floating world

a cape for me

We went to a wedding on Friday, and I was worried that the strappy dress I planned to wear might not be warm enough for autumn weather, so I made a simple cape to wear on top. The pattern is Burda 8173 and the fabric is from Tessuti - a beautiful chocolate wool on the outside, and lined in a silk satin I found in the remnants bin. It was very cosy, and the silk felt all swishy and luxurious against my skin; so much nicer than polyester. I've never worn a cape before, and when I told Mark I was making one he looked slightly worried... I think he was expecting a rectangular, Superman-style creation. But this one comes just above the elbows and is not superheroesque at all; I can see it getting a fair bit of wear with skirts and boots this winter.

very good things

Some recent flickr favourites:

1. floral lingerie, 2. Ruby Red, 3. antelope et steak, 4. Liberty Spots, 5. Sisters, 6. progress., 7. plusquilttop, 8. they're lit, 9. Bondi Bay, Sydney, 10. Tabi and Zouri footwear, 11. pink weeping ume blossom inokashira.jpg, 12. yellow, 13. japanese anemone, 14. the first sakura at fukuoka castle, 15. sakura, 16. Hooty owl zipper pouch, 17. film.171, 18. Russian doll keyring for my sister, 19. upon reflection..., 20. Pencil Roll, 21. plum flower in snow, 22. kitchen, 23. mieze2.0_standing, 24. Radical Tree, 25. Peg Bears - Up Close

Based on these, it seems I am attracted to photos of flowers, handmade toys and patchwork. And bright colours.

Some other things that I'm enjoying this week and looking forward to:

1. New edition of Mixtape - mine came last week and it is fabulous. Small and light enough to read while breastfeeding, which is a distinct bonus.
2. I found a great new blog, I Heart Japan. Melissa writes about the kind of quirky, fabulous things that I really miss about Tokyo.
3. I love the Radio National First Person readings. This recording of Walking Life's Glorious Adventure by Tara June Winch (only available as a podcast until next week, but you can also read it online here) is beautiful. The way she writes about her daughter's first steps made me shiver: "From that first contraction, to that first step, to the end of our days - I will continue to let you go, to let you walk alone." She catches the bittersweetness of watching a baby grow up so perfectly... a good one to read/listen to for mothers' day.
   
4. The current First Person book is anthropologist Liza Dalby's memoir about living in Japan, East Wind Melts The Ice. I've been listening to it online while watching Ali or knitting. And the next one is going to be The Pillow Book, which I've been meaning to read for ages.
5. More stuff for Japanophiles - this exhibition on Taisho Chic starts at the AGNSW later this month. I can't wait.
6. The Hope Street Markets are on next weekend in Paddington. I haven't been before, but they look really good so Ali and I will be checking them out.
7. Kluster online zine. Such cool formatting! Great content too.
8. There is a Cat Rabbit exhibition  at Ruban Rat Newtown from this weekend. Another one I definitely want to have a look at. Based on the photos I've seen on Flickr it looks very cool.

That's all for now... hope you have a great weekend and that all the mums have a lovely mothers' day.

sleeping sack

Another, larger sleep sack from Burda pattern 9640; the ones I made when I was pregnant are outgrown now. The sleep sacks are a key element in my campaign to encourage more consistent sleeping from Ali, so I think I'll make a couple more. I totally recommend this pattern - it's so easy to put together, and it means that the sleeping bags cost almost nothing, whereas if you buy the Grobag ones they're about $60 each. I do like feeling thrifty (it doesn't happen very often).

The fabrics are from Sprout Design and Ikea, and it's lined with an old shirt of Mark's. The shirt was one he had made in KL when we were there on a stop-over years ago, and I think it's Zegna fabric... anyway, it's very soft and feels lovely. And there is a flannelette layer, cut out of an old sheet and sandwiched inside for added cosiness.

I used Amy's bias tape method, which is great, although I made it hard for myself by accidentally buying the super-thin bias tape... not ideal when you are trying to trap 3 layers together. And I had a breakthrough with the zipper... I have always had a phobia of zips, and this was the first one I'd done on the new sewing machine. I followed the instructions in the Janome manual exactly and even though the diagrams are really confusing it all made sense and turned out much tidier than any zip I had done previously. Very exciting! If I do a few more to practice I may actually stop avoiding zips and getting stressed by them. And then maybe I'll finally get around to making myself some clothes. 

top stitching in action

The top stitching photo from the last post was a close up of these pants - pattern M from this book again. Made up in a soft browny/grey Japanese cotton I bought at Tomato before we left Japan. The red top stitching is down the side seams and around the hem.  Nice and simple and soft and crawling-friendly.

top stitching

I would love to be able to make things beautifully, but right now my sewing is very patchy. This is partly due to a slapdash temperament, but also because I have cobbled what I know together, rather than learning formally. I did a basic sewing class at Grace Bros when I was 13 (remember when they had fabric and haberdashery in department stores?), and Textiles at school in year 9 and 10, but mostly I've learned from my mum, craft books or just by figuring things out. This means that there are lots of simple things that I dread doing, like zippers, and other things that I don't know how to do properly. One thing I could never work out is why when I hemmed jeans or did decorative top stitching, the stitches kind of disappeared into the fabric. Hooray for the internet. Last week I found this post on Pink Chalk Studio via Whip Up, and after a quick trip to the monster that is Spotlight I now have a denim needle, top stitching thread, and can do nice visible top stitching. Yay! Reading craft blogs has definitely been a big help, not just for practical sewing tips like this one but also for inspiration. I don't know if I ever would have started knitting if I hadn't been tempted by all the gorgeous things I kept seeing other people make.

There are so many fabulous tutorials out there, but a couple of good ones I've seen lately are this bias tape one from Angry Chicken and this elastic casing one from Jade. And Collette has lots of really useful links and tips on the Tessuti blog, like how to cut delicate fabric. Hopefully one day I'll get to do a sewing class like this one and learn how make things properly, but until then the internet is my classroom. If you have any links to other good tutorials or sewing / knitting tips, please share.

bird textiles

(photo from the Bird website)

I visited a gorgeous new fabric shop for the first time on Thursday: Bird Textiles sell beautiful handprinted fabrics, original clothing designs and a range of homewares. AND they support sustainable design. Their Sydney store is in Surry Hills in the most divine old pharmacy - it still has all the original fittings and is heritage listed. For anyone in Sydney I definitely recommend a visit, and for everyone else their stock is available online - have a look. It's expensive, but very cute.
 

hooray for chocolate slice (& links)

Good things from the internet:
Very quick to make and extremely yummy chocolate slice. Recipe from Sadie and Lance. Make some now! It's even quicker than the brownies, and as a bonus doesn't require chocolate.
Cool shoes from Andrea & Joen. I'm all about flats right now, and their Sunday range has lots of cute ones
Stick on wall decorations. I am considering this one for our bedroom. Or maybe this one
Two Thousand email magazine / Sydney guide
The lovely Icing blog
The Powerhouse Museum photo archive on Flickr
This gorgeous quilt, and this one too, found via Hop Skip Jump. I am extremely tempted to make one for my bed.
Beautiful prints from Yuki
Tapettitalo: gorgeous wallpaper from Finland. Can you tell I have decorating on the brain?

Ali and I are both much less snotty now, and it's a 4 day week here (Anzac Day is on Friday) so life is good.

this post is brought to you by kleenex, sudaclear and panadol

The baby and I have been struck down by a cold, and neither of us are impressed. Ali is outraged because his nose is running like a tap, he doesn't know how to blow it and hates me wiping it. He keeps gagging on mucus and he's totally off solids. So sad. I am unimpressed because it's the first time I've been sick since I had a baby, and I'm realising that my previous get-well strategy of curling up on the sofa to watch Oprah, read trashy magazines and feel sorry for myself is not an option anymore. I have become a human hankerchief... my top looks like a snail crawled all over it, but it is from a 7-month-old nose. So we have been all about panadol, tissues, and the sudaclear plug in vapour thing here.

On the plus side, being housebound gave me the chance to finish off Ali's hoodie - I really loved this pattern (Knitting Pure & Simple baby tunic), you can literally cast off and put it straight on the baby, there is no seaming at all. And how cool is Kitchener stitch? I had never used it before, and was so excited to work it out. I keep finding that all these intimidating-sounding knitting things are actually not too bad when I try them. (I realise I am sounding like a total knitting geek here. Apologies to all non-knitting readers)

The pants are ones I made a few weeks ago, from a pattern in this book. Most of the stuff in there is for girls, but there are some nice unisex pants, shorts and overalls too. Having found a pattern for crawling-friendly pants at last, I'm going to be making a few more pairs the same to keep Ali's knees cosy over winter. But not just yet. Right now I am going to try and convince Ali to have a nap so I can too. Please send end-of-cold wishes our way...

bend-the-rules clutch

Considering the huge amount of sewing stuff that lurks in the study, it's not often that I can complete a project without having to buy anything at all. Even if I use fabric and patterns that I have already I almost always need to get a zip or thread, so I was really happy to finish this clutch from Amy's book without buying anything at all. I used silk from a swap on the outside, an old flannelette sheet as padding and left over Japanese cotton from this bag as lining.  And a button from the button jar... I can't remember where I got it originally, maybe from Allison? At the last minute I realised I needed corded elastic for the closure, and couldn't face a trip to Spotlight, so used a hair elastic instead (Spotlight with baby = awful). It's a great simple pattern - actually the whole book is great - and it was so satisfying to be able to make something from start to finish while my mum minded Ali for a couple of hours yesterday afternoon. Not that I have much call for a silk clutch bag these days, but it was fun to make nonetheless.

chocolate brownies

Because it's raining, I'm tired and the whole house is covered in Cruskit. And because chocolate makes everything better.

Update
Here's the recipe. It's super quick to make, doesn't use much kitchen equipment and they feel very decadent to eat. It's from Donna Hay Modern Classics 2

200g chocolate (dark cooking chocolate is good. For the last batch I used Spanish cooking chocolate and half a Lindt dark chocolate bunny)
250g butter
1 and 3/4 cups brown sugar
4 eggs
1/3 cup cocoa
1 and 1/4 cups plain flour
1/4 teaspoon baking powder

Preheat the oven to 160 degrees C (325F)

Melt chocolate and butter in a bowl over a saucepan of water on low heat. Stir until it is all melted. Allow to cool slightly.
Add sugar, sifted flour and cocoa, eggs and baking powder to the bowl. Mix until combined.

Pour into a 20cm (8") square slice tin lined with baking powder. Bake for 50 minutes or until set. Cool slightly in the tin and cut into slices. Makes 16 slices. (I used a rectangular tin and cut it into 20 slices. It is really dense and rich, so smallish slices are good).

Make a cup of coffee, collapse on sofa and enjoy.