Toddling about

Made this sweet wee set for a friend.

The bib is backed with navy towelling and it makes it nice and thick and soft. It has a velcro catch and is simply overlocked together so is almost embarrassingly easy.

The rompers were a touch more difficult. However they are quite cute and hopefully will fit.

I love the fabric - its very sweet with the little turltes without being overly kid-like.

Landscapes

Sometimes you just have to appreciate the beauty that New Zealand allows us to live within. The last few weekends have been uncharacteristically sunny and pleasant (not just for Wellington, but for anywhere in winter). We have made no inroads on the wallpaper stripping as it just seems wrong to be inside on sunny winter days. Plenty of time for rain.

Last weekend we spent a lovely morning up Makara hill munching on bacon sandwiches and reading, and then this weekend we wandered round the coast to Red Rocks and made silly noises and daft conversation with the seals. (I love the way that each seem to have a personality and look at you like you're being very tiresome when you disturb them - which is probably true, but still funny).

Watching thugs looting the streets of Brixton - 2 minutes from where we used to live only a wee while ago - just underlines how very lucky we are. To be so far away from that kind of grey and desperate environment and to be immediately close to this type of landscape is just such a privilege and surely fixes the soul.

Open Studios - a treat

I treated myself to a new book. Another pearl by Lotta Jansdotter (she just keeps producing crackers). This one is called Open Studios.

Whilst it sometimes reads a little like a series of adverts for her similarly very talented and artful friends and acquaintances, the photos are really wonderful. It explores the working environments of these creatives and each page is just full of wonderful images. I found myself getting nose-to-nose with each page in a desperate attempt to get a little closer and further into the studio I was viewing. I have spent many a happy moment scanning each image a thousand times to take in every morsel of every shot.

A very pleasant treat.

Straight to the third bottom

I confess, I have successfully contributed to the size of my third arse in the space of just a few hours. I have always felt bad about wasting those pieces of fruit and vege that we buy and fail to eat. Having just thrown out some wrinkled soft old beetroot, I was loath to toss the bananas. Hence the banana loaf (c/o the Edmonds Cookbook).

I melted dark chocolate and butter to make the icing. I swear, it is so rich its to die for - and indeed may cause a heart attack after just one slice.

Yummo.

A new lease on life for that fav old t-shirt

I have a particular T-shirt that I have loved for quite some time. It has an image of a wee girl on it - that classic type of image that was always on writing paper sets ..... when I was growing up and receiving writing paper sets was the norm. Its got such a little girl charm about it.

However, in the last few years I wore it less and less. The length of the t-shirt meant it hovered just around my waist and this always made me nervous. Not only do I feel more comfortable in layers and lengthy tops, but its my theory that no one wants to see the midriff of those of us over-30 years old, unless you are in the bedroom, on the beach in togs, you survive on a diet of lentils and hours of yoga, or you are a belly dancer. So I wondered if I could hold on to my treasured t-shirt but give it a bit of a length-update to see if it was then still wearable in an over-30 type way.

I plonked for a somewhat slap-dash approach of adding a thick ribbing waistband at the bottom. I used the theory that the ribbing should be about 2/3 of the width of the distance you are sewing, and simply overlocked it to the base of the t-shit. It has added length and I've worn it all day. Yay- the t-shirt lives again. An excellent way to avoid having to survive on a diet of lentils and hours of yoga.

(Yip, I'm wearing my PJs in this photo)

Recovering that old bedside Lamp

Well, very excited about my first trial of recovering a lamp.

I can't remember where I got this lamp, its just been kicking around for ever and I pulled it out of some storage boxes when we returned to NZ. It had this textured red fabric which I had got very used, but was - at the end of the day - kinda ugly. So I thought it needed a new lease of life and would be a good practice run.

It currently sits by the bed so I was conscious that I wanted to cover it in a yellow, orange or red fabric to keep a warm glow to the light it emits (lets face it, who looks pretty in blue or green light?). That being said, I just couldn't help myself. I was given some fabric samples by a colleague at work and the blue one was simply crying out to be used. So whilst I may not look pretty in its glow, the lamp itself will look gorgeous. Such stunning fabric.

I didn't employ any smart and careful techniques with this. I just cut and yanked the existing fabric off the underneath roll - this one was laminated paper but could be plastic if purchased - (rembered to take the "before" shot mid-way through yanking) and then glued a line of fabric vertically to the paper shield, rolled the fabric around the lamp, glued another nicely folded-under vertical strip, tucked under to top and bottom, and glued to the metal circular surround.

What I would say in hindsight is have regard to which way you look at this lamp. For example, this one sits on a low table and therefore I will more often look "down" on it. A tall standing lamp in contrast, you are more likely to look "up" into. Make sure you have enough fabric at the top / bottom to produce a nice tidy edge when you fold the top / bottom into the middle of the lamp. If you need to prioritise one more than the other, then prioritise the most "looked at" side. I, of course, was cutting the height of the fabric a bit fine as this was a sample scrap, and then prioritised the wrong edge. The edge that looked tidier was at the bottom (prescribed by the metal framing), which never gets seen at all. The messier edge was at the top, and was looking a bit rough and ready. So, to tidy up the top and make it look a little less Craft101, I glued a thin piece of ribbon around the inside to hide the scrappy edges.

It won't win any prizes for the most masterful execution, but it looks so lovely sitting there.

I am now quite excited about making the change to a different light fitting in my sewing cave. I'll give you a before and after of that at some point because the current fitting has all that charm that our Purple Palace exudes and it really (really) has to go.

Only minimal productivity

Dear me, how the days just roll by. I cannot believe its July this week. What has happened?

I have accomplished so little in the sewing world since February, I am always feeling a touch guilty. There is a definite lack of focus. The weekends are taken up with weeding and clearing - and boy have we weeded and cleared - and as one sinks into the chair at the end of the day, groaning softly at Gardener's Back Pain (never before experienced) and covered in rose bush scratches, there is just no energy for creative spurts.
I have only managed two projects in the last wee while.

The first was a top from the "Chic and Simple Sewing" book. Its the baby doll top. Not sure quite what happened here. I used the medium size but whilst it fits on the top half it simply balloons out from the boobs down - I mean there's 'flowing' and then there's just peculiar.

Clearly for this to be wearable it needs to be taken in significantly and perhaps given a tie for the back. A bit annoying really as I liked this fabric - I can handle when I stuff thing up the sewing myself but find it a bit more annoying when the pattern takes you to a place that you never expected.

However, before I do the alterations to try and save this top, I am going to see if a friend of mine who is pregnant wants this. Ballooning tops are fine for the woman with the beautiful stretching belly. I also finally did the overhaul on a chair that had been sitting around collecting dust for way too many months. I saw this at a seconds shop and picked it up for $3. It had terribly old gold fabric that had been mauled by a pet of some sort.

The fabric I used is the same design as I used on a seat last year, but different colours. The fabric is just lovely. I do tend to think that as the fabric is so strong the chair looks top heavy and you don't notice the lovely legs. Nevertheless, this will do nicely for a few dollars and the cost of the fabric (not cheap but lets pretend it was).

Right - what next?