goals for this year was to downsize my stash. About now I'd like to clarify that this statement was in relation to yarn only :-P

We have recently been to visit my parents and anyone who knows my Mum will know exactly where I get my craft hoarding ability from. In passing I asked if she had any fabric squirreled away that would be suitable for a couple of projects I have in mind for gifts (so I cant tell you what they are). This got the excited response of "Oh let's go look in the cupboards"! Yes cupboards plural, four of them, large ones. So while looking I may have got a little sidetracked from the original projects but look what I found......

Wovens

Knits

Wool fabric

Now I just have to find room for it all here and decide what it wants to turn into, all suggestions welcome.

I was also gifted a nice wee bundle of girl patterns by a family friend

So let's face it I've done a good deed by giving these things a loving home, a bit like rehoming a pet from the SPCA.

First Mate Hoodie

Well I did manage to complete my first knit project of the year in January - just!  It is a First Mate Shirt for Mr A and it was a test knit for Elena.  So here it is...

There are lots of things I love about this pattern but I think the main one is the cables!  I have a bit of a thing about cables at the moment, especially for wee boys which is one of the reasons I was keen to have a go at this pattern.  I love that it has two different cable patterns, one down the front and the other down each side :-)

The construction of this jersey was new to me.  It is knit in the round and completely seamless but instead of the usual raglan design it has the set in sleeves which look really nice.  The only thing I'm a little disappointed about here is the fit.  I was hoping that by knitting a size 3T with 4T length Mr A would get this winter and possibly next out of it but in actual fact it is a perfect fit on him now, so he better not grow before winter ;-)

You have to excuse the rubbish modeled pics, it was boiling here and it took quite some amount of persuading (and bribery) just to get the jersey on so arranging any nice shots was out of the question.

So what's next on the needles?  Shhhhh it's a secret, can't tell just yet.

Check this out

Check out Hugs to Hold a fantastic idea aimed at putting a smile on the face of the children who have lost everything in the recent devestating floods in Australia. A soft toy seems like a small thing but could make a huge difference. I hope to get something completed for this soon and hope many of you will join in as well :-)

Also take a look at this awesome giveaway on Heart Felt . She has three beautiful zip purses from Atticus Finch to give away.

Upgrading

Today I upgraded one of Mr A's christmas presents.  Santa gave him this awesome car wallet from Lulu's Closet and he loved it for taking cars out and about (you can never go anywhere without cars round these parts).

Anyway the way the velcro was stitched on meant that a lot of his slightly bigger cars didn't fit so I decided to upgrade it to allow more vehicles to be taken out on adventures.  So I removed the velcro (and the button wheels in the process), added snaps and replaced the wheels.  Voila!

The Dress That Nearly Wasn't

Well that says it all really.  THE dress is finally done.  Anyone who knows me IRL or online will have heard me mumbling and grumbling about this creation on and off over the last couple of weeks.
So here's the general idea

I should have known from my very first oopsie that this wasn't going to go well but it went something along the lines of
* Forget to cut the skirt out on the fold so had to get more fabric so I didn't have to have big joins front and back of the skirt (about now I should have started to think twice about continuing, but did I... NO).
* Sewing the underneath romper part I put the elastic on the wrong side, unpicked it and sewed it again on both legs only to find out that it was right the first time and have to unpick it ALL again and redo it (time to stop sewing for the day you might think?  Well if I had half a brain yes, but I soldiered on!)
* Time to attach the skirt to the bodice and although it worked I'm sure I did it in the most difficult way possible.
* The end is in sight.  Miss M is awake but happily playing so "I'll just quickly sew the romper on and it will be done" - NOT!  Somehow I managed to attach the romper not only inside out but back to front, and I overlocked it before I realised.  Queue throwing the dress in the corner, turning off the machine and going in search of chocolate.

Anywho after that somewhat embarrassing array of errors I got back to this today and here is the final result.

And thankfully for my sanity and that of all those around me it fits with room to grow :-)

And here's my wee girl showing off her latest trick!  Yes she is standing just by holding onto the toy box and yes she is only 4.5m old.  So much for my sit quietly in the corner baby - hehehe.

So after this sewing debacle you may think I will pack up the machine for a while but no.  Look what arrived in my letter box last week.  

My new ottobre mag and some yummy Michael Miller cord earmarked for a winter pinafore for Miss M.  I need to make a new nappy stash for Miss M as well so there will be more sewing posts over the next wee while.

Uh Oh

10.41am

10.43am and so proud of herself!

Nowhere To Park

So what is this post about?  A trip to the mall?  The library carpark on a rainy weekend?  Nope!

Mr A, who is dead nuts on vehicles of any shape, size or variety got the coolest roadways set for christmas.

He was playing with it with Daddy last weekend when he proclaimed "But there's nowhere for the vehicles to park Daddy".  Queue the cogs slowly starting to turn and a trip to the local hardware store for mdf, black spraypaint, a test pot of white acrylic paint and a drill bit.  And so the process of carpark making began.  After measuring, cutting, drilling out the holes, black spray painting, masking and painting (with the help of Mr A, if you decide to try this at home the combination of a 3.5yo and acrylic paint isn't necessarily a good one) we had this.

Remove the masking tape...

and play :-)

Mr A was thrilled and the cars seemed pretty pleased with the results as well.  Now to wonder if 23 car parking spaces is enough or if an extension will be required before too long.