Leggings Giveaway

 

Updated to add: The winner is Lindsay!

*****

It's Giveaway Day! Many thanks to Sew, Mama, Sew for hosting this fun biannual event.

The prize: Girl leggings size 3-4 years. They are 100% cotton jersey, red and white striped leggings, very festive for this holiday season. I sewed these for my daughter, but they don't fit her, so my loss is your gain.

Enter to win:

• Please leave an answer to the following question: Who will wear the leggings/who will you give them to?
• One entry per person
• I will ship internationally.
• I will pick the winner.
• The giveaway will be open until December 13 at 5 p.m. PST, I will pick a winner and email the winner by December 15, and I will ship the item by December 20.

St Nicholas Day 2013

Happy Saint Nicholas day from our home to yours!

This year there were little white Christmas lights... bringing light to our dark winter days and nights.

St Nicholas day from previous years:

• 2012 
• 2011 
• 2010
• 2009

Please share links to your St Nicholas day photos in the comments, I would love to see, thanks!

PS It is -9 degrees Fahrenheit outside today and we have about 4 inches of snow. What is the temperature where you are right now and how much snow do you have?

The 12 Days of Christmas Guest Post

 Today I am visiting Suz of Sewpony for The 12 Days of Christmas series. I invite you to come on over to see what I sewed for my daughter's Christmas outfit for this year. And be sure to check out all the posts December 1 - 12 (I highly recommend seeing what Sewpony, craftstorming and Sewing Like Mad have already made, you won't be disappointed).

Book Report Dress

 With church choir dress code being white top, black bottom, I have been looking for dress patterns that can easily be color blocked... the Book Report Dress came to the rescue!

 The white wool felt bow and the black fabric-covered headband that I made matched this outfit perfectly.

 The hidden on-seam front pockets are my favorite detail on this dress.

 Project details
Pattern: Oliver + S Book Report Dress (difficulty level: 2 out of 4 scissors)
Size: 5
Modifications: I added one inch in length to the bodice and one inch in length to the skirt
Fabric: fine wale corduroy (got the idea to use light weight corduroy from Cindy at Siestas and Sewing) I've worked with stretchy corduroy before when I sewed up a pair of Oliver + S Art Museum Trousers. I got frustrated with how the paper pattern pieces kept sliding on top of the corduroy with I was trying to cut them out. This time around I traced pattern pieces onto freezer paper and ironed them onto the back of the corduroy. Much better results!
Notions: 6 white and black cat buttons (made in France) because someone around here likes kitty cats >^..^<

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!

Weaving Rubber Band Bracelets

 The Rainbow Loom bracelet making craze has hit our home. At church the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd graders are making woven rubber band bracelets for a couple of weeks to donate them to a local charity.

This Let's go fly a kite's flickr photo caught my eye and it lead me to the Lil' Loom.

All that is needed to make a Lil' Loom is a wine cork and 2 push pins.

 Poke the 2 push pins next to each other into one side of the cork.

 I purchased these little Color Loops Weave Kits (which includes a little plastic crochet hook) for $1 each at a dollar store. A package of 300 rubber bands with some clips was $2 at a beauty store. And I picked up a stackable 7-day organizer for $5 at a drug store.

 We found that glass baby food jars make great storage containers for the different colors of rubber bands.

 We made an 'on the go' version for traveling on the school bus, in the car, because weaving rubber band bracelets can be done anywhere. The clear 'c' clips are stored in the clear compartment and the colored rubber bands are stored in the matching colored compartment, then we took larger rubber bands to wrap the Lil' Loom and mini plastic crochet hook around the stackable organizer.

After watching a video on YouTube, creating a fishtail rubber band bracelet is really quick and easy.
Happy rubber band bracelet making!

Homemade Christmas Crèche

 A project that 1st graders do at our church is work together as a family and create a simple Christmas Crèche (crèche is the French word for cradle). To keep with the simplicity of the story of the birth of Jesus, families are encouraged to use simple materials, for example, items that can be easily found around the house. Ours is all done and ready to go to church to be blessed with holy water by our priest.

We made Mary, Joseph, Jesus, an angel, 3 wise men, 2 shepherds, 1 gray donkey, and 1 white sheep.

Our inspiration came from:

• painted cork people with wood bead heads from KJ from let's go fly a kite who linked to this one
• wood peg and wool felt nativity set

 Supplies:

• wine corks (for bodies)
• wood beads (for heads)
• wool felt (for clothing, angel wings, donkey fur, star of Bethlehem)
• wool roving (for angel hair, wise men beards, sheep wool)
• nails (1.5 inches in length, used to attach the wood bead to the cork)
• craft gems (for the gold, frankincense and myrrh)
• pipe cleaners (for angel's halo, wise men's crowns, shepherd's staves, and to hold up the star of Bethlehem)
• permanent markers (to add faces to wood beads)
• toothpicks (for the legs on the donkey)
• scraps of beige yarn (leftovers from a knitted sweater and bunny, for the hay in the manger)
• cardboard tube (for manger)
• cardboard box (packaging from a doll my daughter got, for the stable)
• cardboard circle from a frozen pizza (for the base)
• hot glue gun

 A very quick explanation on how to make one of the figures… cut out a piece of wool felt to wrap all of the way around a cork, attach it to a cork with a hot glue gun. To attach the wood bead to the cork, put a nail through a wood bead and push the nail into a cork. Baby Jesus was half of a cork and for the animals the wood bead and nail were put into the side of the cork. All of the figures stay in place thanks to the hot glue gun, so nothing will move or tip over.

 The only thing I bought were the wood beads which were a couple of dollars. Otherwise everything else came from around the house, from our stash of craft supplies, items that could be found in a recycling bin, etc.

 All of the 1st grade nativity scenes will decorate the tables as centerpieces in our church's community room during Advent. After that ours will come back home to stay.

Happy 790th anniversary of the Christmas crèche! It was 790 years ago when St Francis of Assisi staged the first nativity scene back in 1223.

Red Riding Hood Doll

  I had been wanting to make this doll for months, so it feels good to have finally made it.

The pattern and instructions came from the book We Make Dolls! Top Dollmakers Share Their Secrets & Patterns by Jenny Doh. It's called Red Riding Hood and was designed by Suse Bauer.

It was so nice that all of the supplies (fabric, felt, button, embroidery floss, stuffing) were basic, you know, what most crafty people already have on hand, so all of these came from my stash and no need for a trip to the craft/fabric store.

One thing I really liked about this craft book is that the pattern didn't need to be enlarged so I didn't have to make a trip to the copy machine.

This doll turns out kind of long, 18 inches!

Red Riding Hood is a little gift for a little person :)

Off to my next project...