Christmas Skirts

OK, time for a confession. I am one of those mum's who makes her children wear a Christmas outfit - and when I say Christmas, I mean it needs to have red and green in it:) I saw this cherry print a couple of months ago and while not Christmas per se, I thought it would be cute in a Christmas outfit.

Since I didn't have a lot of the fabric the idea of a panel skirt seemed perfect. A friend had seen just such a skirt based on vertical panels (non Christmas) so we came up with a pattern.

The skirt contains eight panels, each a different fabric. I started with the cherry fabric as the inspiration. Middle picked the other fabrics she wanted (all reds and greens, none necessarily Christmas though) while littlest got hers picked for her by yours truly:) We have paired them with pre-made tops that I've embellished.

Fortunately, the girls love them. Once we get past all the Christmas making and craziness I might even make a few more of these skirts for the girls, but in different fabrics:)

Now that the skirts are done, all we need to do is to go get our cheesy Christmas picture in our Christmas outfits with Santa:) And oh, I can cross two more Christmas making projects off my list! Cyndy

PS in case you are wondering, as oldest is a boy a red or green T-shirt is about all I can get him to wear - no Christmas sewing involved:)

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Christmas Making

Well, Christmas is just over a week away and I am still at only one fully completed gift (a dress for middle). Clearly I must like/need the pressure and/or am easily distracted/have a short attention span:)

Ok, maybe the picture is not as quite as dire as I have just painted. True, only one gift is complete, but many are in progress like this doll for littlest. I just need to sew the legs on (they are done, just not sewed on), finish the head,  make a few clothes and the linens for the doll bed. So, I just need to focus, focus focus. Right? Or maybe I should be asking Santa to bring me a couple of extra days:)

Hope your Christmas making is doing a little better than mine! Cyndy Pin It

My Place and Yours - Christmas Special

This is a hard one for me. As someone who grew up in the northern hemisphere (the United States) Christmas is about cold, snow, a fire in the fireplace, hot chocolate and tacky Christmas lights all over your house. Hot, sunny and going to the beach just doesn't seem right:)

That said I have (kinda) adjusted and besides Christmas in our house is all about the children. No designer colours or decorations, just lots of stuff made by the kids, picked out by the kids, given to the kids, was mine when I was a kid:)

This year we actually have two Christmas trees. One is fake (got it for $12 the first Christmas we spent here) and one is real. This is our first real tree because I am a bit of a Christmas tree snob. It's not that I like perfectly manicured Christmas trees, because I don't. In our house, we used to go out to the Christmas tree farm and cut our own. It was usually wider than it was tall:) It's more that I like a certain kind of Christmas tree (Douglass fir) and it appears they don't grow them here in Australia or if they do they cost a bazillion dollars. But this one was free, just the right price for me to overcome my snobbishness:)

Christmas is also about memories. I love it when we are decorating the tree and the children shout out, that ones mine, or I got that from ____, or ask me about a decoration that predates them. When I was in my mid 30's my mother decided (without telling us children) to move to a themed tree. That meant all the decorations we had made as children, had been given etc... that didn't meet the theme were tossed. My sister and I about had a heart attack, because even at our "mature" age we still loved the memories that all these things represented.

And finally Christmas is about traditions. It's about putting up the tree the weekend after Thanksgiving (yes even here:), making Christmas cookies, writing a  letter and visiting Santa, watching Its a Wonderful Life at least once, and getting up at the crack of dawn on Christmas day to open your presents from Santa no matter how old you are:)

Merry Christmas from my family to yours and you can check out more Christmas specials here! Cyndy Pin It

My Creative Space

 

Even though I should be focusing on a specific craft project (like Christmas presents) sometimes I get distracted by an idea that I decide I need to try. Recently, I embroidered words on some needlework. It looked awful, so I unpicked it.

I had done the words freehand. But after seeing my results, I thought there has to be a better way. Sure enough a better way occurred to me so I decided I needed to try it out - now. As it was an idea that I hadn't tested and I have other projects I should be working on (like Christmas presents) you would think I would try it with something simple. Not my style, because I decided to go all out and do an entire multi sentence quote complete with a picture (from Norman Lindsay's The Magic Pudding)!

You will be glad to know that my idea worked:) My words looked so much better. What did I do to embroider the words? I simply printed the words in a font that I liked on paper (make sure to print them in a colour other than the colour you plan to embroider them in) and affixed the paper to the fabric I was using. I then embroidered on the paper/fabric and pulled the paper off when I was finished.

So now that I know it works, its time to get back to the projects I really need to get done (Christmas presents:).

Hope you are not too distracted in your creative space this week. For more creative spaces you can visit here. Cyndy Pin It

My Creative Space - Doll Clothes

If you have been reading for a while you may recall in August I wrote about the doll I planned to make for my littlest for Christmas this year. I finally cut the doll pieces out a couple of weeks ago, but have yet to start sewing them together. I figure I need to do that when littlest isn't around if I want to keep it a surprise:)

I have also started to cut out some of the clothes for the doll. I've decided to go with a palette of pinks, as this is her favorite colour right now, and make some coordinated  tops, skirts, dresses and pants. While I sew a lot without patterns and directions, I am using a pattern for these (they came with the doll pattern) and actually finding it a bit difficult! Not sure if it is me or the pattern directions. It could also be the small size, as I find this changes how you can work with and even conceptualize the material. I was thinking I might be able to sew them while she is around as I can probably fudge what they are with her. Or, maybe since I am finding them a little difficult I need to be sewing them when the littlest isn't around so I can concentrate:)

Either way, I hope you are getting lots done in your creative space this week! For more creative spaces you can visit here. Cyndy Pin It

Op Shop Finds - Vintage Vegetable Themed Table Cloth

Do you have something that when you see it in an op makes your heart beat a little faster? Your eyes dart from side to side? Your palms start to sweat? Do you have some you so covet that you hope no one else notices your excitement, for fear they will swoop in and grab the item from you?

I do, it's vintage vegetable themed kitchen items of any sort. I love vegetables on anything; cookware, serving ware, table cloths, tea towels, art work, rugs. Yes, on anything.

About a week ago on my way to Spotlight I stopped in one of my favourite little op shops and when going through the table linens found this fabulous vegetable themed table cloth. A little wrinkly I know, but it did need a wash. I've ironed it and am already using it on the children's computer table in the kitchen. I paid $2. Sigh...doesn't that just warm your heart? Cyndy Pin It

My Creative Space

Today is Thanksgiving in the US, so this past Sunday (as it's not a holiday here) we celebrated with all our friends downunder (more here). That means my focus was on getting ready for the party. Lots of baking (boy did the house smell good, sugar cookies, pumpkin pie, turkey:) and lots of cleaning.

I don't know about you, but I don't have a separate craft space, I use the kitchen table and the kitchen island for most of my making. While I clear the kitchen table so we can eat our meals, the kitchen island is a writhing pile of craft supplies and projects. For the party I had to clean it ALL up. It started out well, putting thing back in all the right places, but in the end I was dumping things into boxes/bags so I could just get it done!

Now we all know packing up is easier than unpacking (well, for me at least:) so I haven't returned everything to its home on the kitchen bench yet (I couldn't even find my basket of scissors for 2 days as I couldn't remember where I had moved them too). But as I look at my kitchen island, it's already looking like that writhing pile of craft supplies and projects! I think it might be time to just say "Hi, my name is Cyndy and I am a messy crafter:)"

It's messyalready for a good reason. A friend has talked me into sharing a stall at the Queenscliff Market this Sunday (it's also the Queenscliff Music Festival), so I have been making a few things to replace those I sold at my first market; mostly, some new wool embroidery pieces. Fortunately, I am only having a stall, not one of the market organizers, so not feeling stressful (I am also guessing having had a stall the fear of the unknown is now gone:) So if you are going to Queenscliff this weekend come by the market and say hi!

Hope you are getting lots done in your creative space (messy or not:) this week! For more creative spaces you can visit here. Cyndy Pin It