Christmas sewing - Eblieh and Eee Eee

Katie's most favourite animal is Ebliehs (a.k.a. Elephants!).  I decided that Santa ought to give her one for Christmas and had a wee hunt around on pinterest to find a toy elephant pattern.  This is the one I decided to try - but I machine stitched it - for speed really, rather than aesthetics.  Since the pattern wasn't intended for machine sewing there was a couple of places where a number of seams met and they were a little tricky.....but a bit of wrangling and manipulation soon sorted them out.

I also made a couple of wee mice, complete with little beds, for Santa to give the girls.  I saw the pattern mentioned on Flossie Teacakes (Florence has some wonderful adaptations including a pig and crocodile).  The tutorial is here.  The Eee Eees are very satisfying to make - quick, simple and effective.

The photos below show Katie sporting her first ever ponytail (polylail). She was very proud of it, although it lasted all of 5 minutes before being pulled out, and blissfully unaware that she is still completely lacking in proper hair at the front!  Her attempts at a 'camera smile' result in this wrinkled nose grimace - which I find incredibly cute but I am, of course, awfully biased.

I'm burying my head in the sand at the moment and trying to pretend that school doesn't start back tomorrow.  Still, I know they'll have fun and Katie and I may brave the swimming pool.........I do wish the water was warmer.

Hoping you have a lovely Sunday evening and not too much of a shock tomorrow morning.

Animal girls

Little girls with the sillies.  

Fun after supper.

Teddy and doll carrier - Katie's handmade birthday

Katie turned two last month and an adoring set of older siblings meant she was a very lucky girl.  All the children wanted to make her something and their gifts are so lovely I thought I'd share them.

This wee teddy carrier was Islay's idea and she chose the fabric too - I did most of the sewing but Islay was very involved in a supervisory kind of way...............repeatedly asking when I would be able to make it and hovering over my shoulder and breathing in my ear while I was making it!

Katie isn't too keen on carrying her baby in it but she does love to carry Ele around.  It is especially useful when arranging fabric scraps.....two free hands and Ele is still close by.  That, in Katie's book, is a very good thing.

Details:
Pattern - bear carrier from 'Oliver and S - Little Things to Sew' by Liesl Gibson
Fabric - Yay Day (Birch Forest and Wings of Love) and Essex Yarn Dyed Linen in Black from The Village Haberdashery
Buttons - vintage buttons
Comments - a straightforward pattern, straps are really long on a shorty like Katie but do leave lots of growing room, it is adjustable so will fit a small toy like Ele or a much larger teddy or doll, I love the fabric.....a lot

Catching up

Catch-up time!  Finally, here's some photos of my makes from this summer's Fat Quarterly Retreat.  I loved it and learnt a lot but I think it is far too late now to say much more - so many others have already done so.
The cushions below are the finished pieces of Precision Piecing from Lynne's great class- I had a treat and bought new fabric for this class, just buying what I really liked without much thought with what I'd do with the end product...........as I finished the precision pieced pieces (I do like writing that!) I realised that whatever I turned them into would never look right with anything in our house, much as I love the fabrics and colours.  I have made them up into 16 inch cushion covers and will load them up onto my folksy shop - it has been closed since Katie was born but I plan to re-open it in the next few weeks, I have quite a bit of stock built up ready to go.  And so many ideas for other things I'd like to make, as and when I find the time!

 I also attended Lu's Improv class - this was a lot of fun, I like working that way and Lu herself is brilliant.  I used my leftover Maze and Vale and other odds and ends from my Free As A Bird Quilt.  Lu hand quilts her improv pieces, but while I'd love to do it, I just know I wouldn't find the time.  So it is quilted with an improv spiral instead - done completely free-hand and more than a little squint!

My mini-quilt is living happily on our dining table with our basket of special shells and other treasures.

 Apart from the above I haven't really managed much this week.  I still have crochet and English Paper Pieceing to finish from FQR -don't hold your breath!  Katie is feeling pretty poorly and really isn't herself.  She fell asleep on Tuseday morning around 7.45 am.  I put her in the playpen each morning while I'm in the shower (she is such a busy fiddly little person that it is the only safe thing to do) - when I came out I realised things were unusually quiet - this is what I saw when I peeped into the sitting room!

Please don't pin this photo

She has wanted a lot of attention and has spent a lot of time sitting like this, cuddling Doddy Pot (Spotty Dog).  Hopefully she'll be back to her cheery self soon.  

Thanks so much for all the lovely comments on the Free As A Bird Quilt - they were lovely to read and very much appreciated. 

Free As A Bird Quilt

My, or rather Katie's, Free As A Bird Quilt features Maze and Vale handprinted fabrics.  I started collecting them a couple of years ago - just 2 or 3 fat quarters, a couple of sample packs and a couple of miss-print packs too, bought here and there as a treat.

I didn't have any very definite plans when I bought the fabric, I just knew I loved it and that I'd love to have some.  I think, also, that since Leslie's was one of the first blogs I ever read that  liked the idea of supporting, in a very small way, her handprinting adventures - not that success was in doubt as she is very talented.

Some time last autumn a quilt idea slowly grew on me - after one of my 'pull them out and gaze at the lovely fabric' sessions.  Once the idea settled, probably during the night, I quickly got to work selecting the right co-ordinating fabrics.  A mix of soft pinks and greys, the odd hint of green and a wee pop of red too.  

The design is a disappearing nine patch (in this case 5" squares made into nine-patch blocks - and then quartered and put back together) and I had some careful planning to work out a square size which would minimise wastage of my Maze and Vale and one or two of the other fabrics as I had very little of some of them.  

I was unsure about backing until I spotted the Kokka Swallows flannel from Raystitch.  I guess you'll know by now how much I love flannel and mixing fabric textures and weights (maybe one of the reasons I love my Maze and Vale selection so much since there's cotton, cotton:linen mix and linen in there) - and it seemed perfect for the quilt, especially once I realised it was just the right width so I could make full use of the selvedge to selvedge pattern.

The binding is a mix of the reds used in the quilt and I played safe with the quilting and stuck with my usual not-quite-straight-lines across the width.  

It finished at about 100 by 120 cm (40 by 47 inches) - which seems perfect for Katie, especially since she'll move up into a big girl bed, and out of her cot, some time in the next year or so.........but I'm not prepared to think much about that big girl step just yet.

Once I'd though of the name 'Free As A Bird' it really seemed perfect, I think it suits the quilt and it suits Katie (along with her Sunshine quilt, too, of course) - she's a very happy and independent wee girl.

The other children aren't completely neglected and do have their own made-by-me quilts and blankets but they were made several years ago when I was very much less skilled.  I think that I'll make them each a proper big quilt once they are around High School age (which means Finn needs one soon as he'll be at High School next year, and 11 at the end of this month - I have my eye on this design but will need to consult him and then, if he likes the idea, involve him in fabric choices - which could be interesting given his level of colour-blindness!).

Me, Kate and Susie - on the beach

On Thursday I had just about the best weekday morning possible.  Katie and I walked the big kids to school, popped back home to collect the car and Susie and then set off for Gullane beach.  I had planned a wee walk and a play but we were having so much fun that it was well over two hours later that we made our way back to the car.  We started out with Katie in the backpack and went east along the beach and then around the headlands on the wee coastal path.  It was a mild (ish) day, with not much wind and I could have walked and walked.  Katie chatted and bounced and Susie ran and ran.  It would be hard not to have fun with those two for company.  Susie is a lovely wee dog - my mum calls her Scamp.  She has such a scruffy, happy, cheeky face, and personality, that Scamp suits her perfectly.  She's not dissimilar to Katie!

Much as I would have liked to have kept going we had to turn back in the end.  Once we were back on the beach Katie was freed from the backpack and had a marvelous time playing with Susie (they are such good friends) and playing in the sea.  Needless to say she finished completely soaked (actually, they both did!).  I ended up taking off most of her clothes and she had very soggy vest, socks and wellies by home time.  I did remember a change of clothes though, and a banana for each of us - sometimes being the fourth has it's benefits.....your mum, occasionally, remembers to be prepared!