My Little Luie Turn ONE!

My baby is no more.. I know have a 1 year old on my hands. We had a Party on Sunday and for a present I made him a little party outfit :)
I found this fabulous cotton drill (?) at a garage sale a few weeks back it was a sample piece but will be enough to make a few things.

Snap on bow tie for the birthday boy...

and matching pants, with some contrasting red stripe.

Isn't he just the cutest little party boy ever!

Mwaaah!

Party post to come soon :)

My Creative Space

Yesterday Ollie and I made Christmas decorations. Most of you would have seen them around. I have seen some gorgeous ones on various bogs and Pinterest. So anyway I thought I should give it a go. I have a second round of Christmas decoration swap with our baby coffee group, so thought I could make these, and get Ollie to have a go too.  I just used plain old Das, it was ok.. but I'm sure you could get better, softer and more pliable clay.

Medium.

a collection of textures to stamp onto clay

Ollie getting busy

..

rolling on a zip (makes train tracks!)

Ollies collection of ornaments

My collection of ornaments for the swap.

Bootiful!

Have a lovely Thursday. 

My Fabulous Fair Day & maybe the start of a business!

Eight hours on I am still buzzing at how my first shot at selling my own creations went... I went with no expectations and I am so proud to say it was a hit!
I went with about 33 items and sold about 20 (and counting)! Take a look at what it all looked like ;-)

"The Ollie T, w 'stache"

My fav - and a customer fav too

SOLD OUT

"'Stache Singlet"

"Luie Legs", spots

"Luie legs", stripes

"Nunu Knees"

Cotton shorts w rocket pockets

Linen shorts w floral pockets

Linen shorts w floral pockets

Bubba Bloomers

And here's our little stall, like I had mentioned in my previous post I shared a stall with a extremely talented friend. My condition to share a stall with her was that she stick with girls clothes and I do the boys. And it worked really well. There was no competition between us and the collections actually complimented each other. We were also super lucky to be out on the verandah as the space inside was crazy busy with stalls and we had room to wander and hang our little clothes line :)

Chelsea's gorgeous little collection

love the lace style fabric!

So anyway it was a fabulous first experience for me and I will be back... actually I have already semi committed to the christmas art and craft fair in two weeks! YIKES better get sewing... again!

And who know this could just be the start of a wee business for me. Hurray! 

Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

xox

Garage Sales, 2nd Hand Shops... My Weakness

When I can I try and get to the various garage sales on Saturday morning here in Gisborne. Some weeks are disappointing and some are fabulous! Check out my finds this week:

Favourite find by far for a long time! ONLY $5 

Watch out soon for a before and after on this baby.

LOve love love it! (p.s garden coming soon!)

A bike for Matt - our last garage sale one (which was so retro and awesome) got stolen! 

a great steal for $5.

bill doily table cloth.... can't remember how much? maybe $5?

ah yes more doilies! 50cents each.. couldn't not get them ;)

Little wooden handled zester. $1

Gorgeous little enamel pouring pot (what are these called?) a couple of dollars

Textured amber glass jug... because who can have enough jugs.... 

my husband may disagree with this..

And Another wool blanket. $5. Because who can have enough wool blankets...

no really they are great!

and just a little add on... It's Matts (husband) Birthday today. Here's the cake we took to his work this morning :) 

Baby Fair and Me!

What a busy week! I have been flat out sewing all week for a baby fair which is on this Saturday that I (very last minute) have decided to sell some clothes at. It's very daunting for me to be one selling my stuff and two to be sharing a table (as in my terrible sewing next to) with my friend Chelsea, who has had her own successful clothing label! I'm doing the boys stuff and she is doing some absolutely gorgeous girls things. 

A couple of things I have learnt this week.. Pressure is a great way to get stuff done. I Have been really wanting to sew in the evenings more often but I am always persuaded by my lazy self to have a "relaxing" night instead. But I can't believe how good I feel after a week of sewing every night for a few hours. 

The other thing I have learnt is that sewing more than one of the same thing (even better 6 of the same thing) is so much easier than just sewing one thing at a time! It always takes me a while to get my head around the pattern (even if its one I have done before!) so sewing a whole heap at once makes for super quick work. Anyway here is a few snaps of the things I have been sewing (mostly half finished..)

stack of half finished linen shorts like these I made a while back.

Knee patch pants

Crawler pants (pattern from Ottobre)

Check Bloomers 

planning... still a bit to do!

One of the many piles of fabric waiting to be used up... or not.

a snap shot of the mess.

I will post again after the fair and show you how we looked

DIY Doily Dress

I have been meaning to post this all week... except I never remember to take photos of the finished garment when I'm actually wearing it out! I am really happy with how this dress turned out as not all my own designs do... 

My first idea came from my cousins blog when I saw the cut up doily she had left over from some christmas decorations she had made. I thought, hey that looks like a purpose built neck line for a top or dress... 

I rummaged through my little pile of doilies and found this one

I snipped out the centre..

rummaged through my stash of fabric and decided this lilac organza would fit the bill.

I am "borrowing" my mums dressmaking dummy and I tell you it makes designing/fitting clothes a breeze! 

I literally took the length of fabric - about 1.5 meters and chopped it in half pinned it to each side of the doily with a few gathers on each boob and one in the centre back. Pinned the side seems loosely and it was ready to be sewn.. 

Here it is before i had sewn it, I decided after to cut it just above the knee. I didn't even hem it... probably will have to at some point though!

Here it is, worn with a tan leather belt and some peep toes. 

I really like the scooping back too :)

I wore it out on Friday night, Matt and I had a very rare night out at a Christmas party and it's definitely a party dress...  Now I just need to find a few more occasions to wear it too, and work on the hang over it gave me!

xox