craftiness

Hello out there.

I've missed blogging, but sometimes, living life is more important and more fun. But now I have something fun to share, so here we go.

I've had a recent spurt! I finished a onesie I'd been dragging my feet on because I'm pretty sure the baby it's for is wearing the size the onesie is. I'm so bad. *And* sharing my fabric stash and tote-making instructions with a couple friends inspired me to sew again, so I finished the back pack! I also hemmed a pair of my own pants into those trendy long shorts which are really quite flattering. I did the same with a pair of pants for Tom to make shorts for him too. But this makes like pair number 4 for that, so nothing really exciting there.

On to pictures!

Soren's elephant



with a little bird...



and another on the behind, with a peanut. On later reflection, I should have decreased the size of the peanut or increased the size of the bird, as it is, it looks suspiciously like something else one might find near an elephant, especially since it's on the rear. Oh well.



Andrew was a fisherman...





satin stitch on a t-shirt is hard and not fun



I put three little bubbles on the butt, but I was tired of satin stitch, and they were too big for just knots, so I just outlined in backstitch. Not my best-ever behind design. If you are really desperate to see it, visit my flickr photoset, you'll find it somewhere in there.

The exciting thing about both these onesies is that I designed them myself. I actually sketched an elephant (20 some times) and doodled the underwater scene. What did I spend the most time on? figuring out how to draw birds! I'm pretty darn proud of myself. This isn't the first time I've done my own design work, but I look at the elephant and just swell with pride that I could draw that. Yay!

On to more self-designed stuff.

Here's a backpack I made for Eve. My friend Kim made a backpack out of some great Amy Butler fabric (I think) for another friend's oldest girl back in November. I was totally inspired and began to make a Christmas present for Eve. I knocked out all but the straps and hanging loop right away, and then became intimidated by the attachment of the straps and left it literally under the needle of my machine until a few weeks ago when Tom decided he needed new shorts. I've told you all that, though. So, anyway, here it is.



Note the flat bottom. Making flat-bottomed bags makes me really happy. I think it's the geometry involved.

I asked Kim for a basic rundown on what she did. If I were to do it again, I would make it bigger and put a pocket on the outside front (and ribbon details, which I meant to do, but forgot until everything was all sewn together, oh well!) which are both things Kim did, and I just was too lazy to pay careful attention to such details. I also think the flap should be longer, but I cut the flap before I made the bag have a flat bottom, so that's my excuse for how short it is.



I love the fabric. I found it all in a quilting fat quarter stack at joann's. It's not going to hold up to a ton of abuse, but Eve's already getting too big for the thing, so I think it will be just fine. Is it some kind of strange Christmas motif? It was the right timing for it, and it's got angels...but not the usual angels, and certainly not Christmas colors. It's really vibrant and summery looking, really.

another thing that Kim told me to do, but which sailed right in one ear and out the other, was to sew the top of the straps into the flap seam, along with the hanger hook, but, you know, Kim sews way more than I do and is clever that way. I'm just pleased the straps are on. But if I make another back pack, I'm totally doing that.

One thing Kim didn't do, but which I did, was put elastic on the straps. I wanted it to be "adjustable" in the sense that the straps could fit Eve for longer than a month, but I didn't want to do the usual strap adjusters (because I am afraid of those!) The bonus of this method is that it allows Eve to easily put the back pack on by herself, but it still fits snugly against her back so she doesn't have her backpack dragging down by her bottom. I can only imagine the back strain the other method would have caused, since I'm not certain a book would fit, and she's always lugging around really heavy beanie babies and whatnot.



fully lined, featuring pockets and a velcro closure for the flap (because every other kind of closure scares me--I need to branch out)



Eve is quite pleased (there's those straps in action!!), and Israel can't believe how talented his beloved mom is. He loves me even more now, and expects to have a robot-angel backpack of his own when he's three. This is not the sort of thing that makes a suitable hand-me-down.

No pictures of the shorts (they're not that flattering.