2009 has been wonderful

I can't believe this is the end of 2009 already... our first year with C. She is a little ray of sunshine and makes everyone around her smile. K. has turned into such a wonderful character, she is brimming with life, dancing around and brings a touch of magic to our days. The girls can be be hard work, don't get me wrong but every night I go to bed and my heart is full of love for them and I can't wait to see what they will come up with the next day. I thought having one child was brilliant, but seeing the two together and how they start to interact and play together is just the best, there isn't a dull moment in our house.

This has been my first year sewing. I can't believe it took me three months to finally get the sewing machine out of the box, just to discover that it wasn't working, after that was sorted and after I discovered the first crafting blogs I couldn't be stopped. When I look back, I can't believe what I have achieved this year:
- 2 quilts
- loads of clothes for the girls

- loads and loads of bags

- aprons, chef's hats and oven gloves






- hats
- stockings
- a frog
and my pride and joy a Waldorf style doll for C.
pretty good going for the first year.

I even managed to inspire some more friends to start sewing, which is really nice because you can chat about new ideas and order fabric together.

My lovely husband has been very patient and helpful ( especially when I had to finish some projects and he had to look after the children, or last week, when C. looked like she had swallowed a pin and he rushed her to A and E to have her checked (thankfully they couldn't find anything)). He is the love of my life and I can't believe we have only been married for 5 years. it was nice to spend some time in Rome just the two of us. Even though we only had a couple of days, it felt like a mini second honeymoon. Thank you for being you and for putting up with my crazes, with me falling asleep as soon as I hit the sofa and with my mad moments. I love you forever and ever.

2009 has been very good to us and I hope that 2010 will continue in that way. I am sure the girls will bring a lot of joy to our days and we will make lots of new discoveries together (the biggest will be K starting school, but I don't want to think about that yet).

Apron Dress

This is K's favourite dress and one of my first attempts at sewing. I followed Bridget's tutorial, which was super easy and straight forward. K loves it and if it was up to her, she would wear it every day. Unfortunately I used some very thin/see through cotton. I know better for next time. I will definately make more next year, when summer comes back.
I think we are getting closer to knitting time again, I have to remember to start earlier than last year...by the time I finished my projects it was too warm to wear them.

The perfect week

M took the week off to spend some time with us and wow did we have fun:

• we saw M's parents and his grandma
• we went to IKEA (yes I bought some fabric and the wrong part for our shelf - I don't know how I always manage to get something wrong when I go there, I must get so caught up in the whole experience that my brain stops working )
• I managed to get some sewing done (yippee)
• we went swimming

and we went to the seaside

The day at the seaside couldn't have been better, lovely sunshine, a light breeze and a picnic. K loves the sea and the beach, she danced on the sand and had a swim in the sea. C had fun trying to eat stones and sand, enjoyed crawling on the beach and bathing her feet in the water.

Perfect Tiered Skirt

After my failure yesterday I have been through my favourite online tutorials and Kuky Ideas posted this one (originally from 3Peas) which is easy to follow and it creates the perfect tiered skirt. It has the perfect twirl and doesn't look like a maternity skirt (M's comment on the skirt that I have made yesterday). I think what was wrong with it, was that the top tier was too narrow and therefore too tight.

The skirt was a success,

K's friend didn't take it off after she unwrapped it...what more can you ask for.

I love making presents for others, I spend a lot of time thinking about the person I create the present for and that helps me feel closer to the person than just going out and buying something. I know some people don't like homemade stuff but so far none of my friends have given any negative feedback.

I forgot to mention the headband it is a tutorial I found on foofangle, I shortened it a bit to fit a three year old.

Getting ready for the Week end

In our house a GP week end is always pre-booked... M will spend his day in front of the telly watching racing cars. I will hopefully meet up with my fellow GP sufferer and her children and enjoy the day by talking about sewing, showing off new projects and chatting (much more civilized than motor racing I think, although our husbands won't agree).

The only thing is that M has already influenced the girls or how would you interpret this picture?

Oh dear

I tried to make a tiered skirt today and somehow it didn't turn out the way I wanted. It is going to be a birthday present for K's friend and I want it to be right (I just couldn't give something away that I am not 100% happy with). So out came the seam ripper and I took the first tier off. Somehow I am still not happy, so I will do my calculations again and start all over again. Better to start afresh than piecing something together.
We were in Germany for the last three weeks to see my parents, it was lovely. My dad took K everywhere, she explored the whole village, even spent a couple of days at the local Kindergarten. She made some new friends down the road, called "the boys". She spent all day outside, starting in the morning with a trip with her "shopping partner" (Opa) to the local shop. C grew up so much in the time there, she got two teeth, is crawling and is sitting in a high chair. It feels like she is growing up so much quicker than K did.
I got so much time to relax, read books and meet friends. I even got some time to sew, a quick refashion of a t-shirt for my mum and two hats from the Ottobre 4/2007 magazine. Unfortunately I am better with giving things away than taking pictures but I will get better.

Bags

I went a bit bag mad in the last few weeks but I think once you have started you can't stop and I have found so many tutorials I want to try.

Just before the holidays started I made five bags for K's pre-school teachers: 4 Market bags and 1 Margaret bag. I thought they would be more useful than flowers, soap or chocolate.

I have been making making bags for my mum and sister as well, they will get a selection and can choose which one they like better. i made a Phoebe, a Margaret and a Wasp bag.

Market skirt finished

Good morning. I woke up at six this morning and could not go back to sleep, so I got dressed and went downstairs to finish the market skirt (from dana-made-it.com). Apart from a couple of mistakes and a few seams I had to undo it turned out really lovely. I am going upstairs to wake up my little angels and hope that K will like it. I haven't made any skirts for C yet because she is rolling around so much and I think that skirts are not that practical at the moment.
I have just noticed that the pocket is at an angle, will have to rip it up and do it again. Maybe early morning sewing is not the way forward.

Here is the picture. K wanted to wea a hat, she had chicken pox last week and doesn't like the spots. The red fabric I have used was a bargain from IKEA. I found it in the children's section where all the bedding is and it was £4.99 for 3m, what a bargain. The hat is made from a burda pattern ( I think it was in the German burda magazine in April).

Knitting

I don't know if you have come across Drops Design but it a treasure chest full of free knitting patterns. They are very well written and easy to follow. I love it because it comes in so many languages, which means I can recommend it to my friends in the UK and in Germany.

I have made a super cute cardigan for K. and lots of people commented on it and wanted to know where the pattern was from.

Hello

I have become quite obsessed with looking at other peoples blogs. I love all the crafty ideas and am completely in awe of all the wonderful ideas that are out there. My daughters have been dressed in so many cute outfits that I have made following free tutorials and patterns (thank you to all these fantastic people who make their ideas freely available).
Recently I even infected a new friend with my sewing bug and after sending her all the links that I have found via e-mail, my husband suggested to just start blogging myself.
I hope one day to create a tutorial as well but until then I will just share what I have made.