Teetering tower of quilts ready for market

This is just a selection of the quilts I'll have on hand at tomorrow's Midwinter Arts Bazaar. In addition to these gorgeous quilts, I'll have baby dresses, sleep sacks, stuffed bunnies, greeting cards, notepads, wrist cuffs, patchwork coasters, tote bags, tooth fairy bags, upcycled pouches, brooches, hair accessories, and more. Phew! I hope it all fits on the table.

Stop in and say hello to me and my crafty friends: Tinker and Little Minx!

Northern Artery Midwinter Arts Bazaar
St. Martins Hall, Northumberland, North East Valley
Saturday, June 29
11 am - 4 pm

Eftpos won't be available on site, so be sure to talk to me about alternate payment arrangements if you've got your eye on one of my quilts. Always a good idea to bring plenty of cash to a craft market. Just sayin'.

A little housekeeping

Sorry to pause all the crafty awesomeness with a boring old administrative post, but there are a few things you really ought to be made aware of.

First off...did you know that Google Reader is going bye-bye on July 1? Yup. It's true. If that's how you tend to follow along with Milkybeer Handmade blog, please take some time to switch your allegiance to some other reader before it's too late! To make it easier, I added a Bloglovin' block a few weeks back over there in the sidebar. Bloglovin' is just one of dozens of options available to replace Google Reader, but it does seem to be a popular one around the craft blog scene. Go on...click the button...all the cool kids are doing it.

Secondly, I'd like to remind you of my other social media homes: Facebook and Pinterest. Lots of great stuff happening on both those sites. I try to keep things interesting and not simply post the same things you find on the blog, so it's worth following along there too. Don't be afraid to comment on anything you see here on the blog, on Facebook or over on Pinterest. I LOVE hearing from readers.

And finally...the shop...remember my shop? Sigh. It's been so long since it was last open. No firm date in mind just yet, but I do promise to clear away the cobwebs and freshen up the inventory for a grand re-opening sometime in July. Yippee!

As a reward for getting through all that administrative boringness, here's a picture of Abner dressed as a chef and stuck in a box. TDSH and I are so proud.

Paper Patchwork Wall Art

That big blank wall above our bed was in desperate need of some art. As a quilter, I do love the look of patchwork, but I don't always love seeing quilts hung on the wall...a little too homespun for my liking. Solution: a paper quilt (of sorts).

Here's what I love about this project:

• it's cheap. Total cost was about $20.
• It's renter friendly. Just pop the papers off the wall when it's time to move on. No damage to the wall and you can even stick it up at your next place if you're careful.
• No worries about a big piece of art falling off the wall and crushing your head during an earthquake (yes...I really do think of things like that).

Here's what I used to make this project. I'm not sure Magic Dots were the way to go. I love how they let the paper lay flat against the wall, but they are not sticking so well in our damp weather. Good thing they come 700 to a pack!

Happy crafting!

Colourful hair comb loveliness

This little hair comb project was quite literally one of the very first things I ever pinned on Pinterest. So thrilled was I to find a project that used up all the leftover embroidery floss from the hand-stitching on my quilts. About three years and 1000 pins later, I finally got around to making a few. Lovely aren't they?

My favourite part is picking the colour combos. A little gold, blue, green and brown...

and some grey, green, lilac and blue. The options are endless!

It's been a great project to keep my hands busy as TDSH and I watch videos on YouTube each night. I do have several quilts on the go which I could/should be working on, but sometimes I just need to change gears every once in a while and try my hand at other crafts.

The original DIY tutorial can be found over on the Lemon Jitters blog if you want to make your own. That girl has heaps of awesome crafty ideas!

Op Shop Fabric Finds

Since the first day we arrived, people have been telling me about Dunedin's legendary Op Shop Fabric Sale. Imagine it, table upon table of fabrics, notions, buttons (a whole room full), patterns and whatnot at rock bottom prices. I had to join the masses and check it out. My mission was to have a project in mind for each bit of fabric I bought rather than just, "Oh, look! That's pretty!" I must say I didn't do too badly. Of the eight bundles of fabric that came home with me, I have projects in mind for six of them:

Pretty blue pyjamas for Abner...

Some retro-inspired seat cushions for the kitchen chairs...

A nice comfy stripy dress and maybe a pair of pants or skirt for Abner...

A manly hot water bottle cozy for The Dear Sweet Husband...

...and the impulse buys.

What on earth should I make with those last two? Some dresses for Abner, perhaps? A skirt or two for myself? Got any ideas for me?

Fun new toy: Palette builder

I have yet to figure out exactly how this fun new toy will be of use to my life, but, honestly, how cool is the palette builder tool from Play Crafts?

Simply upload a picture, click a button and almost instantly, you have a selection of colours pulled out to match the image. Not enough colours? Click another button to add a few more. Not happy with the pixels being sampled for the palette? Just click your mouse and move them to a more pleasing colour.

I suppose it might be really handy if you were looking to make a quilt to match a picture. Just use the tool, print out the palette and take it along to the fabric store with you. Or, combine the palette builder with the Quilt Assistant from Cosman to make your picture into an actual quilt. Yeah, Quilt Assistant is another online tool I stumbled upon recently (when I should have been applying for jobs, ahem). Download the program, upload your picture and BAM...you've got yourself a block designed on your image. You just have to print out the templates and get cutting. How awesome is that?!

Alas, I am not into paper piecing (yet) and I have no need to match my fabrics to my artwork, so the palette builder will remain just a fun little toy for me for now. I've been wasting plenty of time playing around with some of my favourite pictures from the past while. Here are a couple of my faves:

Colourful twig art

I realized the other day that the pictures I posted of our lounge a couple of weeks ago were taken before I created my favourite piece of art for that room: colourful string wrapped twigs!

I originally saw the idea on Pinterest (just a pic, not a tute) and actually sat down to make these one night (bringing my pin:project ratio up to 200:1. Because my twigs are so large, they are a PAIN to photograph. Normally they reside up on the mantle and arch their way across the wall. I moved them down to the hearth so you could see them a little better against the white bricks.

Here they are in their normal spot. Lovely aren't they? I love how the bendy willow branches form a natural arch over the artwork.

The process is extremely easy if you want to make your own. Just go forage out in nature for some suitable twigs (any size will do). Use leftover bits of embroidery floss and just start winding. I tied off each end so there are wee little knots in spots, but it doesn't ruin the overall effect at all.

To display the finished twigs, I got The Dear Sweet Husband to hold them in position in one of my painted mason jars (my most popular pin on Pinterest by the way!) and carefully dropped small stones into the jar to hold the twigs in place. The heavy base also means they won't tip over as easily.

We still have that big blank white wall in the lounge...anyone got any DIY art suggestions for me?

Fashion re-make and re-do

This here, is my favourite of all of Abner's tops. It looks so cute paired with a long sleeve t-shirt and a pair of jeans. It reminds me of the kid's clothes you see in Japanese sewing books (which I am still obsessed with, by the way). This was purchased from H&M a while back now for something like $8. The trouble is, kids grow. This one will have to be passed on soon enough, but I thought I might try to make my own version - slightly larger - before it goes out the door.

Voila! It's really hard to see because of the print, but trust me, it looks great!

I placed the original on top of some craft paper and sketched out each piece of the pattern adding a little bit here and there to scale it up a size or two. I even lined the top part (yolk? Can you tell I don't do a lot of garment sewing?!) and added a wee bit of extra fabric as trim around the neck line. All of the seams are encased in French seams or with bias tape (made of the same fabric).

It's a little roomy for now, but should be just right by the time Abner actually does outgrow the original. I could always tack up the bottom hem if it bothered me that much, but so far, no complaints from Abner.

Now that I have the pattern pieces done, there's nothing stopping me from making up more of these. I even have a lovely Liberty-esque print picked out for the next one! Honestly, whatever did I do with my time before I started sewing?!

June weekend

Our weekend was filled with walks by the ocean and a trip to the art gallery [forget the art, Abner loves to watch the film archives]. Not a bad way to spend a couple of days together as a family. What were you up to?

Scrap busting: hair accessories

The scrap busting never ends around here. My go-to project for the smallest of my scraps is fabric covered button hair elastics. I originally got the idea from the Flax and Twine blog, but there are lots of people making similar items. These were the last of my button sets from Canada. I'm a little bummed out to see that similar products here in NZ are WAY more expensive (what else is new!)

The hair bows are a new one for me. I found the free pattern on the Oliver + S blog and have whipped up several for Abner lately. I have yet to sew a single Oliver + S pattern that I didn't like. Liesl is so good at what she does! The best thing about these hair bows is that each one takes less than five minutes!

What's your favourite speedy fast sewing project?

My new favourite quilt

Love those colours. Love those triangles. Love this quilt top.

If you're going to learn any patchwork skills, making half-square triangles is definitely one you'll want to master. They're not hard, and are oh, so versatile. There are heaps of tutorials out there, so give it a go. A good one to start with is this one by Lindsey Sews over on the Sew, Mama, Sew blog. It teaches you how to make eight at a time!

The sketchy, solids are called Painter's Canvas by Laura Gunn and were purchased at The Stitching Post in Arrowtown way back at Easter. The lovely print is called Bazaar Style by Pat Bravo and was purchased separately here in town from at Needle 'N Thread. That they all go so nicely together was just a happy accident.

Fingers crossed that I can get my hands on more of that lovely print for the back!

Finger knitting

What's a crafty mama to do when she finds her child home from school with no activities planned (Like I did during last week's snow day)?! Teach your kid to finger knit, of course!

We found this great tutorial over at Lines Across and it had Abner busy for at least an hour. I'd never done finger knitting myself, but the tutorial was really easy to follow. Nothing like learning a new skills about 30 seconds before teaching it to your kid.

Of course, she also played in the snow plenty. Our backyard had its own little snowman family by the end of the day. Such fun but I'm sure glad the snow didn't stick around!

Children at Play improv quilt blocks

Dear reader, these blocks are the result of several hours of playing. No rules. No design in mind. Just a heap of fabric and a rotary cutter in hand.

The jumping off point for these blocks is the Children at Play fabric by Sarah Jane. I am in love with Sarah's illustrations and colour combos. She has lots of other drool-worthy goodies over in her shop. Do check it out! But I digress...as I was saying, with a jumping off fabric to start, I picked through my stash and found a surprisingly large selection of fabrics that seemed to go well. Then, I just started cutting...and cutting...and cutting. One block at a time, working my way toward a fun little quilt for some lucky baby.

It's been a great exercise in trying a few things that I'd only read about and never tried, like my first string block (third picture down, top right). Working quickly on what is essentially a different project with each block has also highlighted a few problems with my sewing (and my machine). Turns out, I am a puller and my machine feeds through the top and bottom fabric at different rates. This means I get stretched out or bunchy seams if I'm not careful. A good thing to know! My solution is to become very good friends with my pins. Use the pins. Stab the pins. Love the pins.

My question to you, dear reader: to sash, or not to sash*? I still have a few more blocks to sew up, so have a think on it, and do let me know what you think I should do. As is, the blocks will finish at 12" so it'll be a decent sized baby quilt even without any sashing.

*For those of you not in the know, sashing is the strips of fabric that go around a quilt block essentially creating a frame for each block.