Create for Life Cafepress Shop open for business!

A sneak peek of my designs - there are 4 to choose from at present!

OK - so I didn't get round to taking the photos of my bags and apron for my 'made-it' shop, but I have managed to upload some designs to my Cafepress shop, so go on over and have a look.  Cafepress offers lots of designs which can be printed onto items of your choice from mugs to clocks, t-shirts to water bottles.  You could get stuck on there for hours!!  (Make sure you visit my shop first though!!)

Time to be

I've had a short blog holiday! 

The photo kind of lets you know what I've been up - making lots of bags for my little on-line shop at made-it.  I should have a button on the blog tomorrow, which will mean I've finally uploaded photos of my goodies for sale!  I had great fun today trying to make Photoshop work and writing my shop policy - much prefer the creating!!

To be honest I'm getting a bit stressed about the proximity of Christmas - so many things to do and so little time!  Must remember not to lose sight of the good side of the season - it's not all about shopping and getting the best presents, whatever everyone keeps telling you.  It's more important to be than to do - that's going to be my mantra throughout silly season!

Business cards and teddy bears - getting it right!

I found the cutest baby bear in Little Man's school bag.

When I told him how proud I was of his baby bear, he looked at me in disgust, saying 'it's not baby bear' and had another rummage in his school bag ...

And here they are, Daddy bear, Mummy bear and the real Baby bear.  Aren't they just so cute?

Later in the day when I looked in the mailbox, I found another little surprise.  My Moo Minicards - I'm going to put them in with pieces that I sell and hand them out to anyone who's interested in my work.  I think they look pretty good.  Yay - exciting!

Countdown to Christmas

I like to spread out a bit when I'm baking ...

When I went back to England for a holiday a couple of years ago, I brought back with me some dodgy CDs (mum had been collecting them from a daily newspaper!) and crammed our bags full to bursting with memorabilia from my youth.  Our baggage allowance was 100kg in total, and we reached 99kg.  (Stay with me on this, it is relevant) ...

Ready for the oven

Today I made my Christmas cake, just in time - better than last year when I made it 2 weeks before the big day!  Now I've heard it said that if you want to make a great cake, make it when you're in a good mood.  This is where my dodgy CDs came in!  I defy you not to make a good cake if you're listening to Bananarama!  Whatever you may think of them (if you even know who I'm talking about) their music is of the annoyingly catchy type, and I'll be humming 'Venus' and 'I heard a rumour' for the rest of the day!

Yum - finished - will go into storage until it's iced on Christmas Eve!

The scary part is I was a wee 16 year old when most of these songs were released.  Still I enjoyed my trip down memory lane and had a good boogie all by myself whilst making the cake!  And do you think I scraped the bowl clean with all that brandy that was in the mix?  You bet I did - why do you think I waited until the kids were at school before I made it?  :)

400 posts and counting ... and other stuff ...

Ooh, it was my 400th post the other day and I didn't even notice!  Just having too much fun blogging!

Today I've been busy doing preparation work - cutting out fabric for some bags I'm making for my 'made-it' online shop, as well as cutting out for Roman blinds.  To be honest I'm not looking forward to making them as curtains and blinds are so functional and not as exciting to make as other things.  I find it really difficult to get going on these projects, but I'm always so pleased at the final result, even after thinking the whole process is boring!

And the photo of the grass tree?  It's a little hint at my next creative blog project - for some reason I find grass trees utterly fascinating and I'm hoping to capture as many on camera as I can.  I'll keep you posted!

Taking time out ...

I was busy doing mum stuff in the kitchen today when Little Man came in and asked me "could you please come and do something with me?"  He asked so nicely, how could I refuse.  And this is what we did, we placed all of his plastic soldiers on his aircraft carrier.  It made him so happy that I helped.  And I almost missed out - almost used that "I'm busy!" phrase.  Glad I didn't, it was really special just 'being' with my Little Man.

What a scorcher!

Today the temperature hit 39 degrees here in the Hills.  I've found someone who suffers from the heat as much as I do:

What you can't see is that he's actually sitting flaked out under the air-conditioning.  A dog after my own heart. xx

Butterflies

I woke up with butterflies in my tummy this morning because I was nervous about meeting my blogger friend Sally.  We've 'talked' via our blogs for the past year or so, admired each other's creations and shared moments of motherhood woes and life experiences.  Really we knew quite a bit about each other already ... but I always get those nerves when I'm up to something new.

Anyway, we had the most lovely morning tea.  Dear Sally had already chosen a seat inside the cafe as she knew I hate the heat, and we sat and chatted non-stop over our coffees (mine iced and hers hot!).  We put the world to rights, spoke about motherhood, our love for craft and creativity and how we both view it as a necessity in our lives; food for the soul.  We talked about how we're all caught in a consumer society that puts little value on unique, handmade goods - when did we all begin to want to be the same as everybody else? 

One of the best things I got out of today though was when I was explaining that I don't use my little studio as much as I want to, and that I don't produce as many art works as I would like.  Sally asked straight out why was that - and I floundered around for answers; the best I could come up with was that I was scared no-one would like my work!  It sounded so silly to my ears and I realized that I'm just making excuses.  So, thank you Sally for your wonderful honesty, your hints on crafting, crochet and blogging, but most of all your company - it was a great way to start my day and how wonderful to meet someone in the 'real' world that I'd first met in the virtual world of blogging.  The community spreads a little wider :)

Treasures I find ...

Sometimes when I am walking through the forest, certain pieces 'call to me' and I have to pick them up.  This time it was this partly burned stick, with a wonderful gnarled head.  As I walked along I wondered what I was going to make with it, it even looked like it might become Charlie's chew toy at one point.  It was only as I was approaching home that I was mulling over how it could be a walking staff if it was longer, when my arty mind took over and had the idea to make an art doll who could use it as a staff.  From my medicine doll coursework I still have to make my Talisman doll and this stick is going to be perfect.  So now it sits on my bookshelf and I look at it everyday and spend some time thinking about the creation of my doll.  It won't happen for a while yet - bringing a doll to life takes a long time!

What do you think of my fabric?  The jolly robin fabric is going to be used in my November sewing challenge very shortly.  I was ironing the pieces after washing them for shrinkage allowance when I thought how gorgeous they all looked together.  Yummy colours.  Still haven't worked out what I'm going to make from the troll fabric, but it looked like such fun.  When I was at university I had a small yellow haired troll that I'd bought at a Spar shop!  This fabric was bought through sheer sentimentality!  But isn't it gorgeous!

Divine Didi Dolls

What a lovely surprise arrived for me in the post on Friday - a gift of a Didi doll from Claire at Felt Like Stitchin' (who I met when we were both taking part in Blogtober 2010).  Isn't Flossi just gorgeous? 

Beautiful stitching - take a look:

And it even has a teeny tiny pocket on the back with her name tag in it!

It's so gorgeous - pop over to the Felt Like Stitchin website so you can purchase your own delightful Didi doll!

Sometimes I just can't blog ...

Not blogging tonight. Just haven't got the heart :(  I've just had to put eyedrops in Little Man's eyes as he's not too well at the moment and he disapproved in the most major way; I feel like the worst mum EVER.  He did ask me for a hug before I put out the light, so at least I know he still loves me. xx

Back tomorrow.  Wherever you are, have a beautiful day (or night!) xx

Let's talk about the weather ...

Sunshine trickling through the trees behind our house in early summer

It's been such a fresh day - rain after hot weather always seems to refresh both the atmosphere and the spirit.  When we went for our walk today we could smell the eucalyptus in the air and the promise of clear summer days to come.  Heavenly.


Sunbeams

Summer is such an energetic time - people come out of hibernation and enjoy time with friends and families, barbecues galore, spending time in the fresh air after being cooped up for winter.  Summer and its heat revives people (I find staying in the air-con has that effect on me too, but you still need the heat to make that work ...)  I'm really hoping that I'm acclimatizing a bit more and that I'll be slightly less grumpy this year!

I still can't get used to Christmas in the blistering sunshine though!

A sea of crochet

OK - so my Granny a Day Challenge has changed into more of a Granny Every Few Days Challenge!  I've been catching up with my granny squares over the past couple of days - my next project to be finished is a black and coloured little number.  Crochet is a fantastic crafty activity as the weather gets warmer, especially when you're working with small squares, as there's no weight as such to make you feel stifled.  I really don't need anything else to make me grumpy when it's hot!  It makes my family a lot happier too :)

Dare to daydream ...

As I may have mentioned my new favourite hobby is going for walks in the bush with my dog Charlie.  It's so peaceful in the forest, you can lose yourself in your thoughts - as I often do!  The other day I walked past my usual landmarks without even noticing and ended up in a completely different direction to the one I intended.  My concentration was only broken by magpies swooping Charlie as he dared to walk by their nests. 

What was I doing with my quiet time?  Simply daydreaming.  Dreaming about my art, projects I want to complete, people I want to connect with very soon, what I'm going to write about in my blog ... and so it goes on.  But it's healthy to daydream - you become aware of your inner thoughts, dreams for the future, choices you can make, to be inspired.  So I say to you all - take a part out of your day to daydream and just 'to be'.  Having 'me time' is vital to your overall health.  Take some time out :)

Lego rules

I've always loved Lego since I was a kid, when my sister and I used to build houses for our Daisy dolls.  But this is the best Lego item that has ever been built for me - my son BB thought he'd annoyed me so built this little gift for me.  It's one piece of Lego that's not going to be dismantled for a very, very long time.   xx

October Sewing Challenge show and tell - easy peasy skirt

The challenge for October was to upcycle a couple of items bought from an op shop.  I didn't do quite as much sewing as I'd hoped but I did manage to make two things:

The first is a skirt made from my favourite, but holey, pair of jeans, and an old skirt of my daughter's.  It's easy peasy to make and took about an hour. 

Read on if you want to see how I made it or skip to the pic of the top!

To make the easy peasy jeans skirt:
1.  Cut off the legs of your pair of jeans, about 2.5 cms below zip, or where the seam stops being curved.  Tuck in pockets so you don't cut them off by mistake!

2.  Cut waistband off skirt.  Make two rows of gathering stitch along the top of the skirt.  Pull up the stitches, a little at a time if you have a lot of material in the skirt as I did, until the skirt width matches the width of the bottom of the jeans yoke.

3.  Pin, tack and stitch  - being careful not to sew the pockets into the seam.

4.  If you're like me you'll want to try the skirt on before doing anything else to check all is OK.

OK? Good ...

5.  Recommended - stitch a second row around the skirt/jeans yoke seam.  Optional - neaten the seam.

6.  Press the seam upwards towards the yoke.  Topstitch along the denim - I used two rows and two colours for a bit of interest.

Yay!  It's finished.  Wear your skirt with pride and show off how clever and environmentally aware you are.

This top is made from a men's shirt I bought from the op shop for $3.  There's a tutorial on the blog My Gramma Said which shows you in detail how to make the shirt - good instructions and photos.  Again a fairly quick make, just over an hour. 

I wasn't sure what my daughter would think of it, but as soon as she came in and saw it on the mannequin she asked 'oh, can I have that?' which is always a good sign, then she wore it until bedtime.  Very cute she looks in it too.

Now you can see how easy it is to customize clothing.  I think it might become my new sewing craze.  I still have to upcycle the rest of those items I bought at the beginning of October.  Better get my thinking cap on ...