A 'simple' Quiet Book

I had a go at making a 'simpler' quiet book on the weekend (as opposed to Hamish's!). I wanted to see how much effort it would take because I was thinking it might be a good item to include at the Craft Market. It was so much fun to make and it's a great way to use up all of those felt scraps!

It did take a little longer than I thought, only because I was making a lot of it up as I went along, some ideas for pages I borrowed from other blogs and then made my own 'pattern' pieces up because my book is a little smaller then most. I also had to control myself here and there, if I had my own way I would've sewed on little beads for the cupcakes and embroidered the girls face etc., but then I would have to charge $100 for it ;-) It also turned out unintentionally girly, oops!

Pg 2 and 3 - Dress the girl A little girl (in underwear) complete with a wardrobe of outfits. I am in love with her spotty pj's!

Pg 4 - Match the colours and the shapes

Pg 5 - Match the cupcakes to the number As you can see this one changed a bit at the last minute otherwise I would've chosen a plain colour for the patty pans!

Pg 6 - Write a letter

Pg 7 - Post your letter

Lucky it's a bit 'old' for Izzy and too pink for Hamish, otherwise I might be tempted to keep it :)

In the mail!

Another t-shirt dress this time for my neice Layne along with her I-Spy bag! I saw these Fraggle Rock t-shirts on sale at Kmart and couldn't resist turning one into a dress for Layne because I believe her Mum was a huge fan of the show back in the day ;-)

Hope they like it!

A few more things for Izzy's room, and SEWING!

A few more additions to Izzy's room to share! Firstly some framed butterflies...

I have had these shadow frames from Ikea for a while so I used one to frame some 3D butterflies I found on eBay. I covered the backing board with some fabric I had and then stuck the butterflies on with sticky dots.

While I was browsing 'butterflies' on eBay I found this vinyl wall sticker(s) which I thought would be perfect for her robe sliding doors as there is not too much else you can do with them! For around $15 I thought it was pretty cheap for the size! They also seem a lot easier to remove than the other one Izzy has in her bedroom already. I love the sillhouette!

And now I am going to embark on a sewing frenzy! The Free Reformed Church of Southern River will be holding a Fine Food & Craft Market on Sat May 1st (at the church) and I hope to have a stall along with my sister-in-law Tash. I am aiming to have some I-Spy bags, girls T-shirt dresses and other goodies for sale!

T-shirt dress for Izzy

Izzy has a few t-shirt dresses and I love them on her, they are so comfortable while still being 'girly' so I couldn't wait to make her one myself using the Sienna Dress pattern from Lil Blue Boo. The bottom ruffle, the ribbing on the sleeves and the little ruffle on the neckline were my own additions. As it was my first time sewing stretch knit I was a bit nervous but it was so much fun!

Instead of using recycled t-shirts I used some flowery stretch knit I had bought from Textile Traders on sale. At the time I wasn't even sure I liked it but it was cheap ;-) Mum had also given me a box of all of her ribbing a while back and the only colour that wasn't in there was navy of course, but for some reason the turquoise seemed to match the navy print, so then followed the turqouise polka dot.

Because of the dark colours I was intending the dress to be long sleeved, but alas, they didn't fit over Izzy's cast so I chopped them! Otherwise she wouldn't be able to wear it for another 5 weeks and it is already on the smaller side.


I was planning to get the little princess to model it for me today, but it's not really photo taking weather here. I'm so happy with how it turned out I'm already scheming the next one!

Introducing my first softie....

...Isabelle Owl!!

My lovely sister in law (thanks Tash!) won this pattern on a blog giveway and kindly passed it on to me, and yes it is actually named Isabelle Owl. How cute. It has two removable baby owls tucked into it's pocket wings. As I started sewing this the day my Isabelle broke her arm, I decided I had to give the poor owl a broken wing too! The only problem was I did the wrong wing, it should have been the right - ooops :)

It is actually deceiving and a lot bigger than it looks, Izzy thinks it makes a nice pillow!

More I Spy!

Two more I Spy bags complete! The blue one was a request from Scott's Aunty from Tasmania for her grandson (she saw Hamish's when we visited Perth). It is almost the same as Hamish's but with his name strung together using smaller beads.

The purple one is for my niece for her birthday (if you are reading this Ellen, Layne will get it eventually!!). As she will be getting this while on a holiday up north I decided not to go with rice as the filling so I used a packet or 2 of mixed beads. It turned out really well, I love the colours and this makes it harder to find things.

Now to find an easier way to sew vinyl without it sticking to my sewing machine :)

A sewing book

I found a new sewing book to add to my collection on the weekend! I have seen some of Cath Kidston's projects/fabric around and I loved them so when I found the book I was excited.....and even more excited when I found inside the front cover all of the materials to make the bag on the front - how fabulous!

Now I just need to put that on my long list of to-do's and drool over the other great projects in the book with a cup of tea (for the 10th time!).

A crown for a prince

Hamish had a 'Blue' day at Kindy today. They were asked to wear something blue on their head and to be creative! I was sure Scott had an old blue beanie somewhere that I could use but at 4pm yesterday I still couldn't find it, and so the crown was born! Yes you guessed it - made from felt!

I used the pattern from here and it was very easy to make, including the elastic strap. Hamish helped pick out the blue buttons from the jar, a good colour sorting exercise in itself because he took out ALL the blue ones and was devastated when I told him I couldn't use them all.

But he was proud of the end result, and was still wearing it when I picked him up this afternoon. I'm thinking it's probably about time I made something for Izzy again?!

Birthday & Bunting

Well Hamish's birthday is over for another year, seems to have been a success! Most of his party decorations and pieces were store bought but I did have a go at making some bunting! I have had fabric laying around to make some for Izzy's room for ages now, but for this I used some old scrapbooking paper.

First I glued two sheets back-to-back because they were of the cheap one-sided variety. I then cut triangles out of each sheet using a cardboard template. They were then joined together by a packet of bias binding. I used glue for one and double-sided tape for the other and the tape was definitely better.

The colours don't look great on the photos, it was one of those typical drizzly Albany days!

And finally, a photo of the birthday boy in his t-shirt which he has been dying to wear :)

More wall 'art'

I've shared the project from Izzy's room, now here is one I did for Hamish. He has a nautical/beachy type theme in his room so I picked this photo frame display up from Spotlight on special for $10! The only thing was it was all in shades of beige and cream so I brightened it up with some blue, white and red craft paint.

The pictures inside the frames came from a roll of wrapping paper I bought from Red Dot for his 1st birthday! I held onto the leftovers after wrapping his presents determined I would use it for something one day, and 2.5 years later I finally did. Thankfully it wasn't too crumpled after 3 moves :)

T-shirt for the birthday boy

Hamish turns 4 on Monday! He is really into 'Cars' and that is the theme of his party, so I took the idea from here and omitted the car pocket and sewed some Lightning McQueen patches on instead!

I didn't let Hamish model it for the photo because I knew he wouldn't let me have it back, I left the room for a few minutes and returned to find him wearing it! A bit of old-fashioned bribery and it is now safely tucked away for his birthday on Monday.

Canvas 'Art'

I thought I would share a past project completed for Izzy's room. The idea/pattern came from an old Australian Handmade magazine although there was meant to be another owl canvas but I substituted it for a butterfly one instead because I thought the other owl looked creepy! And it ties in with Izzy's butterfly theme better.

I used 3x 30cm square canvases painted in a cream base coat with a different colour paint effect over the top (surely there is a better way to describe that!). The rest was constructed with some gorgeous scrapbooking paper - the thicker card like variety and glued into place. When it was dry I coated the whole canvas with two coats of Mod Podge which until then I had not used but now I love it!!

A fun and pretty cheap way to brighten up a bedroom wall!