Thursday, September 29, 2011

One of those, "Please vote for me!" posts!


 I entered my Fall Felt Rosette Wreath into the Celebrate Color contest on the wonderful blog Stitched in Color. It was sort of on a whim. I didn't expect much. But gah! I'm a finalist!

Now there are five finalists, and the ultimate winner is decided through a public vote. Which means... will you vote for me? I'd be so delighted. You can do that right here. My wreath is in the first category, home decor. And you don't have to join anything or even leave a comment. Just click the button by my wreath and hit vote.

It's open until midnight tonight. So excited! The winners gets an AWESOME stack of 21 fat quarter solids. I would die. Die! 

Wednesday, September 28, 2011

I have money to spend!

A month or so ago, I was delighted to sign into flickr one day and see a two-week old message from Pink Chalk Fabric Studio. They liked my Outside Oslo pillow, which I'd uploaded to their photo gallery, and wanted to include it in their newsletter. They wanted my permission. There was one decision I didn't need to think about long -- especially because when you're featured, you get a $20 shop gift certificate to use! Score!

So I have $20 of fabric money burning a hole in my virtual pocket. It's hard enough for me to pick fabric when I'm somewhere like Jo-Anns. Online is so much tougher! The shops are so well stocked with everything cute ever made, ever ever ever. Or so it seems.

I pinned a few of my favorites. Please tell me what you like. (All can be purchased, obviously, at PinkChalkFabrics.com) What would you spend $20 on?

My mother-in-law wants a Christmas apron. Here are a few fabrics I could snag for that project.

Dena Designs Kumari Garden Holiday Sanjay
Kate Spain Flurry Snowfall Red Ribbon
Michael Miller Holiday Calico Trees Multi


Or I could hit up the sale fabric. I do love sales. These are all on sale.

Alexander Henry Rivoli Floral Salmon
Not sure what I'd do with that one. Maybe another Go Anywhere bag?
Anna Maria Horner Little Folks Coloring Garden Sea -- Voile
Or this one. Voile is not something I'm familiar with. Maybe sleep shorts?

I am also a tad ga-ga for this new listing.
Dena Designs London Somerset Blue
So, what would you buys?

Of course, I could always be really practical and get something solid. Or a pattern to use again and again.

Help a girl out! What's your favorite?

Monday, September 26, 2011

Presents for Kim Kim

I said good-bye to a dear friend last week. My friend Kim. She moved to China, and she'll be there at least three years. Maybe five.

She's very dear to me. She's the kind of friend who brings you flowers for no reason. She did this for me at least five times. She's the kind of friend who comes over when you are feeling like shit and plays with your kids and brings fresh squeezed orange juice that cost $7 for a half-gallon AND the most delicious chicken pot pie you can ever imagine. She's the kind of friend who listens when you cry about your kids, your job, your mother, you husband, whatever, and then somehow makes you realize that you're silly because your life is really, really blessed. She's a kind soul, one of the best I've ever met. She's amazingly kind-hearted, nice to everyone, always giving of her time, her things, her talents. She's always wanted to live abroad and this is an amazing opportunity for her and her husband. I'm happy for her. And I'm going to miss her so, so much.

She hates having her picture taken. So I have hardly any to share.

Here's one from our last girls' night out.

Me, Aimee, Kim and Kelly
I fretted for months about what to get her before she left. I wanted to give her some parting gift. She's a fabulous, thoughtful gift giver, so this makes it tougher. Right?

I settled on two things. First, when Anna of Noodlehead came out with her new bag patterns, I immediately thought of Kim. Kim loves handbags and accessories of all kinds, and she has been super encouraging about my sewing habit. And it's called the Go Anywhere bag. I figure, hey, she can go to China with it!


Used a nice heavyweight houndstooth, a yellow patterned Olive and S fabric, and some of my Jessica Jones Outside Oslo home decor fabric, too. Inside is a purple Joel Dewberry wood print. I love it and have been hording it for months now, trying to figure out where to use it. I love these colors -- yellow, black and white, and then the pop of purple inside.


There are tons of details in this bag. A pocket inside, a pleated front with three pockets and a large pocket with a magnetic closure in the back.


Pleats are a little scary. Mine turned out only so-so. But this is a great pattern, and I'm excited to make another one. This is a big, roomy bag that can hold a ton. Very useful!


I hope she loves it! (And she said she does. :) )


So that was part of the gift. I also wanted something that had more of my boys in it. Because Kim is amazing with them. She's as much a part of their lives as she is a part of mine. Luke is going to miss her like crazy, as much as a three-year-old is capable of missing someone.

I stumbled one night onto the etsy shop called FlashyFish and found a vintage glass locket that was just perfect.  Here's the listing.

I wanted one side to be pretty, and the other to have a picture of the boys. So I took this painting that Luke did:



I scanned it into my computer and scaled it way down, then printed it out. I also printed out a cute photos of the boys taken this summer. Popped them in the locket, and seriously, why are lockets so dang sentimental. I wanted to cry just looking at it!



I must get one for myself. I really loved it. Kim opened it and didn't say anything, and I think that was because it choked her up a bit. Either that or she hated it. But I'm pretty sure it was the first thing. I really hope she loves it. Cause I love her. :)

If you want to follow Kim on her adventure, she has a blog!

Linked at...
Creative Itch Sew Happy Geek Weekend Bloggy Reading

Thursday, September 22, 2011

Felt flower fall wreath

First off all, thanks for those who commented in the sewing confessional! It's so nice to know that you're also ignoring your tension and totally forgetting about what needle you're using. And not caring about which needle size is right to use anyway! That's another one I am very bad at. I just use the same needles for everything.
Glad to know I'm not alone!

I had some fun with my sewing machine, wrong needles and all, last weekend. I'll show you my project shortly! But first:

Another project completed inspired by something found on Pinterest!

I'm loving Pinterest. You? I really don't want to just pin pin pin and never make the things I pin. So I'm trying to be diligent about that. This weekend, I carved out some time to turn some of the inspiration from my wreath pin board into a new fall wreath for my door.

The board had lots of good inspiration, but I honed in on this one.

Isn't it pretty? I thought those rosettes were orange, but the blogger says they're mustard. I had orange in my head though, and went to the store for orange felt. The only orange felt I saw had a distinct I'm-about-to-go-hunting vibe though. So I skipped it and went with mustard (probably the same mustard?), two shades of brown and a mossy green.

Then I made many rosettes, some small. Some big. At least half were yellow because I thought that would pop best. I still really wish I'd found some way to get some orange in there. But oh well. I like the results as they are!




Not too "country," is it? At one point I had some fake berries stuck in it, but my friend pointed out it looked a little less Martha and a little more country that way. I think she was right.

What's on your door for the fall?

PS. I just might enter this into the Stitched in Color Celebrate Color contest. Go check it out here!

Monday, September 19, 2011

Come enter the sewing confessional!

I think some people think to sew -- especially to sew well, or at least to sew well enough to make things you love -- that you need to be near perfect. Every seam must be straight, you must follow every rule.

Not so.

I break 'em all the time. And half the time, I don't even realize I'm breaking them. And the results turn out fine. Maybe not perfect. Maybe I won't open my Etsy shop tomorrow. But I enjoy myself and make things cute enough to at least use myself with some degree of pride.

Here are two I have broken recently.

I sewed about five minutes the other night with the wrong needle. I forgot I'd been using a ballpoint needle. My seams were looking a little wonky and then finally my needle just broke. And that's when it dawned on me -- wrong needle.

The second is a really bad one. Tension. I forget to adjust it all. the time. Actually, I think I've made my last 2-3 projects without giving it a second thought. I'm sure that was stupid of me. But you know, both things turned out fine. Shrug!

So, what's your sewing confessional? What mistake do you make, even if you know better? And how did it affect your finished project?

Friday, September 16, 2011

I made a circle skirt, I am sewing genius


So, I was at Joanns. (How many posts could begin that way? Many.) I ran in for one thing, but thought I'd just peak at the apparel fabric. Thanks to some recent blogging series about working with knits, I'd been thinking I wanted to give them a try. Also, I had this skirt pinned on my Pinterest board.



It came from the Ice Cream Social Skirt tutorial at the blog icandy handmade. Cute, isn't it? She made it based on the tutorial for the circle skirt at Made. Really, a circle skirt doesn't belong to anyone. It's as basic as it gets, as one of the contestants on Project Runway said last night. But in any case, I learned to make it from those two sources, and I plan to make many more. It's fast, it's cute, it makes you want to twirl. What more could you ask for?

So knowing this, I grabbed some striped purple kint fabric, a polyester, from Joanns. I thought it was $3 a yard but got confused by the signage. It was really $7 a yard. So I paid $14 and should have enough left over for some other sort of project (maybe a circle scarf?).




It's really something I think you could dress up or down.

I really like how comfy it is, and how easy it is to pair with flats and wear around the house or to the park. I tried to take a picture of me in my yellow flats wearing it....

  But this kept happening.


Oh, and here's how the waistband looks. I made mine four inches tall.  I also chose not to embellish the bottom, because I had no cute trim. And I'm lazy. Made this way, the whole shebang takes like 30 minutes. (Especially considering I totally forgot to wash my fabric first. Whoops).


Hopefully it doesn't shrink! Cause me likey.

Linked at... 

Join  us Saturdays at tatertotsandjello.com for the weekend wrap 
 up           party! Weekend Bloggy Reading

Thursday, September 15, 2011

There has been sewing!

I swear!

I finished a skirt inspired by something I found on Pinterest. (Follow me!)

Oh, and am putting the finishing touches on a present for a pregnant friend.

Very soon, I will have cute sewing projects to show off.

Just.... not yet. 

The thing about having a sewing blog is that first you must find time for the sewing, then you must find time to photograph your cute sewing project, then you must upload the photos and edit them, then put it all to words. Don't forget before you get started you might need to spend time drafting a pattern or finding an online tutorial or buying a store-bought pattern, as well as shop for fabric -- assuming it isn't coming from your fabric stash.

When I was on maternity leave, I could crank out a few projects a week. And find time to blog about them! I made the time for it because I love it. I love the sewing. I love blogging about it and connecting with others who share my passion. All of that is still true, but finding the time is much more difficult, even if I am only working part time. My three year old doesn't nap anymore, and that's been a huge factor. There is no 2-3 hour break built into my day anymore. So last week, when we had a family wedding, I found little time for anything extra. This week, I've found a little time for sewing, but no time for photography.

I'm a big believer that you must embrace the stage you're at in life. Right now, I'm in a stage where I can sew 1-2 times a week for any length of time, and completing one project a week is about all I can expect of myself. Blogging about it might or might not happen right away. I have to be OK with that or I will drive myself crazy.

The other part of this is that because I'm busier, I have less time to become inspired. That's a bummer. I find myself often thinking... what do I even want to make? I was not like that on my maternity leave.

So one thing I plan to do with my blog here is build a little inspiration well for myself. I will be pointing a little more often to inspiration sources. Tutorials I want to try. Fabric I covet. Finished projects that are to die. That sort of thing.

If you follow me on Pinterest, I'm sure it will be a bit of an overlap. But that's OK.

I want to keep my little home here thriving and active, so that's my plan to help me do so. I hope you'll stick with me!

And just to make this post prettier, because ever post needs a photo, my little guy started preschool this week. How that can be, I don't know.


But it be. Sniff!

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Painting my front door.... yellow?

First off...


Say whaaaaaa? Seven months old? Meeeeee?!

Isn't that the cute?

I thought so. Had to share. I can't believe I got him holding his own sign AND looking my way.

OK, onto other things. I've been a busy little social bee for the last week. We had a huge event here in town called Arts, Beats and Eats. We had friends in from out of town. Family, too. I had a girl's night out with my dear friend who is deserting me following her dreams and moving to China. And we have a wedding coming on Friday night! My brother-in-law is getting hitched! All this is to say: in my sewing nook, the only noise you'll hear these days is crickets. And spiders. Do spiders make noise? Anyway, I have nothing to show you and that's a bummer!

But I do need your opinions. I've been thinking about painting my front door. It's white. I want to jazz it up. My first thought was orange. I pinned a bunch of orange doors, and I love them. The problem is, my house is about half orange brick. So there is a clashing issue, as well as a that's-just-too-much-orange issue.

So then I thought yellow? Maybe? Then I just told my husband to grab whatever paint chips inspired him the last time he was at Home Depot.

Take a look and tell me what you think.
 


I think it would need to be dark. Like, the bottom of any of those chips. And I'm leaning toward yellow. (Or blue, but my husband has vetoed blue.) Although if it wasn't for the brick, I'd truly still want orange. 

What do you like?

Saturday, September 3, 2011

A summer tradition I'll miss


Many of our Saturdays in the summer start like this. A walk downtown to the Farmer's Market.

We always stop to throw a few pennies in the fountain. 

Then it's onto the market. I love this building. It's big, airy, kind of dark, and always bustling.



And the variety of foods and plants you'll find inside is pretty impressive.  














There's also antiques and vintage do-dads.

 
I buy veggies, herbs, meats, cheese, bread, flowers and more at the market. I love going without a list, just buying whatever inspires me that week. Once this summer it was homemade gnocchi one week. Last week, we brought home a locally produced spicy chorizo that I used this week to make delicious egg and chorizo tacos. I also bought a pint of cherry tomatoes that were so sweet, they were like candy. I snacked on them all week and am now daydreaming about them, they were that flavorful. And we bought basil to make pesto. So tasty.


Sigh. I can't believe this is the last weekend of summer. Where did it go? I know the market stays open through some of the fall, but it's really a summer thing in my mind.

What summer things are you going to miss as the fall comes? And did you shop your local farmer's market this summer?