the eve eve

Hello Christmas Eve Eve. 

I'm a big fan of the Eve Eve.  Christmas Eve has its designated activities and so does the Eve Eve.

Eve Eve is the last preparation day.  If there are any last minute gifts to be bought or cookies to be made, this is the day.  It's a get things done day.  It's a business day for the business of making merry.

My business today is to boss the Sugar Daddy around.  He must go to See's Candy.  He must bring in all the Amazon boxes from the garage and debox everything so I can start the wrapping procedures. He must taste the gingerbread to make sure it is soft and delectable.  He must bath the hound dog and make sure all the good movies are in the que.

It's the one day of the year that I am allowed to be bossy.  Because, you know, I'm the Christmas foreman.  And the Sugar Daddy respects that title.

He helped me finished up my last handmade gift for the children.  It's a reading fort. Or eating fort. Or possibly a sleeping fort. It's really just a simple fort. Because forts are cool.

Sugar Daddy did the wooden frame construction. I handled the design and duck cloth sewing.

It was an inexpensive project. I got the idea here. I bought the duck cloth from an Army Navy surplus store and got it duper cheap.

I think the rug rats will enjoy it.

Merry Christmas Eve Eve.  I hope you have a productive day. Have some caffeine. Crank the music. Get er done.

merry mermaid

If you are like me, you have a ton of fabric scraps saved up for some rainy day project. Probably way more scraps than you will ever really get around to using.

But I really love some of the smaller pieces of fabric I have. Some were pretty expensive so I only bought a fat quarter to begin with.

I made this little mermaid doll for Birdie for Christmas using up some of my favorite scraps.  She only took me about a couple hours to sew together and she didn't cost me a cent.

If you would like to make your own little mermaid, here is what you will need:

Scraps of fabric in three different patterns
Enough felt for the head and arms with a different color for the hair
Embroidery floss for the eyes and for the hair
Polyester filling
Beads for necklace if you want one
Two pom poms if you want them
Sewing machine

You can download my pattern and directions here.

I gave a couple options to the hair because Birdie's best friend Emerson has an afro and her mother might make her one too. Don't be afraid to alter the pattern to match the little girl you are sewing it for.

And again, don't use cheap felt! It will make a big difference. If you can't find good felt, use cotton.

Happy sewing!

Frankie's blocks

I wanted to make something for Frankie. Something extra special. Something he could take with him for his own children to play with in years to come.

And the boy likes blocks.

I ordered unfinished wooden blocks and went to work.

I nearly died when I ran across the vintage alphabet graphics. They are so sweet. You can find the original source for the graphic on the Rook no. 17 Blog.

There are even a few animals in there that I have never heard of before.  Ibis? Who knew?

I painted the blocks first then distressed the edges. I used gel medium to adhere the graphics to the blocks.  Modge Podge would work as well as gel medium.  Then I gave them a coat of clear gloss.

The blocks are available here.  I have made the graphics available here. They fit on 2 inch blocks.

I made twenty blocks. It took three alphabets.  The whole project cost under $25. If you can cut your own blocks you could do it for a fraction of that price.

Here's to cheap- handmade- and classic toys!