Olive Mae Dress Giveaway courtesy of An Art Nest!

anartnest giveaway

Remember my Olive Mae dress pattern? Susannah from An Art Nest made a beautiful one and is giving it away to a lucky winner at the end of February! To enter the giveaway, go to her post and link back to it on your blog, Twitter or Facebook (make sure to leave a comment letting her know you did so).

Good luck!

Love mix for Valentine's

My husband is just about the most difficult person to give gifts to. I feel an incredible amount of pressure when trying to think of what I could possibly give him. We are both picky people, as well as apartment dwellers with very little room for storing gifts that we can't really use or don't really like. I think, as gift recipients, we've both offended each other numerous times over the years. As a gift giver, there are also valid charges against me such as past unfulfilled IOUs. Even altogether missed gifts due to a lack of inspiration as to a fitting gift for my incredibly unique husband. Perhaps the missed gifts have contributed most to my downfall in his perception of my gift giving habits. He has even claimed at times that I never give him gifts.

Well, my friends, let me draw your attention to Exhibit A: the most brilliant gift ever that started out as a lowly IOU. It ended up as an IOU fulfilled, and superbly fulfilled at that. You may recall the matching rainbow sweaters that I made for him and our daughter a few Christmases ago. 10 points for me.

And now on to Exhibit B, the second most brilliant gift I have given him. My husband's wallet has been falling apart for awhile now. But I never wanted to buy him a wallet. That would just be too ordinary. Definitely not of the excellent nature that I have decided all my gifts to him must be. Then one day while browsing around on Etsy, I came across Brave Moonman's shop. The moment I saw those little pouches resembling retro cassette tapes, I knew what to make for my audiophile husband.

 

Actually making a wallet was much more difficult than I had anticipated. Then creating the cassette tape image proved quite challenging as well. The entire process took upwards of 6 months as I sporadically tried various materials in an attempt to find something that would work. I made two or three that I ended up rejecting before finally settling on one. I used a mixture of felt, bias tape, a coordinating fabric and embroidery for the cassette. The execution wasn't perfect, but the idea was. Perhaps one day when this wallet wears out I will make a superior model.

But in the meantime the love mix wallet is tangible evidence that I do, indeed, give my husband gifts. And quite nifty ones at that.

dangerous hobbies

My husband sporadically complains about my knitting. It's not that he doesn't like the results -- he's a hearty fan -- and it's not that he dislikes it as a hobby. No, the problem lies entirely in the needles.

They're hard to snuggle with.

Technically I'm banned from knitting in bed. And the couch has its own ground rules: I can knit with abandon all day while most of the crowd is at school, but when it's time to cuddle on the couch, I generally switch to a book (by choice, of course -- even for a knitting addict like me, snuggle time trumps knitting time. Hands down).

Have you got any dangerous hobbies?

Wintering in style

 My daughter insisted on wearing her sunglasses while posing in this newest mitten sweater creation. What a funny girl!

 I love the cheery colors on this one, as well as the faux scarf (oh so stylish!). Actually, before she put the sunglasses on, it just looked warm and cozy.

I finally figured out a solution to the problem I was having with ease of flipping the mittens on and off. Hooray! The mittens on this sweater work like a charm, so I'm putting it up in the Etsy shop.

an attempt at a tutorial - pajama pant edition

For those who have requested a tutorial for the pajama pants, please note that I rarely use patterns, am never true to recipes, and also don't do much with my hair (this last point being completely off topic, but an indication of just how not precise I am). And with that, here goes:

Fold fabric, wrong sides together, and lay out a pair of pants on it. Trace (or just cut, if you can't be bothered to trace, like me) with enough room on the edge cut edge to allow for 1-2 inches of seam on the inside (and any extra give you want them to have), 2 inches on top, and 2-3 inches on the bottom. [please note that the picture below doesn't follow these instruction at all when it comes to the top and bottom. I left no extra fabric because, well, there wasn't enough fabric to do so. so this girl's pj pants are more like really long shorts with a low waistband. but she insisted on the this exact fleece -- what could I do? and also, aren't those pants fantastic? no, I did not make them. but I wish I had a pair for me.]

With wrong sides together, sew from the crotch down to the bottom of the leg.

Sew your first seam with the edge of the presser foot against the cut edge of fabric and the needle in the middle position.

Turn inside out (right sides together) and move the needle to the far left position to sew over this seam in order to create a french (or hidden) seam.

Turn one leg inside out and insert into the other leg. With wrong sides together, sew the curve together.

Turn the outside leg wrong side out, and sew along seam to hide the raw edge.

Measure for your elastic. I usually use about 1 inch wide elastic (but whatever I've got around is the second choice). Fold top edge under 1/4 inch, and then fold the width of the elastic plus a little give on each side. Do the same with the cuffs (your second fold being about 1-3 inches, depending on how long you want the pants to be). Iron the folds for cotton on warm, but be careful with fleece. You have to iron it a little cooler so it doesn't melt. Or (if you're lazy like me) you can just fold and sew without ironing. Sew along the edge of the folded down piece, right on top of the 1/4 inch fold, leaving about 1 1/2 inches open to insert elastic. Sew along the folded edge of the cuffs as well.

Wrap the elastic around the waist of the future pants' wearer without stretching it. Pin a safety pin through the elastic to mark your ending spot, and pin another one to the cut end of the elastic. Use the safety pin on the cut end to thread the elastic through the waistband. When you emerge at the other end, match the cut edge to the safety pin marking your ending spot and sew the elastic together. Cut close to the seam and let the rest of the elastic feed into the waistband. Sew the last 1 1/2 inches of waistband seam.

Et voila.

wednesday's ode

To beautiful scenery.

possum dummies

What does it mean to be brave? It's doing something, even when you're really scared. This is the message of one of my favorite childhood books, Brave Brush-Tail Possum by Diane Redfield Massie.

Brush-tail possum has resigned himself to a demise via Goanna Lizard. Why doesn't try to run away or defend himself like they do, his friends wonder? He can't help it, he says. He'll freeze if he sees the Goanna Lizard and he'll be eaten like the rest of his family before him, because "that's what possums do."

But the next morning he is busy doing SOMETHING, though his friends have no idea what and eagerly watch as his project unfolds. Possum eventually presents a banana leaf bundle stuffed with a ghastly mixture of bitter berries, skunk cabbage, stink bugs, and mud. His friends, guessing repeatedly that it's a sausage, are finally met with Possum's frustrated, "IT'S NOT A SAUSAGE!" He mournfully explains it was an attempt to make a possum dummy so as to confuse the Goanna, but, he sighs, "He'll know it isn't me." His friends backpedal in an attempt to encourage him: "It's a good dummy. It looks just like you, Possum!" Though Possum feels a bit more hopeful, he worries that he might freeze anyway if he looks at the Goanna's eyes. "Don't look at his eyes," cautions Koala Bear.

That very night he comes face to face with the Goanna. He feels himself begin to freeze, but his friend Wombat comes to the rescue from below. His distracting "YA! YA! YOU FLABBY LIZARD!" gives Possum just enough time to push his dummy out and stumble behind the leaves. The Goanna, not realizing the switcheroo, greedily consumes the possum dummy in one bite. "GGGGGAAAAAAH!" ... "THAT'S THE LAST POSSUM I'LL EVER EAT!" he bellows as he retreats. Possum's friends congratulate him: "You didn't give up, even though you were scared, and that's really brave."

And Possum has to admit that he is.

I volunteered to do an activity in my daughter's preschool class. The children helped me to mix up some crepe batter and I demonstrated how to make a crepe (though I never claimed any expertise!).

We then read Brave Brush-Tail Possum and set out to make our own possum dummies.

The kids excitedly piled bitter berries (raspberries), stink bugs (Cocoa Crispies) and mud (Nutella, or chocolate pudding for those with nut allergies) onto banana leaves (crepes) and rolled them into possum dummies. Yogurt was available as well, just so they weren't too ghastly.Though several of the children declared they'd never eat crepes again, most happily devoured their concoctions.