Runaway October

So I decided to join in Sun­day Stash started by Tamara of 1/4 of an inch. The idea is to air out some of your stash and maybe get some inspiration.

This is one of my favorite fab­rics. I picked it up on clear­ance when a local Han­cocks was going out of busi­ness. I’m not sure what to do with it though. Of course I bought 2 yards… just in case

This is a lovely lit­tle 1 yard piece that I just picked up at Good­Will this Sat­ur­day. $1.50! Go Me! It is Alexan­der Henry’s “The Great Pumpkin”.

Under­neath both of these is a huge piece of yummy cor­duroy that I also scored at the thrift store also. It’s a rusty red­dish brown that will make great fall or win­ter projects. I intend to use it for steam­punk cos­tumes, of course.

If you’d care to join in, hop on over and tell Tamara that you’d like to play too.

 Manic Mon­day for July 21

What’s your favorite beach in the world?

I’ve actu­ally only been to a few beaches… The beach in San Diego was crowded, dirty and pretty much ghetto — not my first choice. The only other beach I’ve been to are the ones in Rocky Point, Mex­ico. So I’ll have to answer this ques­tion after I’ve trav­eled the world a lit­tle bit more.

What’s the next coun­try you want to visit?

Ire­land, hands down, though Ger­many, Bel­gium and Asu­trailia are all pretty evenly tied for second.

What one thing are you crav­ing today?

Does peace and quiet count? Or a maid? I am crav­ing a meal that some­one else cooks for me and cleans up after­wards. Or a prime rib from Out­back, I always crave those. Or Honey Hot chicken wings from The Vine. I should prob­a­bly go cook din­ner now. 

Okay, so, things have been quite busy here. Some good things, some bad things. Lots of pictures.

Where to start.…

Rowan now has two teeth and judg­ing by his level of irritibil­ity it seems he may be pop­ping out a few more. The first one was super easy and I didn’t even know it was hap­pen­ing. What a trooper huh? He’s been wear­ing his Amber Teething Neck­lace and just looks so cute in it! We call this his pirate face.

[singlepic=139,350,center]

[singlepic=140,350,center]

::::::::::::::::::::

We recently spent a morn­ing at Agri­topia with Grandma Ann and were blessed with an over­cast sky. Sadly it was humid enough to induce a full body sweat film, but we still had a good time. The food was won­der­ful as well. Rowan just adored the grass.  We don’t have a sin­gle blade at our house, because it’s a crappy rental. Declan loved being able to run wild while we sat and ate — Oh, to be a two year old again. Notice the shorts D is wear­ing? Made ‘em. Yep. I actu­ally made some­thing for a boy. Not as easy as you think.

[singlepic=143,400,center]

[singlepic=144,350,center]

[singlepic=141,350,center]

 ::::::::::::::::::::

I com­pleted my Chromium Star Afghan for a very preggo friend, though it didn’t come out as expected. I don’t have the time, or the heart, to frog it and start over. It ruf­fles in cer­tain sec­tions, as you can kinda tell here. Before it ruf­fled so bad it wouldn’t lay flat. This is after wash­ing and block­ing. The points also curve but I kinda like it that way. I asked the pat­tern cre­ator for help a cou­ple times, but have got­ten no reply. If you break the star into sec­tions — you should see ten here — the sec­tion that goes from the val­ley to the peak ruf­fles up, like there’s way too many stitches. I’ve gone over the pat­tern time and time again and can’t fig­ure out what I did wrong. Any ideas?

[singlepic=131,350,center]

 ::::::::::::::::::::

I opened an apple for the kids the other day and the seeds had started to sprout. How cool is that? We popped them in a lit­tle pot and look what we have now. One is a marigold and the leafier one is the apple. Funny how they start out the same size. The apple was organic and local grown so I’m hop­ing that it’ll will actu­ally grow since it’s most likely not some funky kind of com­mer­cial hybrid.

[singlepic=138,350,center]

 ::::::::::::::::::::

My biggest news is that Matt has fully given me his bless­ing to really move on an Etsy bou­tique. I’d like to make some income from it, but Matt will be happy if I just cover the cost of all my fab­ric. I cre­ated a pat­tern for a sim­ple lit­tle jumper and match­ing dia­per cover and used one of my favorite girly fab­rics. It came out awe­some. I even made some labels that will make do for now. But then dis­as­ter struck! The reverse but­ton on my machine just kinda popped out in my hand while try­ing to do the last two but­ton­holes. I would have been fin­ished. But no! Matt’s mom had given me her old machine, so I can use that for straight sewing, but I can’t get the but­ton holer to work.

[singlepic=133,350,center]

 ::::::::::::::::::::

Stu­pid me, I marked the but­ton place­ment on the out­side of the dress with an indeli­ble marker not think­ing I’d have an issue. Grr. Now I have a cute lit­tle jumper set that I can’t sell until I fig­ure out the but­ton­hole idea. I was so so so happy to be get­ting some­thing rolling. It’s cute though, no? Would you buy it? Well, if it was finished?

[singlepic=134,350,center]

::::::::::::::::::::

I think I’m going to have my labels made by Spoon­flower. The ones I made myself were on muslin with fab­ric paint and I really like the soft­ness. No one wants those itchy pokey tags. Now I just need to come up with a logo and make all the ban­ners and avatars for my bou­tique. Any one want to help? I’ll make you cook­ies and water­mel­on­ade!

I’m think­ing of pay­ing some­one to do it for me. Maybe I should look into busi­ness grants? Any­one want to help fund my ende­vour? Or buy a new sewing machine!?!

Com­ments guys! I live for com­ments!! Seriously.

(As always, click for big­ger pictures.)

[singlepic=113,400]

I used a pat­tern from Hip Hand­bags and love the way it turned out. I’ll def­i­nitely be using the pat­tern over again, as both my mom and myself really liked the size and shape.

[singlepic=114,400]

Only prob­lem is that it’s more of a medium purse than a mar­ket tote.

[singlepic=115,400]

I went ahead and put a reg­u­lar dou­ble welt pocket in it any­way, using match­ing pip­ing from the out­side. The lin­ing is the Sage Kleo from Alexan­der Henry’s Fash­ion­ista line that I am totally in love with.

[singlepic=116,400]

I totally love the way it came out, but I real­ized I could really use one of those itty bitty mini irons. I just could not get the wrin­kles out of the bot­tom cor­ners. It got pretty man­gled try­ing to sew the bot­tom on. Appar­ently my machine does not like tight cor­ners when using buck­ram and heavy inter­fac­ing. Who knew?

[singlepic=117,600]

I hope you enjoy Eliz­a­beth. I’ll get it in the mail as soon as I have some­one to watch the kids!

________________________

On another note, here’s the iron­ing board cover I did recently. Cute, no?

[singlepic=109,800]

I really need to work on tak­ing pic­tures indoors. Sum­mer sun is just too harsh to take stills outside.

Ama­zon is hav­ing a great sale on tons and tons of toys. Lots of out­door stuff, but other cool stuff too… like this:

Check it out here!