Crafty Mermaid

A few quick card makes.  I haven't been as prolific as usual in my card making this year and these were for a house warming, to say hi to a friend who was soldering on, two new baby cards, and one for a relation on BMs who is ill and recovering. I made the 3 for BM to give him a choice. Not a lot of cards stockpiled at the moment. I just haven’t been making them over the last year or so. Possibly because my craft stuff is unevenly distributed throughout the house and not so easy to access. 

A few quick and oh so satisfying makes with cotton yarn.  I followed the Greedy for Colour Christmas Bauble tutorial at the start and then kind of winged it at the end. I also added a few beads for an extra dimension.

Deets: Self styled pattern using Peter Pan merino baby in 3037 (darker purple) and ? (lighter purple) and I presume size 6mm crochet hook. In the pursuit of using up my existing yarn (these skeins were left over from LP's blanket ), I got out my hook and tried to make up a new crochet hat but its massive so it won't be fitting LP for quite some time.  In the meantime, its gone into the present box for an older child to be gifted with it at some point!

A pair of Itch to Stitch Tierras Woven Joggers The Deets: Itch to Stitch Tierras Woven Joggers in size 12. Black fabric from stash (one of my first purchases and completely unsuited to the dress I thought I would make with it!) and black lining from stash from the Star Fish liquidation sale (I have quite a bit of this left over, so glad I bought a lot). I don't think this make is going to last that long as the fabric is likely to fray quite quickly. The Good:   A classy looking pair of trousers to add to my work wardrobe.  Length and size works.  This isn't the size recommended based on my measurements but is consistent with my Itch to Stitch Belize Skort pattern .  I didn't make any alternations to the rear and just sewed up the standard size 12. The Bad:   They don't really stay up if there's anything in the pockets and the back is a little low despite my significantly lacking behind. The Changes: I made a straight size 12 but didn't include the cor...

For some reason, I've been collecting photos of cakes past consumed.  These were somewhat worthy of a post.  I just can't seem to shake the idea that they need to be noted in some way. I think it all started with my fixation on getting a 'real' birthday cake as my birthday present from BM last year. Forgive the added flower effects - but I was rather excited on cake collection.  This beast was from Sweet Bakery in Marsden village . And was actually as tasty as it should have been.  Also rather larger than expected.  We had a dinner party for a few friends and despite our and their best efforts only got through half! I'm definitely going to have to up my cake baking game!   Many of the confections you can buy easily outstrip my best efforts. How can you remotely compare to decadent creations ala Louis Sargeant - at least they're manageable size wise! Although some cakes aren't really anywhere near as edible ...

Our recent family trip to Ireland, the UK, and the States didn't result in quite as much fabric as it normally does!  Three main reasons... 1. LP is great at fabric shopping for a bit but gets bored and I had to drag BM around with us too! 2. It was mainly a work trip for me (BM and LP hung out while I conferenced, meeted and seminared) 3. I've discovered a wonderful online tool called the stash shrinker created by SewJourners Stash Shrinker is a pre-programmed excel spreadsheet to help you keep track of your fabric purchases against your fabric use.  By recording each sewn item and the amount of fabric used as well as the fabric purchases you can track how much your stash is increasing or decreasing.  I quite like it because I don't have to inventory my current stash and just mark in new purchases as well as record what I've made.  I originally started with a 3m out for every 1m in guideline but realised I just couldn't keep to it!  (Dammit!)...