Two hours without kids

And

One finished phone case! Off to bed now :-)

Slowly getting it together

So here is a sample of the gifts I've finally starting making for Christmas....

Squirrel and acorn coaster

I am working from my lovely new book 'Super-Cute Felt' by Laura Howard of Lupin Handmade, who has a blog over at Bugs and Fishes.

Hedgehog phone cover

Still lots to do, and I haven't quite worked out what to do for the boys in the family...

Jess played an angel in her nativity play, which was really lovely.

Thankfully I'd managed to persuade her not to go in this rather fetching outfit she was sporting earlier in the week:

Mainly by turning her worn-out shoes into sparkly angel disco shoes! They just about lasted for the two performances; here they are looking slightly less fantastic, but still rather fun!

And the lovely sun-filled but frosty days we've had lately have returned to the more usual grey rain :-(

Luckily we made the most of this glorious morning to have a quick frolic on the beach before school started.

Slightly belatedly joining Fiona at Raindrops and Daisies for Green Day xx

Hello sunshine!

Hey there! Been a while, so sorry.... mostly we have been busy partying... 

Birthday flowers for me :-)

Birthday celebratory dinner at an excellent pub with most of the family in attendance 

(sadly no pictures yet of the Milly's Monster bash, but it was Berilliant!!!! - I was too busy to take pics, so I'm relying on sis-in-law's phone pics when she returns from Goa - no I'm not in the slightest bit jealous... 

Birthday girl being chomped by the Enormous Crococdile

enjoying the brief bursts of glorious sunshine between the grey rainy days... 

More birthday flowers! 

buying books (eek! - don't tell Jude!)... 

and watching the flowers grow :-)

Another lovely birthday gift for me and an early Christmas present bought for Tula peeking out on the left: slippers from Funky Feet

I've also been given a rather handsome stack of old magazines to snip up - yippee! At over three quid a pop, this is quite a haul! So that'll keep me and the girls busy for a bit....

and of course, it's nearly that time of year again....

Painty, stitchy glueyness....

Oooh, it's been awfully stitchy, painty and gluey round here lately in preparation for Milly's monster party this weekend. This lovely fellow has been hanging around our hall waiting for "Pin the Eye on the Monster":

He's made out of a piece of MDF painted by me with acrylic paint and then cut out by Jude.... here are the eyes:

They're machine-stitched out of fabric scraps from my stash and then glued onto cardboard. At one point the kitchen was covered with eyes on every surface:

They have a strip of double-sided sticky tape on the back so the kids can take turns sticking their eyes onto the Monster. And here are the party bags which are finally finished.... with a little help from my lovely friends (thanks Dotty!)

Each one was hand-stitched onto soft cotton bags which I made out of an old bedsheet, until I ran out of time and lovely Dotty ran them through the machine for me, being slightly more nimble with an electric needle than me. This was the prototype:

And this one's my favourite (I'm keeping him for myself!):

Also been making pressies for other kids: this is a cute little bag for a girl called Molly out of some great soft cord fabric I found in a charity shop recently:

I appliqued the M blanket-stitching it in place with embroidery thread.

And her card:

A few weeks ago I knocked up this little bag of marbles for another girl (see a trend developing here?):

And that's it for now, next post I'll show you Milly's homemade monster outfit....

xx

A Scarpered Sewing Muse and a Lovely View

Well my dears, this is my hundredth post... and I have made no progress with creating something for a giveaway to celebrate because my sewing muse has legged it. Done a runner, scarpered.

I'm too embarrassed to even show you the thing that I did make because a) it's so badly botched and b) I may be able to salvage it somehow and still turn it into something useable.... I have always had a real fear of cutting into lovely fabric - especially if I have very little of it - in case it all goes wrong, and this has happened a couple of times before as I am pretty new to the whole sewing malarkey.

So yes, I hacked into the pretty patchwork I was so pleased with and well, let's just say I've learnt my lesson: always practice something new on crap material FIRST!

So in the interlude while I coax the Muse back into my fingers, here are some pretty pictures to lift your spirits on what is today here in Cornwall a very murky, misty, damp sort of day :-)

Had to jump out of the car to snap this the other day

The view I see on my way back from school

Birds always look so cool perched on wires in flocks

Fun with yoghurt while Mum's back is turned!

Happy Green Day everyone!

Check out the other lovely green pics from all over the world at the very lovely Fiona of Raindrops and Daisies - who is also offering a very sweet giveaway herself....

Scraptastic! WOYWW is here again!

Happy Wednesday all!

As you can see, I'm taking a break from monster-making... I got a bit distracted by all my scraps

saved from all my (unfinished) projects

most of which are tiny  and useless

but being the veteran hoarder that I am, unable to throw anything vaguely useful away I've kept them, wondering what to do with them all

then I thought, what if I pin them in a long strip and then sew the strips together?

voilà!

I'm really pleased with this piece, and of course it does need more work, embellishing, stitching &c,

but - what do I do next? 

Do I carry on with all of the scraps to make one huge quilt/wall-hanging/thing?

Do I reinforce all of the edges and turn it into a bag? Possibly for Christmas presents?

Do I put it all away and get on with something for Christmas instead?! Only seven weeks to go, Granny's blanket is nowhere near finished....

Any ideas most welcome!

This is my 99th post.... I'm thinking of doing a giveaway to mark my next post - I'm not sure what it will be yet, but it may be fabric-related.... possibly patchwork....

Joining Julia at Stamping Ground and all the other creative desks for 

What's On Your Workdesk? Wednesday. Go take a look!

xx

WOYWWing & monster making

Hello fellow WOYWWers! Welcome to the monster workshop...

I haven't been able to do much lately as little Tula Belle has had a monstrous cold (I wrote that without intending to be funny - monsters are definitely taking over my brain) which has meant I've been unable to leave her for more than 30 seconds during the day without her crying, unless she falls asleep. Hard work at half term with all three girls home! We even had a thoroughly pointless trip to hospital on Friday night where we got to watch TV for four hours, waiting for the doctor's verdict. Yes - FOUR hours, with three under-fives in a horribly hot waiting room. Luckily the two older ones were angels, and there were lots of toys to keep them occupied, and the TV for Jude. Unlike my lovely girls, I was not in the best of moods, due to lack of sleep and worry over Tula, so by the time the doc re-appeared at 10:30pm, I was about ready to rip his head off. Needless to say, he allowed us to leave shortly after.

Tula is a special little girl as she was born with a slightly odd shaped chest, which means she is likely to have more problems than most babies coping with colds, which is why I wanted her checked out this time, as she hadn't been able to drink all day what with being so congested. Thankfully all was fine and she is slowly on the mend. I keep a separate blog to follow her story, which I occasionally update.

So, as a result, not much progress is being made with any of my projects. In fact, at some point I need to sit down and work out exactly what I need to get going on if I'm to get anything done for Christmas this year. Normally I'd be working out some card designs by now and have at least one pressie finished... this year: nada. zilch. zip. Despite my feelings about the whole Christmas frenzy, our gifts may have to be a little less personal this year than I would like.

scrappy heaven

Anyhow, back to the messy desk! I started making a pile of monsters to stitch onto party bags for Milly's birthday, but now I've finished a batch of the bags, I've realised most of the monsters are too gangly to fit the size of the bags.  Below left is one that's definitely too big, and he doesn't look anywhere near as nice shorter... so I've been playing with the pile of scrap fabric the lovely Dotty Bird flew in recently and trying to make some more squat figures.

I don't seem to be able to make 'cute' monsters: they're all a bit strange... 

This is the one that freaks Jude out the most

One completed scrappy monster!

My inspiration must come from my real-life monsters...

Skip on over to the lovely Julia at Stamping Ground who hosts What's On Your Workdesk Wednesdays and check out all the other busy desks on show.



Happy Wednesday everyone!! Have a lovely week x

Green Day!

I kept some photos back from this post just for today's Green Day!

A wonderful section of wildflowers in the planting scheme at Stratford Park in Stroud

A couple of late-blooming roses hanging on even though bare branches are starting to appear

How I wish my wildflower garden looked this fantastic!

Joining Fiona at Raindrops and Daisies for Green Day :-)

There are lots of fantastic photos from all round the world - take a look!

Have a great weekend everyone xx