My Supertote

Ta-dah. Introducing the first real bag I've ever made!!!! :D

Supertote pattern by Anna of Noodlehead.

It's the first time I try one of Anna's patterns, and I'm super pleased with the final product. Anna's instruction are straightforward and clear! Here are some notes that came to mind while making this bag:

1. My least favorite part of sewing - preparing the fabric, cutting the pieces. This pattern has a lot of pieces. Over the course of a week or so, I cut and prepared my fabric pieces. Then the nice little bundles stayed on my sewing table for a few days while I recovered from that! hahaha!

2. The little squares on the exterior pocket are what spurred me to make this Supertote in the first place. Having ordered some beautiful fabric from Alison Glass (Petal in Eggplant from the Handcrafted range; planning to make a summer dress with that), there were a few samples of her Sun Print line in the package when it arrived. Ooh, I had to make something that would show off these colorful squares.

3. I decided to use an old pair of jeans to create a reinforced gusset layer. Needless to say, when I was sewing the lining to the bag exterior, throught the pleat region, there were about 8 layers of material there. So as not to damage my machine and needle, I slowing (and manually) passed the needle through the fabric. I see now, after a few weeks of use, that the stitches are sort of loosening, so I may have to hand-stitch those spots closed. Maybe. This kind of hand sewing is not my favorite thing! ;)

4. The interior pockets are indeed roomy as Anna describes in the pattern. However, I think I made mine a tad too roomy. Probably because I didn't tighten the elastic enough. The pockets gape open a bit, so they function more as dividers than pockets. At some point I may un-stitch the lining and try to tighten the elastics, but perhaps I'll just leave them as they are at the moment.

5. I used a thrifted and dyed bed sheet as the fabric for the lining. I should have realized that a used bed sheet will have thinner regions in the fabric where head and/or feet will have worn away the thread. Thus, the main compartment of my inner lining bag is a bit thread-bare, it may need replacement at an earlier timepoint than expected. ah well.

6. I always keep (tiny) left-over scraps from a project, thinking to myself, "one day this will come in handy". Well, making this Supertote, I was able to use up a tiny piece of yellow cotton containing orange flowers for the zipper tabs, and a half-yard cut of a yellow paisley cotton that I had bought years in a quilting shop just because I liked the yellowness of it ;) It's yellowness matched (almost) perfectly with the yellow of the inner lining, so yay to using up some of my scrap stash!

7. Altogether, this bag took a couple of evenings to construct. However, it was "in-the-making" for about 5-6 weeks! Ha! A few days after I finished making the bag, we went on holiday. So I brought it for it's maiden voyage, and it's definitely a great travel bag due to it's roomy-ness.

Right, on to the next project! (ignoring the growing pile of clothes that need mending....)

Sending hugs in the post :: part 2

For my mother, I took an old wool sweater of mine, one she knew well from the time I still lived at home, and cut out a large love-heart. Onto this I hand-sewed some felt flowers (continuing my felt obsession), and machine-appliquéd a smaller love-heart onto the front, made with a scrap of woolly sweater and some fabric (from a thrift-store shirt, the same one I used to make a mini doll shirt out of).

The same thrift-store shirt served as the backing for creating a....cushion. I stuffed it full of polyfill, cuddled it for a few evenings, and then shipped it off to the green isle.

Edit to add ::

Unfortunately the postal company that was in charge of delivering the package within Ireland is a complete joke; I used Track-and-Trace, and although online it stated that delivery had been attempted several times, there was no trace of it being anywhere near my mother's home.

At least the package made it's way safely back to me...I will have to give this heart to my mother in person. An excellent reason for a visit, don't you think? ;)

Dinosaurrrrr

Mister Man really likes his Monster t-shirt, much to my delight! I've made shirts for him before but this is the first time he actively searches in his wardrobe to wear this mama-made tee. No need to convince me to make another tee for him. Again, I used the FST pattern from Rae (cut out size 5T, with 4T length). Found some Pinspiration here and hand-appliqued a felt-dinosaur to the front of the tee. And this was a collaborative project, as even Papa joined in; he cut out the dino and his spikes.

Using a blanket stitch and embroidery thread, I attached the dino to the t-shirt (I used a small bit of washable pritt-stick to keep the dino in place while I stitched). It has been a while since I hand-stitched something, and the slow repeatable motions were quite relaxing.

And much to my delight, this tee has also been approved by the little man, who is such a busy little bee, it was hard to get a "non-blurred" photo of him wearing his newly acquired tee-shirt.

 

I was worried the felt wouldn't hold up being washed (for the first time) in the washing machine, but I just turned the t-shirt inside out and put it in a lingerie wash-bag so it wouldn't be rubbed against during the wash cycle and it came out fine.

Something girly

I've had this Lillestof organic cotton jersey in my stash for a while, never really knowing what to make with it. However, a day-care friend of my son is celebrating her 3rd birthday this weekend, so I decided to make her a little something.

This t-shirt is made using Rae's Flashback Skinny Tee pattern, cut out in size 3T. I really like this pattern, it's definitely becoming a staple go-to pattern for me. And it's easy to modify...I added 2.5cm to the front on order to create gathers along the front neck line but they're not that obvious. Ah well, perhaps my next attempt will turn out better! An old t-shirt of mine provided the fabric to create the cap sleeves and to bind the neck line. As you can see from the *beautiful* stitching along the neck-line, I have to improve my patience when sewing the final touches on a garment ;) I added a ribbon "label" so that it's easy for the little Miss to determine the back/front of the t-shirt.

To complete the gift, I wanted to make one extra thing, a little pouch or bag, but before starting I decided to check my IG feed, and noticed the lovely felt pouches my sister-in-law had just made and posted a tutorial for...what perfect timing. Thus, a little matching pouch was sewn, and hopefully the birthday girl will fill it with her treasures.

A belated birthday gift...

It was the birthday of a good friend of mine a few weeks ago, and I wanted to make her something to mark the occasion. We don't see each other very often, and months can go by between chats. However, I think about her often, and every now and then we exchange hand-written letters or a long phone call. It's the type of friendship isn't affected by silence or distance...we can pick up exactly where we left off.

She loves getting dolled up for nights out. I remember many a Saturday night getting ready at her place, chatting and giggling as we anticipated dancing the night away! She had (and probably still has) quite a collection of make-up, and I remember the "hundreds" of bottles of nail varnish in every colour imaginable. So what better than to make her a Snappy Manicure Wallet by Anna of Noodlehead (free tutorial here). I filled it with some new bottles of nail varnish, some new nail files and some hand creams. I wrapped it up in some happy polka-dot paper and posted it off. 

Happy belated birthday, dear friend! xxx

Cute Little Monsters...

Time took on a different meaning in the last months, but finally Mini Man made his appearance on the 22nd April.

To celebrate his arrival I made a birth-notice card to share with family and friends. A quick search on pinterest led to me to this pin, and the Cute Little Monster theme was born ;) I created 4 monsters out of felt (one for each member of the family), photographed each one on a white background and used Adobe Illustrator to prepare the images for the birth card. We printed our cards using an online service and we were really happy with the quality.

To celebrate the arrival of his little brother I made big brother a new T-shirt. Using Rae's Flashback Skinny Tee pattern, I made a 5T size with a 4T length (Mister Man is a stocky little fella for an almost 3 year old). I gave it short sleeves in time for summer. Using the pre-existing hems of the XXXXL shirt I used to make Mister Man's tee made this a super fast sew. I printed out the monster onto iron-on transfer paper, and added it to the shirt. 

And here it is being modelled by the new big brother...

Another type of doll...

I promised myself that I would only start a new project, once I had finished one on my Work-in-Progress list. Well, my little man got his doll, after months of it sitting in my WIP box. So time to start a new project...

I bought this book for myself for Christmas. My sister-in-law had made a beautiful Princess doll for her daughter for Christmas, and so I wanted to give this style of doll-making a try. My experience with doll-making being limited, I found the instructions of Tante Hilde straightforward and clear. You should check out her blog and marvel over the amount of lovely dolls this woman has created...

With a clear deadline in mind (visiting friends whose daughter would be the recipient of the doll), I started tracing and cutting the fabric for this doll 5 days before we had to leave. Stuffing a doll isn't as boring when you're watching a hilarious comedian, so after two short evenings the doll was stuffed and ready to be given hair and a face. In one evening I had given her dark brown eyes, and a soft pink mouth. Her hair is two-toned, brown and cream, and gathered into two pigtails on either side of her head. She was given a batik-like torso, because I didn't have enough skin-coloured fabric for the entire doll ;)

I made her a plain khaki skirt, trimmed with orange-blossom bias tape. Now she was ready (or at least we had to leave to visit the friends whose daughter was getting this doll). Into the car she came with us as we travelled north, through Friesland and over the border into Germany, where she was well received by her new owner!

However an outfit isn't complete without a jacket and shoes, so upon my return I made her a little fleece cardigan, trimmed in the same bias as for the skirt, and completed the look with a pair of green felt shoes. 

And now there's a little package in its way to Germany. 

I've learnt that there's nothing like a clear deadline to get my creative bug rolling. Now, to instil that sense of deadline for other projects...

A Waldorf doll

About a year ago I really wanted to make a Waldorf-inspired doll for my then 1-year old son. I liked the idea of creating a look-a-like doll for him, and while I don't necessarily find all aspects of Waldorf style education appealing, I like the idea of using simple, natural materials/toys for development through play.  I found a supplier of doll-making kits in the Netherlands and I ordered this kit, which, with the blond hair shown on the kit, is basically my son in waldorf-doll format. Perfect!

The kit arrived and I got started straight away. The limbs, head, and body were made and then sat in my "work-in-progress" box for nearly a year (oh, I am so ashamed to admit that!) as other aspects of life took over (I'm this close to finishing my PhD thesis!). 

Well, my little Mister Man is still waiting for that doll! And given my crafting resolutions for this year it was first on the list to become a Finishing Object!

Then he got a cap of hair:

Using a crochet hook, I added locks of hair all over the cap, followed by a "stylish" hair cut. 

And he really came to life with the addition of two blue eyes, a little button nose, and a cheeky red grin.

Then, with the help of this book, I made a lumberjack type hoody (with Velcro along the front) and a pair of pleat-front trousers to dress this new boy. 

I'm so happy how he turned out. Here he is, enjoying the bit of sun we got in this cold winters day. Now to introduce him to my little man. 

Here's to the first item crossed off my In-Progress list! Yay!

Elizabeth