Not being in the habit of creating of preschooler-pleasing art, I turned to AI for design inspiration on this one. I think my prompt was “Cute juvenile unicorn sunshine flowers”. It did the trick; Miss Four loved it.
PSA: Niamh rhymes with leave.
My Christmas gift to my daughter Tui, honouring her urban farming days.
Two of my dear friends have Boxing Day birthdays (Dec 26). I’m pretty sure neither of them read this blog, so I’m not ruining any surprises by posting their card here.
Custom label, sewn in. There was a bit of a learning curve on the stencilling, but I’m really happy with the end result. I pretty sure Felix will be too.
I love it when my grandkids request specific handmade gifts. I just received the Christmas wishes, and Felix (12) asked for a Zelda champions tunic. The base garment is easy enough; applying the white embellishment is more of a challenge. I quickly abandoned appliqué, and now I’m going the stencilling route. Right now I’m taking a break from hours of hand-cutting stencils from freezer paper (and wishing I had a nearby friend with a Cricut). White fabric paint has been ordered and is on its way. Fingers crossed that this plan works, and doesn’t end up looking too “Becky Homecky”.
I’m getting ready for a 10-year-old’s Crazy Hair birthday party. Except mine will be more of a crazy hat.
This is the third cross-back apron I’ve made for myself (I’ve also made several as gifts). It’s for sure my most-worn garment, given that I don it every day when cooking and cleaning. I wore aprons #1 and #2 to tatters, so today it was time to make #3.
Helena Fitzgerald calls the week between Christmas and New Year Dead Week. For me, it’s always the opposite — it’s the time of year when I go into a flurry of gift making. Given that most of my loved ones live on the other side of the planet, gifting requires advance planning. I love to start the New Year with a bit of hoard of future presents and cards, ready to pop in the mail at the appropriate time.
For a few years there, USPS wasn’t shipping parcels to Australia, which really put the kibosh on my handmade gift-giving. Even a card was taking up to three months to arrive. Ordering something from Book Depository to be shipped direct to the recipient just didn’t give me the same joy. So I’m thrilled that the mail service seems to be back to its pre-pandemic level of operation (still slow and expensive, but the goods get there within a month.)
All that to say … this isn’t Dead Week. For me, it’s Maker Week. 😊
I spent the morning and half the afternoon happily working on a quilt, but noticed that my back was getting really sore. I stopped to stretch and make some tea and suddenly realised that I was SICK. Yep, after managing to avoid it for two years, I have caught the dreaded ‘rona.
Am I still going to feel like daily sketching as the virus runs its course? Of course I’m hoping for a light touch and a quick recovery, but we’ll see!
Thank you, Virginia Woolf, for giving me the words when I couldn’t find the right ones myself.
hashiworks 