Friday Favorites

1. ice cream social dress, 2. petal pillow, 3. Hipstamatic album, 

4. snappy toddler top

I'm always bookmarking tons of tutorials and other goodies that I find through blogland, so I thought I'd turn my online dog-earing into a weekly (hopefully!) post to share with all of you. This week I've chosen some tutorials that are all on my to-make list.

My favorite is the Ice Cream Social Dress from Jess on Craftiness is Not Optional. Her tutorial seems amazingly simple and (cross your fingers!) I hope to try it out tonight!

I haven't really delved into home decor sewing as of yet, but I love the Petal Pillow tutorial from Cluck Cluck Sew. Again, another simple project that I could probably finish in an evening (I think that's one of my biggest criteria for taking on new sewing projects!). 

From Wendy over at Wendolonia there is the Quick Hipstamatic Album. Hipstamatic is an iPhone app that enables you to take old-school photos with your camera phone. I've heard about Hipstamatic a few times before and I think I'm definitely gonna have to get the app now (how could I not for $1.99?).

And another girly project on my list is the Snappy Toddler Top for Eleanor. This project seems a little more complex than the Ice Cream Social Dress, but Prudent Baby provides a free pattern and I think I might just be up for the challenge!

How about you? What's on your to-make list?

Pipe Cleaner Glasses

As crafty as I may be, I'm not always the best at coming up with crafty activities for the kids. Well today I had some success with these pipe cleaner glasses! Liam spotted my stash in the laundry closet and immediately wanted them down. 

Normally I spend the morning catching up on laundry and dishes and then if there's any more time before lunch I try to get a bit of sewing while the kids play. Today I was good and took some time to get creative with the kids instead. Here are some photos of them sporting my creations (sorry I only have a blurry one of Liam): 

What are your favorite kids crafts?

Family Beach Trip

We decided to take an overnight trip with the kids down to North Padre and Corpus Christi this past weekend. Although it's not officially summer yet it was a perfect time to go--it wasn't too hot (or crowded) and I still have a couple months before the new baby arrives. The kids had never been to the beach and we all had a great time (despite some minor sunburn and the craziness of doing it all in less than two days).

We had debated buying some sort of canopy or umbrella before we went but decided to wing it and made sure to bring hats and sunscreen. We did bring way more food than we needed--you don't end up eating as much as you think with all the sand, but the bucket and shovel sets I bought for each of the kids came in handy. The boys tromped around like pros in and out of the water, but Eleanor freaked out as soon as her feet touched the sand.

I did eventually convince her to go shell picking with me, but she shouted no at the water any time the waves came near her. 

Overall, we spent about four hours on the beach Saturday afternoon and then cleaned up for dinner at Doc's under the bridge between Corpus and Padre Island.

The main sitting area is surrounded by water and it has a great view at sunset. The food is also really good. I tried the parmesan herb crusted flounder, and no, I did not manage to eat it all (Chris helped me out a bit). 

The kids slept surprisingly well (we haven't always had success sleeping away from home with them)--especially Eleanor--she's been in a bit of weird sleeping phase lately. After a well-rounded breakfast of cereal, poptarts, and fruit, (the hotel didn't have a free breakfast), we packed up and walked out for one last look at the water before heading off to the Texas State Aquarium. The admission ended up being a bit more than I had thought, but luckily we got a discount by showing our San Antonio zoo membership. 

We arrived just in time for the dolphin training and then headed down to the underwater viewing room; it was pretty cool seeing the dolphins close up. 

The aquarium had a great layout with both indoor and outdoor exhibits, including an Amazon section. My favorite animal had to be the tiny little seahorses--I used to love seahorses as a little girl and couldn't believe such small ones existed!

We finished our visit off at nice little park-like area right on the coast outside. They had some shaded benches and these cool blue viewing telescopes (although the one we tried didn't work). Off in the distance you could see the USS Lexington.

We picked up some lunch along the way and were on the road and back home around three. The kids and I slept most of the way home (thank you for driving honey), but we were all still pretty pooped from an eventful two days. It'll definitely be a trip worth taking again though--after the new baby's a little older of course!

Birthday Goodies

I wanted to include some pics of some of the gifts I received this weekend in my last post, but didn't want to make it too long.

I received this awesome set of framed letterpress blocks from my hubby as a surprise. Well, it was a surprise that he bought it, but I actually accidentally found it a couple days early. I was looking in the garage for an old onion sack I saved (I'll be posting on that project soon) and my gift happened to be right underneath--I promise I had no idea he was hiding anything for me! Anyway, he saw the onion sack with my crafting stuff and asked if I'd seen anything with it. I broke the news and we both had a laugh--it did get him off the hook as far as wrapping it up though. It's now hanging above the fireplace in our sitting room--my favorite place to read at the end of the day. 

On the craftier side, my in-laws sent me a bundle of this cute fabric and thread--I think I can come up with some sweet little girl things to make with the fabric and I always need a variety of different colored thread--it was a nice surprise in the mail last week!

They also sent me a copy of A Rainbow of Stitches which I blogged about not too long ago, and Alabama Studio Style. I'd heard of this book before, but hadn't had the chance to look through it. After flipping through a few of the projects I realized that everything in the book is sewn with cotton jersey (i.e. t-shirt) fabric and I love it! I love making things out of old t-shirts but this book brings sewing with cotton jersey to a whole new level. 

 

The garments in this book are more couture than anything I've ever done and I'm thoroughly intimidated, but I know that I have to try making one of these dresses sometime (post-pregnancy-body of course). My favorite is this hand-inked and quilted camisole dress--it's so intricate!

My parents also gave me some spending money (yay!) which I took with me to Saturday's craft show. I also used some of it to by this colorful twill I plan on making into some floor cushions for the kids. Living With Punks has an awesome tutorial that I'm going to try out for these. I'm also gonna try using up some of my giant stash of fabric scraps instead of fiberfil  so we'll see how they turn out!

Birthday Weekend

This past weekend we celebrated my 26th birthday--I'd been hinting to my hubby that I wanted to do something different for my bday, so when I found out about the Renegade Craft Fair up in Austin, it seemed like the perfect excursion. My parents were generous enough to watch all the kids for us and we headed out around 10am Saturday morning.

 photo by mirsasha

We arrived in Austin right at lunch and decided it would be best to eat before walking around a 200+ vendors craft show. We found Freddie's Place nearby and I tried out their yummy crispy chicken chipotle-tortilla wrap (with jalapeno honey-mustard!)--it wasn't as spicy as it might sound. Although we opted for sitting inside, it looked like they had a pretty awesome kid-friendly patio with a playground and all. I wish San Antonio had more non-fast-food kid-friendly places to eat like this.

After lunch we headed out for some craft-show fun. We perused the aisles of vendors for about two hours and although I was thoroughly pooped by the end, I soaked up some major inspiration and even bought myself a couple of goodies. I don't think Chris was completely bored, either (I did point out a group of guys who seemed to be visiting a craft show of their own free will).

One of my favorite booths featured hoop-framed embroidered art by Moxie doll. I loved her Paper Doll Pose embroidery for the girls' room, but didn't want to spend quite that much when I could make my own version for far less. I'm sure we've all either heard or said that when it comes to buying handmade--but I actually make things (and embroider) so I think I might be a little more likely to do so (eventually).

 

Another one of my favorite things about the show was the free photo booth they had. Chris and I had fun picking out props and getting silly for the camera. 

I splurged and bought myself a fat quarter bundle from Austin's Stitch Lab ($12 is a splurge for me when I'm usually working from scraps and upcycled materials). Stitch Lab was doing a bunch of free demos, but I was ready to get going by the time we reached their tables. 

I also bought this reversible headband (I'm forgetting the vendor!) which after bringing it home I'm not sure I'll actually wear. I love the design, but it was so hard picking out a pattern! Oh well, if anything I may tweak it and make more of my own. 

We almost bought some prints for our living room from the illustrator Lisa Chow. She had a series of buildings and butterfly prints we were debating between. I had a hard time visualizing exactly how they'd look at home, so I decided it would probably be best for us to think about it and order them online when we had made our final decision.

 

Once we were done at the show, we had about an hour left before we had to leave back for S.A. and couldn't help but stop by the Goodwill that was nearby. Among our finds were a bag full of old buttons and India-inspired tin for more crafty storage. Thrift-store shopping always makes for a great day!

Back in S.A. we took the kiddos out to eat at Rosario's with my parents. The kids were really good (we've started bringing our own crayons and coloring paper--plus the chips and salsa kept them occupied). We had some more yummy food and even some dessert--the kids all shared some chocolate flan and loved it. Overall it was a perfect day--my hubby was very sweet and accommodating to my every whim (I'm sure that wasn't the easiest honey!) not that I'm that demanding anyway :) . Can't wait to see what another year has in store!

Renegade Craft Fair This Weekend

This Saturday is my b-day and it also happens to be the first-ever Renegade Craft Fair in Austin! Chris and I were trying to think up somethin' special to do, and it looks like we have a willing babysitter (thanks mom!). So if all goes as planned, that's where I'll be this Saturday! (Knock on wood.) It's free and they have kid-friendly activities if you want to make it a family trip!

Liam's Quilt

So I finally finished Liam's baby clothes quilt in the last few minutes of Mother's day this week. It's been a long time coming, too--I started at least a year ago! Not that I've been working on it every day since, but there were a lot of tedious steps with how I designed this particular quilt. I didn't really map it out before I started; I just kind of made it up as I went along--also contributing to how long it took! 

I started off with a bag of his old clothes that I cut up into various sized pieces, and since most of it was knit fabric I had to attach interfacing to the back of each strip so I could sew without them stretching.  I had originally envisioned the entire quilt made up of clothes squares, but when it came down to wanting to finally finish the thing I knew it just wasn't going to happen!

I also quilted the individual squares straight to the batting as I made them (a method inspired by the book Patchwork Style) which definitely gave me the feeling of getting it done faster--I escaped having to machine-quilt a giant blanket by tying the top and bottom together--but you can see the ridges on the back of where all the squares are sewn together. I do like the blue, green, and red for the border I was able to find, and I'm very pleased with how my first full-size quilt came out!

And with Liam's love for snails, I had  to add a little embroidery to the back!

Quilt top closeup

Liam is head over heels for his new quilt!

Flea Market Finds

 

We took a family trip out to Bussey's Flea Market on Saturday in search of some old-time goodies for our home. We have a handful of different things we're looking for and we love the junk-market/vintage style. I wasn't sure how fruitful our trip would be since we'd never been to this market before--sometimes it ends up being just a bunch of resold dollar-store stuff. There was a fair share of made-in-China goods around, but there was lots more to see as well. 

 

One of our favorite stalls had a mix of old and new metal garden figures, windows, etc. 

Skyler was trying to show Liam some sort of bug he found.

This was another 2-room stall with tons of stuff we would have loved to take home with us. 

Like this steepled birdhouse.

Or this ride-on fire truck. I have no idea how much it was, but I'm sure it must have been a pretty penny!

I also spotted some vintage-y linens. I'm not sure if they were old or not, but they looked pretty in the breeze.

Overall the kids were pretty good. We got there about mid-morning while it was still breezey and overcast--it definitely wouldn't have been as enjoyable on a warmer day. Eleanor hung out in her stroller and was thankfully very patient. We did make sure to bring snacks and head home before lunchtime.

And the boys pestered us constantly for every toy in sight, but found distractions from time to time (like posing in front of the Bussey's armadillo). 

We came home with some good finds, like this garden case for $40. We've been wanting to redo one of our bathrooms so this will be getting a new paint job and going inside. 

We bought this set of galvanized tubs for $13.

And I found this vintage suitcase for a mere $3! I love storing my sewing supplies in old suitcases. My sewing station is in the family room and suitcases look much better than plastic tubs.

Lastly, we did come across a Thomas the Train duplos set to add to the boys' collection for $3. They grumbled that it wasn't the toy they wanted to get, but by the time we got home they were dying to play with it. 

We had a great morning and will probably find ourselves out there again on another cool day (maybe this time without the kids).