Friday, September 27, 2013

A Fairy Princess...Elephant edition

So I fell in love with a pattern from Shiny Happy World recently posted...I am mostly a quilter but Wendi makes it sound do-able so I figured a fleece softie for my niece for Christmas was in order...

This was the trial one...
 Oh, mister elephant...I love you...but my 3 year old princess loving niece may not as she prefers PINK!!

So I made another in pink fleece!  Here are the two together...had to move mister's ear so you could see hand-holding...
 And here is Miss Pink twirling in her fairy princess tutu in the grass...I used this pattern for the tutu but, ahem...enlarged it and, um... shortened it for Miss Pink's more ample but short posterior...who says elephants can't be fairy princesses?
Now, here's my dilemma...after visiting said niece this last weekend...I have discovered that she is currently a large fan of a certain Disney princess mermaid...can you imagine this pachyderm with a finned tail? no?  me either...hopefully she will appreciate Miss Pink sans mermaid tail!

I highly recommend the patterns on the Shiny Happy World site, Wendi makes it very clear and easy to make a great softie...even for a novice at such things like me!  I had a lot of fun with this one!

Friday, September 20, 2013

When a Good Strawberry Goes Bad....

So I joined another Flickr swap Strawberry Pincushion Swap and of course, wanted to take a trial run of the Strawberry thing, having never made one...I used the tutorials Erin suggested.  All went well, and I decided to make one that was "unripe" in texty fashion...I used a bit of my new fabric purchased from Hawthorne Threads...Tim Holtz Eclectic Elements...
And the strawberry went together well...it's about 2 inches long.
And I did a bit of embroidery on the wool felt top...
 And then my 40ish eyes READ the strawberry...
Ahem....does my strawberry say disembowel?  Never thought I'd write that on the blog...

I'm planning to make another more appropriate strawberry for the swap, lol!

Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Pin it Pin Cushion Blog Hop - My Day

So today is my day to share a pin cushion in the most recent awesome Blog Hop by Madam Samm and her lovely cheerleader extraordinaire Kristen.  Much thanks to them both for letting me play along today!

Between family activities and an unpleasant summer cold a lot less sewing has been happening around here lately but I found my inspiration for my pincushion from the garden and my favorite fabrics...

 My pincushion is 3 inches by 4 inches.  It is filled with ground walnut shells and uses a 1" x 2" wool applique sunflower from a Primitive Gatherings pattern called Little Buds. The full pattern is on my "to-do" list for this winter as I purchased this kit from the Grand Rapids Quilt Show a couple weeks ago...but I couldn't resist pulling out the sunflower for this quickie-now project!!
 I stitched around the flower with 40 weight Aurifil thread since the flower was so teeny-weeny...
 And used a Robert Kaufman Quilter's Linen around the edges...
 The text print is my all-time favorite from Moda's Sweetwater line Mama Said Sew...
 And the back is Flea Market Fancy Grey Seeds.
This little pincushion fits well in my hand and happens to match my Tammy Bag ...


Thanks for stopping by and please be sure to visit the following who share my day today...
 

Tuesday, September 10, 2013

Pear Butter and Pinnies

 Today found me canning again, not something I enjoy in 95 degree heat but our small harvest of pears was ready and I managed to get 3 and a half pints of pear butter.  This is a fave around here and it was special to use our own homegrown pears this year, even though there weren't many pears...
This is a pin cushion that some of you saw earlier in this post.  I did tiny embroidery which was great fun and I am itching to use these motifs again soon...but my day for the Pin It Blog Hop is tomorrow and I have another tiny motif pin cushion to show...come back and join us tomorrow!



September 10
Meadowbrook

Wednesday, September 4, 2013

Nothing any cuter than...

Chicken Babies!!!

 I went to pick these up today...we used to get our little ones in the Spring but decided Fall is easier since we've been hit with loss of power and snowfall when they arrived at least two separate occasions.  I think we will be safe from snow for awhile yet...