My first zippered project!

I went downstairs last night to make something that was consuming my brain.  I did the usual, ‘oh I’ll just work through 1 show and then go to bed’ and as usual didn’t go to bed until hours later.  After completing enough to get my creation out of my head inspiration struck while looking at some of my new lovely fabric scraps.  Originally I wanted to attempt the boxy pouch but quickly realized none of my scraps were the right measurements.  So I ventured off on a journey to make a lined pencil case type thingie.  And boy did it turn out to be quite the journey!!

After much stitch ripping, brain scrambling and muttered potty mouth words I have a very sweet and cute Snow White zippered pouch!  I even got fancy and stitched one of my new labels into it.  Shout out to Jennifer for those wonderful little labels by the way.

I only had the one zipper, there was a trip to the fabric store this morning.

Part of my day in Toronto.

Had some fun this week wandering about Toronto.  I’m going to have to make time to do this again really soon!  There was way to much to see and I ran out of time for all the fun things I wanted to accomplish.  In Kensington Market we stumbled upon Funky Junky, an awesome vintage store full of fantastic stuff.  I was camera-less but snapped some photos with my iphone.

A collection of vintage cameras and accessories.  Beside them was an ancient Singer sewing machine, the old weighs-a-ton black model with the fancy gold writing.  Yeah, that’s my description.

Suitcases and other travel worthy things.  Super cool stuff.  The white one was really cool but when we opened it there was a blow dryer inside!  Beside them you can see the collection of phones.  Around the corner from those was a big box with Gem’s Roadster in it!  Complete with FM radio in the trunk.  There was also a stack of old video games, including Intellivision!  We had that.  I remember my mom bought it on some financing plan it was so expensive when it first came out.  Of course Atari took off and poor little Intellivision was left in the dust.

Here’s some random kitchen stuff.  It was easy to lose track of time in there with so many fun things to look at!  The best part is it will be even more fun to make sure to pop back in every time I’m downtowm and see all the new treasures.  Definitely taking my camera next time.

The truth is out, my child is a robot.

While Nate was napping on Sunday Wesley and I got a little creative.  I cut the diaper box into a robot costume for him to play with.  We covered it in some foil so he’d be all silver a shiny.  Little did I know what I was getting myself into.  When I asked him if he wanted to come with me to the craft store he said yes and asked to bring his ‘robot box’.

We picked up some decorations for the front (buttons and stickers) and back (stripes aka ribbon).  Then once Nate woke up we headed over to my Aunt’s house to visit with my cousin for a bit while she was in town. My Aunt’s dog was not impressed with the outfit.  Sorry it’s blurry, robots move fast!

Wesley asked for some cheese and crackers and then was presented with the problem of trying to eat them while being a robot!

Later I had to run out for some milk and other things and robot Wesley tagged along once again. *sigh*

My 4 simple goals, at last.

I too jumped on the blogsphere bandwagon and decided to join in on Elsie’s 4 simple goals (before 2011). Then I sat around in a panic wondering what the heck I was going to choose to accomplish!

I think I’ve narrowed it down.

1.  Be more present in everything I do.  Mostly when I’m with the kids, the dishes can wait.

2. Read books in bed again, before sleepy time.

3. Take time for just me more often.

4. Try to take awesome photos.

My kids created and photographed by me.

Other nice fancy pants photos borrowed from We Heart It (click images for link to source).

Vintage finds!

Managed to sneak out to some yard sales 2 weekends ago.  I really wanted to look for an old suitcase to an underbed storage thingie I saw in a Better Homes and Gardens Storage magazine I picked up.  Since I only had 1 kid with me I thought I could quickly stop and check out a yard sale or two.  I made it to 2 and hit jackpot at both!!  The first one was right across the street from me!

Found this cool bar set thingie at my almost neighbours house. She sold me 3 things for $1, so I guess that means I paid $0.33ish for this little gem.  She didn’t even know what was inside.  When I shook it and asked, ‘what’s in there?’  she said ‘I don’t know it was my Dad’s’.  It even has the key!

Then I decided to just follow signs if they happened to be along my way to my final destination and I happened upon this lovely find.

I was so nervous asking how much it was, in my head I was praying they didn’t notice how great it was and name some crazy price. She said “$2?” I couldn’t believe it! So I just acted kind of cool and said “hmmm . . . . ok I guess”. hehe! As I was walking away I heard her say it was her great grandfathers!! Who sells something like that!? It’s in wonderful condition. I can’t see any year or anything that tells me what year it’s from. There is some writing on the front that says “Made in Czechoslovakia” but that’s it.

Here’s a shot of the project I was hoping to find a suitcase for.  It’s in the summer 2010 Storage magazine by Better Homes and Gardens.  I can’t bear to cut the top off to use it for the underbed storage, I’ll have to keep looking for one suitable for that project.

The next weekend I wandered around some sales with some friends and found these awesome dishes! They’re in fantastic condition.

I also grabbed these cute little mugs!  It’s a set of 4 and they were all individually wrapped in plastic and then they were sitting in a little cardboard tray and wrapped in plastic again.  They are flawless, such a cute and fun find.

I can’t wait to go out again before the summer is over!

Scrap shopping!

Thanks to a post over on Keyka Lou I was enlightened to the fact that people sell scraps on Etsy.  Cute fun little packets of odds and ends of fabric from their stashes.   So off to Etsy I went to do a little search.  I think I got a little carried away.

I went to The Hey Day Shop and couldn’t decide between the 3 stash listings she had for sale, so I bought them all.

There’s even more listed right now . . must . . . resist . . .

I also went to Funky Good Stuff and picked up 2 bundles. It arrived yesterday and it was full of a bunch of cute fairy tale fabrics! Snow White, Little Miss Muffet, Goldilocks and Rapunzel, they’re all so cute.

Finally I picked up some cute bird themed scraps from Starlit Nest who has odds and ends for sale and even offers a subscription program that lasts 6 months of fun scraps arriving in your mail box every month!

Oh AND I had some fun ordering some cute fat quarters from Bytinster. There’s some really adorable stuff there right now! I’m loving these.

Jazzing up boring white address labels.

I’ve been doing a lot of shipping lately with the sales in my shop and after a few handwritten return address labels I thought I’d get a bit inventive.  Plus it saves space on the package.  So I printed some return address labels on Avery label paper.  Then I gathered some other paper materials to stick them on to.  I started with an old atlas.

Then I grabbed some other things to reuse like Nate’s recent art work and some flyers from the newspaper.

It was super easy I just peeled off the sticky label and placed it on the backing paper so it would have a neat border.  Then I cut around it leaving a bit of the backing paper showing.  Other things I thought would make really neat backing papers are wallpaper scraps, paint chips and old stamps, sadly I didn’t have any of those lying around.

I used packing tape to just go over the whole label when adhering it to the packaging, I wanted to make sure they stayed on as some are going far, far away.  Glue, a tape runner or a Xyron would work too.

Girly Handmade Beginnings pants this time!

I was so happy to get to pick out some fun and girl-ish stuff to make for the lovely baby Samantha.  I also got fancy and appliqued some t-shirts to go with the reversible pants.  Needed a nice thoughtful gift and a break from being a pillow factory.

You can’t really see but there are little brown, pink and white birds on the first pants.  I added some brown with white polka dot fabric to the inside to make rolling up the pant legs more fun.  On the second pair of pants I actually cut the leg shorter and added that bank of green apple fabric so when she grows bigger and can’t roll up the pant legs they’ll still look like they have a fun contrasting cuff.

Now I just have to get her counting book all done! :)

Apple cozy complete.

Despite being embarrassed and a tad annoyed by the outcome of this project I’m going to share.

I needed a lot of help along the way for this project.  Mostly because it was my first time following a pattern when crocheting.  Before this I had only made squares.  *SOME* people laughed at me and asked if I was making a plum cozy initially but I found my groove with the right hook and a much looser grip.

All said and done I started over about 3 times, I went up a hook size, I pulled rows out numerous times, I counted along the way and was somehow waaaay off on many, many rows.  Finally when I was done I was so proud and ran to the fridge only to discover it doesn’t fit the apples I usually eat at all.

Guess I’m starting a new one!

Where have I been?

Doing this!

It’s been a busy few days around here. The funny thing is it’s been great for creativity and ideas are just popping into my head constantly now. The downside is I have to jot them down and get to them later now that there’s orders to make and ship. It’s hetic and the pressure is on but at the same time I’m having a blast. I could use a maid though, the house isn’t surviving this creative spurt too well!

I also managed to sneak out to 2 yard sales on Saturday, since I only had Nate with me I thought I’d stop at some as I meandered over to the Grandparents. I hit jackpot! I have to snap some pictures but I picked up the most awesome vintage suitcase and an amazing train case type thing that’s actually a bar in a case. I was pretty surprised at my luck. I think I have to make more time for yard sale-ing in the future.

Ok, I have an idea I have to get out of my head before going to bed, hopefully before the single digits!