It's Super...

I've been up to another crafty project in the last couple of weeks, and it isn't quilling.

My toddler needed a costume for some parties that we attended this weekend, so for the last few weeks I've been creating a second identity for him...

...The felt pieces were cut and then backed with iron on interface to firm them up a bit and prevent them from coming apart as I stitched. I hand sewed the whole lot, even the hem of the cape as sewing machines and I just don't get on.

One layer of felt was sewn to the next from the top down, and the shirt was bought and the symbol sewn over the top of the shirt's own little symbol. The socks were plain so I added a star to jazz them up a bit. I added some little Velcro squares to the back of the shirt and the top of the cape to keep it in place and avoid having the ribbon tug at his throat, which would surely have been guaranteed to bother him and have it end up thrown off within a matter of minutes.

He LOVES it. Especially the cape. he swooshes it around and loves to be picked up to 'fly' around, and on the swings he wants it out so it can flap in the breeze. He didn't try to take it off once, and it all survived the day very well.

Worth every minute of hand stitching.

I'll be back in a day or two with this week's quilling project, which is the beginning of Christmas fun!

xnata.




 

Week Six: New Year's Celebration

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas, and if you're like me the Christmas celebrations are still ongoing! I hope all of your celebrations are wonderful.

This week's project is in honour of the next special day we're all heading towards at a rapid rate, which of course is the New Year!

To welcome in 2013 I went for a cityscape with fireworks

 

I went for nice bright colours to make the fireworks nice and celebrate-y

 

 

So, I wish you all a Happy New Year and hope you have a great time celebrating the beginning of 2013! See you next year/week for a project that might flutterby...

xnata

Christmas 2012: Baby-Proof Beach Theme!

I am the Mummy of a clever, mischievous toddler. And a small house.

For a moment, I considered skipping decorating for Christmas at all, but that was too sad. He deserves a magical Christmas every year of his life.

Plus, this year one side of our family will be having the Christmas gathering here, so we really couldn't skip decorations or a tree. So I have started planning...

First, how do we avoid the whole tree getting knocked over or falling on top of baby? Well, we don't have room for my prefered method of putting a play pen around it, so I'm using my own unique method. There is this weird banister thingy in our house, and the tree will be tethered to this. Problem one solved.

Next, I would be sad (not to mention panicked, stressed and possibly bleeding or being bled on!) if any of my glass ornaments broke. It's just a hazard I'm not willing to risk. So, how can I do christmas without my ornaments, and without spending lots of money on new ones?

As I was stewing on this, inspiration came from a random place - my new tablecloth.

I'd bought a matching table runner for the table on the patio, and some other knick-knacks to match. I loved the colour scheme so much I decided this would be the colours of alterna-Christmas.

Looking at those colours made me think of the beach. Theme found! That way, the majority of decorations are made from free things like shells and driftwood. That certainly fits my budget!

Note how this tiny collection that I already had includes pieces that look like angel wings? It's all coming together...

But, I don't want sand in or near my house. No thank you, so how could I incorporate the colour of sand without it? Hessian/Burlap!

Before I knew it, I'd come up with these hessian/burlap and lace placemats. Aren't they simple yet puuurrrdy?! And the best part - so easy to make, and they work out to cost about $1.20 each, if that :) so making 20 is no big deal!

I'm attempting to make it so that no two placemats are decorated the same.

I'll be using the hessian/burlap and lace and other ribbons and such within my colour scheme to make ornaments for the tree (though some lace will simply be tyed to the tree in bows), all of which I will share with you as I make them. There'll be quilled ornaments again too! I also have plans for lots of paper pom-poms, a paper lantern or two, our usual fairy lights, and a lighthouse :) I've pinned a million pinterest things too, and hopefully I'll find time to do a couple of those ideas too. Still trying to dream up a way to have old fashioned beach huts somewhere in the theme (not life-sized of course!).

Lovely candle holders and pretty smelling tealights will also be on the tables.

I am looking forward to doing some beach combing for shells and driftwood, but I feel weird about using real starfish, because it makes me sad to think people might collect and kill living starfish and seahorses just so I can decorate my table : / so I'm seeking a way to make them instead. Where there's a will there's a way!

I'm only about half way through my placemats, but I'm so glad I thought of it and could do it now, 'cause I really wouldn't have time in December!

Stay tuned for more Beach Christmas decoration prettiness :)


xnata.

Alice & the Mad Hatter

I've heard buzz about a mad hatter's tea party happening somewhere out in blog land, and I'm not going but it reminded me about something I've been meaning to post here for months.

At the start of the year my beautiful sister in law turned 18, and she had an Alice in Wonderland themed party. I helped out by making decorations for the big event, including making these teabags:

I found the illustrations from an old copy (perhaps even the original illustrations) of the story online, and made 100 tea bags, with an illustration on the front and on the back as you can see was 'drink me'. There were about twenty different tea bag tag designs in all (I still have the printout, but failed to take photos of the rest :p silly me) . Then there's the box:

Now this was cool. I made up the ingredients on the back, put an exerpt from the tea party scene in the book on there and named it 'mad hatter's tea', and I used this to wrap a store bought tea box. Those small rectangle bits were on the front and back sides of the box. THEN...I reversed the whole image, and stuck the backwards versions inside, to make it look like you could see right through the box!!!

I'm quite proud of that part. Must find another theme to do it in just for fun. Winnie the Pooh perhaps? Fairies? Disney characters? Hmm. Must do it again. Would sets like that be worth selling do you think?

So to all the ladies off to a mad tea party, I say have fun!

A very merry un-birthday to you,

xnata

("A very merry un-birthday", from Alice in wonderland, of course)