Friday Fun: One Day Early

Yep, I spent all day yesterday in leisure pursuits, and today will be mostly chores to make up for it.  I was gone most of the day yesterday looking for Fall color in the form of bigtooth maples in the 4th of July Canyon.  New Mexico is primarily yellow when it comes to Fall leaves-- our aspens turn yellow, our cottonwoods too.  Beautiful, especially against our insanely blue skies, but sometimes a little variety is nice.  This was the best we found, as the rest had already faded or fallen, but the trip was fun nonetheless.  Its close by too, less than an hour from Albuquerque, I'd say.

Meanwhile, I'm happy to say that my buntings are finished, packed up and mailed off.  Whew, on to the next sewing project.

Crafty: Bunting Flags

Wow, I feel like I was a posting machine for a couple of weeks and then wham-- radio silence.  I didn't burn out or anything, just got involved in finishing up a couple of projects that have kept me away from the computer.  One of them is making bunting flags for my friend's baby shower.  I wanted to contribute something to the decor that wasn't disposable and could be used to decorate her nursery in the long term.  Since the organizers hadn't chosen any colors, I started with some old fabrics that I had on hand and then bought a few more that tied them all together.  I would have preferred warmer shades of orange and yellow, but those just didn't appear.  Fate sent me green and blue.  I wish that I'd been able to find nicer patterned fabrics too, but I went to the fabric store closest to my house, and their selection was not good.  I feel like they'll be fine, but could be better.  Oh well.  They also took much longer than anticipated due to sewing machine angst.  (Old machine = temperamental and I'm not knowledgeable enough to adjust accordingly).  I'm just going to send them off (baby shower is in Northern California) and advise that the flowers bring in bright contrasting tones.

Don't Mess With a Good Thing

Since I had so much fun making the baby shower gifts, I thought I'd continue with the theme and make a few Valentine cards this year. I really liked how they turned out, but I only had the patience to make five of them. Hand lettering and coloring them took forever!

This morning I was feeling a little down-- the sun was disappearing behind grey clouds already, my on-again-off-again car problem was on-again yesterday which has me worried, and I have tedious computer work on my plate for the afternoon. In an attempt to focus on the positive, I took this picture of my favorite color combo, as currently played out on my mom's sideboard. Grey and pink (and red), I love you!

Crafty Rabbit

Here is a picture of the finished rabbit. It turned out very cute. I spent so much time carrying it around, sewing one little piece or the other last week, that I felt a little guilty stuffing it into the box below. It was a tight fit but he survived just fine and was well received.

The guests were also asked to make a page for a memory book, and this was my contribution. My printer is old and out of ink, so I had to hand draw it. I added color to the border after taking this pic, which made it look better. And I must have Valentine's Day on the brain, because there were hearts all over the place.

It was a very fun shower, no dumb games, just a bunch of people hanging out,catching up and eating delicious food. It started snowing about halfway through, so our drive back down to Albuquerque was through a storm. It was beautiful and rather dramatic. All in all a good day.

More Time Than Money

I got invited, rather last-minute, to a baby shower this weekend. With only one week to come up with a gift, and absolutely no desire to hit the stores for a mass-marketed gift, I decided to make one from scratch. Luckily the weather has been overcast and rainy/snowy the last couple of days, so sitting inside sewing while catching up on my Hulu queue was not unpleasant.

Snow early this morning.

The shower is for a good friend of mine, who I don't get to see too often, so I wanted the gift to be unique. I decided to make a toy rabbit. Its not finished, but I think it's going to be cute. I'm planning on putting a little lavender sachet in the body so that it smells nice and helps the baby sleep. (I haven't heard if its a boy or girl, so I'm trying to make a neutral rabbit). I also wanted it to be soft, and safe for chewing (I'm giving it to a newborn), and for it to be entirely made of things I already had in my sewing box. I'm using fabric from an old pair of pants and some felt left over from another project. I'm not sure yet what I'm going to stuff it with.

Stuffed toy in progress.

I'll post the finished product when I complete it. Probably this weekend.