Well my little man has managed to pick himself up a cough. Poor little mite is even coughing in his sleep. Consequently I've been giving lots of cuddles and the sewing has taken a back seat. However my other love of cooking has been indulged a bit this weekend. We had a friend we haven't seen for a while come over this Sunday so I decided to try out new cake recipe I had found on the BBC Good Food website. It was a Lemon Curd and Blueberry Loaf Cake and you can tell it was good - a second one was made today!
It has a gorgeous icing on the top made from the juice of a lemon - it really adds a tang! It's one of those things that now I've heard of doing it I wonder why I've never done it before! Little man however, is not a fan of lemon flavoured things (one of the only things he won't eat) so I had to bake some extra blueberry cakes for him. I feel slightly better about giving him cake if there is fruit in it!
Finally got round to wrapping mother in laws gardening hamper ready for our trip to London for the family party on Friday - I'll add a picture when we get it out to take but until then, here is a picture of the buttercup bag I made a few weeks back for my sister in law's birthday.
It was my first bag so there are a few things I would do differently next time round, mainly with how the handle is attached but, I'm still really pleased with it.
Don't you just hate it when you pick some lovely fabric, decide what to make from it and then it just doesn't look right when you're finished? I'm sure it's partly to do with me substituting fabrics and trying to find a different way to do it - lack of experience probably plays a big part in it too!
Last night I thought I would cut into the fat quarters that I bought the other day from my new favouritest fabric shop and make myself a receipt/voucher wallet (I'd been eyeing this up on http://www.skiptomylou.org/2010/02/16/oilcloth-receipt-wallet/ for a while). Anyway when I looked at it, I found she had used oilcloth, I thought not a problem I'll use some fusible interfacing to make my fabric a bit stiffer but, as it turns out the oilcloth didn't need hemming or anything so when following the tutorial I was left with raw edges. I decided a bit of bias binding would do the trick here but, bias binding is not my friend and I haven't figured how to make it go round square corners so this is where a lot of the bits I'm not happy with crept in.
So my mind has been going into overdrive a little since I made it trying to think of a new way of making it so that I don't have raw edges and therefore don't have to do battle with binding. Well I think I've got an idea now so watch this space and I'll try and get a tutorial up over the weekend.
I'm in love! I've found a new fabric shop. Well it's new to me, it is actually part of a chain that is based around here but, rather than being the small shop in the town's shopping centre, it is a two-storey building on an industrial site. Even better, it's less than a 5 minute drive to it from my house!! I was rather restrained when I went in the other day and only bought a pack of 4 fat quarters (how excited was I when I saw they sold fat quarters?!). They are 4 different brown patterns and I've already earmarked one for a cosy for my husbands cafetiere so his coffee stays a bit warmer.
I haven't managed to do any sewing over the last week - my other half has been stripping down old laptops to sell and so my evenings have been taken over with photographing parts and listing them on ebay - quite dull but he assures me I can spend some of the money he makes on some new fabric so it will be worth it in the long run!
I finally decided that I was fed up of losing nappies to the bottom of my little man's nappy bag and them getting bashed about so after seeing the brilliant diaper pouch on Noodlehead's blog I decided I just had to have one! I didn't have any cotton webbing or velcro to hand so mine has a strap made from the same fabric and is fastened with a magnetic clasp. I think the strap has turned out a little too long so I might see about shortening that and I'd never done box corners before so they aren't amazing but overall I'm quite pleased with it.
I also did a little bit of shopping last night for my other love - cooking - and have purchased myself a bullion bar silicone mould for making some mini chocolate slabs for my brother in law's birthday. I'm hopefully going to use it to make little cakes and cereal bars as well - I'll share some pictures of the goodies when they've been made but in the mean time here is a picture of the tray.
The postman arrived, the waiting ended, the cold set in for both me and my little man so sewing went out of the window. I've felt so very sorry for my little one over the last few days. He is 15 months old and this is the first real cold he has had and I can't help but think how truly horrible it must be to have a cold and not know how to blow your nose. He has now perfected the 'I'm feeling very sorry for myself' look. I think he will suffer from 'man flu' when he is older!
Anyway the colds seem to be clearing up and my mother in law's birthday is creeping ever closer so I thought I'd get on with the gardening apron tonight and, I'm pleased to say it is finished. It's not amazing and there are a few bits I might need to have a look at just to be completely happy with it but, overall I'm really pleased. It was my first time using bias binding and I found it very fiddly! I should probably have had a read of how to sew on bias binding but, I kind of just went for it and think it looks ok.
So here it is:
I slightly changed the tutorial from http://www.make-it-do.com as I wanted the apron to be a little bit longer. It was a fairly easy make so would definitely recommend it.
Don't you just hate it when you start a project and then realise that you don't have something that you need? So I came to the realisation that I'm going to need some interfacing for the pocket on my mother in laws gardening apron to make it a bit sturdier. Unfortunately, being a bit new to this sewing malarkey, I haven't built up a supply of the basics like this so currently I'm waiting. Waiting for the postman to arrive with my interfacing - unfortunately he normally doesn't arrive until after lunch boo :(
So in the meantime, I've been browsing through loads of the wonderful blogs that are out there getting inspiration (I've add a few of my favourites in the sidebar if you want to have a look). I've also been making up some patterns. Does anyone else find they have to cut out patterns to pin on fabric rather than just measuring? I find it impossible to cut things out straight and even without cutting round something so, when I've learnt how I'll make sure to try and add these to any makes I put on here just to help out any other crafters who struggle with straight cutting like myself.
As promised, here is a picture of the fabric I am going to be using for my mother in law's gardening apron. I picked it up in Ikea the other day along with a couple of others - I really love the fabrics there and they're reasonably priced so I tend to end up buying more than I expected - I've currently got fabric in my stash from Ikea waiting to be made into a handbag and wallet for my sister's birthday and a tote bag for my sister in law's birthday.
I started cutting out the pieces for the gardening apron last night and thought I would pin on the bias binding ready to do a bit of sewing on it this evening but, unfortunately I was rather tired and not reading the instructions properly. It turns out I've missed a step so have to unpin it sew the pockets on and then pin it back in place. Is it just me or do you occasionally lose time doing and then undoing something you shouldn't have done in the first place?! I really must learn to check before I go ahead and do things.
Well hopefully there will be more progress on the apron tonight and I'll have a few more pictures to show you as it gets closer to being finished but, in the meantime here is a link to the tutorial over at Make It Do that I am using (I'm changing it slightly as I thought it was a little short) http://www.make-it-do.com/sew-it/garden-apron-tutorial/
