tiny happy

some spring things

While I was hanging the washing out today, Keira was pottering around the garden, and discovered the watering can filled with rainwater, and sat there for a while dipping her hands into it, and pouring the water over her feet. Then it dawned on me that she is the classic age for 'water play.' I brought out some plastic containers and jugs, and she spent the next two hours happily tranferring water between them.

This may sound like nothing exciting, but for me it was a major breakthrough, because Keira is the kind of baby who has never enjoyed playing with toys, games, or anything that doesn't involve me holding her, or an adult giving her one-on-one attention. So, naturally, I'm praying for sunny weather so that I can organise this activity for her every morning!

She was sitting in her tights and nappies, in a pool of cold water, but the sun was shining and it felt positively 'springy'. So I didn't feel too guilty, and even got a bit of gardening done, without having her tugging on my clothes the entire time. Blissful...

Inspired by the budding magnolia tree outside our bedroom window, I made this little purse today, for a friend:

I used the wonderful tutorial here at Mollychicken, and used dark green cord fabric for the outside, and embroidered some little white branches with buds ready to open on the front. My blanket stitch still needs some practice, but this is a really fun, quick project.

The purse is lined with some hand-printed fabric I had stored away a while ago, and rediscovered yesterday.

earthy little vest and a pretty view

Some more knitting goodness from my Mum. She spun and knitted this little pullover for Arlo from more Chilco Fibres Pacific Pallette yarn- this time in the 'autumn' colourway. But it turned out a bit small, so it's off to my neice Phoebe along with these browny-red pants with a poppy patch, made by me. (More home-dyeing- can you tell?) I love these earthy colours for little girls.

The children and I had lunch today at the top of a street across town that has this lookout:

I don't think we'll ever get to live in this part of town, but it sure is pretty.

Keira, international knitting model

Here she is in a creation of my Mum's. (See why I don't knit much anymore?) It's a beautiful cross-over cardigan in handspun wool. Keira looks so proud!

It's the design named 'Maja' in Rowan Junior. Mum spun a couple of hanks of Chilco Fibres' 'pastel' colourway to knit this. (From the 'Pacific Pallette range, hand-painted by Elspeth Wilkinson, a spinner and dyer from Ashburton.) Knitted up, the colours melt into each other like a sunset. I love it, and so does Keira. Thank you Mum!

Arlo and I spent a couple of hours finishing off a special project, too. A while ago, in a swap with my friend Helen, Arlo was sent a soft-toy-making kit that she had found in a second-hand shop, nearly finished. It was quite old, but had been nearly all sewn up with the neatest, most beautiful stitches. Arlo helped me fill him with stuffing yesterday, and I sewed the rest and here he is...

Arlo's called him Eddie.

quilt monday- fern quilt

Here's my quilt for today: a medium-sized cot-quilt I made while I was pregnant with Keira. I never had a scan to find out what sex she would be, but I was quite sure she was a girl, and I loved the name 'Fern' so this quilt was in preparation for her arrival. (Tom wasn't so keen on that name so we compromised and her name is Keira Fern.) Noone else believed I would have a girl (there are lots of boys on Tom's side) and a few people thought this would be a bit flowery for a baby boy (grr... it would be perfect for either, I think!) I wanted to create the effect of a carpet of ferns or leaves covering the baby. Also, green's my favourite colour.

It's very similar to this quilt which my Mum made for Tom and I... hehe probably because I snatched all her fabric scraps from that project! But it appears I should have snatched some lessons from her too, because there are a few technical problems with Keira's one. I knew I should have used pure cotton fabrics for all the squares but I so wanted to use a couple of pieces of blue and black floral silk I had salvaged from an old dress... Anyway, as you can guess, those blocks have now come away and are looking a bit raggedy. (A project for Claire's quilt restoration group, perhaps?)

Sorry for not listening, Mum... I'll know better next time though ;)

This was pretty much my first patchwork attempt and I didn't end up doing any quilting on it (hmm, maybe that means it's not technically a quilt?!) Instead I used small pieces of embroidery thread to tie each square together (in the corners of each block.) It's backed with dark green cotton. I have another small quilt like this almost finished which I hope to show soon.

Thank you for all your good luck wishes for my market stall! I had a lot of fun on Saturday, even though when I got to the market, it was pouring with rain. And continued to rain the whole morning, except for the last hour of the market. Most of my things got saturated, my shoes leaked (I didnt realise how old they were!) and I could feel myself sinking into a Very Grumpy Mood. But my sweet friend Amelia, who I was going to have a side-by-side stall with, shared her site with me, and we did lots of chatting and coffee-drinking. Umm, and chocolate-eating. So that warmed us up.

It was a wonderful weekend all round, apart from Arlo developing a fairly bad stomach bug. He's better now, but suffice it to say there is a lot of washing on the line today.

a few pretty things...

Not much energy or brainpower for words today, so here are a few pictures.

Beautiful crocheted hat for Keira sent by Dairne in Wellington.... thank you!

Three shoulder bags in the afternoon sun awaiting buttons for the market stall tomorrow. They're all made from recycled curtain fabric.

a lovely old, falling-apart  book I found at the op-shop, and some pretty pages inside:

and this wonderful piece of vintage fabric given to me by Rhiannon. Lucky me!

Goodbye, friends. Hope you have a relaxing weekend.

dyeing day

It was sunny and warm yesterday so I had a morning dyeing some stuff green.

I used one tin of Dylon dye to turn about six kid's t-shirts, and two metres of cotton fabric green. I also dyed a piece of fine wool fabric to use as lining in my baby shoes. I don't know whether my kids are especially grubby (wouldn't be surprised) but I find that white t-shirts end up with brown-ish stains around the neck and on the front which are hard to wash out. So sometimes I pop them all in the dark-coloured dye pot, and voila! the problem is solved. Plus, all stains in future won't be so obvious!

I've been asked many times how I dye fabric and wool, and I wouldn't give any advice on the wool, but dyeing fabric, at least with simple chemical dyes like Dylon, is very easy. I would really love to discover some natural dyes in the shop so I could get the kids involved an not feel so guilty about getting rid of the dyepot afterwards. The product claims it is 'harmless' but I figure it doesn't do the environment any good to tip the hot dye down the sink, nor can it be healthy to breath in those dye-ish fumes while it's cooking away in your kitchen. You probably shouldn't do this when you are pregnant and I usually send the kids outside to play while I'm dyeing things.

Anyway, my compromise is to dye as many items as possible, and use up as much of the chemical as I can, each piece of fabric getting lighter and lighter. Here's how I do it:

You need:

*cotton* items or fabric to be dyed (I've never had success using this kind of dye with synthetic-blend fabrics.)

one small tin of dylon fabric dye or similar

a big, old saucepan and wooden spoon

an old bowl to dissolve the dye in (I use a glass one), and metal tongs

1. Prepare your work space by putting newspaper or similar around any surfaces you don't want dye to splash on. Half-fill an old, large saucepan (i.e. one that you won't use again for cooking) with water, and place on the stove, at a medium heat.

2. Fill your sink with water and pop in all the items you wish to dye. Soak them, then wring the water out.

3. In an old bowl tip your tin of powdered dye, then add a couple of cups of boiling water, and 1/4 cup of salt. Stir to dissolve thoroughly, then add this to the dyepot on the stove.

4. Carefully put in the items to be dyed- as many that will fit in without the water level rising too high. If you quite like a bit of that 'tye-dyed' look to them, keep them really scrunched up but if you want an even dye unfold them and don't put too many in at once.

5. Bring the water to a simmer, and stir regularly with your wooden spoon. 'Cook' the fabric like this for about 20 minutes.

6. Carry the pot over to your sink and, using metal tongs, squeeze each item as much as possible, and place it in the sink. Return the pot to the stove for another round of items if you wish, they won't have such a vibrant colour though.

7. Rinse the dyed pieces in your sink until most of the dye has come out.

8. After everything has been dyed and rinsed, place the items in your washing machine with a small amount of detergent/powder, and put them through a normal cold wash cycle. Hang outside to dry.

This fabric was in the second 'round' of dyeing. It's got a tie-dyed look to it, but I quite like that for kid's clothes (I did grow up in Nelson, you know...)

From my experience, the colour has been quite fast after this initial washing, but it could still pay to wash your new green t-shirt separately or with dark colours the first time.

I like to applique or embroider on my colourful baby t-shirts for a bit of a change from your usual blue or pink...

book bags

I found this old Crown Lynn pottery jug at the op-shop the other day. I used to love searching through all the pottery and ceramics at second-hand shops, looking out for familiar Crown Lynn or Kelston Ceramics pieces. (We had a couple of different Crown Lynn crockery sets when I was growing up, and I always love to see those sitting on the shelves.) By the way, do any NZ readers out there know of a good website with information about Kelston/Crown Lynn pottery? I had trouble finding one...

But now I tend to look at the fabric and linen when I go op-shopping and then get out of there because the children are making such a din. They usually enjoy sitting there, playing with the toys and books for about ten minutes, but that's their limit. What a luxury it will be to go op-shopping without them one day!

Anyway I fell in love with this little jug with the blue blossoms. It's filled with white magnolia buds and leaves on our kitchen table, a little sign of spring...

I made this little set of children's (or adults!) bookbags last week, to include on my market stall. I made an effort to use fabrics and colours I wouldn't usually (in this case, red and bright green and orange) to make them feel quite cheerful and fun.

The fabric on the left is a crazy 70s seersucker with what looks like cave people dancing around apple trees! And I found some red and navy cotton twill tape in my ribbon box so used that for the handles. The gingham in the middle was an embroidered tea-tray, and for the bag on the right, I used an amazing hand-stitched (I think) old tablecloth, in a sampler style. It looks like someone was practicing smocking, applique and all kinds of embroidery on here so I had to use it for something...

more great mail, and a bear that's maybe a mouse

It seems we may need to get a new letterbox- since starting this blog I have been sent such great parcels, they can't fit in there and yesterday I found one on the ground below! This week was no exception...

I met Michelle (from the UK) through Flickr, and sent her some baby shoes for her little one (who is due any day now!!) And she sent me this huge collection of cute things in return! Thank you so much, Michelle, you really didn't have to do that...

Gorgeous fabrics, including a silk scarf that used to belong to her nan, handmade crocheted buttons, an hilarious vintage Stitchcraft magazine, embroidered name-tags for Arlo and Keira and nice things for the bath. Oh and look at that crocheted mat- she made it herself (from recycled plastic bags) I have such crochet envy (one day I'll work it out...maybe...) Thanks Michelle, for such a thoughtful parcel, and best wishes for the arrival of your new baby!

It really was my lucky day because my order of (mostly) old paper arrived too from Marianne. Arlo and I have had the best time looking through it, at all the pretty birds and flowers and smelling that gorgeous old paper-ish smell (my favourite smell ever.) Marianne also included some exotic-looking stamps, and Arlo seemed interested in those most of all... might be time to make him a stamp album!

Collecting stamps made me so happy as a child, and what with all the parcels I seem to be getting in the mail lately, it could be the perfect hobby...

In crafting news, I've been working some late nights trying to make things for my weekly craft stall at our local market, which I begin this Saturday! I'm trying to stay calm and not let it get stressful, for the sanity of my family as well as my own, so fingers crossed! (I'm only partly succeeding, by the way.)  After all, I doubt that the people visiting the market will care/notice whether I have 10 or 20 pairs of baby shoes or other stuff, and besides, it's supposed to be 'fun'. Hmm...

I did make this little guy over the weekend, I intended for him to be a bear, but he looks decidedly mousy I think:

I used a soft, worn woolen blanket for his body and some brown velvet scraps for the face, and one side of each ear, arm and leg. I thought the fabrics were a good choice until Keira was being extra 'affectionate' with him, and ripped a hole in his back! Oh dear, he doesn't seem to mind too much though. Next time I might use some sturdier material.

quilt monday

Here's another old quilt I originally found at the Recycling Centre, sometime last year. It's quite rustic, probably made in the 70s, with different-sized blocks of bright red and blue fabrics. Some of the blocks have seams running in unusual directions through them, so I think a lot of old clothes were recycled for the quilt top.

It was probably intended as a picnic rug or throw, as there is no quilting on the top and the back is a sturdy kind of upholstery fabric. But I like it enough to have it over a couch in the living room. Plus, I think it feels right at home next to our bright red fireplace.

Here are some of my favourite bits of it:

'Tsotsi'

A couple of nights ago Tom's younger brother Nick kindly offered to babysit for us so we jumped at the chance to see a film in town. I'm embarrassed to say that the last time I went to see a film was over a year ago! But I've since made a pact to go more often... I'd forgotten how wonderful it is to go to the movies.

We saw 'Tsotsi', a South African film directed and written by Gavin Hood. It was amazing, from the intense storyline and character portrayal, to the breathtaking South African hip-hop music (most performed by the artist Zola who also acts in the film) throughout.

This is actor Presley Chweneyagae, who played the main character 'Tsotsi.' In the film his name means 'thug', and he is a hardened gang leader whose mother died from AIDS when he was a child, leaving him to grow up among a group of other orphans in a collection of abandoned concrete pipes at the edge of Johannesberg city. The film is set in the outlying ghetto of Soweto, and follows Tsotsi for the six days after he attempts to murder a woman outside her house, and steal her car and money. As he drives the car away, he discovers her baby in the back seat, so the film is about how his life changes after this.

It made me realise that I need to read more/see more/hear more from this part of the world. I find it too easy to immerse myself in media of my own culture, 'comfortable' music, films, television... without taking a further step to explore the more obscure offerings that aren't so well promoted in our media. And Africa is such an unknown (sometimes I feel like I don't want to know about some of the terrible suffering and strife) to me, I'd like to learn more. I certainly need to hear more of that music, too!

Tsotsi is the most incredible, moving and gripping story of redemption I think I have ever seen in a film, and I highly recommend it if you have the chance to see it.