NIKKI-SHELL

The post all about quilting

At the beginning of 2007 i started a green, black and white quilt for our bed.  Needless to say it was put aside for other things mainly baby quilts.  There has been a number of babies born to friends this year and i've made simple quilts for three of them, the most recent being this one for Jonas.


Now i'm working on the green, black and white quilt again, i mean it's about time really!  Last night i cut out all the remaining blocks (72 in total) and finished sewing them together today.

Each one is like this but i have used different black and white fabrics for each one.  My next task is to decide what colour to use inbetween each block, as a backing and for the binding.  I'm thinking i'd like a black and white binding with black as the dominating colour but i'm umming and ahhing as to whether i should have white or green inbetween the blocks and the other colour as the backing.  What do you think?
Anyway while i take my time deciding i'm going to get started on yet another quilt.  This one is all mine!  Bought with my Christmas money, it's going to be a combination of these red fabrics as the background:

with appliquéd flowers in these black and white fabrics:

The fabric is in the machine and i plan to start cutting tonight.  I'm thinking of having a plain red for the backing of this quilt and black and white for the binding but i may change my mind between now and then, who knows!
Do you think i could manage to have both quilt tops finished by the time baby arrives?  i'm making it one of my new year goals, one of many i have.  I'll post all about my goals and a recap of 2007 on January 1st.  Do you have any goals for the new year?  Leave me a comment and let me know.

On Sale NOW!!!!

Issue 3 of Mixtape Zine is up for pre-sale!

Head on over to our NEW SHOP to pre order your copy now!!  Get in early and get a free gift with your zine.
Shipping February 8th.

I'm very excited about this issue!  Go on, make time for the small things!

Hot and tired

Hello again!  I seemed to disappear for a little while there didn't i?  I hope you all had a very happy Christmas, we certainly did.  We spent the day with our adopted family, playing, eating, drinking and generally having a wonderful day!  I am glad to be on the other side of Christmas though (i took down the tree yesterday) and am now looking forward to the new year which is fast approaching us.
I have quite a lot to show and tell which i've been meaning to do so over the past week but have been putting off because i'm hot and totally tired of being pregnant.  Rather than sitting at the computer uploading photos i just want to lay around at home and grumble about how hot it is.  So yes, i need to dig out the camera and all the things i've made over the past 3 weeks and get snapping.  I will show you my muslin for the Desira top from BurdaStyle though.

Yep, check out the size of that bump people, it's looking rather large isn't it?  I'm 29 weeks on Sunday and when i went for my antenatal appointment on Monday the midwife told me i was measuring at 30 weeks so i'm either further on that they think or i'll be giving birth to a bloody big baby.  I'm totally over being pregnant now, i've put on around 10kg and i can feel it, i feel sluggish and tired and the heat doesn't help one little bit.  I want my slim figure back so i can fit into my clothes and make pretty new ones without having to make all these maternity alterations to them.  Oh well, i'm sure it'll all be over with sooner than i can blink and then i'll be complaining i have no time to do anything because i'll have a baby attached to my boobs.
Anyway, enough complaining and back to the Desira top.  I made the following alterations and made up this muslin from a sheet i bought at the op shop for $2.

I think it still needs some work and although i'm over making maternity clothes i do need to make a few more since i have only a few that actually fit and i still have 10 weeks(ish) of growing left to do, ugh.  So, how do i fix the gaping at the bust?  I didn't cut the neckband on the bias so i'm thinking it could be solved by doing this and making some sort of small gather on either side before attaching the band.  The snaps at the sides need to be moved higher up too and i may add a little extra fabric onto the sides of the front pieces.  Other than that i think i'd be pretty happy to wear it.  What do you think?  I have another white sheet to use and also a cute white and blue floral sheet to make a few of these from.  You can read my column on BurdaStyle.
I'll be back tomorrow with more pictures :)

Keeping busy

The past week has been spent chained to the sewing machine. Not in a bad way though, i've actually enjoyed it!  In this time i've made 4 ruffle skirts, 2 mini bride dresses, 2 aprons and 2 sets of pajamas.

More pictures later.
I've also half finished hand-quilting Esme's quilt whilst watching a few movies, Thank You for Smoking, Black Snake Moan and The Firm.  I enjoyed Black Snake Moan, i wasn't too impressed with Thank You for Smoking (found it quite boring) and The Firm was just full of footy violence, not really my cup of tea.
This weekend i'll be working on a muslin of Desira from BurdaStyle.  To make it fit i plan to make the following alterations:

extend the length and curve the front to accommodate for my bump lifting the hem and add extra width to the front pieces.  You can read my column here.

Trying hard to be as organised as possible

ARGHH!!  I'm trying to not get myself in a tizzy this Christmas.  I have so much going on and i'm trying hard to not lose it and crack up.  First of all there's Christmas, i have gifts to make for the girls which include dress up bride outfits, clothes, finish crocheting the teaset and a quilt for Esme.  Then i have Mixtape to organise, BurdaStyle columns to write and sew for and a house and family to look after!  There's more but that stuff can wait until after Christmas.  So, it's one step at a time for me, i'm making a list and putting them into order of priority and i'm going to take it easy and not pressure myself into getting it all done in the next fortnight.  I'm sure i'm not the only one who feels this way around this time of year.   The rest of my family live in the UK so we don't exchange presents and boy am i glad, can you imagine the state i'd be in if we did?!
I did manage to finish aprons last night for the girls.

I used the Layla pattern from BurdaStyle and reduced it's size.

I'm going to be writing up a list over the coming weeks of things i want to accomplish/achieve in 2008 which i will post here on my blog on the 1st of January.  I love New Year, it's full of new beginnings and promise.
Talking of making lists, have you seen this cool shopping list maker?  Shop Get What.  Such a simple yet useful concept and i most definitely will be using it when i do my next big shop.  Thanks to Yoshi and Melissa for setting it up!

What happened?

I was doing so well, posting all through November and beyond then nothing at all for six days!  Oh well, it seems i broke the habit, what's the saying?  21 days to form a habit, 3 to break it.
Anyway, i've been a busy bee this week as usual.  I figured out my overlocker finally.  I put the girls to bed and had some stern words with it, pulled everything apart, cleaned it, changed the thread and needles, fiddled about with the tension and it finally worked!  Just in time for me to sew up a few pairs of trousers from the BurdaStyle pattern 'Nichola'.  I actually made two pairs and another are in the WIP pile but they're all the same except for different fabrics.

They look nothing like the trousers in the pattern since i made some modifications.  I lowered the waistband at the front to fit under my bump, gave them an elasticated waistband and left off the zip and pockets.  This pair are SOOOOO comfortable but the other pair i made up are made of a stiffer fabric and the inner seams rubbed against my skin.  I may bind the seams with a soft fabric to see if that makes a difference.  You can read my column on BurdaStyle here.
I really needed to get these trousers made and now i need more tops, my bump has POPPED so much even more so since this picture was taken the other day.  I went around to Justine's tonight to have a marathon session of season three of 'Love my Way' with my bump hanging out of the bottom of my t-shirt, such class!

Ruffles

Thanks for your suggestions about tying the elastic when shirring.  I had actually sewn both seams before adding the shirring which means i did not enclose the elastic ends in the seam.  Next time i know to sew one seam, sew in the shirring THEN sew the other seam catching the ends. 
Once Esme saw that i was making a dress for her sister she wanted one of her own but instead of a dress i made her this cute little ruffle skirt!

I used this tutorial but changed the size of the pattern pieces since the tutorial is for a size 5-6 and Esme is a size 2 and instead of sewing the under skirt band to the top ruffle i sewed the two bands together making the skirt shorter.

I haven't attempted to use my overlocker today, i'm afraid of what i may do to it!  I've changed the needle and threads, rethreaded umpteen times and tried doing this in different orders, i've changed the tensions on all threads and still the lower loop thread snaps EVERY BLOODY TIME!  I may have another go tonight once the girls are safely tucked up in bed and can't hear my cursing :-\  Wish me luck!!

Shirring

I was forced to sew a new dress for Mia today, literally!  She stood beside me while i worked telling me i just MUST make her a dress so of course i obeyed. 

This is the the first time i've sewn a dress with shirring and i'm pretty pleased with how it turned out.  The only problem i have is fastening the elastic at the ends, one row has already come undone.  Is there some kind of trick?  Does anyone want to tell me what it is? 
She loves her new dress and spent ages spinning around in the garden in it.  Of course it MUST have a matching headband according to Mia.  I promised her one if she would let me wash and brush her hair, it's a daily fight to get this done.  She obliged so now i have to go make it.
Once i've figured out how to tie the elastic properly i'll be making more of these for both girls, they're so easy to make and look very cute!

On another note my overlocker is pi**ing me off big style!  One of the threads keeps on snapping and whatever i try i just can't fix it.  I think i have and start on my pattern pieces then it snaps again.  I've really felt like throwing it out the window today, you should have heard the language coming from my mouth! 

Paper bags

Look at what i did yesterday. 

I took my own recycled paper bags with me when i bought my dry goods instead of using their plastic bags.  And the majority of what is inside those bags is organic!  I'm trying to change a few things at a time.  Even better was that i carried them home in my green bag and we walked there and back, how's that for being eco friendly?  Most of what we bought are being turned into muesli bars so i can stop buying the nasty ones full of rubbish and wrapped in too much packaging.  I also bought a sack of flour, it cost me $20 for 10kg, does anyone have any idea where i could get it cheaper?  I'm thinking of asking my local bakery.

Wardrobe Refashion has been mentioned over on a new website-Living Creatively, you can see my interview here.  I'm yet to have a good look around but it looks great, sort of an Aussie version of Martha.

Organising my grocery shopping

We've decided to get organised with our grocery shopping.  Instead of doing a fortnightly shop and just buying whatever we're planning a fortnightly menu and are only going to be buying what we need for that menu.

I got the idea from Simple Savings where they are doing a once a month menu and Dinner Daily where Liesl does a weekly menu.  Since i shop fortnightly i'm going to be doing a fortnightly menu.  The menu above is for this week.  I usually shop on Friday's with my partner-in-craft so i have a menu ready to buy for which will cover us until our next shop.
You can see i haven't added lunch on the menu, mainly because we will have leftovers or sometimes having a big breakfast means we don't eat a big lunch, maybe just a sandwich and fruit.
I'm hoping that by doing this we will not waste so much food or eat so much packet convenience food ( not that we eat a lot of it anyway but the less we eat the better.  Instead of buying the muesli bars that Kev and the girls like to snack on i'm going to make some instead.  I'll also make some cake that can be sliced and frozen, lentil pate that can be spread on bread for lunch, fresh fruit icy pops and yogurt pops (with homemade yogurt), biccies and other homemade treats.  Who knows, we may even save some money, maybe.

Thanks for your compliments on my Christmas postcards :)