Badges

I've never really been one for hand sewing: too fiddly, too many knots to tie, never sure if I can see better close up with or without my specs. However, I had an idea in my head last week - you know, the sort of idea which makes your fingers itch to get started in case the idea floats away before you've captured it. And you know what? I think I love hand stitching.


This week I went to visit three of my friends' new babies and deliver the mobiles I've been making (see here) so I thought I'd like to make a little something for the older siblings to make them feel special too and so it wasn't all about the babies (even though it was really!).


It started off with a little friend of mine who had her 4th birthday last week. I wanted to give her something she would love, I knew it had to be pink and shoes are a bit of a theme with me at the moment (more on that later). I'm pleased now that I've been hoarding all those tiny offcuts of fabric and felt:

I'm really pleased with how this has turned out. I love how the tiny seed beads mimic the cut-out pattern of Startrite shoes. I made another of these (but with turquoise shoes) for the sister of one of the babies but knew I needed something for the boys too. And show me a three-year-old boy who doesn't like tractors:

I'll be making more of these soon (definitely a space rocket one) but first I need to invest in a thimble. Ouch.

The traffic these days....

Look at all the vehicles I've been cutting out today, queueing up to be made into bunting and mobiles. Now think about all the button wheels I have to sew on...... toot, toot!

Boy meets bluebells

I grew up in an area renowned for its bluebell woods so for me this is a special time of year. That nature can produce such intensity of colour and scent takes me by surprise every bluebell season. We love to walk in bluebell woods in the late afternoon when the flowers seem to glow in the dimming light.

This year our Little Helper noticed them for the first time. He's already showing some of his Daddy's love of wildflowers (lots of daisies and dandelions proffered in his grubby chubby fists) but witnessing his first awareness of bluebells was a special moment.

Odd

I've been sorting out the children's clothes drawers and tackling the Mount Everest of laundry that lurks in our house in preparation for going on holiday tomorrow. Now, I'm confident that I've washed and sorted everything that needed washing and sorting and yet there are still these...



...the Little Helper's odd socks. 15 of them! How did this happen? Where are all the others? I suppose it doesn't help that clothes in our family have been handed down and down and down the children (my nephew is now 16 and I'm fairly confident some of these were his) so the Little Helper is the sixth child to own these socks. Nor does it help that I am congenitally incapable of throwing anything away, but.....15! My husband confidently tells me that he's sure some of them are in the garden. Hmm. I wonder what it will take for me to finally accept that I am never going to find the other half of these pairs and actually throw them away.

We're going to Cape Cod tomorrow, so off to find some actual pairs of socks to pack.

The cutest thing on my ipod

This is a story about a tractor making hay in the snow as told by my middle son just before his 3rd birthday. He is now 5 and this reminds me that I should record them more often. They grow up too quickly.

Bags

Following my post earlier this week, this is what I have been doing with my lovely fabric haul.

I've been working on my "perfect tote" pattern for a while now. When I say "perfect", I mean perfect for me, i.e. that it is big enough for my stuff and a nappy change for the little helper, the handles are long enough to go over my shoulder even when I'm wearing a coat, that I can open it wide enough to actually see what's in it. I find with a lot of bags that I have to scrabble about blindly without being able to see the bottom. So I knew I needed something with a gusset (I have a friend who would stop reading this blog this second just because of that word!) but that wasn't too tricky for me to sew. Also, I now know from experience that bizarrely I find it easier to make a lined bag: I am not one of life's neat sewers, and the lining lets me hide lots of mess (can I somehow employ this technique in my kitchen, I wonder?)

The most enjoyable part has been choosing which fabrics and linings to use together. I love this bird print with the red polka dot lining:

I've been really careful about cutting the gorgeous shoe fabric as it's just too good to waste, so I've made these little bags for girls - maybe not quite big enough for everything I haul about with me, but certainly big enough for a purse and some lip gloss.

Satisfaction

This is the bottom of my ironing basket. I hadn't seen it for months.