Lego Shoes

It has been ages since I have even thought about making baby shoes, but the opportunity presented itself to make some baby shoes for a special lady about to have baby number two ...

Shoes are a size 6-12 months, 100% cotton machine washable.

I cracked open the embroidery machine and did some labeling for the back of the shoes. Took me a few tries to get it right, given I had not done this in about a year!

Packaged them up nice and neat for the present. From the offcuts I made a toysaver with my bias maker.

I hope that she likes them and that she gets some good use out of them. Now I have to go and tidy my craft room again ..

My Creative Space ...

Last night I started embroidering this Aunty Cookie Alphabet print. Intended on for Tori's room, I wanted to give it a bit of colour and depth.

The birds will be given feathers and the girls perhaps bows in their hair! A good activity for in front of the telly at nights.

Are you playing along this week? Head on over to our creative space ...

Melbourne Aquarium

We found ourselves at the Melbourne Aquarium on Sunday to celebrate the third birthday of a friend. Victoria had been waddling like a penguin all morning ...

Tori and her friend with their "dolphin bouncy balls" ...

Afterwards we had cake near Enterprize Park and then Tori and her friend ran around like lunatics ...

Nicholas enjoyed the crisp autumn air, he has his three month Maternal Health Nurse check this week.

When we got home and did the bedtime routine, I had to sing many verses of "Old MacDonald".

Old MacDonald had an Aquarium, e-i e-i oh
And in that Aquarium, she had some penguins, e-i e-i oh
With a waddle, waddle here and a waddle waddle there ....

.. you get the picture!

Nephila Edulis, our very own Garden Orb Weavers

It was with great sadness this morning that I noticed that one of our Garden Orb Weavers had disappeared. Every morning we go down and check on them out of the window near our living area.

We had two Garden Orb Weavers, one with seven legs, which the husband named "7 of 8" and a smaller orb with all 8 legs. Our girls ... The eight legged one spent the morning rebuilding her web after the rains last night.

Having watched Charlotte's Web the other night and then spending hours online researching Nephila Edulis, I headed out this morning with the "good" camera to take pictures of the remaining spider. Anxious to document it's existance.

I had a good look around the space surrounding the web belonging to "7 of 8" and I spotted it. A golden orb egg sac, hanging from the underside of the pergola structure .. and then I spotted "7 of 8" ... she was still with us!

How beautiful is this egg sac?

Tori and I are looking forward to keeping an eye on the egg sac to see when all the spiderlings hatch.

I feel very glad to have found her, but I know that once the Orb's lay their egg sac it means that their time on this planet has come to an end.

So for that, I am very sad as we have watched her grow and eat bugs since late last year. Farewell "7 of 8", we have become very attached to you.

No Time for Fear by Paul De Gelder

In the last few weeks I have crossed baths with this book twice. I've been meaning to blog about this for a while, but alas ... sick kids have gotten in the way :-(

Anyway .. the first time I heard about this guy was on "The Circle". I had flipped onto the program and found the girls interviewing Paul De Gelder with great enthisuasm, giggling and swooning over the man with no fear of sharks. I was struck by his confidence in talking about his experiences.

The second encounter was listening to Richard Stubbs on 774 radio. Richard was also swooning over Paul, but in a "man crush" kind of way. Both interviews were so completely different and covered different aspects of Paul's experience. He has also appeared on Life Matters (radio) and Australian Story (ABC TV).

As a result, I am suitably motivated to tackle this book after I finish reading Kerri Sackville's new book (nearly there). When you learn about the challenges faced by Paul De Gelder, it really does put things into perspective. Two and half days with sick kids on my own doesn't sound that hard.

I am hoping to pop this book onto my bedside table for a bit of inspiration in the early hours of the morning when Nicholas wants a feed and play ...

More fairy shots of Tori

A friend, Kerri, took my hubby's camera for a test run the other night. We dressed Tori back up in her fairy gear (no argument there!) and Kerri snapped away.

I think that the fairy costume looks even better with a black top, rather than the pink one that she had on at the fairy party.

We were rather chuffed by the results, Kerri is a talented lady!

I am hoping to get into my sewing room today to finish off some bags for a custom order. Pictures soon!

Hottie Challenge

I have a hottie in my life so I decided to share the love and enter into "The Hottie Challenge".

The challenge is to create a Hottie Cover using any art or textile technique that takes your fancy.

Not only is this crafty challenge fun, it is for a great cause. The Hottie Challenge is Opendrawer’s first project to help raise money for the Margaret Pratt Foundation (Research for heart and Lung Transplants) our chosen charity.

I can't go through winter without my heat pack warmed up each night. Even though the cover doesn't have to be functional, I can't help but design something with my own needs in mind.

My sketchbook is open and I have a few ideas sketched out that include using applique and non-traditional quilting techniques.

So if you are up for it, sign up, donate and lets get sewing!

Fairy Party

Never one to dodge the opportunity to get crafty ..

armed with some coathangers, a roll of gaffa tape, some elastic and lots of glitter tuille ...

we made an outfit for Tori to wear to a 4th Birthday Party today.

Tsar Rugs

Fleur Harris, Melbourne Illustrator and Designer has just had her website re-vamped, so I thought I would take another stroll through some of her posts and I came across this one.

Isn't this rug absolutely devine .. not just because I am a patcher but because it is so different.

Her post lead me to the Tsar web site and many moments of looking longingly at their groovy rugs.

So many of the rugs in their geometric range could be quilts!

I love this one because of the flash of red and orange. We have a grey lounge suite in our family space, so any of these colourful rugs would go quite nicely with it.

Have you seen any inspirational rugs lately?

Mother's Day

I loved the way that my daughter told me what was in my present as she handed it to me. The smiles from my little boy who is becoming more aware of the world around him. My husband for giving me some time to myself and the laughs shared with the grandmothers to whom I am indebted for the way they support, encourage and nurture my role as mother in my own family.

I hope that you all had a wonderful Mother's Day last weekend.

11 weeks

11 weeks and it feels like more. Nicholas is sitting on the 95th percentile for height and the 75th percentile for weight. So we think he is going to be a big boy. Still not sleeping more than 2-3 hours through the night. He has one more week and then we bring out the big guns!

It's been a weird version of hell in my household over the last two weeks. With me suffering a migrane and then my husband got food poisoning and then in his weakened state, got the cold. Which then of course turned into something worse! He has been bed bound for most of the week, that is, when he didn't go into work!

So I am looking forward to next week. Looking forward to everyone feeling a bit more healthy and I am looking forward to spending more than 10 minutes in my sewing room.

Etsy Friday Finds

It has gotten cold here in Melbourne over the last week .. so my thoughts go to keeping warm! Tori's baby beanie is multicoloured with a nice flower .. I'm thinking something different for Nicholas.

 

Earflap Beanie Custom Order by cathi518

 

Cute skull beanie by NinisHandmades

 

Green Hat with Braids by JustDandyCreations

 

Ladybug Beanie Pattern by BusyMumDesigns

Animal Hat Patterns by melunder8

The big question now is whether I buy one already made or make it myself?

Table runner finally finished

Finally scraped together the time to finish the hand stitching on the table runner.

I love the colours in this Japanese Fabric and I am contemplating making a quilt for my family space with these colours. But I am still playing with designs and fabric possibilities.

If I do a quilt with this fabric, I will probably use the fancy binding technique that Patch Andi blogged about a while back. But for the table runner, I was happy with a simple binding in black.

Highway to the Danger Zone

I had a lot of fun coming up with things to put on these button badges for a friend's 40th. For his birthday he took a joy flight in a Strikemaster in Tasmania, so it seemed appropriate to continue the theme when we were thinking of a present.

Did you know that it is Top Gun Day on Friday May 13th. Here is the Facebook link, and the twitter link. Along the same lines as talk like a pirate day .. but cooler!

What would you have written on your Top Gun badge?