Eisblumen

Tangerine Pearl Quilt

2012-01-25T06:13:00.000-08:00

The baby quilt I was working on is finished! I really like how it came out and I decided to call it Tangerine Pearl, because a) Kirsty made me aware of the fact that tangerine is Pantone's colour of the year and b) the little girl I made it for is called Helmi, which means ... you guessed it ... pearl. And the shades of gray have something of the sheen of a pearl to them, so it somehow all works out ...

The binding in a darker colour really gives a nice frame and finishing touch to this quilt, I think. I have to say that there were times when I shied away from orangey fabric, but in combination with the grays and purple it really is very pretty. There will definitely be more citrus fruit colour in my sewing in the future!

The flannel backing is so, so soft and pretty in itself. It really is perfect for a baby quilt, especially for a baby born in winter.

So snuggly! :-) I decided to enter the quilt in the Tangerine Tango Challenge over at flickr. There are so many great entries in that group! Tangerine really packs a punch! :-)

As an end note, I'm a bit sad to see that picnik is closing. I've really enjoyed playing with their great and fun features lately, as you might have noticed. Now I'm thinking about what to do when I feel like adding something extra to my photographs in the future. I have Photoshop Elements and want to learn more about using it. Do you have any good tips about books on Photoshop Elements or do you know anything about Google+ which apparently offers similar features to picnik? Your thoughts and advice would be really welcome! :-)

Have a great day!

procrastination

2012-01-18T05:01:00.000-08:00

So, why is it that one is suddenly terribly productive when in fact one should be doing something entirely different? (No, don't answer that ...) Anyway, I've been busy procrastinating and finished my first HST Block of the Month. And what I found out is:

Yes, they are! I really had fun making this block using a technique new to me. I think the star pattern is really pretty and I'm really looking forward to whichever block Jeni will be presenting to us next month! Below you can see a close-up of the fabrics I used:

The safety pins are Monaluna Sew Happy and the flowers Just Dandy by Josephine Kimberling. I don't have the selvedge of the aqua fabric anymore. I bought it a long time ago on sale here in Helsinki.

But this is not all. The baby quilt I am working on is now ready for having the binding sewn on by hand:

I used a print from MoMo Just Wing It! for the binding and I think the purple really brings everything together nicely and provides a nice frame for the patchwork.

Also, I've cut the fabrics for my first Swoon block!

It was really a close call! If you ever want to make this quilt and are using FQs, know that there's no wiggle room! But with sweat on my forehead and bated breath I managed to cut everything! Let's see how it'll come together! I chose to make an all solids Swoon, because I thought it might be more timeless. The coloured fabrics I use are all from a Moda Bella Solid FQ bundle I bought from Pink Chalk Fabrics last year. The white is Kona Snow.

I think it'll be quite pretty. :-)

I'll leave you with a little mosaic of some lovely notions a good friend of mine sent me for my birthday:

Aren't they cute? I already used the pins, they're the perfect size for pinning binding to quilts. :-)

Maybe procrastination has its merits, after all ...

alchemy

2012-01-11T11:06:00.000-08:00

Hello, I'm back and it's 2012! :-) I hope you all had a good start into the new year! I was quite busy in the past few weeks, but Monday I was finally able to squeeze in some sewing!

A friend of mine had a little girl in December and I'm making a little quilt for her. Above you can see part of the top. I used this flannel fabric as a backing and pulled fabrics to match from my stash. I decided on a simple square patchwork design. The squares are 10 cm plus seam allowance and the top is 9 times 8 squares. I'm hand-quilting it with light pink embroidery floss. I think it's going to be pretty. While I was cutting and sewing, I was thinking how cutting up fabric and sewing it back together really is a strange thing. Somehow crazy, even. However, the shuffling and re-connecting of the fabrics has some kind of magic to it, or at least it must be something like alchemy. Mixed up together the fabrics are even more beautiful than all on their own. What do you think?

Like everyone else, I was looking back on the past year and decided to make a mosaic of everything I finished last year.

This is what I found from my flickr account. Is this really all? Mmmmh ... Of course, there are some unfinished projects lurking around here, as well. Somehow, though, I thought I had sewn more. I'm really happy about all the things I made and about the creative outlet sewing provides me, but one thing is sure, I bought more fabric last year than I used up ...! I really hope I'll manage to sew more this year!

As for other crafty plans, I would like to take part in two sew-alongs. Firstly, the swoon-along and secondly the HST Block of the Month sew-along over at In Color Order. I bought the Swoon pattern last year and I've also got my fabrics picked out already, so this sew-along is coming at a perfect time for me! Also, I love sampler quilts and I think the slow pace of making one block per month is really appealing, so I decided to take part in the HST sew-along, too.
So, big goals, but most importantly I want to keep on having fun sewing and writing about it here! Do you have any crafting goals or projects that you are really excited to start?

Christmas is coming

2011-12-22T02:21:00.000-08:00

Most of the doors of my advent calendar are opened now and Christmas is only a couple of days away. Time really has been flying ...

For the most part, the preparations are at a good stage, most of the presents are wrapped and I even managed some last-minute sewing. More drawstring bags ... They are just so cute and fun to make!

First, I made this DVD-sized one. The main fabrics are Just Dandy and the strings Painter's Canvas from Magnolia Lane.

The lining is a fabric I bought years ago and which I love, the colours are just so nice.

Then I made three little bags for my friend's kids. For the girly ones I used Megumi Sakakibara prints as main fabrics.

The boyish one is using a cute car print from Michael Miller.

This is probably the last sewing for me this year. The time between Christmas and the New Year is quite busy for me this year, so this will probably also be the last post for 2011. Thank you so much for reading and see you next year! I wish you Happy Holidays and a good start into 2012!!!

(pictures taken in Helsinki city centre)

christmassy drawstring bags

2011-12-12T02:40:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, I used the about 3 minutes of sunlight we had around here to take pictures of the drawstring bags I made last week. I used the great pattern by Jeni at In Color Order. I chose to make the Project Bag size, which I think is quite versatile. The cutting and sewing were all very quick. Jeni's instructions are great and I made the bags in a kind of assembly-line style, which helped to further speed along the process.

The first bag is using a glittery Lecien fabric (Lovely Punch Collection) as the main and Little Mittens by Michael Miller as the accent fabric. The strings are a fabric I bought locally that had no info on the selvedge.

The second bag uses Deck the Halls as main and the Lovely Punch as an accent. The strings are Painter's Canvas.

The third bag is Little Mittens with an accent of Westfalenstoffe's Doppeltes Lottchen (Two Lotties). I lined all the bags with solid white fabric, since some of the fabrics are quite light and other colours were showing through. I definitely will make more of these and I want to try out the DVD Bag size next! They are so cute, useful, fun to make and also make cool presents (and great stashbusters)!

I wish you all a lovely week! Only less than two weeks till Christmas!!! :-)

in the Christmas kitchen

2011-11-30T00:45:00.000-08:00

WARNING: This post contains a lot of christmassy stuff and even more images edited in Picnik! Two of my current obsessions combined! :-D

Last year, I made some gifts from the kitchen following Nigella Lawson's instructions. The recipients really liked them, so this year I wanted to make something else from Nigella Christmas. I decided on the Christmas Chutney and the Chili Jam, because I thought they sounded yummy and relatively simple to make.

The preparation of the chutney really was quite straightforward, but it took some time to make, since it has to simmer on the stove for about an hour. Our place smelled like vinegar for a day, but I somehow quite liked that. I put the chutney in nice jars and wrapped them in paper with some red and white twine and a label.

Pretty! The Chili Jam was even easier to make and I got three and a half big jars out of the amount. If I feel like it, I'll make a second batch using smaller jars which might be more practical.

Of course the half-jar had to be tasted right away. The jam is really good with blue cheese and on a sandwich with ham, as my tests have yielded so far.

Since Sunday was the first of advent, we are now again slowly unpacking our Christmas decorations. This year, I made this candle "arrangement", using some bottles I made useless for storing liquids in by melting the caps in the oven while trying to sterilize them. Clever me! Ahem ... I love that there's a J with a little heart on that runner. I know it probably stands for "Jul", meaning Christmas in Swedish, but I like to think otherwise. :-)

What about you? Are you in the mood for Christmas, yet? Have you started decorating?

Have a good week!

Makeup Roll

2011-11-25T06:22:00.000-08:00

Finally, I finished this Stitched In Color Makeup Roll for a friend of mine! (You can buy the pattern here.) I had the pieces cut for some time now, but just now got around to assemble it. Thanks to the clear instructions, this actually came together much more easily than I thought! I'll definitely make some more, including one for myself. (By the way, it's so gloomy here at the moment, that the only place where I can get a half-decent picture is on the windowsill ...)

It was really fun to choose the fabrics for this project. I tried to find something in my stash that my friend would like and I hope I'm right. On the other hand, that big floral Loulouthi print is so gorgeous, I can't imagine anybody NOT liking it ... The stripey fabric is Loulouthi as well and the dot fabric is from Beach Mod by Monaluna for Birch Fabrics.

I crammed the roll full with some of my own makeup for the pictures. Also, it was recommended in the pattern to determine the placing of the button when the roll is filled. I really think this is such a cute project. It's really satisfying to make something as well thought out as this and when it was finished, I thought that this is like a little quilt for your makeup. :-D

I think I'll get some small surprise to put into this and then send it on it's way to it's recipient!

I wish you all a great weekend! :-)

fall colour pillow

2011-11-14T05:58:00.001-08:00

So, after some more trial and error, I finished the pillow I was working on last week. I am actually quite happy with my free motion skills now, although there is some room for improvement. I will definitely use this technique again in the future!

After quilting the leaf shapes, I quilted some straight lines with my walking foot, following the orientation of the fabric pieces.

I shadow-quilted the yellow border, but then decided to stop there and leave the outer border as it is. I wanted it to complement the "bounciness" of the leaves and I think it works well like this.

I used the Hydrangea print for the back and added a zipper to the bottom of the pillow.

This is actually the first pillow cover I made I'm happy with in terms of fit to pillow form. I used a 50x50cm pillow form from Ikea and I cut the squares 48x48cm, including 1cm seam allowance throughout, so it's 46x46cm finished size. I think the batting also adds some nice bounciness.

The back is actually really pretty in itself and if the recipients don't like the front, they always can turn it around, I guess. But I actually like the pillow now as it is. So much, actually, that I decided to enter it into the cool Celebrate Color contest over at Stitched in Color.

The contest is all about celebrating fall colour and using inspiration from nature in sewing and other crafts. I usually prefer cooler colours, but I love autumn and the sight of leaves turning all kinds of beautiful shades from golden to burgundy. Autumn means long walks, apple pie and cozy evenings at home for me, so I think the pillow really fits in well with the theme. I made a little collage to show you what I mean:

I hope you have a beautiful autumnal week and maybe you'll be inspired to make something as well by the things you see around you. :-)

just trying something ...

2011-11-08T02:20:00.000-08:00

During the last week, I didn't have much time for sewing and the sewing I did get done was very much trial and even more error ... I wanted to make a pillow cover as a present and had the idea of free-motion quilting the front. Since I'm really new to that technique, that idea probably wasn't that smart. Of course, I haven't finished the pillow, yet, but I'll show you what I did.

Above you can see the layout of the pillow front and also the areas where things went very wrong. Also, I'm not so sure about that border. Everything seems quite "blah" to me, although I really love those fabrics together. (That's fabric from Cut out and Keep by Heather Moore for Cloud9 and the mustard fabric is from Laura Gunn's Magnolia.)

So, this is where I started with the quilting and then realized two things: a) I should have practised on some scraps first and b) using your regular sewing machine foot for free motion quilting is just not working ...

Here I exchanged the foot for the appropriate machine embroidery one, but since I'm stubborn didn't move on to scraps but kept trying on the cushion cover. I was attempting to quilt the centre squares in this pattern that I saw on the Oh, Fransson! blog. This second attempt is actually not all that bad, considering, but still not making me happy ...

And this is the 3rd attempt that yielded the best result and also the one where I ran out of time ... I think I'll rip out the first two and quilt them anew, and then I'll quilt in straight lines around the centre squares with the walking foot ... I hope that once the quilting is finished and the back added, I'll like that pillow a bit better!

Here it's really autumnal and actually quite pretty and warm for this time of year! I hope all of you have a nice day!

fall magazine inspiration

2011-10-25T10:57:00.000-07:00

Now that it's getting colder again, I'm drawn more than usual to beautiful books and magazines for lots of eye-candy and inspiration. It is so much fun and relaxing to read a nice magazine and drink a cup of tea on your day off, which is just what I did today. I bought the October issue of Elle Interiör, one of my favourite magazines.

This issue has a lot of great decorating ideas and the homes shown are beautiful and inspiring, as usual. I wish I spoke Swedish to learn more about the creative people living in those homes. Since Swedish is related to German, I can guess at some of the written content, though. But even without the text, the pictures really speak for themselves.

I love this little bookshelf by David Design! This would be so cute next to our bed or even above the sofa. And I think it is so beautifully styled here, with the pretty book covers and the bird so fittingly perched on top of them! Since I own a couple of these Penguin Hardcover Classics, with cover design by Coralie Bickford-Smith, I was inspired to set up a little display on our bedroom dresser.

At the moment I feel that I want to change the look of our home a bit, but don't really know exactly what and how, so it is really fun and satisfying to play around with a display from things I already have and that I can change around whenever I want.

There are two of my favourite things in this pic: my favourite pin, a Coco Chanel Medal of General Valour by Katariina Guthwert and my favourite book, Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. Also, the postcard is of one of my favourite paintings, A Satyr mourning over a Nymph by Piero di Cosimo. I am so happy that I was able to see it at The National Gallery during our visit in London this summer!

Fabric obsessed as I am, I used the beautiful colour palette spread in the magazine as a guideline to build a stack of coordinating fabrics. I had a match to every colour that was featured. So this either means that a): this magazine really is perfect for me and caters REALLY well to my tastes or b): I have too much fabric.

I think I'll go with a) ...

hoodie

2011-10-21T03:42:00.000-07:00

Since it now safely arrived at its destination, I can show you the little hoodie I made for Kirsty's little boy. It's made from the Baby in the Hood pattern in Anna Maria Horner's Handmade Beginnings. It was really fun to make and to choose the fabrics to go together in this item. For the lining I chose flannel, because it's getting colder now and also because it's so cute for babies, I think. Also, it is what Anna Maria Horner used for the jacket in the book. Fortunately, I had enough of this Folksy Flannel print to make the lining. I think it's such a nice detail and flash of colour in this garment.

The main fabric is Cloud9 Flannel, which is relatively stiff and brushed on the wrong side, so I thought it is a good weight for this kind of jacket. For the contrast fabric of the hood stripe and button placket I wanted something REALLY boyish, so I chose this Caleb Gray Suburbia tools print. To avoid that the jacket exteriour should become too uniform or boring, I decided to topstitch the seams in a contrasting thread. I used buttonhole thread, which is a big stronger, to further give the jacket an "utility" vibe.

The metal buttons also underline that boyish feel and the aqua button loops tie everything together really nicely. It took me some time to decide on a fabric here, but then I ended up choosing this Innocent Crush Bubble Burst print.

This was really a fun and very clear pattern to work with. I'd like to make a girly version for our niece some time and see how different fabric choices affect the design!

Napkins

2011-10-13T06:26:00.000-07:00

Today I finished the napkins from the Color Blocks Placemats + Napkins Sew-Along. I made a mistake when cutting, so I had to piece in the little squares in one corner. I think they look quite cute, this way, too.

For the backing, I used a print from Loulouthi, because I didn't have enough of my contrast fabric. The big print gives the reverse side some more interest, I think.

I really like the combination of fabrics with our tableware. This project really is a lot of fun, I think I'll make some more napkins some time in the future! It's so nice to have something new and pretty for our house. :-)

Placemat fabric choices

2011-10-07T01:28:00.000-07:00

Up to now, I haven't participated in any sew-alongs, but when I saw this on Sew, Mama, Sew!, I wanted to join in. This patchwork placemat and napkin sew-along is following a design and instructions by Elizabeth Hartman of Oh, Fransson!. Since I've been looking for a nice easy and effective project, this seemed perfect! Also, I think it's great that the pace is slow, just the right thing to kick my sewing gear up with leaving room for other projects on the side if inspiration strikes.

These are the 4 fabrics I chose for the main part of the set: Anna Maria Horner Garden Party Waltz, Rosalie Quinlan Sweet Broderie, Alexander Henry Heath and Laura Gunn Magnolia Painter's Canvas.

For the background & napkins I chose a chocolate cotton-linen blend and the contrast fabric is from Just Wing It! by Momo for Moda.

These fabrics are not very much in line with the Christmas-theme of the sew-along, but they go well with our tableware and are nice for fall, I think.

I'm looking forward to seeing how these will turn out!

A walk in Munkkiniemi

2011-09-25T02:42:00.000-07:00

Last Sunday, before I was felled down by the flu, J. and I took a walk in the Munkkiniemi district of Helsinki. We received a nice book with different walking routes in Helsinki as a wedding gift and finally decided to get to know some parts of our home town we don't know so well.

If you like functionalist architecture, Helsinki has a lot to offer to you. I really like this style, and although it looks quite simple and boxy, I like the details and materials employed.

There is a park in Munkkiniemi and the area is quite green and quiet.

Originally, architect Eliel Saarinen planned a different Munkkiniemi, but low funds and passing of time resulted in only a fraction of his designs being built.

This former pension, designed by Saarinen, was later a cadet school and is now used by a government institute.

Saarinen also planned the first row of detached houses in Finland.

Munkkiniemi is situated close to the shore. There is a nice walking promenade and a café in the area, and of course also some seaside villas.

There is even a small strip of beach with public changing rooms.

Tram number four has it's end stop close to the shore and next summer I'd like to come back and have some tea at the café and maybe even go for a swim.

This tower was used for surveillance and messaging by the military during the Crimean war. Today, it is situated in a residential area and itself used as housing. Designer Timo Sarpaneva lived here during the 1970ies and it is said that the front man of Finnish rock band HIM, Ville Valo, has moved here some time in the last decade.

I really liked getting to know Munkkiniemi better, there are still some things to see, like architect Alvar Aalto's home which can be visited (for quite a big fee ...) by the public. It's nice to go out of one's usual route and learn something new about one's home town!

For next week, I hope that I'll get some sewing done!!!

Have a nice Sunday! :-)

I thought I'd edit the post to include some HIM. So here's the video to one of their most famous songs.

slow going

2011-09-12T01:56:00.000-07:00

Sorry it took me so long again! It has been slow going when it comes to craftiness around here. There was work and then there were craft botch-ups ... I have several different projects on my mind, in several different stages of completion. The only finished item I can show you for now is this hot water bottle cover I made:

I was looking for a small project to try out and practise machine quilting and this seemed perfect. The pattern is from Cath Kidston's Sew. I used some Folksy Flannels leftovers and I think it's really quite cute!

The cover that originally came with the bottle was already suffering from some pilling and really wasn't nice anymore, so this was a fun and practical project. The only cursing took place when I made the button loop ... Fiddly stuff!

Other than this, I've been sewing a little dress and I'm not really happy with how it's turning out.

I think the fabric is wrong, somehow. I took the pattern from an Ottobre magazine and I think I should have gone with a fabric that's less stiff and more fluid, so the pleats would fall more nicely. Maybe the fabric's pattern is too big for this project, too. Also, I took a shortcut by not wanting to bother with buying matching thread for the teal fabric.

Cream on teal just doesn't work! I think I will pick the topstitching apart and sew it again with matching thread. Hopefully, that will reconcile me enough with this project to finish it!

I'm also sewing some other small things and I've been slowly stitching away at the Daisychain sampler. Also, this pile is on my mind:

I'm thinking little girly quilt, but I'm not really decided on the design, yet. I hope crafting will pick up speed around here, again, so I can show you some progress!

London and ABCs

2011-08-24T03:47:00.000-07:00

Finally I'm back in this space, I'm sorry it took me so long! We were in London for a few days during our holiday and then we went to Germany. We had a good time and a jam-packed schedule, so when we came back and I started work again, I noticed I hadn't really wound down much. So that's what I've been doing during my free time in the last couple of weeks: not much ... Ok, what I've been doing much of was watching TV ...

Above you can see my favourite pic from London. J. took it at the Millennium Bridge and that's my fuzzy head there in the centre. We walked a lot and our favourite afternoons were those spent at the Thames.

We liked the atmosphere and mixture of architectural styles and since we're living so close to the sea here in Helsinki, I guess we're always drawn a bit to water ...

I don't have any special tips for London, but I really liked this little garden on the site of a church that was destroyed in WWII. It's name is Christchurch Greyfriars Garden and it's not far from St. Paul's. It is really pretty and such a nice surprise in the middle of a business area.

I really like the way the layout of the garden hints at the original architecture of the church.

Of course, I also had to drag J. to Liberty where I had a hard time to limit myself to only three different prints. I really liked the department store and think it has a lot more charm than Harrods, which I found mostly oppressing ...

And now to the TV-watching ... I "found" two new (to me) BBC versions of classics of English literature and both really impressed me. The first was recommended to me by a friend and it's the 2009 version of Emma, starring Romola Garai and Jonny Lee Miller. It is now my favourite adaptation of Emma and I love the natural and fresh acting and the arguments between Emma and Mr Knightley were so funny! Also, it has probably the most beautiful dance scene, ever!!!

The second adaptation I came across when I looked up information on the screenwriter of Emma, Sandy Welch, and found she had also written the script to BBC's North and South. The atmosphere and setting of this Elizabeth Gaskell adaptation couldn't be much more different from Emma, but the series is very beautiful and beautifully acted, too. And this one features the most beautiful kiss in TV history, in my opinion. And then there's Richard Armitage ... I really recommend both series for long autumn evenings which are sure to come!

In respect to craftiness, I don't have much to show for my time at the moment ... I've started working on the Daisychain ABCs emroidery sampler kit I ordered from Alicia Paulson's webshop some time ago.

I'm really enjoying following someone else's design and stitching away slowly, at the sametime cooking up ideas for future projects. I already have some things lined up that I want to start soon, and I hope I'll be able to show you something next week!

folksy girl's tunic

2011-06-27T03:41:00.000-07:00

This little tunic was a birthday gift for our little niece. Since I got the Hideaway fabric, I knew I wanted to pair it up with the Westfalenstoffe print to make something cute for her to wear.

I like how both prints are kind of folksy and retro and really cheerful. I wanted the garment to have a retro feel as well, so I settled on a tunic style with a big pocket, like I've seen children in old photographs wear.

The pocket opening is trimmed with rick-rack to amp up the cuteness even more. I didn't find a pattern I liked for this project, so I made it myself using a basic children's top sloper. I was a bit afraid I didn't make the neck opening big enough, but it turns out it fits fine. Phew!

I bound the neck- and arm openings with bias tape and used the button loop technique for the closure.

This was a fun project and it turned out just as I hoped! The fabrics are so cheerful, just the right thing for summer!

40ies style girl's pinafore

2011-06-08T00:54:00.000-07:00

This little pinafore dress is for a friend's little girl who I'm going to meet for the first time today. :-) It's a size 80, so it's going to be too big for her, but this looks like a design that can grow with a child and fortunately it's a layering piece that's not only limited to summer. I made it using a pattern from a back-issue of Suuri Käsityö magazine (6-7 /2006). The pattern was constructed from a dress design that a woman made for her little daughter in the 40ies. With there being a shortage of fabric at that time, this pattern makes the most of a half-yard.

My friend loves vintage style and the colour blue, so I thought this pattern combined with the lovely Little Folks print would be perfect for her daughter. It also was perfect for me, since I only had a half-yard of the fabric ... ;-)

My favourite feature of the dress is the back closure. (Please note the mismatched print in the back ... I decided it gives the dress character and charm ... ;-)) The thriftiness of the pattern designer really shows here, because with the use of button loops there is no need for the fabrics overlapping, resulting in saving fabric.

Also, the look is very retro to me and goes really well with the rest of the design. It was really fun making the loops, I followed the tutorial at the Oliver+S blog. I used thicker than regular thread to give the loops some sturdiness.

AND: I love these buttons! Another friend of mine gave me two of these little retro boxes for my birthday! We had buttons like this on our duvet covers and pillows when I grew up and they also remind me of my great-grandmother who still wore my home area's traditional dress (the style she wore is the Marburg protestant traditional dress you can see in the first picture of the link) every day of her life.

The construction of the dress is very interesting, there are no exposed seams. Every thing is either hemmed, lined or, in the case of the waistband, covered with a strip of fabric.

So, there's only simple straight stitch needed, no buttonholes, no zigzag, no serger. I love how this fact also reflects the time the dress was designed in.

In the spirit of thriftiness there was no ribbon on the original dress, but I couldn't resist. This yellow folksy ribbon just was so perfect for the project.

I love all these primary colours together, it's just so cheerful! J. found the old fruit drop tin while cleaning out the attic. It's so pretty. Why does it seem that packaging was prettier in the past?

I'm really happy with the dress and I hope my friend will like it, too! It was such a pleasure to sew with the voile again! I ordered some yardage of Loulouthi voile for myself, so I'm looking forward to making something nice for myself some time! :-)

We're having really beautiful weather here, so I leave you with some pics of the flowers on our balcony. Because I (finally) can!!! ;-)

Have a good day!

Craft ADD continues ...

2011-05-19T05:05:00.000-07:00

It seems like I can't concentrate on just one or even two projects right now ...

I'm working on the Spring dolly quilt when I want some slow sewing in front of the TV. Above you can see the layout I tried out before starting to appliqué the green spiral. But I have so many ideas right now (and amassed so much fabric ...), that I can't help but start other projects as ideas spring to mind.

Like this Habitat quilt I started. I wanted a design that really showcases my favourite fabrics of the line, the two fabrics in the centre. So I decided to try my hand at "quilt design" and just go with what feels right. The original plan was to sew the half-square triangle border right onto the centre panels without the solid in between, but boy, do I suck at math! I really miscalculated the size a square had to be for rotary cutting before cutting the triangles, so I put in the border to make up for my mistake. Maybe it was for the better, it looks quite nice.

Still missing one side ... Please don't look too closely at my sloppy piecing ... :-P For the next border I'm thinking along the lines of the pixeled print in blue. I would like the finished quilt to have quite a "fluid" feel, so I think the same print but in a contrasting colour would support that idea. What do you think?

As for the third project going on around here right now ... I promised to make an outfit for a friend of mine and it is quite a big project and I'm not sure if I didn't take on a bit much ... Not only in terms of the work amount but also regarding trickiness ... Alongside work I really can handle only small doses of trickiness ... Well, of course I started with the easiest part of the outfit, a bolero and fortunately it came together quite quickly!

I drafted the pattern myself from a basic pattern and hemmed the borders and sleeve ruffles with the serger's rolled hem stitch.

I think for this kind of thin and slippery fabric that is really the best and easiest option and it actually also looks quite nice. So now I'm trying to motivate myself to continue with the skirt ... I unpicked the invisible zipper about 5 times yesterday ... Wish me luck!!!

Spring

2011-05-09T04:05:00.000-07:00

In this picture you can see a Maibaum, or maypole, which is a symbol of spring in many places.

Last week, J. and I spent a couple of days with my family in Germany, including the 1st of May. We were mostly in my home village and enjoyed time with my family and took walks outside.

It was really great to visit and see my family and also soak up some beautiful greenness and sun!

Fortunately, spring has slowly arrived to Helsinki as well, otherwise it would have been quite tough to return ...

J. and I also spent an afternoon in the nearby town of Marburg, where I studied and where we met about 9 years ago!

Marburg has a medieval town centre and beautifully cared for old houses. The Brothers Grimm lived here for a time, and I think the town really has a fairy tale atmosphere. Especially since moving to Finland, when I come back it really reminds me of the stories the brothers collected, partly also in the area around Marburg.

Being an university town, Marburg offers a lot of little cafés and bistros where one can eat well for affordable prices. Also, it combines old and new, as in this advertisement for a comic book store:

Marburg citizens need not worry, Spidey's watching ... ;-)

I'm really feeling energized by spring, maybe even too much, because I think I have some kind of craft ADD. I started a new project yesterday (with quite some unfinished projects lying around ...). Inspired by spring and by Sarah Fielke's stunning new book, I decided I want to make one of the dolly quilts from it. Of course the quilt's name is ... Spring (it's the quilt that's in the quilting hoop on the book's cover).

I received the book last week and love it! I especially like the dolly quilt idea, so many new techniques that can be tried out in a small and manageable project! I decided to make the Spring quilt first, because I had almost all the materials already (except for the pre-made bias tape ...) And since it's appliqué, I can work on it in front of the TV, something that's is just perfect from time to time!!!

I cut out the leaves and the butterfly yesterday and I really think this will be very fun to make! This also taught me some things about my stash:

Some of them I already knew, like that I love fabrics that have either aqua or olive green or both in them, but I was surprised that my stash is actually quite varied. Don't get me wrong, I know that I have quite a lot of fabric, but I always thought that my tastes are somewhat narrow and limited. I got a nice variety of fabrics for the leaves, though, and they are not too matchy-matchy, I think. (The instructions call for scraps, but I cut the leaves out of fat quarters or half yards I horded ... Anyone else do that?! :-P) Also, I have more florals than I thought:

I love fabrics that are spotty in some way:

And I'm drawn to fabrics that in some way remind me of formica table tops like on the kitchen table we had when I was a child.

I also like:

stripes

other geometric prints

slightly retro prints with a mid-century modern feel

novelty prints showing animals (especially birds), insects, kitchen appliances, crockery, sock monkeys and buildings

(isn't this one perfect? It's a pillow in my father's house, I think I have to ask if I can have it next time and make a new one in return ...)

prints that contain lettering, writing or newsprint

batik effects

Anna Maria Horner's bold and beautiful prints

and

prints with simple hand-drawn (or apparently hand-drawn) designs like for example Megumi Sakakibara's prints

What about you? What kind of prints are out there that you can't resist?

quick spring project

2011-04-26T12:05:00.000-07:00

Happy Tuesday! I hope you all had a beautiful Easter! I had an annoying cold last week, but fortunately I was better in time for the holidays! We've been having beautiful weather here and I was itching to make something spring-related. But with my energy-levels still low from the cold, it had to be something quick and simple.

Enter the trusty table runner ...! I had painted this small piece of linen some time ago. I had wanted to experiment a bit with painting on fabric and creating a simple pattern and this is what I came up with. I've been reading some books by Lotta Jansdotter and I think it shows!

The drawing was really easy and I love the combination of the dove grey and the linen. Also, I wanted the brush-strokes to be quite thin and transparent to emphasize that it was painted on by hand.

I simply straightened the sides of the fabric and sewed a narrow hem. I fringed the short sides to play on the handmade and imperfect theme a bit more.

This little runner in combination with these beautiful tulips was just the right thing to celebrate the arrival of spring!

Alice in the Candy Store - finished!

2011-04-18T03:33:00.000-07:00

So, I finally finished the Alice Candy Store quilt! Actually, this is the first real quilt I've ever finished!!! Yay!!! (I've got one I've started a LONG time ago, still got to finish the quilting ... I'd like to finish it this year, it's one of my resolutions ...) I've also still got to hone my quilt photographing skills ... It's hard to get a good pic of the whole quilt, even though this one is only a small size.

I quilted it with red and black embroidery floss to go with the colour scheme. I like the diagonal quilting lines and the fact that the thread is sometimes blending in with the fabric and sometimes forming contrasting lines.

For the binding I used the same fabric as for the "frame" for the inner panel. I really like how it turned out. I've never sewn a binding like this and was a little nervous, but it was really fun. I followed the very clear instructions in this book and they made figuring this out very simple.

J. said some of the motifs say more "Las Vegas" than "Alice in Wonderland" ... Well, I ran out of ideas and the playing card motifs were just such a simple solution ... :-D

Can't get enough of that cute swallow!

For the backing I used the red Woodcut print from Innocent Crush. I had to add to the sides of the backing to make it wide enough. That print is so pretty, I'm glad I've got some of it left over!

Here's one motif I haven't shown you in my last post about the quilt. The making of this wasn't exactly a piece of cake, but I really enjoyed it and am proud of the outcome. This is such a nice pattern and I think this is a great beginner quilt!

If you want to take a look at the process posts about this quilt, you can find them here, here, here and here.

Have a great week! :-)

fabric love

2011-04-08T01:55:00.000-07:00

This week has been going by so quickly again! I'm working on the Alice quilt binding, but haven't been making a sufficient amount of progress to merit taking pics ... We've been having some dreary weather here, so I'm cheering myself up with fabric (I might even have ordered some new fabric ... I think I'll have to put an embargo on myself ... Did that ever work for any of you?!).

I love this Hideaway print paired with the classic Westfalenstoffe print. It's such a folksy and happy combination. I'm thinking about making a little tunic out of these.

Another combo that would make a cute item of clothing for a little girl. The top print is Alexander Henry June Blooms, the other is Mod Dot.

This springtime pile consists of Kumari Garden Sacha, Innocent Crush Bubble Burst and a Bliss print. Fabric companies: if you want me to buy your stuff, just keep producing fabrics combining turquoise and green ... ;-)

I think this Habitat pile will turn into the next project for myself. I'd like to make a Jane Market Bag out of these. Have you seen the finalists of the Modern Madness on the Fat Quarterly blog? What a though one! I love both collections, they're so versatile and pretty. How about you?

With these bright fabrics and a video about another (even worse, if possible) fabric horder than me, I'd like to wish you a happy weekend! I hope I'll get some real sewing vs. dream sewing done!

Time flies

2011-04-01T02:16:00.000-07:00

These last couple of weeks have been going by so quickly! I've been working a lot and my energy levels haven't been on their all-time high. I've worked on the Candy Store Alice quilt, though, and it's almost finished. I need to do a tiny little bit of quilting and then only add the binding ... I hope I can show you the finished quilt, soon! (And give it to our goddaughter ... Better late than never ...!)

Here are some more process shots of the quilting:

I've tried to come up with some motifs in tune with the Alice theme, so roses were top of the list. I drew the motifs straight on the fabric with a 2B pencil. I also tried to keep the drawings simple, so it wouldn't be too hard to quilt the outlines later.

A little bottle. I was thinking whether I should write "Drink me!" on the little label, but I think I'll leave it blank.

Please tell me this looks like a mushroom?! This was surprisingly hard to get right!

The butterfly is my favourite. So cute.

Here are some random things that made me smile during this last couple of weeks:

I scored some cool fabric on sale here. They still have some great fabrics left. The fabrics arrived and I'm so happy with them! Among them are some I've been lusting after for some time like this and this. I also got a yard of Innocent Crush velveteen and it's amazing! I bought the Maybe print with making something for one of the little girls in our circle in mind, but the width would probably allow me to make a skirt for myself instead ... Mmmmm ... Now I want more! :-D

I had a DVD-fest yesterday and I can only recommend this and this movie!!! Nothing like some good comedies on a gray day!

Have you seen this?!!!! I was speechless when I first stumbled upon it on Amazon! I'm not sure what to think, but it's a great mixture of crazy and amazing - acrazing ...?! :-D

As is this, my favourite ever youtube video! It's a classic, so you might have seen it, but anyway, here it is (sorry for the bad quality, but it's genius anyway):

Have a great weekend!!!

walking in Helsinki

2011-03-23T01:58:00.000-07:00

This weekend we had guests from Germany and a great time! I'd like to show you some pics I took on our walks we took in Helsinki. Having guests and showing them around makes you appreciate the place where you live in a new way. So now I was able to see the beauty in our wintry spring once again.

We took a walk through Eira and then arrived at the shore where there were some boats waiting for the ice to melt.

Here is where people come to wash their carpets in the sea in summer.

Here's a view out of the tram in the centre of Helsinki. It was snowing all of Saturday.

On Sunday we went to Suomenlinna Sea Fortress by ferry. Here's a ferry waiting to go to Stockholm.

A view from the small ferry we took. There's an exclusive boating club on that island.

There's still quite a bit of ice on the sea.

Arriving to Suomenlinna.

There's a lighthouse on top of the church.

Don't you think using these colours and white would make a stunning quilt?

Nature-made ice sculpture.

Man-made icy flower pot.

Views from Suomenlinna.

Fortress structures.

View from King's Port.

So, now you know I haven't just whined on a high level here when it comes to the long winter ... ;-) But these pics and the great walks we took make me appreciate it again. So now I'm waiting for spring a bit more patiently ...

Slow Table Runner

2011-03-10T01:14:00.000-08:00

This was planned as "the quickest project ever". Game plan: Buy a length of fabric with printed borders, cut it in half horizontally (equals two runners), tidy edges & hem them by machine, finished ...!

But then somehow I got it into my head to try my hand at hand-sewn mitered corners and slipstitched hemming ...

Well, two days later I've finished one of the two, but I have to say I'm quite happy with my decision. The fabric (Ecrulat Lycéenne, bought here last year, but apparently it's out of stock ...) is so pretty and the linen/cotton blend really lends itself to this kind of project. The fabric wasn't cheap, either, so I guess I'm doing it some more justice by hand-stitching. Also, I wanted to make the most of the fabric I had and with hand-sewing it's easier to achieve tidy narrow borders.

The fabric goes really well with the little plates my grandmother gave me last summer. In the spirit of not-keeping-it-real, I staged a little tea party for you ... ;-)

Have a good end of the week and a lovely weekend!

I heart quilting

2011-03-02T01:42:00.000-08:00

This title is not completely true. I enjoy the sewing part more than the quilting part, but this is my first attempt at quilting with perle cotton embroidery thread and I really like this method. I like how the quilting is so visible and the thread is really vibrant and pretty. Plus, there's no pressure about the quilting having to be tiny and perfect. Some imperfection and "chunkier" stitches only add character with this method.

So, you have guessed that finally my batting and backing fabric arrived. I ordered some Innocent Crush Woodcut, the same red print I used in the front, for the back. This fabric is so pretty and large enough in scale to make for an interesting quilt back. The batting is Vilene 275 Cotton and I really like the drape of it and have had no problems quilting so far. I'm not completely sure that I'm using the right needle, though ... What kind of needle are you using for hand-quilting?

As for other projects, I was so inspired by this, that I had to have a try with a version of it and made four place-mats (individual sized ones) from Central Park oilcloth. Central Park may well be my favourite fabric collection right now. It's so pretty and so versatile! I love this print especially.

I failed when it came to the binding, though ... I tried to make a natural linen binding, because I loved the look and the contrast of the plastic oilcloth with the rough texture of the linen, but I completely botched it up.

I had a hard time getting it to go through the binding maker the first time, but when it came to the first seam all was lost ... Also, look how uneven the binding turned out ... So, linen binding discarded ... :-P

Now I'm thinking about other options, for now I really like this one:

My issues with this fabric are that it would make the place-mats very summery and bright as opposed to relatively neutral. Another point to consider is that they're going to get stained for sure, and white binding on an oilcloth place-mat you can't wash?! J. says the place-mats are fine as they are, without binding. Dunno ... I guess I'll have to think about it some more. What do you think?

Interiour Inspiration

2011-02-22T00:28:00.000-08:00

Since it's still too cold around here to be outside much, I've been mostly pottering around at home during my free time. Reading blogs, library books, drinking tea and watching sentimental movies (like this and this, love both of them!)

And, since I don't have much else to show for my time, I thought I'd share some of the great stuff that inspired me this week.

First, there was this post on decor8 about little decorating projects for the home that can be achieved easily and mostly without any cost, simply by arranging and re-arranging little corners of one's home. My favourite of the 20 inspirational pics was number 5 and you can see my (by far not as great as the original) version above.

Another favourite on the net this week has been this post. Such beautiful pictures and such a great and simple project. And you really don't need a messy baby to justify making one! ;-)

I was really lucky at the library to find three great books on decorating, all in tune with the simple and thrifty philosophy expressed in the decor8 post.

The first one is by Emily Chalmers. I love all the books she collaborated on with Ali Hanan and Debi Treloar I've read so far. Cheap Chic is really inspiring and gives a lot of ideas to transform one's home with simple projects and ideas.

A pot of paint can make all the difference.

Bored with your bookshelf? Sort by colour.

Why not make your fabric collection a feature of your home?

Make the most of your pretty tableware and beautiful packaging.

Nail a favourite print on a frame for instant and unusual artwork.

The second book I borrowed is Thrifty Chic by Liz Bauwens and Alexandra Campbell. The photographs by Simon Brown are beautiful. This book is giving ideas and instructions how to create beautiful interiours room by room.

A lot of them are low or no-cost, like this pretty display of pebbles.

Or this cheerful flower arrangement.

Or how about the collection of bottles to decorate a window?

Why not display your button collection in an unusual but practical way?

Last but not least I borrowed a book recently published in Finnish. It was originally published by the makers of VT Wonen magazine from The Netherlands.

The Finnish title means "enjoy your home". The book is full of pretty photographs, tips about decorating, floor plans and colour palettes. And how gorgeous is that cover?!

A simple yet immensely effective colour scheme.

A laid-back but festive table setting for a birthday party.

I hope you liked my little tour of the things that have been keeping me smiling this week! I'll leave you with a little clip (with English subtitles) from Finnish comedy series Studio Julmahuvi capturing the Finnish Soul during winter.

Business as usual ... ;-)

Mojo and Moaning

2011-02-15T01:46:00.000-08:00

I'm still waiting for the materials for the Alice quilt and also for my mojo to return. Anyway, I should be doing something else than sewing, namely writing thank-you-cards for our wedding. Yes, I know ... We're VERY late! Our pictures FINALLY arrived last week, our photographer has been in and out of hospital and we had to wait quite some time for them. I bought baby pink and lime-green envelopes and small lime-green postcards to glue them on. This long and cold winter made me go for a springtime theme. I'm not sure about the lime coloured cards in retrospect, they give our faces in the black-and-white photographs a nice greenish tinge ... :-P

Also the stamps are going with the hopeful spring theme.

And look at the flowers J. got me for Valentine's! A perfect match! :-) These really cheer me up! I have to say that I'm feeling like this a lot lately:

At least it has been sunny the last couple of weeks, but still, I feel like this winter has been lasting forever! It's not all bad, though. Here are some pics I took on a walk we took to Seurasaari open-air museum last Sunday:

The bridge leading to the Seurasaari island. You can see people skiing and walking on the frozen sea.

A view from the bridge.

A typical traditional Finnish fence.

The roof of one of the houses re-built on Seurasaari.

Phone-booth.

There used to be Dutch-style windmills in 19th century rural Finland, too.

A neo-gothic summer garden house.

We took a shortcut over the ice to Hietaniemi.

The Prime Minister's residence Kesäranta ("summer shore").

So, I guess I should watch Groundhog Day, write the cards and think about the positive sides of winter!!

Candy Store progress

2011-02-07T01:42:00.000-08:00

The sewing won on Friday and I finished the Candy Store quilt top! (Has there ever been a more perfect tape measure/project match, by the way? I got this one as a gift from a friend of mine last year. :-))

I only used four blocks of the Alice fabric, because I wanted to keep it simple. The centre diamonds are going to be embroidered with different motifs, so I thought it's nicer to keep the whimsy to a minimum.

Sweet little sparrow. There a sparrows nesting under the roof of my father's house every year. They are so beautiful.

Alice and the Rabbit.

King and guard.

Alice and Chesire Cat.

I decided against the Westfalenstoffe fabric for the border and went with this toned down black and white one. I think it provides a better frame for the fabrics used.

I love the little details in the fabrics. Lots to spy for a little one. And big ones, too ...

Now I have to draw up the motifs for the centre diamond panels. I will use the fabrics as inspiration for these. I'm waiting for the backing fabric and batting to arrive, so there's time to plan the drawings. This should be fun!

Alice in the Candy Store

2011-02-04T01:11:00.000-08:00

The last couple of weeks have been quite busy for me, I've been working a lot and warding off a cold, so craftiness took the backseat for a while. This week I'm getting back my mojo and started a new project. We were asked if we'd like to become godparents to our friends' little girl, so I decided I wanted to make a small quilt for her to give on her Christening. I ordered an Alice-themed Fat-Quarter Custom Bundle from fabricworm and I love the fabrics in it! They have such a knack for putting together the loveliest sets! The colours are red, beige, grey, black and a bit of white.

It also includes two of the Alice fabrics by Kokka, you can see my favourite detail in the first picture above. I decided to make the Candy Store quilt from Material Obsession and (not counting the 16 centre plain squares!) the Bundle gave me enough fabric to cut the squares and triangles for the quilt top with some scraps to spare. Here and here are great pics of versions of Candy Store on flickr. (I dare you to do a flickr search on Material Obsession! You might get an awesomeness attack!!!)

I thought along the lines of the fabric above for the border and binding. I love all the classic Westfalenstoffe fabrics! Their design is timeless and they remind me of my first experiments with patchwork when I was 11. But let's see how the blocks come together, first ...

I already put together some of the Broken Dishes blocks. For the quilting of the 16 central panels I'm planning to draw up some Alice-themed motifs to underline the theme of the quilt. I'm really confident that this could become a really cute quilt. If only I finish it ...

Today, I have the whole day off and I'm torn between sewing and going to the National Museum. They have an exhibition on doll houses there right now and I'd really like to see it. Let's see ... Maybe I can have my candy and eat it, too? I'll let you know!

simple baby blanket

2011-01-20T02:25:00.000-08:00

I put the apron project on hold, because friends of ours became parents of their second daughter last weekend. I wanted to make something small for her and decided to make a flannel blanket. I still had some Folksy Flannel fabric and after some thinking and playing went for the option of using 3 fat quarters in a girly pink colourway. My first idea was to cut the fabric into smaller pieces, but when I had cut the fabric in 25 cm strips I changed my mind. I used three of the strips as they were, so the patterns could really shine and to avoid the design from becoming to busy. I shortened the remaining three strips by 5 cm and then cut them in half horizontally.

I decided on the layout you can see here, with the strongest colourway in the middle and the smaller pieces of the same fabric forming a diagonal line.

The "filling" is simple cotton flannel and the backing a hot pink cotton. When piecing the front I used 1 cm seam allowance, because the flannel is rather thick. The finished blanket measures 71 cm x 76 cm.

After piecing the top, I made the sandwich, turned and ironed and then stitched all around the edges, using my machine's foot as a guide. Then I simply stitched in the ditches of the patchwork pieces.

The blanket is really cheerful and pretty, perfect for a baby girl born in dark and grey January. And it's cozy. This one makes me want my own adult-sized flannel blanket for snuggling up in front of the TV or with a good book. (I'm currently re-reading Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, for some reason I always feel like reading the series in winter when it's especially gloomy outside.)

This is my favourite detail of the Coloring Garden print. Gooseberries are my favourite berries. Everybody goes crazy over strawberries, but I'd take gooseberries over them anytime. They're sour and sweet and pretty. Their colour is beautiful and they remind me of my childhood summers in rural Germany.

Can you tell I'm done with winter for now?! ;-)

arranging and re-arranging

2011-01-13T01:25:00.000-08:00

I haven't got much craftiness to show for this week, except for the little pile above. (Unless you count ordering quilting books on amazon as craftiness, that is ... No?) I pulled these fabrics out of my stash with making the apron (here's a pretty example) from Patchwork Style in mind. My first inspiration was to use the bold flowery Laura Ashley print on the left with the pale pink linen/cotton-mix fabric on the right. It wasn't very easy to find 6 fabric to go with those out of my existing stash of recent and older fabrics even though only small scraps are needed and I've got quite a good range of fabrics, I think. After some re-arranging and switching I came up with the collection above and am still happy with my choice after sleeping over it. Not too matchy-matchy, also not too wildly different. I'm looking forward to seeing how the project will turn out!

As to what I've otherwise been doing with my spare time ...

... I've cleaned out, re-labeled and re-arranged our spice drawer. I know ... For some reason in January the cleaning and decorating bug gets me. After we put our Christmas decorations in boxes last weekend, I got the urge to re-arrange things in our home and have everything be orderly, cozy and stylish (still a long way to go from that ...). And I started with the spice drawer ... Well, ... Anyway ... I labeled the lids (instead of the sides) of our recycled spice jars with labels from this pretty book. So much more practical if you can see right away what's inside the jar when opening the drawers ... Duh!

I also made this little arrangement.

We got this dancing couple as an engagement present and bought the postcard in the frame on our trip to Paris when we got engaged in 2009. Next to them I put some postcards we received from friends and family in the last couple of weeks telling good news and sending good wishes for the New Year.

It's a good start.

New Year - Old Project Obsession

2011-01-05T00:31:00.000-08:00

Hello all! I hope you had a good start into this New Year 2011! A new year always makes one think of new beginnings or things one would like to change. This year I've been thinking about things I'd like to carry on into this new year, like my interest in Japanese cooking, trying to make the everyday special with little things like using pretty tableware and blogging regularly here.

Another thing I'm carrying into this year is my infatuation with the Pink Penguin wristlet. They are so fun to make and always turn out so pretty! I made this one with Cosmo Cricket's Tailor Made for a friend's birthday. She's a dressmaker and I thought she'd surely appreciate these sewing-themed fabrics as much as I do. I really love this collection, it's so pretty and whimsical and I love all the sewing-related bits like scissors and thread. My favourite print is the tape-measure one. I ordered a complete collection fat-quarter set (along with some other pretty fabric ... :-)) here. Sometimes (read: more often than sometimes ...) I can't resist all the pretty fabric available in the US!

This lady even looks a bit like my friend! Fabric destiny!

I also ordered some labels for her to sew into her creations. As you can see they have a cute pic of a spool of thread on them and there's also her name and above it it reads "Made by hand" in Finnish. If any Finns are interested, I ordered them here.

This one turned out so super cute! The fabrics of this collection work extremely well together, I think, and look even better when cut up and combined.

cookies, tea towels and lights

2010-12-23T10:19:00.000-08:00

Yay! I made some Christmas Cookies! I don't know when was the last time I made some. J. isn't that big on sweets and I usually go straight for pure chocolate ...

These are the Christmas Chocolate biscuits from Nigella Christmas and I used Dr. Oetker sprinkles. The look really pretty in their clumsy way and taste great!

I also did some last-minute sewing. This is another tea towel with machine-appliquéd hearts. The idea and heart pattern comes from Cath Kidston's Sew! (I just looked at the Cath Kidston homepage and how cute are these candles?!)

I like the combination of the plaid and the two prints. Really pretty! Christmassy, but not too much so, so it can be used all year round - I hope.

It's been quite busy around here, but as you can see, I'm trying to cram in all I can before the Season is over!!! Yesterday we finally got around to decorating the tree.

I wish you all a very festive Season, Happy Holidays and all the best for you and your loved ones!

More kitchen-themed gifts

2010-12-17T02:25:00.000-08:00

Remember these? I decided to embroider some tea towels to go with the spices to make a nice kitchen-themed set. As to other things to possibly go in such a set, I was thinking along the lines of these and this.

For the first two towels here I used Pleasant Kitchen Dishtowels designs by Alicia Paulson. The towels are from Ikea.

For this one I used a design from Decorative Embroidery which I borrowed from the library. It's a really good book for beginners, I think, and contains lots of pretty but simple patterns and ideas.

Love this central heart! I want to make more of these, they are so beautiful and fun. Also, the heart design gives many opportunities to try different colour combinations. Maybe some pillow covers with this design?

Since the jars of spices are a bit difficult to pack as presents, I covered a paper bag from one of my favourite little shops here in Helsinki with a page torn out of Kotiliesi magazine. Kotiliesi dates back to 1922 and the website claims that it was Finland's first women's and home magazine. The name means something like "hearth of the home" and I wasn't really attracted by the name. Luckily, my mother-in-law always gives me her old magazines and I now I really think that Kotiliesi is the best Finnish magazine in this category. There are always beautiful food spreads and table setting suggestions. Also, there are nice home stories and interviews. It's the perfect magazine the relax with, especially in winter.

There are still so many things I'd like to make before Christmas, but so little time. I guess I'll have to shorten my list ...

Have a great weekend!!!

10 Favourite Christmastime Movies

2010-12-08T02:33:00.000-08:00

The Christmas mood is going on strong around here. Yesterday I went to see The Nutcracker at the Helsinki Opera House and it was a really beautiful production. I'd never seen this ballet before and I liked it a lot. In addition to that, it snowed so much here that today the roofs have to be cleared from snow to avoid any structural damage or accidents. So you can imagine, that I'm in a cozy mood and all I'd like to do is watch movies, drink hot beverages and do some crafting (a little work in progress sneak peek up there ...) Alas, I have to go to work in the afternoon, but that didn't stop me from making a list of movies I like to watch during this time:

Elf (Will Ferrell at his best!)

The Muppet Christmas Carol (A classic!)

The Ref (funny and mean family comedy with a brilliant Kevin Spacey ...)

Groundhog Day (this cheers me up whatever the season ...)

Three Wishes for Cinderella (this is always shown on German TV at Christmastime, such a beautiful fairy tale movie!)

Ronja Robbersdaughter (a beautiful film based on a book by one of my favourite writers ...)

Pride & Prejudice (Jane Austen starring Colin Firth, what more do you need ...)

Die Hard (the perfect action film for Christmastime ... Bruce Willis + Alan Rickman = great!)

The Nightmare Before Christmas (love the animation, love the songs)

Mary Poppins (great songs and my childhood crush Dick Van Dyke)

What are your favourite Christmastime movies?

Sugar & Spice

2010-12-01T02:16:00.000-08:00

Since moving to Finland, I think I understand the importance of Christmas much better. I'm not talking about religious references and meaning now, rather about the fact, that in the midst of this dark and cold wintertime we all need something to look forward to. At least for me, it's energizing and motivating to plan for Christmas, or even just dream about what kind of food we could have, how to decorate the apartment and what kinds of crafts to make and Christmas cards to send.

One of my favourite companions during these daydreams has been this:

(picture via amazon.com)

It really is a great book packed full of food, Nigella's cooking philosophy, decorating ideas and beautiful pictures. I'm aware that not every body is a great fan of Nigella's, but I am and I think this book is one of her best. Although I love the sparseness and simple photography of Feast, this one is just perfect for Christmas with all its eye candy. (The cover shown above makes me wonder if its digitally remastered, though ... On my version Nigella is holding a tray of oven potatoes, much more fitting, I think ...)

One of my favourite sections of the book is the one about edible presents. So this year I decided to follow some of the instructions. First, I made the Christmas-Spiced Salt, because it is easy to prepare, looks pretty and will last long.

I added some ribbon and some cute Cath Kidston stickers and it looks really cute, I think. I made five jars of this. The great thing about this is also, that one could easily come up with recipes of one's own and mix in spices according to one's own taste (or cupboard contents ...).

I also made the Vanilla Sugar, for the same reasons as above.

These jars are a bit bigger, I made three of them and because they are so pretty already, kept the decoration to a minimum. Now I'm thinking about what I could make next. I'd like to try some steeped fruits and also spiced olive oil. Some biscotti presented with a bottle of dessert wine would also be a nice present, I think. What I like about these presents is that I can prepare them in advance at my own pace at home. I think the preparation for Christmas is more than half the fun and this year these presents are part of it.

Another part, of course, is decorating. In our house the rule is that the Christmas decorations can come out on the first Advent Sunday, so this Sunday we started to decorate and will add the rest of our ornaments little by little.

I'm also working on adding to our inventory by making these. So much fun, but really slow going!

The village above was a present to us by my father-in-law some years ago. I think it's this one. Anyway, the manufacturer is Konstsmide. It has two light settings, one is a dim glow and the other a technicolor blinking riot. It rocks!

Fabric escapism

2010-11-23T00:45:00.001-08:00

After I made this for my friend, I wanted a wristlet for myself and I came up with this. Since J. and I got engaged and spent our honeymoon in Paris I'm a sucker for all those whimsical Paris-themed fabrics out there. The one I used here is a linen print by Kokka.

I decided to stick to the colours of the tricolore and use scraps from my stash with this print that have a vintage or rustic feel. I love that mock cross-stitch print in the top left corner! It's from the Sew It Book Collection by Red Rooster. I'm newly interested in cross-stitch and embroidery, not least because of Alicia Paulson's amazing new book.

As you can see in the pictures, it's winter here, although people are still officially talking about "autumn". It's great that it snowed, because of the snow it's not as dark as it would be otherwise. What better antidote to the darkness and cold than pretty fabrics, some sewing and daydreaming of Paris?!

The handy inside pockets are really cute. I love that blue flower print as well. A late friend of my grandmother's gave me a lot of her patchwork supplies and fabric scraps some years ago. She was a great fan of the colour blue and the scraps are all very lovely and old-fashioned in the best sense. It's strange and wonderful to think how fabrics and sewing can connect people in a unique way. I didn't really meet this woman very often or know her very well, but she knew I was interested in patchwork and that was enough for her to be so generous. Now her fabrics are a part of my little projects and they make me think of her.

The Dress

2010-11-16T03:16:00.000-08:00

So my cousin and my father-in-law came to the rescue and here are some pics of the dress! Sorry, there is only one a bit poor picture of the whole length, but at least the picture shows you the nice weather we had ...! ;-)

My good friend and namesake Eva made me jewelry for the wedding. I hope she can find it in her heart to forgive me for customizing it into hair ornaments! (Bridezilla alert!!!)

More facts about the dress: the pattern is from Burda magazine 4/2009 and I used 3.8 metres of polyester duchesse satin and 90 cm of guipure lace. Plus 3.15 metres of viscose lining and an 60 cm invisible zipper. And thread, of course.

My biggest concerns regarding making the dress were the slippery nature of the satin, the sewing of the lace and the invisible zipper. The satin was easier to sew than expected. I had a sufficient amount of notches and also pinned the pieces together at critical points for more precise construction. The problem I had with the fabric was more linked to ironing, my puny household iron wasn't able to open the seams at the required low temperature, so I decided to invest in having it ironed at the dry cleaners, who did a great job.

The lace was also easier to handle than expected. I found that all you have to do is to fearlessly sew across the "empty spaces" and you'll be fine. I finished the seam allowances of the lace with a narrow zig-zag stitch.

The invisible zipper is always a bit of a challenge and I was afraid the satin would make it even more fiddly to insert. So I decided to prepare for it extra carefully. What I did was hand-baste along the centre back seamline and then iron it to the wrong side. Like that you can easily see the line along which the zipper is supposed to be sewn. Also, I ironed the zipper from the wrong side. Like this, the "ditch" you have to sew in to precisely insert the zipper is becoming more pronounced and the zipper application is a bit easier. Attaching the zipper I used the invisible zipper foot of my machine. Other things that help with zipper application are basting or pinning. With invisible zippers I prefer basting. Here's a video I found about this topic. If the zipper foot compatible with your machine looks like the one in the video, you're in luck! We had the same kind in school, but the one belonging to my machine is much more fiddly.

Here's what the dress looked like in the magazine. In this picture you can see the hem, which I think is really pretty. I also can tell you why the models have placed their hands in front of the photostory bride's belly: SERIOUS Bridget-Jones-style underpinnings required. No, not the ones with the leopard print ...

There's some more wedding-related things I wanted to show you. First, the bouquet, which turned out exactly the way I had imagined it:

It was so beautiful! My grandmother had it dried and now it's in Germany decorating the guest bedroom.

Here's J.'s matching lapel corsage:

AND: the amazing wedding cake my mother's friends made:

It was three-tiered and very yummy!

Thank you for your patience and excuse me for taking so long with this!!! I hope you enjoyed the pictures!

Mrs. Tease

2010-11-10T03:39:00.000-08:00

So here I am, back in the internets! I'm sorry for being such a tease, and I'm afraid that you'll have to wait for a little bit longer to see pictures of the dress! Sorry!!!!!! As you can imagine, being the bride and all, I didn't really have the chance (nor was it the foremost thing on my mind) to take pictures of the dress, so I'm waiting for our friends' and family's pics to slowly arrive here to see if there's a good pic in there for you!

In the meantime, I'm hoping to be able to appease you a little with pictures of the beautiful decorations my grandma made for the dinner we had after our civil service ceremony.

In Germany it's obligatory to have a civil service ceremony, a church ceremony isn't possible without the marriage certificate from the magistrate. So, if you intend to have a church wedding in Germany, prepare for two ceremonies!

The civil service ceremony was held in a tiny old church that is nowadays owned by the magistrate and it was really beautiful. Only our closest family plus my maid of honour's family were present. In the evening we had dinner at my father's house, and my cousins and their families joined us there. We were 23 people and had a really nice time with rustic food from my home region. My aunt, grandma, cousins and uncle helped us prepare the food and the decorations for the evening. The room you can see there used to be a pub, my family had a little pub business until 17 years ago.

I'm really glad I took these pictures! My grandma really did such an amazing job!

Hope to be back soon with more pics!

tiny sneak peek of a big project

2010-10-08T09:34:00.000-07:00

The scrap you can see above is from the lace I used for my wedding dress. We are getting married next Saturday and after giving it a considerable amount of thought, I decided to make my dress myself.

When we got engaged, a lot of people asked me if I was going to sew my own dress since I was training to become a dressmaker. My first reaction was that I wouldn't. I felt that it would be too much pressure. Me being a perfectionist in these things and all the other things that have to be organized for a wedding seemed to speak strongly against it. Also, there's the superstition in Finland that it's bad luck to make your own wedding dress. (I'm sure, though, that this originates from a clever marketing ruse of dressmakers and tailors of yore. Also, I'm not Finnish.) But then ...

... I saw a picture in a Burda magazine from the library. And got to thinking about how hard it would be to find a similar dress off the rack and how comparatively easy it would be for me to make it. And how little enthusiasm I had for scouting around various bridal wear shops in Helsinki without ever finding anything that I would like as much as the dress in the magazine.

So, I decided to make it myself after all. It's finished now and I'm (after one minor crisis) happy with the outcome. My good friend from school helped me with the fitting and gave design support when I wasn't sure about what to do. I'm glad I didn't have to make all the decisions on my own, but had someone to support me. As I'm trying to keep the dress a surprise for J, I won't show you a picture, yet. My friend said, the dress really looks like "me" and I feel comfortable in it (as opposed to "in disguise"), so I think that's a major point of success!

I'm already in Germany to get some last preparations on the way. Please cross all your fingers and toes for us! I'm already having nightmares of there being no food and such ... :-o ;-)

1+1=1

2010-09-29T04:47:00.000-07:00

This shirt is for my friend's little boy and looks great worn as a layering piece over a long-sleeved T-shirt for autumn.

I used two of my fiancé's old shirts for this. They were too worn at the collars & cuffs to be used at work, but apart from that still in good shape. The cool thing about this is that you don't have to bother with button holes and attaching buttons, since you can use the existing ones of the shirts!

I couldn't be bothered with a collar, either. Also, I think this bias edge looks much more relaxed and in synch with the mix of materials here. It's supposed to be a fun shirt for every day, so no fussy collars disturbing playtime.

I used a basic children's shirt pattern and made half-sleeves. Also I made a yoke which is cut on the bias to add further interest.

I like the pleats in the back, as well. Of course, you could also make something similar using only one old men's shirt. It's good to see this nice fabric getting a new lease of live!

Meet Herman!

2010-09-23T00:11:00.000-07:00

This is Herman the Sock Monkey and made from two red heel socks like the ones in this post. I followed the instructions included with the socks and making him really wasn't difficult. I liked that the outcome and character of the monkey are all the time a bit of a surprise. Every little detail can influence the personality of the monkey like what kind of eyes you choose or how its mouth is going to look like. It is also a nice way of venturing into the new territory of making stuffies.

Some small sewing

2010-09-15T01:39:00.000-07:00

It's my good friend Dana's birthday next week and I put a little package together to send to her. She and her boyfriend visited us here in Helsinki in August, so I decided that the items in it should follow a Finland theme.

I made her a pretty patchwork wristlet following the Pink Penguin's fun tutorial. I arranged the fabrics so that the panels represent the Finnish flag.

The fabrics I used were mostly scraps from my stash, some of them given to me by a friend of my grandmother's. The patterns are all so pretty!

The vintage zipper came from my mother's sewing box. Love the hardware!

I decided to quilt the patchwork panel and batting (I used one layer of flannel here) together with zigzag stitch and I love the look of it!

Cute little loop!

I took these pictures yesterday and today the weather is even greyer, so I won't even attempt to take pictures of the other goodies in the package. But here's a list with links: a tea towel with Finland-themed design (the bigger blue one), the best crushed cardamom for making Finnish pulla, some shop-bought mini pulla for those days one can't be bothered to start baking, some chocolate filled with salmiak (here's a pic in a Finnish review) and some delicious autumn tea. All things you cannot easily get in Germany or elsewhere except Finland. I'm really happy with this package and I hope it arrives safely and well in time for my friend's birthday.

I guess, I'll be multi-tasking this autumn ...

2010-09-09T01:27:00.000-07:00

Forgive me the slightly forced title! It was too silly to resist ...!

Yes, this bag is made with Anna Maria Horner's Multi-Tasker Tote pattern. I know ... I think she has been responsible for 90% of my sewing output and inspiration this year! I'm really looking forward to her gorgeous new collection, but honestly, I think I could keep going for another year on her Little Folks collection alone ...

The fabrics I used are from Finnish brand Marimekko. I bought them in a sale they had a couple of years ago, because I liked the prints and colours. I didn't really know what to do with them, though, until I saw the Multi-Tasker Tote pattern and then everything was clear! The main tote fabric is a sturdy cotton as used for instance in curtains or tablecloths and the print is Tilkkula by Erja Hirvi. The lining fabric is a cotton satin weave with the classic Puketti print by Annika Rimala.

The tote pattern and instructions were very clear and everything came together nicely. I really enjoyed working with this kind of pattern, for a change. I'm usually using European patterns from magazines where you have to trace (sometimes even scale) the patterns and there are only quite meagre written instructions. This was really almost mindless sewing. And very relaxing. You simply cut out the pattern, the instructions clearly telling you at every step what to do. Plus there are how-to pictures for a lot of the steps! Definitely worth the money.

Well, the title isn't only silly, it's also true ... I have a lot of projects I want, have or have promised to do. At times it is slightly overwhelming, because (as probably many crafters know) just when you really don't have time for it, inspiration strikes. I feel like the more projects I'm taking on and the more I make, the more ideas I get, which would be great, if only I wasn't so impatient! :-P At the moment one big project is on the forefront, I've been working on it for a bit and it's already in a good stage of completion. I'll tell you more about it, soon.

After I finish that, there's an even bigger project waiting for me which I'm really excited about, but also intimidated by. I'll also tell you about that one, once the time is right. Well, I guess everybody knows about craft anxiety and the dilemma that the project at hand keeps you from all the other 1000 ideas you have. And the feeling that you would like to rush through things to finish everything right now, but you know that rushing is no good ... I guess it's good to take some little breaks from big projects once in a while and do something just for fun. Like this great tote!

Boxed corners are cool! :-)

That's more like it ...

2010-09-06T02:44:00.001-07:00

Remember this dilemma I had? Well, I decided to keep the central panels as they were and appliqued them to neutral coloured canvas.

I used thread in matching colours and attached the panels with a zigzag stitch. I adjusted the width of the stitch to almost the maximum and the length to almost zero. This technique required a lot of thread (I used about half a regular spool per pillow), but it looks very nice, I think.

The colours of the fabrics and the feel of the prints go really well with the rest of our living room. My fiancé likes the fabrics as well, especially the Pressed Flowers print (below right).

The backs of the pillows are made with the same cotton canvas used on the front and I made a simple slip cover style, which means simple construction and no zippers or buttons in the way of comfort. As you can see in the first picture, we could do with some pictures on our wall, but actually the pillows have a really nice framed feel. They are cuddly pictures, so to speak, and I can't see anything wrong with that! :-D

Love that bird in the corner there! :-)

Bananas for Monkeys

2010-08-30T06:37:00.000-07:00

I have a weakness for monkeys. More precisely toy monkeys or monkey fabric. This must be genetic, since my grandmother loves monkeys as well and has a great collection of monkey knick-knacks. It skipped a generation, though. My mother was an avid collector of everything cat-themed.

My monkey love started to get serious a couple of years ago and I haven't got a really large collection. (You already met Chappy sporting the fabric basket ;-)) I'm more for stuffed animals than knick-knacks and try not to amass too much stuff. This book was a real eye-opener, though. I LOVE IT!!! I can't stress the genius, beauty and cuteness of this book enough!

Here are some of my favourites:

Ask this one for advice, he'll know something clever to say!

I bet this monkey knows how to tell a good joke!

Looking for fashion advice? Just ask her!

This one decided to go as Baby Jane for Halloween!

They break my heart!

So you can imagine that I couldn't resist when I came across this fabric collection online.

(my loot)
(close up)

Or these socks including instructions!!! Now I can make my very own sock monkey! Yay! :-)

I'll only have to decide what it should look like and get some other projects finished, first ...

Scalloped Baby Blanket

2010-08-27T00:25:00.000-07:00

Here I am still obsessed with the Laura Ashley fabric! It hit me, how well this fabric pairs with this pretty Folksy Flannel design I had in my stash. (With lots of babies on their way in our circle, I thought I'd better stash up on flannels. :-)) So I decided to make a Scalloped Baby Blanket as seen in Bend-the-Rules Sewing. I made two of these 3 years ago for my friend's twins (then both sides were regular cotton fabric) and I liked the project a lot.

This time I tried to make the scallops a little too "scallopy" for their own good. At times when I made the scallop edge too deep, the fabric puckers when turned right side out. Well, from now on I'll know better ... The vintage feel of the fabrics goes really well with the scallop design, I think. This is a really summery, happy, nostalgic blanket. I also think that the future recipient could use it all through childhood right into her teens and beyond as a doll blanket, little throw or even a table cloth. While the colours and patterns in the fabrics are very "now" I think they are also timeless.

As you may be able to tell by the light in these pictures, we are slowly making headway into autumn around here. It's become rainier, darker and chillier, all starting last weekend. When this blanket's recipient is born, it will be almost winter.

Pretty colours and cozy flannel to keep baby warm and happy!

Summer pillows

2010-08-18T01:28:00.001-07:00

Last week I decided to make the most of what remains of summer (and the summer sales ;-)) by purchasing this Laura Ashley fabric. I got several metres, since the price was really low and I really like the happy colours in this print. I first used some of it for making a fabric basket and then I thought: pillows! I also have some ideas how to turn this fabric into gifts for friends.

I made two pillows to go with our light blue linens, I think the prints go well together! They are simple slip covers and were really easy to make. I took a finished pillow as a model and I'm really happy with how they turned out! A nice one-afternoon-project. Today it's really grey here, but the pillows remain cheery! :-)

Pink Penguin fabric basket

2010-08-09T02:04:00.000-07:00

Here's a little fabric basket that I made for my future mother-in-law following Ayumi's great tutorial. This was a really fun project and the basket is really cute! It's recipient liked it as well! :-)

I tried to combine fabrics and colours that my mother-in-law would like. I used two layers of flannel instead of quilt batting, since I didn't have any batting and the flannel works just as well, I think. The only problem with using the flannel is that the layers get quite thick added up, so you need a strong needle and when stitching the upper rim you have to be a bit careful.

For the bottom and right sides of the handles I used an old linen dishtowel. It was a bit worn at some points so I decided to cut into it and use the parts of it that are still fine. The linen is a beautiful quality and especially soft since it has been washed a lot. I particularly like the green stripe. Pity it is hidden on the bottom of the basket!

There are so many uses I can think of for a basket like this, and using it as a hat is just one of them! ;-) I surely will make more of these as presents and for myself! Thank you Ayumi for a great tutorial and thank you Kirsty for introducing me to the Pink Penguin!

say no to catching dust

2010-08-04T00:48:00.000-07:00

These covers were made with instructions from one of my favourite sewing books, Simple Sewing with a French Twist by Céline Dupuy. They were really simple and fast to make and I think they look great in this large-patterned Ikea fabric. They are really practical for those jackets and coats that somehow always end up hanging from the hallway coat rack all year round.

Johanna's tunic

2010-07-29T02:57:00.000-07:00

This tunic was designed and made for my friend's daughter. I had 1/2 a metre of the orange Dobby Dot fabric and wanted to make something for Johanna from it to match the colour of her glasses. A sleeveless tunic seemed realistic to achieve from the amount of fabric available and as a layering piece will hopefully be worn well into autumn.

I wanted to take advantage of the beautiful hand of the fabric and design something billowing and girly. The ruching was easy to sew with this light a fabric. I fussy cut the Small Gathering fabric (leftovers from this pillow project) for the topmost button panel and highlighted the flower print with yellow snap closures.

Neck- and armholes are finished with self-made bias trim from the same contrast fabric. Coincidentally and funnily the print matches where the neck trim meets the button panel.

The hem is simply overlocked and turned. I decided for a 2 cm seam allowance to give the tunic a tiny little bit of weight a the bottom so it would fall more nicely. I'm really happy with how it looks on the hanger and am excited to learn how it will fit. I haven't made many original patterns for children, yet, so I'm a bit nervous about fit and wearability.

baby blanket

2010-07-26T00:01:00.000-07:00

I made this little baby blanket for our little niece (and her parents, as I know that they are big Africa and wildlife fans). I used a fabric panel with elephants as the top and the backing is the beautiful and soft Forest Hills in Moonlight from Anna Maria Horner's Folksy Flannels collection. The picture doesn't quite convey how well those two fabrics go together. I'm really happy about this and feel lucky to have found two so beautiful fabrics so perfect for this particular project.

The size of the blanket was dictated by the size of the elephant panel. I cut the backing slightly larger than the front so that the flannel would just peek out from behind and frame the front a bit with specks of colour. I cut a plain white flannel the same size as the front for filling the sandwich. Since I didn't want any stitching to disturb the front design, I decided to do some free motion quilting along the black outlines which is almost invisible on the front. My free motion stitching has room to be perfected, but I hope this doesn't influence the practical use and care of the blanket. I rimmed the blanket with parallel stitching to give it a nice border.

This was a really fun and satisfying project and I like the idea that it looks pretty and will also hopefully be used and drooled on a lot. ;-)

pitiful pillows

2010-07-01T00:47:00.001-07:00

As a treat to celebrate my graduation I ordered some Drawing Room fat quarters plus a metre of the Volumes fabric with some colourful pillows in mind. When the fabric finally arrived I was already so hyped up on ideas and inspiration that I jumped right in and cut the fabric with minimal planning and no renewed consideration. My idea was to construct the pillows out of a central panel which would then be sourrounded by a patchwork border. When I saw the strips sewn together, though, I had to admit to myself that this design is too busy for my taste and while the fabrics go well together I wouldn't be able to look at those pillows for long ...

So now I put the project on hold and am thinking about new possibilities. One idea would be to sourround the pillow panels with a solid fabric and use the patchwork pieces combined with the solid for a floor pillow. Maybe it was all for the best ...

simple sewing

2010-06-30T23:37:00.000-07:00

Sometimes the simplest projects can be the most satisfying.

I made these coasters from Folksy Flannel and a tie dyed cotton I dyed at school. I followed the measurements and instructions in this inspiring book, except that I skipped the facing and binding. The flannel is, for my taste at least, thick enough without adding facing.

I had a fat quarter of the flannel and made six coasters and there's still a nice bit of the quarter left. Enough to make three more with some fabric to spare.

I'm really happy about this project! It felt good and liberating to make something so simple which will also hopefully get a lot of use. (Using a coaster right now! ;-)) My head is spinning with inspiration and ideas right now, but somehow none of them is cooked up well enough to embark on a larger project, yet. So it's good to get at least some small sewing out of my system!

This weekend ...

2010-06-28T01:35:00.000-07:00

... we, among other things, ...

picked pretty flowers (and then took pictures of them ...)

celebrated midsummer

watched it rain

doodled
cuddled our cute little niece
found a cool 1950ies cookbook

had a picnic
read a lot
had a barbecue
ate strawberries
went to the sauna
took naps
ate salty liquorice ice cream
:-) !!!

Little Daisy Dress

2010-06-21T05:57:00.000-07:00

I made this dress for my fiancé's niece, who was born a little more than a week ago. Since her wardrobe is already well-stocked with newborn size clothes, I decided to make a size that will fit her later on.

This is the first children's pattern I designed myself and I'm pretty excited to see how it will wear and of course how it will look when worn by an adorable little one! But since the dress turned out quite big, I guess I'll have to wait for that a little while ...

I used fabrics from Anna Maria Horner's Little Folks collection and the fabrics themselves plus the amount available to me influenced the design for this dress to some extent. First, I wanted to make the dress solely from the green fabric, but it turned out that I didn't have enough to make this size. Then I decided to make the skirt from the voile, but a single layer was a bit sheer for my taste, especially since I can't be sure that it can be worn already during summer, so I added a second layer in a different length.

After that, I thought the dress was in need of a bit more whimsy, so I added the ruffle trimmings to the layered skirts, which at the same time balance the top and bottom using the green fabric. I'd have preferred to make the bodice lining from the voile, but I didn't have enough left. So I used a neutral cotton fabric.

My initial idea was to use snap closures on the bodice for convenient dressing, but when I saw the finished dress, I thought those would have been a bit bland. So I went looking for buttons and found the perfect ones.

These mother-of-pearl buttons are the ideal colour, shape and size for this dress! I'm so happy I found them! I love how the edge of the flower shape echoes the Pastry Line pattern on the Dobby Dot fabric!

My grandmother sent me this daisy lady with a letter in Spring. I think she goes well with the spirit and colours of the dress. I'm really happy with how the dress turned out and hope that it will be pretty and comfortable when worn!

Graduation

2010-06-06T03:24:00.001-07:00

Yesterday was Graduation Day and I am now officially a dressmaker, certificate and all! It still feels a little unreal that school is over and that those two years went by so quickly! I guess, I'll need some days for it to sink in.

In Finland it's the custom to give students a rose when they graduate. Mine got crushed in the car door on the way home, which shows how nervous I still was ... Well, I tried to make the best of it by arranging the petals in a vase.

Actually it looks really pretty like this as well! :-)

Twin sweater

2010-05-22T01:49:00.000-07:00

This hooded sweater is reversible and I made it for my friend's little boy. I'd wanted to make something for him for some time, since I felt I always get more excited to make things for his twin sister and I wanted to even out the score. I also thought that since the twins aren't even 3 yet, they wouldn't mind if one of them got a new sweater and the other not, since clothes are boring ...

Well, I'm naïve ... My friend wrote to me that after the sweater arrived the two fought over it and in the end her daughter won and wore it happily all day. But clever mom that she is she just turned it around the next day and the sweater's rightful recipient wore the stripy side. Now the two alternate. :-D

The pattern is from Ottobre 4/2009

May in Macro

2010-05-06T08:05:00.001-07:00

Finnish nature in May ...

... slowly awakening.

Flowers and quiche

2010-04-26T12:20:00.000-07:00

Friday we had some guests over and we had some loosely French-themed food like quiche and different cheeses with French bread. Inspired by the beautiful Spring sunshine I couldn't resist buying some fresh flowers for the table.

The quiches turned out very nicely as well. We made two different ones from this great book.

springtime pillow

2010-04-17T00:10:00.001-07:00

springtime pillow
Originally uploaded by frostpatterns

I made this pillow from Anna Maria Horner's Good Folks Small Gathering Azalea fabric. I fell in love with this print some time ago and finally decided to order some of the fabric. The fabric is just as amazing, or even more so, as I expected. The quality of the fabric itself is great and the colours and the print design are just so beautiful!

I decided to center the design on the flower detail for the pillow fronts. I also added pink piping around the edges to somewhat frame the fabric and emphasise the colours even more.

I got rid of those depressing grey pillows we had (at least for the duration of summer)! Feels a lot better now!

Spring

2010-04-10T10:33:00.001-07:00

Today was a beautiful Spring day here in Helsinki (that is, if you are like me desperate enough for Spring to call a day of sunshine a "beautiful Spring day", despite the remaining snow on the ground and the bare trees ...).

I went to the city centre to stroll around for a bit and visited the Designmuseo, one of my favourite museums here. They have a new exhibition about Modernism at the moment and a permanent exhibition about Finnish design, which I like very much. Their shop is also great.

Today, there also was a workshop on cake decorating! How cool! The materials were included in the entrance fee and everybody was welcome to try their hand at it and take the result home. There were different decorations available and it was really fun!!! The women in my family are really good at making cakes and decorating them beautifully, but I never really tried it before myself.

I think it turned out quite nicely! As you can guess, Spring was the inspirational theme for my decoration ...

Also in the spirit of Spring, I made this dress/tunic for my friend's daughter. The pattern is from Ottobre Spring '09 and the fabrics are Little Folks by Anna Maria Horner. I recently ordered a collection of those fabrics and they are really great. Everything people have been writing on the net about them is true. They ARE "buttery", "dreamy" and "breathtaking"! AND a pleasure to sew with. There is a great post about sewing with these fabrics on the designer's blog here.

Love that rick-rack framed heart-pocket!

A New Look

2010-03-22T07:17:00.000-07:00

After some thinking I decided to come back to writing this blog. For the past two years school has taken most of my time and attention and I didn't feel very inspired to post. I feel that a writing a blog doesn't make much sense if it feels like a chore.

To mark a new beginning, I changed the look of the blog. I hope the new layout will be a nice background for the things to come!

And speaking of new looks, I made a new cover for my chair:

It used to be black, dull and a bit scruffy. I'm really happy with the result! The fabric is from Ikea. To make it, I pinned some old fabric very snugly to the front, back and seat of the chair and outlined the position of the seams with a marker on the fabric. I then added seam allowances and cut out the pieces. Those fabric pieces acted as my patterns for the covers. I added extra length to the bottom of the backrest cover for snap closures. Also for the seat I made sure that there was enough fabric to secure the cover neatly and for making a tunnel for the fastening. The covers are removable: the cover for the backrest closes with snaps at the bottom and the seat is pulled tight with elastic.

It's spring!!!

2009-04-09T05:46:00.000-07:00

And I suddenly have a lot of energy and feel inspired by so many things at the moment! For instance by this post. I love the idea of putting fabrics together to mirror what is going on in nature.

I've been longing for a nice blanket to snuggle under on the sofa for a while now, and now I somehow got it into my head that I will sew a patchwork one myself. Since I didn't want to buy any new fabric (my stash is big enough right now ...) I looked what I had and put together this pile:

I'm really happy with how well they go together! Also, they convey a feeling of a kind of relaxed and simple coziness that I would like to create in our home.

Have a good weekend!

blog coma

2009-02-10T04:24:00.000-08:00

So, today I'm temporarily awakening from my blog coma. I've got a lot of ideas and planned projects and only so little time. Up there is my attempt at a nutcracker doll from Stitched in Time. There are a lot of projects in that book that I love and would like to make some time in the future. Who knows, maybe this summer?

Swizzle Vest WIP

2008-11-18T04:13:00.000-08:00

Well, I still don't know what to do with my Zitron yarn, but I started a new project, this time something for myself. It's the Swizzle Vest from Domiknitrix and the design has been on my mind for quite some time. I found an FO pic here. I got the yarn a couple of months ago and since we spent some time in the car at the weekend I finally started it.

I'm knitting it with Rowan Big Wool (yes, I'm a real yarn snob ... But I enjoy knitting with nice yarn much more, not to speak of wearing the final project.) I decided to go for black and off-white, although I also really like the suggested colourway of black and red. The local yarn shop didn't have any nice red and also I thought since it's a layering piece the more versatile the colours, the better.

I'm really enjoying knitting it so far, although I had some trouble with the lifted increases and at first also with the tubular cast on. On the other hand it's nice to have a bit of a challenge and learn something new. I think it's really obvious that the designer put a lot of thought into the pattern and the shaping of the back looks really beautiful.

Unfortunately, it's not so well visible with the black yarn ... As you can see in the cast-on row, I didn't listen to the author of the book and just bought one size of needles, since the girl in the shop said that it should work fine. So, I didn't use a size smaller needle for the cast-on row and it's a bit loose. Well, it's not perfect, but I'm ok with it.

I like the fact that this vest is so nice and curvy and that it knits up fast. I'm really looking forward to see how it'll turn out!

I'm still here ...

2008-11-04T09:05:00.000-08:00

... only really busy! School is great, but these first couple of months have been a bit tiring. Lots of new stuff to learn, getting used to a new routine, etc. ... BUT: I got some knitting done!

High time, too, since the recipient of this cardie (the cardie I wrote about in my last post) has already arrived! I really like the design and it wasn't as hard to knit as I first thought. There was some twisting of stitches and cursing involved, as the yoke is knitted on circular needles and I found out it's not so clever to try to do that while you have a cold and headache ...

There really were quite a lot of loose ends to be woven in, so if you're not a fan of that, stay away from this. But I think it was worth it.

I already got a new ball of yarn to play around with:

It's Zitron Nimbus in colour 4. It's a lovely yarn, only I don't really know what to do with it. Anyway, knitting it is a pleasure, I already almost knit up the ball once, just to see how the colourway turns out.

New things to do

2008-08-27T07:31:00.000-07:00

Well, my resolution was to be posting more regularly, but in the past few weeks I haven't really had time or my head was so full of new information that my brain went on strike in the evenings. The reason for that is that I started school! Yes, I'm back to school and I'm training to become a dressmaker!

I'm very happy about this opportunity and about having the chance to learn a craft professionally. This is marking a new stage in my life and I'm very excited! Until now we've been practising different types of seams, been drawing with Freehand and learning about different kinds of materials. Soon we'll start preparing to sew some children's clothes.

As for the projects to accomplish at home, I'm currently working on a baby sweater for a couple we know. It's the Classic Baby Cardigan design by Debbie Bliss from the same magazine as the short-sleeved cardie. I found an FO picture here. I'm going to use the exact same yarn as suggested in the magazine, even the same colours. Boring, I know. But since I loved working with Baby Cashmerino so much while making the last baby project, I really wanted to knit with it again, and when I saw the colours in the shop I really fell for the blue and brown combination. The brown (colour 011) is a really rich dark chocolatey colour and the blue (colour 202) is more of a duck egg colour than sky blue. I'm actually already quite far along in the project, but since the WIP is not such an exciting sight I'm just giving you pictures of the yarns. Another reason for me to knit faster ...

Short Sleeve Cardigan FO

2008-08-06T03:07:00.000-07:00

So, it only took me about a year to finish this. The knitting was done really quickly, the sewing up was a bit trickier. So I got frustrated and the project banned to the closet for the long time it took me to get over that frustration ... Maybe I shouldn't have used the Calmer for finishing, since it's so elastic. Well, I did anyway and the Cardie came out quite nicely, if a wee bit too short for my taste. But since it's a layering piece, I don't mind that too much.

Here's a picture of the cardie from the magazine. I found it at Samurai Knitter.

I only added one button, since four seemed to overload it a bit. I would have only used the top one, anyway.

It's a really beautiful mother of pear button and now I have 3 more left for some other project. Not so bad, I think.

Something completely unrelated: I've got a new favourite website: une fille comme moi. My French is very rudimentary, but it doesn't matter, since I love this page for the beautiful pictures and drawings. I especially like this and this.

A little peek

2008-07-17T08:27:00.000-07:00

I've been shamefully absent from this space! I'm sorry! We've had a guest and right after we've been in Germany at my family's. We had a really great time. But now I hope I'll post more regularly, again! There are a lot of crafty things on my mind. Strangely, I'm feeling the urge to knit something in these summer months. I bought some nice sock wool from a little shop in my home village and I'd like to knit something for myself as well as some nice baby sweaters for some new arrivals to this planet. I really love the Textured Tunic, along with other patterns from Fitted Knits and I think I have to finally give in and purchase the book.

Above is a little peek at a small still life in my craft room. Yes! I have a craft room!!! I'm so happy about that and I think it's a cute little room. There's a table for my sewing machine and some compartments for all the bits and pieces. There's room for my craft books and my yarn and all the other stuff that's handy to have around. There are still some things I'd like to add some time, but for now it is just great. One thing on my mind is a nice inspiration board and I'm also dreaming of this working table, because I think the inserted glass is genius (I haven't tried how comfortable it would be working at, though, but why shouldn't it?)

There's a lot of blue in this room, my favourite colour from childhood. I'm also fond of a lot of other colours, especially red, but I always come back to blue, especially light blue and turquoise.

I love the colours in this Regia yarn my brother gave me for Christmas. I'm wondering if I should make something other from it than socks.

Here's a close-up of the text in the little white frame:

A friend gave me this card some years ago and I really love it. The quote is by Carol Shields and says:

go for long walks,
indulge in hot baths,
question your assumptions,
be kind to yourself,
live for the moment,
loosen up, scream,
curse the world,
count your blessings,
just let go,
just be

Potato Prints

2008-06-22T02:13:00.000-07:00

Recently, I ordered Lotta Prints by Lotta Jansdotter with photographs by Jenny Hallengren. It is a very beautiful book with tons of inspiration and instructions. There are even some stencils included in the back of the book. I wanted to try something as quick as possible, so I decided to do some potato printing.

I had some linen fabric in my stash and decided to make a pillow case. I cut a simple shape out of a potato and just started printing. It was a lot of fun! I used Marabu Textil colours (dark brown, silver and duck egg blue). I think it came out very nicely!

There are so many possibilities in printing to customize ready made clothes or interiour textiles or design your very own patterns for a project! I really recommend the book, it opens your eyes to the possibilities inherent in printing and covers everything from the first inspiration over design to the final technical steps!

More girl clothes

2008-05-23T00:34:00.000-07:00

Since it's so much fun making children's clothes (especially for girls, since you can go more overboard with them), I couldn't resist making some more stuff for my friend's daughter. The patterns are from OTTOBRE design 1/2008.

This is a raglan sleeve blouse/tunic with ruching around the neck, so in fact a tiny peasant top in a VERY loud fabric. I saw the fabric and just couldn't resist it. The colours are beautiful and fun and for something so small it totally works, I think. This top could look cute with a lot of basic clothes like denim overalls, for example. Here's a close up:

Well, you have every colour of the rainbow here. So finding something to match shouldn't be too difficult. The fabric tag said it's Dolce and Gabbana, so my friend's little girl will be the fashionista of the sandbox. ;-)

Then I also made a cute smock:

This is a cool layering piece. I used two grey bandannas (the colour is nicer in real life) and then the same pink and white striped fabric I used for the neck and sleeves of the blouse. The bandanna idea came from watching too much Sex and the City (is it around season 5 when Carrie wears all those cotton bandannas?). Look here for more bandanna clothing ideas for kids. Since the fabrics match, you can also wear the two pieces together:

Me likey! ;-)

tablecloth hooded vest

2008-04-27T02:24:00.000-07:00

Last week I found this fun grandma-style tablecloth in my local thrift shop. I just knew I had to make something cheerful from it for my friend's little daughter. Since the tablecloth wasn't that big (around 1m x 1m, of course I forgot to take a "before"-picture ...) and the fabric relatively sturdy, I decided to make a vest:

Well, I think you can now imagine what kind of tablecloth it was even without the "before" picture. The really kitschy kind. I love how the vest came out. I used pattern number 5 from Ottobre's spring issue (1/2008). Though it will be still too big, I made a size 92, in order to make the most of the cloth and the flowery pattern, especially in the back.

The lining is a thin sweatshirt fabric in a nice pink and as to pattern alterations, I simply omitted the ruching detail. The vest is closed with press fasteners and again I struggled with them, A LOT. So I finally gave in and bought a fancy Prym Vario Plus Kit. It's an investment, but it's worth it in my opinion. I like the look and practicality of press fasteners, but I don't like ending up with crooked buttons and tears of desperation at those flimsy tools coming with the packs. And in crucial situations like that it's maybe also better to work with pliers than thrashing a hammer about ...

Well, I'm really happy with the vest, it's a bunch of flowers that can be worn all year round.

Vest with Garter-stitch Yoke

2008-04-25T00:54:00.000-07:00

This little jacket is for a friend's little son:

It can be tied at the front like a jacket or can be worn tied at the back as a vest:

The pattern is from Knitting in Vogue, Patterns form the 1930s to the 1980s for Men, Women and Children and the name is the title of this post. (I found the book at the library, I think it is unfortunately out of print. Particularly the children's knits are very pretty.) The project is described as a : "Vest knitted in one piece starting with the front, in stocking stitch with garter yoke pattern and back opening". The pattern is from 1936 and I like the graphic effect of the garter-stitch yoke. It was also easy and fun to knit. I distributed the recommended yarn with Debbie Bliss baby cashmerino, mainly because I fell in love with this beautiful soft green colour.

Now the jacket is quite a bit bigger than a newborn size, but that can't be too bad in my opinion, babies grow so quickly. I think it came out quite cute and I hope it's practical to wear!

Perspectives

2008-04-18T12:09:00.000-07:00

My uncle left back to Germany, yesterday. It was great to have him here and very interesting seeing Helsinki through different eyes. I think showing another person a town you already know quite well makes you realize and see different and new things yourself.

I'm feeling a bit under the weather, so I'll spend the weekend trying to relax and seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.

The pictures were taken at Suomenlinna Sea Fortress.

A trip to Porvoo

2008-04-10T06:07:00.000-07:00

Today we took a trip to Porvoo. My uncle is visiting us and we went to see this small Finnish town with its beautiful wooden houses.

We took a walk around the cobble stone streets, looked into some small shops and had a bite to eat.

We also got some delicious handmade chocolates from here and I couldn't resist this beautifully coloured tray I spotted here.

As you can see, it was quite a successful visit. ;-) Now we just need some coffee!

quick T

2008-03-11T01:12:00.000-07:00

This is one of the fastest projects I've made. I was participating in a how-to-use-a-serger course over the weekend and this boat neck T was my exercise project.

I still had lots of this very thin and slinky jersey left over, that I bought very cheaply from the remains department of the fabric store. (The colour in the flat surface pics is more true to the original.) Since the fabric is so thin and clingy, I thought this would be perfect for a pyjama T. Also, since it was from the beginning intended to be worn when sleeping, I didn't fuss too much with it. So for instance I skipped the interfacing on the neckline. The seams are sewn with a serger and the neckline and hems with a double needle on my own sewing machine. I think all in all it took me about 4 hours max to make this. I'm quite amazed! To top it off, I now have the pattern for a very nice boat neck that is not too wide and thus doesn't show any bra straps (if that's something you want to avoid). The body is a bit too wide for me for my taste, but just perfect for pyjamas. Which shows that also quick projects can be really satisfying (which can sometimes be a good thing to remember, since I like to fuss and then stress over the details a bit too much every so often).

I'm also currently working on a project that's going to take a lot more time and I'll try to post something about the process soon. It's quite an ambitious project and I'm very excited about it!

Jacket with(out) red buttons

2008-02-19T05:25:00.000-08:00

I've made this little jacket (pattern is from Ottobre design 4/2007) and am generally quite pleased with it. I managed to sew it all on my own without any assistance and only Ottobre's Finnish instructions to guide me. I really like sewing children's clothes. They are so small (little fabric needed) and the result is almost always cute.

There are some issues with the buttons, though ...

The border is quite thick and those dang buttons don't want to cling as well as I'd like them to. So, today I'll let the jacket hang there (if I make any more attempts at attaching the buttons today I'm afraid I might break something or hurt myself out of frustration and impatience ... After all you need a hammer to do it ...). It's nice like this as well, I think. Yeah. I'll look at it and wait for patience and serenity to return ...

My first dress

2008-02-11T03:10:00.000-08:00

This is the first dress I made. It was sewn during one of my sewing courses in autumn. We were only four students in the class and the teacher was very thorough and had time to assist and guide us through the various stages of our individual garments.

The pattern is, again, from Suuri Käsityölehti, (it was a 2007 issue, right now I can't find better information in my post-move chaos. Edit: It was number 8/2007). The teacher helped me modify it to suit my (pear-) shape and I'm really happy with how it turned out! I'll try to take a nice picture of me wearing it at some point! The material is a very nice wool jersey. And I love that colour!

The gathering around the neckline and the sleeves is made with framilon elastic, you could also use regular elastic, but that would be more visible, I guess. Except for attaching the elastic, it was completely sewn with an overlock machine, (apart from the hem which was sewn by hand with a handy blind stitch the teacher taught me).

I think a simple dress is such a satisfying project for a beginner. To make it even easier you could make one without sleeves. The beauty of it is that when you're finished, you practically have a whole outfit there. All made by you!

And as for the first dress that really made an impact on me as for me to remember it vividly, it was a hand-me-down from my second cousin and a very simple cotton dress with a smocked upper part and tie shoulder straps. (The cut was a bit like this.) It was white with a green and peach flower print and I felt really "grown up" wearing it, because it come from my "big cousin".

good little things

2008-02-06T04:56:00.000-08:00

Look what I made! A mitten!

The reason for me being so excited about this is that this is the first item I attempted to knit with double pointed needles that I'm reasonably happy with. (The only thing annoying me a bit is the size of the hole between the thumb and palm. That probably can't be avoided entirely, but if anybody has a good way to keep it tiny, I'd love to hear about it!) I used a pattern in this book I got from the library and the yarn is one of two Regia sock yarn skeins my brother gave me for Christmas. Since I thought the colourway goes surprisingly well with my scarf, mittens seemed the perfect thing to make from it!

Also, I really have wanted some more lightweight ones than the pair I have for some time now. Well, there's nothing to do now than to knit the second one and hope there will be yarn enough for both of them!!!

I also made some simple small napkins from a fabric I got on sale for 2€/metre.

I really like the old-fashioned feel of the chequered fabric, and the colours are also really nice, so I'm really happy with them. I made 6 of them and it was fun to sew them, also for that price, I wasn't too afraid to screw something up. I got the instructions from Bend-the-Rules Sewing (again!) and used the size suggested there, but somehow I subconsciously decided to make square napkins. (Which is another way of saying when I realized I cut out squares I was beyond changing them ...) Anyway, they are cute and it is cool to have this kind of little everyday luxury like cloth napkins.

Baby Boy Blanket

2008-01-23T06:06:00.000-08:00

This little blanket is for a friend's baby boy who arrived earlier this year. It is strongly inspired by Amy Karol's Scalloped Baby Blanket from her great book Bend-the-Rules Sewing. I already made two blankets from that pattern, but didn't show them here, because the pictures I managed to take before I sent them away were less then inspiring. See some much more fabulous pics than mine for example here, here, here and here.

As the teddy bear fabric is already quite cutesy, I decided to skip the scallops in this case, but I rounded the corners. Which also made for a quicker project to sew. Ha! I decided to go with Amy's hint not to pre-wash the fabric before sewing and the backing fabric shrunk quite a bit when I washed the completed blanket, so it already has a bit of a lived-in look, which I quite like. That may be not everybody's cup of tea, though, so I hope the recipient and his mom will like it!

New Year, New Flat

2008-01-03T05:17:00.000-08:00

Wow, it's been quite long since my last post! Firstly: A Happy and Healthy New Year 2008 to all!

It's been fairly busy here, we've moved and there's still a lot of work ahead to make this new place our home. We finished painting the bedroom, though, and so I can give you a small impression of what it looks like so far.

I think it came out really beautifully. It's still really dark here, so that's the best picture I could get. We painted the ceilings in a toned not-quite-white and took the colour down a bit to the walls. The walls are a light blue. We got the chandelier as a present and the curtains are from Ikea. I'll try to keep you posted on the progress, but as it still is quite chaotic here, I can't promise how fast that progress will be ... ;-) I got a great sewing book, a Filati Handknitting magazine and some pretty sock wool for Christmas, so there's inspiration enough, but I guess the flat will take up most of my time and (creative) energy. I'm taking a sewing course again, starting mid-January, though, so there'll also be things to show from there, I hope. :-)

Little trousers

2007-11-26T01:12:00.000-08:00

Some tiny trousers for a little guy I know ...

It's another pattern from Suuri Käsityölehti. The material is really nice, on the inside it's fleecy, on the outside it looks like terrycloth.

I made it at the sewing course with a Bernina which had a ton of decorative stitches programmed. I like the racecar feel of this one.

I like the practicality and cuteness of this pattern and the little details. There's also an elastic band with buttonholes at the waist, so it can be adjusted to any size you need.

knit, purl, relax

2007-11-07T01:25:00.000-08:00

First some good news, my sewing machine is repaired and I can fetch it from the shop! :-) It's great that it'll be here again to be used, because Christmas is getting closer (argh!) and I wanted to try out some ideas for ornaments.

As for showing some finished projects here, well, I don't know if that will happen anytime soon ... I seem to be in a strange mood, where I have so many ideas and desires to make so many different things that I keep starting new projects all the time ... Like now I felt like knitting something easy and relaxing and came across this pattern in Suuri Käsityölehti 10/2007.

The pattern is by Anu Harkki, who has also written a beautiful book on knitting and a great book of home projects that I've mentioned before. She has a regular column in Suuri Käsityölehti where she's presenting a relatively quick to finish and original knitting or crocheting project each time. It's targeted at teenagers mostly, I think, but I really love the stuff she comes up with. This shrug was just what I was looking for knitting-wise, although I'm not really sure how it will look worn by me. I'm strangely attracted to shrugs, but wearing them well is another story ... We'll see! I liked the grey in the picture, but when I went to buy the yarn, I couldn't bring myself to get it and went for my all-time favourite red. It's grey enough outside at the moment! The yarn is the one recommended in the pattern, Novita Mambo and I'm knitting on 8mm circular needles, because the bigger straight ones are such a strain, sometimes. My pictures don't do the colour justice, I'm afraid. (I really want to try and find a way to take better pictures in these conditions. It's frustrating. I've been told that for example the little girl's dress-apron is so much prettier "live".)

So, I've started a new knitting project before finishing my cardigan. That makes me feel a bit bad. But I have to say that I need some courage for the cardigan, since grafting (or what you call it ...) the shoulder seams hasn't had the results I hoped for. So I'd like to successfully finish something simpler in order to feel mentally prepared to open the seams again and start afresh with sewing together my cardigan! ;-)

playing around

2007-10-27T03:54:00.000-07:00

Since sewing is put on hold for a while outside of my sewing courses I'll show you this:

I made this while the machine was still working, there's some sewing on paper, stamping, there are buttons, fabric and magazine clippings. Quite a lot going on here ... It was fun to make! I just was going with the flow.

My crocheting progress has been quite slow, hopefully I'll be able to show you the caps I'm making next week. Have a great weekend! :-)

involuntary sewing pause

2007-10-16T01:26:00.000-07:00

My sewing machine's bobbin winder is broken and I am frustrated! I already ordered a new one and tried to exchange it, but it turned out that the new one doesn't work either, for some reason. Also I've been so eager to be sewing with a complete machine again that I overturned the screw and now there's no getting it out anymore! Oh the foolishness! Well, before I break the machine completely, I'll bring the poor thing to be repaired by more professional and careful hands than mine!

The frustration was going on yesterday, the sewing I was planning to do was slow and there was a lot of fighting with the machine, some earrings I just bought last week broke out of no account (will have to have those repaired, too ...), and the show I wanted to buy tickets as a present to was canceled altogether. Urgh!

But: I nearly got the little dress finished, just two buttons and buttonholes in the back missing! I think it looks really cute! It'll be most likely still much too big for the little girl it's meant for, but I think it's this kind of layering piece that can be worn all year round. I hope her mom will like it, too! (It's getting really dark here, so the pictures will be a bit dark as well for a while, I'm afraid. :-( You can get a better look at the fabric in the previous post.)

I also bought some more boyish fabric for the girl's brother, which I'd like to turn into a jacket. The dark one is dark blue velour fabric, very soft.

So, since there are no sewing courses this week and the home sewing has been put to a halt as well, I'll have to resort to true handicraft. Maybe quilting a bit? My quilt is patiently waiting to be finished. Or maybe crocheting some more? I've recently made a cap for a friend's birthday.

I used this pattern and altered it a bit, adding the earflaps and the flower. I also made a simple version in gray and am still thinking whether to decorate it in some way or not. When I've resolved that question I'll show you the results. I also started a simple navy and light blue striped beanie for my godson. I hope he'll like it! Will show you that, too, when it's finished. So, now I'm off to a machine sewing-free week. Let's see what'll come out of it!

Works in progress

2007-10-01T05:24:00.000-07:00

It's been a while ... My sewing courses and a new (temp) job have been keeping me quite busy. But still I haven't got much to show for it, since I have so many projects in progress that I really haven't finished much/anything these days. So probably there will be one big "finished projects" post some time in the (hopefully not too far) future.

Here are some glimpses of two of my projects:

I made this using one of the stencils provided at the Ottobre design website. I want to make some nice totes out of these.

This is also from a pattern by Ottobre Design (from the 1/2002 magazine). It's going to be a little girl's dressy/aprony thingy. I think this one should be finished around next week. I'm so looking forward to seeing the result that it's hard not to fiddle around with it at home, but I want everything to be just perfect, so I prefer to wait and make it under supervision. After that I'll probably crank these out like mad, because I think the design is super-cute and also quite versatile ... But you'll see! ;-)

So, I hope I'll have some more stuff to show you next week!

delicious bread

2007-09-07T04:49:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we made some yummy bread. We used a recipe by Jamie Oliver from this book. It's the one with cheese and basil.

The dough already looked "beautiful", as Jamie would say.

Instead of the recommended flower pots we used Teema coffee cups. I love that whole series. It's so beautiful, simple, timeless and versatile, the different pieces can be used for several purposes and they are oven-to-table and microwave- and dishwasher proof. So you can use the big dinner plates also as pie-forms and the cups as muffin or bread molds. (Well, the muffins would turn out quite big, but who'd complain about that?! ;-))

Licensed sewing

2007-09-04T02:22:00.000-07:00

This autumn I'm taking some sewing courses at the Helsinki adult education centre. I've mainly taught myself how to do sew through books and mere trial and error. Now I'd like to learn how to "properly" do things and how to take the most out of the techniques available to me. Yesterday was my first course, the first of two installments of a course with the topic "Get to know your sewing machine". It was very interesting and I learned some new stuff and got some inspiration. It was fun to play with the sewing machine and exciting to see how much you can already get out of just straight and zigzag stitch just by making some adjustments. The teacher also made us do this little exercise for a "Sewing machine driver's license":

So now I'm licensed to sew! ;-)

In terms of productiveness I've been sewing these new pillows for our dining chairs:

I bought these fabrics about 10 (!) years ago for my poor neglected quilt and they were left over and just been waiting to serve a purpose. I like them as much as I did back then and I think they go perfectly with the colour of the chairs.

I'm really looking forward to learning more about sewing!

New old trench

2007-09-03T00:55:00.000-07:00

Summer is officially over here in Finland since there was the first snow in Lapland last Thursday. Down here in the south it's a bit warmer, but anyway it has been high time for me to finish my trenchcoat revamp.

I like it a lot. It adds a bit of colour to rainy autumn days.

To top it all off, I added a little fabric flower to the lapel.

It was made according to this fabulous tutorial.

Lipstick

2007-08-28T04:07:00.000-07:00

Since I discovered my love for make-up, lipstick has been ranking high on my list. It immediately transforms the face and gives it a fresher look. For me personally I prefer bolder colours, but sometimes I wear also toned down lipstick or none at all (especially if I'm wearing strong eye make-up). Here's a small tutorial how to apply lipstick like a pro:

First, put a bit of balm or lotion on your lips, and after some time rub them with a moist terry cloth or towel. This gets rid of chipped skin in a gentle way. Re-apply a bit of balm.

Then line only the lower lip with liner (mustn't be too dark!). Apply several layers of the lipstick you chose with a brush. In between layers blot the colour with a tissue to make it last longer. To further prolong your lip make-up's life-span you can apply a bit of compact powder with a sponge between layers.

When you're finished you can line the outer rim of your mouth with a tiny bit of foundation to emphasize your lips even further. You can also apply some concealer at the corners of your mouth to "lift" them and put a smile on your face. For extra glamour you can apply a bit of colourless gloss under the bow of your upper lip. To avoid lipstick transferring to your teeth put your index finger in your mouth, close the lips around it and turn a bit. The superfluous colour will stick to your finger now instead of your front teeth later!

One of my favourite lipsticks is L'Oréal Color Riche Star Secrets in 703 Andie Carmine. It's a beautiful red with a bit of shimmer, but not too strong, so you can wear it all day long without any fuss.

In this picture I used 710 Penélope Red from the same line. A great bold and creamy red.

Have fun wearing lipstick! :-)

Blue Teddy

2007-08-20T03:54:00.000-07:00

The denim teddy is finished! I'm thinking about adding some personality by sewing some little patches on his body and head, though.

Also I did some bathroom decoration inspired by this great and beautiful book. It's only available in Finnish, I think, but the pictures inside alone are really inspiring. There are many fun and simple ideas to "tune" ("viritetty" means "tuned" ...) little things and areas of your home and wardrobe inside.

Well, adding some pics from magazines or whatever to your tiles with plastic book foil is quite a neat idea, I think. If you get tired of them you can remove them easily without leaving ugly holes in the bathroom walls.