I’m sure only a very enthusiastic mummy can see the beauty in this picture but for me this is just incredible. Little Miss Bossy-Boots’ room looks so big now even with all the tools, doors and ladders in it. I can’t wait for tomorrow!
Category: Home Projects
A new beginning
Little Miss Bossy-Boots is incredibly excited. And so is her mummy. Because today the work on her new room has started. When we moved into this house she was eleven months old and still in her cot so we put her in the smallest room.
Now that she’s a big girl and in a big bed she really needs more space. Her little bookshelf is overflowing and her toys are in boxes under the bed. Yesterday I emptied her room and the space outside her room and as I’m typing this the wall is being pulled down. Check out the before photos:
Grotty carpet, jungle blind and Winnie the Pooh lamp will soon be gone.
This was the wall. Little Miss Bossy-Boots asked for the new wall to be pink so we got some tester pots and painted squares on the wall.
This is the obsolete cupboard and space outside her room which used to house the boiler and will be integrated into the room. Curious cat is optional.
I am so excited about this project and can’t wait to get my sewing room back to make a bean bag, some cushions and other girly things for this room. Check back tomorrow for pictures of the room without a wall….
A year of blogging
It’s a exactly a year since I started this blog and I’ve enjoyed it immensely. I admit that I’ve felt the pressure a couple of times when I hadn’t posted for a while but all in all I’ve loved it.
However, I haven’t posted as many tutorials as I had planned simply because they are more time-consuming than I thought they would. As I have a few almost finished ones (I’m just hoping for some better light for the photographs!) I’m going to challenge myself to post a tutorial every month.
This year I’m also going to challenge myself to try and finish all those UFOs (or WIPs, if you prefer) that are lying around the sewing room.
This little Shark Mug Rug was one of my UnFinished Objects until I bound it yesterday. Can’t wait to use it now.
It might be a bit wonky and all that but I don’t mind. Nobody is perfect.
The next UFO is already on the table getting the same treatment. I’m on a roll. Long may it continue….
Ta-dah!
Do you remember my little doll quilt that I started piecing a while ago? It’s finished! I’m really happy with it. It is, after all, the first quilt I have ever made properly with batting and binding. Ok, so it might not be perfect but it’s definitely the first of many.
My friend Delphine gave me five fat quarters of “Hoopla!” by Moda and asked me to make a doll quilt and pillow for her daughter. Delphine’s husband made a doll’s bed for Charlotte for Christmas and they wanted to make sure the dolls would be comfortable. It was quite daunting at first but once I started it was so much fun. The pillow is just pieced together from leftover bits from the quilt.
There was quite a bit of fabric left after I finished with the quilt so I made a cushion cover for Charlotte. I thought she might enjoy having a cushion for her bed in the same colours as her doll’s quilt and pillow.
I added a bright yellow zip to the back of the cushion as it’s always good to be able to wash a cushion cover.
The best thing about the whole project? Apart from having loads of fun, this is part of a swap. In return for making this quilt for Charlotte, Steve will make Little Miss Bossy-Boots a doll’s bed for Christmas! Definitely a win-win situation for me as I get a fabulous gift for my little girl for Christmas and, on top of that, get to make another quilt.
BTW The doll quilt is 38cm by 44 cm, the pillow is 20cm by 24cm, the cushion cover is 36cm by 36 cm (just in case anyone is curious about dimensions).
Bunting
I have been quiet these last few days because I haven’t been feeling very well. Master got a cold the week before and I was really happy that I hadn’t caught it…that is until Friday. I started feeling poorly on Friday afternoon and by Saturday was so unwell I stayed in bed till 4pm (something which I haven’t done since I was a teenager, I think).
As you can imagine there hasn’t been much crafting around here because of that although I did manage to make some bunting for my stall at the pre-school’s Christmas Fayre. I love making bunting as it’s such a repetitive and mindless activity (I’m not sure what that says about me?!) and I’ve really enjoyed getting the Christmas fabrics out.
So far I’ve got four strings of bunting with seven flags each. I’m trying to keep all prices below £10 as I noticed last year that that was the spending limit for most people for one single item.
I’d like to apologise for the bad quality pictures. It’s a really grey and horrible day here today. Would you believe this wall had the most light in all of the house?
Enough rambling, though, here’s the bunting:
This bunting is traditional with the green wool felt holly leaves and red holly berries which are actually red buttons. I’ve had this fabric for a few years and am really glad it’s finally been used.
I love this bunting and am secretly hoping it won’t sell so I can keep it. The colourful fabric is called Christmas Celebration Twinkle 13 and is by Freedom Fabrics. I love that it isn’t christmassy but still has all the Christmas colours in it.
The rose bunting has, as the name suggests, some red roses on the maroon flags.
I used a smallish scrap of Christmas fabric in this red and white bunting which I’ve had for about 20 years. It has little green holly leaves and gold bows on it and I really like it. I still have a small piece left and I’m not quite sure what I’m going to make with it but I’m sure I’ll think of something in the next 20 years.
a mystery revealed
The mystery item (shown here) is:
A doorstop! I hope you’re not too disappointed. As you can see I’ve added a felt butterfly since. Can’t have something in Little Miss Bossy-Boots’ room that isn’t pink…
I made this one for the door of Little Miss Bossy-Boots’ room as she keeps banging it shut when she’s playing in her room. I don’t mind her closing the door, it’s the banging I object to. Waiting for her to get her little fingers caught or, worse, one of her little friends’ fingers.
She can move a regular door stop but can’t get a hold of this one as it’s on top of the door. Sorted!
A mystery
Do you know what this is going to be when it’s finished? Any guesses?
Finished!
I’ve finished the tumbler cushion I started at the workshop and I’m really happy with it.
So happy, in fact, that I’ve started a second one.
Tumblers!
On Saturday I had a f a b u l o u s day. Master and I packed Little Miss Bossy-Boots and my sewing machine in the car and set off to drive all the way to Lowestoft. What were we doing there, you might wonder. Well, Master and Little Miss Bossy-Boots went to Africa Alive while I was on the adventure of my life (ok, that might be a slight exaggeration). In fact, I was off to Patch Fabrics to participate in a workshop to learn how to make a Tumbler Cushion. I know, I know I could have done that down the road from me at our local quilting shop but not with Katy Jones from Fat Quarterly. I have been reading her blog, I’m a Ginger Monkey, for about a year now and when she posted that she was going to offer a workshop I just knew I wanted to do it. And I am so glad I did (even though my hands trembled from sheer excitement for the first half hour).
We were six ladies, all eager to learn how to make a tumbler cushion. I had picked two charm packs (Camden Market and Robert Kaufmann Kona Solids in Bright) and was soon busy cutting out my tumblers. Counting obviously isn’t my strong point as I realised, after I thought I had cut out all 35 of them, that I didn’t have enough and had to go back and cut another four. I found it a little difficult to choose my solids and was grateful for Katy’s suggestions. She picked a couple of colours I wouldn’t have gone for but I can see now how well they go with the others. Then came the fun part, arranging 35 different tumblers into a pleasing pattern. Being a complete novice in the quilting department I asked for Katy’s help as I was a bit stumped. All in all I did well but she suggested that I swap a couple of the solids with some of the patterned ones as they were clustered together. Katy took a picture of the arrangement to check that it was balanced which made it much easier to see.
Next we sewed the tumblers together into rows of seven before sewing the five rows together. I managed to sew two of my rows together the wrong way and thought I would have to unpick everything but luckily for me it wasn’t too unbalanced with the rows reversed and Katy suggested that I just keep going. Phew! After sewing all the tumblers together we added a border and quilted the cushion. I loved it. So calming. All I could think of were my lines. I enjoyed the process of cutting, arranging and sewing but the quilting took the biscuit. Yep, I’m hooked.
Sadly I had to leave before I could finish my cushion. We were running a little late, so when Master and Little Miss Bossy-Boots arrived to pick me up I had only just finished the quilting. As soon as I finish this post, however, I will be upstairs finishing off my cushion. Because I had to leave before getting all the tips and tricks on how to bind my cushion, Katy very kindly offered to email me a tutorial. I’ve just received it and I’m glad I got it as I would have done it differently.
Before I go and finish off my cushion I’ll leave you with a picture of the front of my cushion:
Aprons
Little Miss Bossy-Boots has a lovely apron my mother bought her a while ago. It’s red and has a picture of “Charlie and Lola”. We love the tv series and have quite a few of their books. In fact their books are some of Little Miss’s favourite goodnight stories. Anyway, the problem with this apron is that the loop that goes around the neck is just way too long. The top of the apron ends up somewhere around her belly button and I keep thinking that I should do something about it. Well, this post is not about me dealing with the apron in question but about me sewing a new apron.
I was going to sew one for Little Miss Bossy-Boots but ended up making one for her little friend Freddie first. It was his birthday last week and I really wanted to make something for him. Whenever I look at pictures of him there always seem to be a few of him baking with his Mummy. Hey presto, birthday gift sorted. I pulled some fabric from my stash and ended up with this:
I love it but then I should, shouldn’t I? After all, I made it. I hope that Freddie will like it too. The ties have orange “tips” because I wanted to use a bit more of the orange fabric. Because of the problem we have with Little Miss Bossy-Boots’ apron, I decided to use two D-rings for the loop around the neck. I like this system as it means that the loop is fully adjustable.
I had to bribe Little Miss Bossy-Boots to model the apron for me. Ice cream! We did, however, take off the apron before eating it…
She did enjoy her modelling session in the end and I have a couple of lovely pictures of a grinning girl. That’s quite something as she doesn’t normally like having her photo taken and looks down on most of them. I have countless pictures of the back of her head and they are wonderful but it is nice to get a smiley face from time to time. I’m just sorry you won’t be able to enjoy it as I’ve decided not to put pictures of her on this blog.
Little Miss Bossy-Boots is now desperate to get her own apron made. It has to be pink, of course, and I have lots of pink fabrics in my stash. However, I bought some tea towels I really loved, one pink gingham and two flowery ones. Three tea towels for £4 were such a bargain, I couldn’t NOT buy them. Once again, I have a few alterations to finish before I can get stuck into the apron properly. But, hopefully, she’ll have it by the weekend.