2 Dec 2010

Feeling festive

Well, I managed to locate the camera so here is the Christmas tree ...



The snow continued to fall overnight on and off but didn't seem to be much deeper than yesterday's 16 inches this morning. Good job really, as I had to take LB to the doctors first thing with a bad cough/cold/sneeze - nothing serious though but better safe than sorry eh! Getting there was interesting to say the least, there was no way we'd be able to get our car off the drive and had we been able to there was no way we'd manage to get it up the hill to the surgery. The buggy was a no-go too, I considered walking with the sling but quickly decided the cold air would do him more harm than good and if I fell he'd get crushed. A taxi was called and we were delivered there and back safely, albeit very slowly and with much wheel-spinning.

This afternoon during nap-time we started making an igloo for BB to play in when he woke. Tim built the walls up to start with and then I took out a brolly and we used it to support the roof. It took about 2 hours to build but the little man was incredibly pleased with it...



I just wish I could fit in it too!

1 Dec 2010

Three became Four

Well, it's the 1st of December and time I started blogging again...
I had a beautiful baby boy just over 2 weeks ago, he is absolutely adorable and incredibly content. From now on I will refer to my boys as BB (Big Brother) and LB (Little Brother.)



The birth was a doddle except for dropping the gas and air in the throws of it all! BB came to visit straight away and was really quite interested and accepting of the new arrival. The first week was really tiring as the new baby was nocturnal, he has now settled down though and only wakes once during the night. BB is still very impressed about having a new baby around the house and is very affectionate and gentle with him, even though he is only 2 yrs old himself. Every morning when he comes into our bedroom one of the first things he does is go to LB's crib and gaze at him smiling before stroking his hair. It's enough to make a grown woman feel all woozy and warm ;)
We are blessed.

Over the weekend it started to snow here and now several days later we have 16 inches of the stuff - Talk about a winter wonderland! I haven't seen so much snow since I was little. BB had been enjoying it tremendously building snowmen, sledging and snowballing, until today when it was just too deep for him to walk in let alone play in. Tomorrow's plan is hopefully to build an igloo of sorts in the backgarden. On the downside our plans of seeing family and friends are having to be cancelled left, right and centre.

Today, because it was the first day in December and to make up for the fact that he had found it too hard to play in the snow, we put our Christmas tree up. It's an artifical one and he'd started putting tinsel and baubles on before I'd managed to get it half built. I have to admit that it's quite OTT this year, we put on every bauble we own and very nearly ran out of branches to adorn. I would post a picture of it but can't locate the camera so that will have to wait until tomorrow.

Right, going to post this now else it will be tomorrow!

xx

5 Nov 2010

Remember remember the 5th of November!

It has been a while since I made anything to show you - appologies! I've been feeling pretty rough and tired with the birth of the new baby just round the corner.
Yesterday I had my hand forced though, it's one of my favourite nephews birthday parties today so a gift I'd had planned for a while needed to be created. I admit I was tempted to forget my plans and pop to the shops for something plastic instead, but I don't really know what boys of that age are into. I do know that he loves dinosaurs though ...



It's a dinosaur canvas for his bedroom and hopefully it will tie in with the decor quite well. The last one of these I made was a dragonfly for the birth of my cousins new baby which was nice but didn't quite end up as I had imagined. For that one I had machine sewn the felt dragonfly onto the background and I don't think it worked very well. I had wanted my stitches to be clearly visible but they just sunk into the felt and created a bit of a padded look. This time I glued the felt on with fabric glue, I think it does work alot better than the machine sewing. The next one I do I'm going to try doing running stitch around the edge by hand - my handsewing leaves alot to be desired so although it sounds like a good plan it could be a complete flop!

23 Oct 2010

Latest Make - Pink Bag

Finally got round to photographing my latest bag, the first of it's type. It's in pink and black (obviously!) upholstery fabric with a woven leather effect handle. The flower corsage with leather leaves can be pinned in any position the owner desires - even on their lapel! It will be added to my Belovedly website and Folksy and Misi shops soon. Watch this space for more in this style.



16 Oct 2010

Latest Bags

Well, I've finished 2 bags today that have been on the go for too long to mention!

The first one is a carpet bag, my first ever one, I even made the handles myself. So as you can imagine it was a very steep learning curve. I started off by using a pattern and then ditched the pattern once I understood how to construct a bag of this type - this usually happens when I use patterns! I didn't like the way it sat and it seemed far too wide for my liking, so I changed the proportions and the shaping. It also originally had a seam along the bottom which seemed pointless to me so I altered that too. Anyway after alot of other changes that I wont bore you with the bag no longer resembles the original pattern and I'm really happy with it...




The other bag was more straight forward to finish as I've been making these knotted bags for a
while now. I love the flowery yellow fabric in this one, it reminds me of the curtains that my mum used to have up in her sewing room when I was little...




13 Oct 2010

Now you see it - Now you don't

Well I browsed through my sewing books and realised I was in desperate need of a sewing machine cover. I love my machine, it's a Bernina Nova 900 and is very purdy. I don't really want to cover it up, but it permanently lives on one side of the dining room table and we eat on the other so for it's own sake it needs to be covered up now that our son is well practised in throwing food!



I couldn't be bothered to read the instructions or even to look at the patterns provided - really - how hard can it be? Not very is the answer. So I measured up, picked the fabric from my stash and set to it. I cut the fabric out on the floor instead of on the table as when I had a scan on Monday (I'm 35 weeks pregnant) they said the baby was in a very bad position and to try spending some time on all fours to try to get it moved, so it was an ideal time to do some multi-tasking!
I sewed it all up in no time at all and then decided I wanted bias binding round the bottom, but not the scratchy shop bought stuff, I wanted to make my own. I couldn't find a bias binding tape maker locally but found this amazing tutorial on how to make some myself without the need for one - and yes, it really does work :D
So here is the finished cover ...



Really pleased with it and am feeling the need to make metres and metres of pretty bias binding now that I know how!

Ali xx

10 Oct 2010



Welcome to my new blog :¬) not really sure what to do now I'm here but I'm sure I'll learn the ropes quickly enough! I've had a very busy time recently having spent the last few weeks photographing and uploading my recent makes, updating my misi and folksy stores and then this last week has been spent on my own sparkly new website which went live yesterday! And so far it's had good reactions -Phew!



Now that all the computer geekery is out of the way I feel at a bit of a loose end so am going to spend the rest of the evening going through my sewing books and magazines searching for the next project. Will update you with what I pick to make and it's outcome tomorrow and the following days.

Ali xx