A quilt for a little man called Felix

I meant to post this last week and not have so big a gap between posts.  But hey, I'm just over 6 months pregnant and baby brain has been quite intense this time, not to mention the tiredness and just plain laziness...  I seem to reserve most of my strength for Tamsyn and the bare minimum of housewifery.  Even though I make sure I read (almost) everyone's blog each day, comments may be brief.  I think "cool!" has been all I can manage some days.  :/

I don't altogether see this as a bad thing, my body is working hard at growing a little person and apart from the occasional meltdown things have been pretty cruisey.

Felix's sock monkey quilt was the first I've ever made where I didn't have a plan other than doing a whole heap of bias squares, and the width of the fabric (all half yard cuts) dictated the size of those squares.  I thought I'd leave the Brady Bunch style fabric whole which would be good for alternating blocks.  When it came to laying out the blocks on the lounge room floor after Tamsyn had gone to bed one night I had come up with a star style.  Ant looked at it, screwed up his nose a bit and said "how about this instead".

I knew he was right.

It's the first quilt I've made purely out of flannel: front, back and binding.  I made sure there was enough fabric left over for a very scrappy back and did some basic machine quilting.  I'm never going to do a purely flannel quilt again, it's so much more temperamental than quilting cotton - it seems to give/stretch more, but I'll continue to use it as a backing fabric.  That works well.

Next up, I want to try my hand at some 'quilt as you go'.  I've been quilting for over 20 years and have never tried it.  I've also been inspired by what this talented lady can do here and here. Oh and here too.  ♥

It's been a long time between quilts...

But I'm getting there, and it probably means that Felix should receive it before his first birthday.  That has to be a big fat tick on the To Do List.

I shall reveal all once it's quilted.

I must be nesting....

Spring has sprung and summer will be here before we know it.  I've felt the urge to make the girl some warm weather clothes now because come Christmas time the opportunity to even look at the sewing machine will be rare.

A couple of weeks ago I had a little op-shopping jaunt with Tara in Deloraine.  One of my finds was this girls' summer top.  Even though it wouldn't fit Tamsyn for probably another five years, I was too smitten with the little cat print and thought I might be able to do something with it.

With a bit of help from one of my Ottobre patterns I've turned it into a little summer dress by cutting out arm holes and adding a ribbon casing to the neckline.  I already had the spotty ribbon in my stash and was just the right length.

While in Deloraine I couldn't resist a visit to the local fabric/quilt shop Fresh Fabric, and fell in love with this Heather Bailey print.  I've made this dress before, this one and then this one for her birthday, each one a bigger pattern size.  I decided to leave the contrasting panel off the bottom edge this time, mainly because I didn't have a suitable contrasting fabric.

And then perusing my fabric stash a couple of days ago I rediscovered this fabric that Tamsyn's auntie sent her for her birthday.  It's an Alexander Henry and was just enough to make up this little number using a pattern I bought on Etsy.  I love the way that it's reversible too and for some reason I had plenty of purple gingham handy to line it.  This is a super fast, super easy pattern so I think there'll be a few more of these coming out of the sewing room.  Yay!

And the winner is...

... with thanks to random.org -

That would be Rel!  Congratulations sweetie, email me your address and I'll pop the bag in the post quick smart!

So, to give this post a bit of variety I'll get my act together and show you one of the things I've made recently for the little girl.

A little sleeveless dress/pinafore which is not quite little enough at the moment, but I'm thinking it'll be great for spring.  It's a Drops design, size 12 - 18 months and very easy to knit up except for the lace pattern in the skirt. 

I've never been terribly great or persistent when it comes to patterned lace and gave up after 2 repeats, but that's just me.  Still, I don't think it looks too bad and was glad I didn't undo the knitting (or frogged, to use an American term!).  The yarn was a great find from The Potty Knitter, who recycles yarns from old knitwear.  I'm tempted to buy a few balls of the slate as well.  Time will tell....

*Giveaways* are a great way to say thank you...

... to that wonderful blogging community who has bestowed on me such kind words (and I've also been on the receiving end of some lovely giveaways too!).  So to spread the love this is what's on offer -

And a back view -

Lovingly hand made by me, this little backpack is surprisingly roomy and has leather straps for durability.

The usual drill applies, leave a comment at the end of this post and I'll close entries on, say, Sunday night (which would be Saturday night in some parts of the world).  I'll get the random number generator thingy to do the hard stuff and announce the winner on Monday.


This pregnancy has been pretty cruisy so far (except for the nagging nausea in the first trimester which has thankfully passed).  I've been making the most of each moment because this will be the last time I'll ever be pregnant (I've discovered that I'm one of those women who love being pregnant), I'm no spring chicken and that biological clock was ticking pretty damn fast.  We really wanted Tamsyn to have a little brother or sister so we're very thankful that we got the opportunity, and no, we're probably not going to find out the sex before it's born no matter how tempting that is!

Edit: After I posted this I thought that I probably didn't give a very long time frame, so I'll extend the deadline to Wednesday 4th of August.  

Also,  a few have mentioned my ability to sew leather.  I can only do this because I have an industrial sewing machine (we call it The Thug...).  However Nikki has a terrific leather sewing tutorial if you want to give it a whirl!

My excuse for being a lazy blogger lately...

Seventeen weeks (or eighteen, I keep losing count).  Due date: Christmas Day.

All going swimmingly.

I love before and after photos

It's true, I really do.  Although I feel confident that most of us do anyway.  It's just so satisfying to see ugly things made pretty.  Here's my contribution...

Before: A vintage dolls pram found at the op shop (thrift) for $15, I think, or was it $25?  Anyway Gracie was quite taken with it's smell.  I think it'd been in the back of someone's shed for a loooong time, it was very grotty...

After: Pulled apart, sanded and spray painted.  I had to drill through the rivets in order to pull it apart, so this meant that I had to come up with something else for putting it back together.  I remembered those screw type things that are often used for book binding, you know, one screws into the other.  After much searching I discovered they have a name - Chicago Screws, and found someone who sells them on Etsy (I only like using sites that have Paypal).  The screws arrived in the post yesterday and as I had done all the sewing the pram was put back together in a jiffy (with the help of those reference photos tacked to the wall!).  Oh and the fabric?  I splurged on some lovely oilcloth from Cath Kidston.

Some may even remember me blogging about this pram a while ago, and my intention to have it finished in time for Tamsyn's first birthday.  Well, I was only 2 months out so I don't think I did too badly.

Besides, I think she likes it.