Sewing Tutorials I want to try out:

Toddler shirt - only doll size:
http://www.prudentbaby.com/2010/05/snappy-toddler-top-free-downloadable.html

Fabric Basket:
http://ayumills.blogspot.com/2008/05/tutorial-fabric-basket.html

Messanger Bag:
http://pm-betweenthelines.blogspot.com/2009/11/messenger-bag-tutorial.html

Clock Pillow:
http://www.sillypreciouspiggies.com/2010/07/craft-tutorial-and-guest-post-clock-pillow/

Kitchen Towels:
http://kleiosbelly.wordpress.com/2010/01/04/christmas-prezzies-6-1-for-you/

It amazes me the things people throw out - especially things that put a lot of work into to creating.

Take this for example:



Someone put a ton of work into that, didn't frame it and dropped it off at the thrift store. I love the colors they used. Though I haven't decided if it fits with my shabby house or will head to etsy.

Then there's this quilt:

It's not perfect; in fact it's quite flawed and weird. But someone worked really hard on it. I imagine they got rid of it in embarrassment as their quilting skills surpassed the quality shown in the quilt - they wanted to hide their shame. I love the vintage fabrics, the colors and how quirky it is. It's going in my car.

La-la-la the fun of thrifting....

Found a few pretties last week thrifting.


I can't pass up anything with an L or an E. This will go on something - or maybe just my inspiration board.



Pretty vintage trims. Love the yellow zig zag one the most.



More vintage and lace trims for dolly clothes.



Pretty vintage Holt salt and pepper shakers.



This little girl looks so sweet.

I have not been very consistent with blogging in this blog. I am much better with my T1D blog. This year when packing away Christmas I decided to archive my vintage collection with pictures. These belonged to my grandmother and were my mom's favorite X-mas decoration. She used to play with them a lot as a child and as a result a few of the little candle holders have broken arms. I wish I knew who made them.

Just a little post. Nothing huge.
I wanted to share a picture of my recent thrift outting:



There's a couple of shiny brites in there, a scary faced Santa from Austria, and a couple of handmade ones from broken jewelry bits. Not bad for $3.
I also picked up some lovely vintage pillowcases for a project, and lucky for me the new dryer arrived this weekend so that I could wash them.

I'm sorry I haven't been blogging here much in the last two months. A couple of days after my last post Bean was admitted into Children's Hospital and diagonised with T1D. It's life changing. I started a second blog that is devoted to it and our family which is currently where all my energy is going. If you are interested in reading about our life please feel free to check it out here:
http://t1djillybean.blogspot.com/
There will be no dolly pictures over there. There will be dolly pictures here however.

Here's some eye candy from our recent trip to San Fran.

Charlotte...
My newest doll. She is a Ichigo Heaven who has had her scalp switched out. I rechipped her eyes and now she feels like mine.



The orange mesh wall in the background is all over our front yard. It's been fun for pictures but I'm ready for them to take it down and put in the new fence so that the dogs can play in the yard again.

Kokeshi

I found these beautiful Kokeshi at my local thrift store in a baggie for $2. I love their hand painted faces and delicate cheerfulness. But my favorite is the pepper shaker. There was no salt shaker in the baggie, and how tragic that the pepper will live out it's live alone with out it's mate. Forever searching, but never finding it's other half.

When I find things at thrift stores I like to google and learn the items history. What it is, who made it, where it came from. At times it's a bit like being a detective. In my googling I ran a crossed this site and it's very touching story:

http://retrorenovation.com/2009/02/03/antique-kokeshi-dolls-kevins-entry/

Beautiful.

Sunday at the Beach

We went up to see R's Aunt/Uncle/Mom/Stepdad/and little brother again. It was a wonderful relaxing time. And as it was the reunion of my parents death it was exactly what I needed. We had amazing hamburgers on the grill then headed to the beach with the kids to look for sea glass. Bean has started a little collection and I've given her a couple of glass jars to keep them in.

I discovered a new blog http://ltran.tumblr.com/ that makes me feel good and all warm and fuzzy. It's full of beautiful quotes and pictures including the following link to this video that made me weepy.

My Favourite Things from kidswithcrayons on Vimeo.

LittleFee Skirt Tutorial & Bodice Pattern

Here's a pattern & tutorial for a simple LittleFee skirt. I've also included a link to the Bodice pattern though I haven't created a tutorial for it.

Patterns can be found here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/melancholywings/3807411991/in/set-72157619751176744/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/melancholywings/3807188884/in/set-72157619751176744/

1. Put two pieces of cotton fabric right sides together. You could use two different fabrics to make the skirt reversible.

2. Pin the pieces of fabric together so they don’t slide.

3. Using a Mark-Be-Gone pen trace the pattern onto the fabric.

4. With your machine on a short stitch length (I like 2 or 3) do a straight stitch along the waist and hem of the skirt.

NOTE: On the pattern this is the red lines. I used white thread on the fabric so that it would show up for the tutorial.

5. Cut out your skirt leaving seam allowences along the edges you sewed (The waist and hem).

6. Clip along the curve of the waist and hem.

7. Turn inside out.

8. Press or iron.You should now how a 'tube'.

9. Tuck in the outside open edges so that the raw edges are hidden in the tube.

10. Press again.

12. Stitch up the open edges of the skirt.

13. Attach either a snap or velcro to the ends on opposite sides so they over lap.

14. Embelish or decorate to your hearts content.

Little Fee Sock Tutorial and Pattern

Spent some time sewing this weekend and wanted to share a simple tutorial and pattern for making LittleFee socks. I like to make doll clothes such as T-Shirts and socks from human shirts. I can never find the correct fabric and scale at the fabric store. But I can easily find stripped shirts on sale at Old Navy. The pink shirt in the tutorial was $2 - far cheaper than what I can find at the fabric store.

Pattern can be found here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/melancholywings/3806398259/in/photostream/

This pattern is easy peasy when you use fabric from a shirt as you can use the hemmed edging for the top of the sock. You can adjust the height of the sock to be below or above the knee.
1. Using the hem of a shirt fold over right sides against each other.

2. Pin so that the fabric doesn't slip and the pattern lines up correctly.

3. Using a Mark-Be-Gone pen trace the pattern onto the fabric.

4. With your machine on a short stitch setting (I usually use 2 or 3) stitch on the line you drew.

5. Cut out the sock leaving enough room on the edge for a seam allowence.

6. Repeat all the steps so that you have 2 socks.

7. Run the sock under water so the 'mark be gone' lines disappear.

7. Allow to dry then turn inside out.

Little Fee Sock Tutorial and Pattern

Our Lazy Sunday Morning

I made baked Brie! It looks a bit like something served at Whooville. The recipe came from a good friend and it's so very yummy.

Summer And Hamming It Up

Bean loves the camera. She'll twirl and jump, make funny faces just to see what kind of pictures I'll take. She adores being the center of attention.
Summer has been flying by fast, I've been working a lot which makes me appreciate every second all the more. We've started to play a new game - One Lie One Truth. Where each person tells two stories or facts about themselves. One must be a lie, the other true and the other players. It's a great way to learn more about each other.

Bean made this candy airplane at the Arlington Fly in and was so proud she wanted me to share a picture of it.

A few weekends ago

I am behind on blogging as I'm currently working crunch time. But in between the long hours I'm getting a few things done around the house. I cleaned up the top of the china case, and have started work on sorting the linen closet. In an effort to simplify things we are getting rid of all the sheet sets but 2 per bed. It's not neccessary for a family of 3 to have 7 sheet sets. It's an excessive waste of space. So off to the thrift store they'll go. I'm using those vacume bags to hold blankets and fabric bins to organize the remaining items.
Two weekends ago we went to the Highland Festival in Anacortes. We saw family, boffer fighting, cattle dogs, pony riding and rain. Lots and lots of rain. But before we were rained out Bean participated in throwing a stuffed sheep over a pole winning a medal she was very proud of and made a shield and clan flag in the children's art tent. After the festivities we headed over to R's aunt and uncles house for some amazing home made chili and smoked salmon.

Some Thrifting

I wanted to share some recent thrift store and doll show finds. We went to the doll show a few weeks back and had an absolute blast. Bean and I spent time together digging through boxes of old doll clothing and beanie babies - the later of which was for her. Then we followed it up with dinner at the Rainforest Cafe - and it really sucks. The decor might be fun but the food is just over priced, tasteless and nasty. Even the children's burger was burned so badly that Bean wouldn't eat it. I don't think we'll ever be going back.

Vintage doll dress, the cutest pink vintage jewelry box ever (I really love this find), 2 small watches, a clip, some hand made embrodiered napkins, a pin and my favorite - a vintage goody swan hair clip that I only paid $2 for. The doll show was really empty this time which allowed me some good finds.

My pippos 'Amelia' in a vintage doll dress and a cameo necklace. The quality of the dress is amazing. I almost think someone made it out of their wedding gown.

A vintage Norcrest swan. I want to put pearl necklaces in it.

And finally some vintage pillowcases. They are so soft, light and airy. And their new home is on my sewing room futon.

Happy 4th of July!

4th of July Weekend

My lovely 3 day weekend started with this:

Banana Muffins with peanut butter chocolate chips! So very yummy. The recipe comes from this wonderful site that has the greatest music:

http://www.pastrywiz.com/banana1.htm

Then Bean and I headed off to do this:

Berry Picking at Stocker Farms. It's the last weekend for strawberries. We had a race to see who could fill up their bucket the most and Bean beat me by a pound. Such a good price we ended up with almost 6lbs of strawberries for $10. After picking we went to their store and bought a couple of ice creams, lemons, honey and some wonderful honey sticks.

We have so many strawberries. Most are very tiny but oh so sweet. I washed them, sliced them and made a pie, enough strawberry shortcake for 2 desserts, put some in the freezer and saved the large ones to dip in chocolate.

Some recent thrifting. The vintage train case I'm going to repurpose to hold some craft supplies. I don't know what I'll do with the patterns. But I love the vintage styles. The first has an old black rotary phone, the second is a sack style dress with a tie - I can't imagine it looking all that flattering but love that they are all wearing pearls. The last is a simple Jackie O coat pattern.

Please excuse our poor deck. I had repainted it less than 6 months ago with Behr. And it peeled in the winter cold. It's under warrenty but I've been to busy to pursue it. It'll have to be sanded and repainted again.