Day to Day

Sewing Blythe clothes

I thought I'd have a play with my new pattern today and surprise Bella after school with some Blythe doll clothes.  In the process I learnt something - Blythe doll clothes are fiddly and you need lots of patience for them.

 

I sewed a couple of bandanas to begin with and they were easy peasy.  Then onto a skirt, which was easy to construct, only when I sewed it together the elastic was too tight and it wouldn't pull up over Miss Ruby's legs.  I think perhaps I didn't keep my seam allowance quite small enough.  So, with a bit of modifying, the skirt became an apron:

 
Both girls are wearing their new bandanas in the photos above and Bella was pretty excited that I'd sewed something from the pattern.  Next time I'll try one of the little tops or perhaps the beret, but for now I'm going to go back to my crochet blankets - I really want to get them finished and soon.

 

{spoilt}

I was totally spoilt today! 

It was my birthday a few weeks ago and today I received the yummiest gifts in the mail, a very sweet belated birthday gift.  Seriously, these goodies are so me - a to die for necklace, the most divine postcards, a pretty birthday card and two very cool prints that are ready to frame.  I'm going to buy some plain black frames and pop them up on our bedroom wall.  So, so good and totally spoilt.

There was also an awesome Blythe doll pattern which Bella is SO excited about.  Her first Blythe doll (Ruby) arrived exactly a year ago today and that equates to a Blythe birthday party, apparently.  There was present unwrapping this morning for Ruby - all handmade gifts by Bella - and tomorrow I've been requested begged to make Ruby an outfit from the new pattern.  We'll see how I go!  

Thankyou so much Tamar, you're a very sweet friend. 

Camp mini album

It's been a while since I've done a mini album.  I try to steer clear of them actually because we have a basket full of them at home (30 plus mini albums - crazy) but I had a whole wad of mini photos from our last camping trip that seriously needed scrapbooking, so I decided that a mini album would be the best way to get them all sorted at once.

I used the lovely Paper Treasures collection from Tarisota and kept the layout pretty simple, using my trusty vintage typewriter for the journaling.

There are a few more pages of my mini album which you can see HERE in the July gallery.

Paper treasures

 

Last week I got to play with the new Paper Treasures collection for Tarisota.  Seriously yummy to scrap with!!  I did two layouts about Bella meeting one of her sweet penpals, Emily.  Emily's Mum (Janelle) took these totally beautiful photos of the girls together and was kind enough to send us a copy of them all.  It was really hard to settle on which photos to scrapbook first, so in the end Bella chose her two favourites for me to use.

 

I did a mini album too, but I'll share that tomorrow.  You can drool and/or purchase the collection HERE. 

Scout Girl

Our Bella has been a Cub Scout for a few months now and on the weekend she attended her first camp.  There was great excitement as she packed her bags and headed off for the night, armed with her newly crocheted hat to keep her warm, Albert monkey to snuggle with and her anywhere pillow to rest her head on.  She pretty much packed her own bag, marking things off the checklist as she went.  Her only concern was that there wouldn't be enough fruit for her to eat while she was away (there was plenty).

So off she set, super happy and excited and home she came the following day - busting for the next Scout camp to roll around.  Her highlight was making flour bombs that they made and threw at each other - we had a mini demonstration of those in the afternoon...um, visualise flour everywhere!  I'm so glad that she enjoyed herself.

Russian dolls

How cute are these embroidered Russian Dolls? The super lovely Rachel of Four Wise Monkeys has a tutorial for them, so I thought I'd share the link here, incase somebody would like to make a set.  Link HERE.

 

When not to sew

Today I wasn't feeling so well, but rather than sit on the couch I decided to do a bit of sewing.  BIG mistake.  

Remember the start of my camera themed photo wallet from THIS post?  Well, I thought this might be a great project to work on today, but it went a little haywire when I sewed the binding (to edge the wallet) into ties and then wondered why they were so long.  Before I realised why, I snipped them down to size. HELLO, what a goose I am!!  Anyhow, I kept plodding along and after a few more minutes I managed to also sew the pockets together incorrectly.  As I was cursing myself and unpicking, I stuck the quick-unpicker right through the fabric and ripped a nice sized hole in it. 

So, I packed away my machine and sewing project for another day when my head is nice and clear.  But, I did learn a new technique today, needleturn applique - hooray!

Bella's crochet project

Bella has been asking me to teach her to crochet for a little while now, but honestly I didn't think she was quite old enough to master it.  I kept telling her that I would teach her in a couple more years and to just carry on with her knitting.   I was secretly thinking I didn't really have the patience to teach her.....I mean crocheting is fast and easy once you know how but it can do your head in while you're learning.  

So, she kept on pestering and a few weeks ago her Nanny Joan decided to teach her. She kind of grasped the concept, but was getting muddled on the edge turns, so she spent her time fashioning up cute circles and odd shapes that she made up in her head.  

 

Then her pestering started again, this time to create a bigger project.  There were big dreams of a crochet blanket, scarves and all sorts of crazy things, but then I remembered about THIS cool pattern that I'd bookmarked a little while ago and Bella agreed that it was the perfect project for her to tackle.

After the first row she was crocheting like a pro and I had to eat my original words that she was too young to be crocheting.  The hat is all finished now and I sewed it up for her yesterday and made the ties, but the entire 'hat' part was crocheted by Bella.  I know I say this often, but seriously there is no stopping this girl once she puts her mind to something.

 

So cute. She's going to take it to Scout camp this weekend to help keep her little self warm.

{stationery}

{source} 
Bella and I bought a set of these sweet label stickers today, from a store in our area.  They're to add to our small stationery stash that keeps on growing.  I think all nice letters need a label sticker on the envelope, don't you agree?! Somehow I think Bella is going to try and use up all the deer ones on her letters, so there might be a bit of a battle going on there because I rather fancy them myself.

Also, I bought these postcards from HERE on Etsy.  There were 10 all up, but I won't share them all - just a few of my favourites:

 

They fed my new postcard addiction rather nicely, only it's going to be super hard to part with them when I mail them out.  I'm going to save them for special postcard swaps and perhaps keep a couple for my own collection.

Around the dam we went

We took the kids around Risdon Brook dam today, they rode their bikes and we walked.  It was a good day and we finished it off with a bake off (cinnamon scrolls) between Rich and James.  James won - his were so light and fluffy!  Sorry Rich :(

Just a short post today.  Hope you're all having a nice weekend!