In a Nutshell

So much time and so little to do. Wait a minute. Strike that, reverse it. ~ Willy Wonka

Things have been busy around here, busy in a good way. In the second half of this year alone, my husband and I squeezed a lot in.

We....

Sold our interstate unit
Bought our own house which we actually get to live in
Welcomed with much love our 3rd beautiful child
Packed up the family and moved into our new home
Went to a wedding in Yamba
Went to a wedding in Byron Bay
Went to a wedding in Melbourne
Celebrated our daughter's 7th birthday
Threw said daughter a completely OTT disco party

and are now preparing to celebrate Christmas in our new home with some good friends who will be staying with us.

Life is good.

Life is especially good because of this divine little boy.

He came into our lives late August and is already 3 months old. My second son is such a joy and the icing on the cake for me. How lucky I am to be the mother of these 3 beautiful children (one of which has the remains of tattoo's on both arms!).


Master F is making the cutest little noises, little squeals, giving us lots and lots of lovely smiles and I am only up to him once (if at all) through the night. He looks so much like his big sister did when she was a baby.

I miss my sewing but wouldn't swap the last 6 months for anything in the world.

Kids Messenger Bag

FINISHED BAG

FRONT OF BAG

BACK OF BAG SHOWING POCKET

VELCRO CLOSURE (FAKE BUTTON)

BAG OPEN (VELCRO CLOSURE, ANOTHER FAKE BUTTON)

INTERIOR POCKET (OOPS A BIT TOO HIGH UP)

MATCHING CRAYON ROLL

CRAYONS TO SHOW SCALE (SMALLER THAN A TEXTA ROLL)

WITH FLAP DOWN (PEN LINES YET TO FADE)

Tote Bag with Zippered Opening

My friend Y saw the tote bag that I made for M and wanted one for her daughter. However, said friend is fussy (!!) and wanted a pocket on the front, a zipper opening on the top of the bag and it had to be big enough to fit A4 books.

The zipper part scared me so I put the whole thing off....for ages.

I ended up using this tutorial for the top zipper.

And here's what I ended up with.

Overall I'm happy with the bag, but the zip I used was too long. I also hope the bag itself isn't too big, it is on the large side but at least it will fit A4 books.

It was fiddly to top stitch and therefore it isn't as neat as I would like but I had trouble getting the bag through my machine, especially the end parts of the zipper. I've only sewn bags on mum's machine before so I was a bit (read: very!) annoyed that my machine didn't seem up to the task.

A pencil roll was also requested so I made one up to match the bag. I've made lots of these pencil rolls after figuring out some measurements so that I can officially call this *my pattern* (yes it's basic but still!!)

Wow, no wonder I haven't blogged in so long, that just took forever to upload pics, seems a few things have changed with the Blogger format.....hmmm not so sure I like it :(

Long Shorts

My skirt/dress loving, non pants wearing daughter told me last night that she would like to wear shorts today. I reminded her that she doesn't have any. She politely asked if I would mind making her some. Lucky for her I've been wanting to try this pattern.

I ran into some problems with the 2nd ruffle and am now looking into buying a ruffle foot. It was one of those problems you run into at midnight when you know you could get the job finished in the next half an hour but your machine doesn't want to cooperate with you!! I ended up going to bed and finishing them off this morning.

I love the trim fabric I've used, so much so that it was hard to cut into since I was only using it for a trim and I was wondering if it would be better as a top or dress.

An easy to sew pattern with cute results. In her words "I love them mum!"

I can't believe how big M looks in this picture. She is so loooooooong now, her legs just seem to go on and on and on!