Someday I have to do this with my kid :)

A cute video I found on the net...

Get with the times!

So a few days ago while Harry and I were out for a walk, I came upon some chalk drawings on the sidewalk.  Not what you'd expect to see children drawing on the sidewalk...it wasn't hopscotch, it wasn't people or flowers or animals or anything of that sort...it was...

technology!

Is it funny or scary? A little of both maybe? lol

Just a little chit chat.

I finally finished off the last crochet project I was working on and have only one work in progress craft...the felt name banner for Harry, which I still haven't finished it off.  I'm itching to craft, to sew and crochet and see what wonderful little things I can make.  But.

I feel like I'm failing.  Not at crafting.  At everything I guess.  My house is a disaster.  I don't want to start crafting while it's in the state it is, because that will just add more mess.  Being a mom is definitely keeping me on my toes, and Harry's not even crawling yet...once that boy starts getting more mobile I'll really be in for it! 

His morning naps are usually short, if they happen at all, lately.  He's such a busy little guy that between feeding him, entertaining him, and trying to get him to nap, it seems all I usually have time for are those little essentials...washing bottles, making forumla, throwing in some laundry here and there.  But it feels like nothing else gets done. 

After lunch if the weather is nice we usually go for a walk for an hour or so.  It seems like a lot of days I spend the rest of the afternoon trying to get him to nap.  No matter how tired he may be, he just fights sleep!  I've tried putting him in the crib and letting him cry himself to sleep, waiting a few minutes before going in, then a few minutes more...but all that did was make him more upset and lose a little trust in me.  So I rock him, I sing to him, I try to play him out, and eventually he nods off.  If I'm tired, sometimes I'll lay down and sleep with him, and other times I'll just keep him on my lap and do some reading or surfing.  There lays my first problem, I guess...I need to put him down so I can do other things.  The problem with that, however, is that he's more likely to have a short nap, then wake up and be grumpy all afternoon, if I've put him down.  If I've held him, he's more likely to have a long solid nap and be a happier little camper. 

After his supper, playtime with daddy, and his bath, off my boys go for bedtime, while I get back to whatever baby chores remain for the night.  By the time I'm done, I don't want to do anything else, especially cleaning.  I just want to sit and surf, or do crossword puzzles, or work on editing my large stash of photos.  And that's usually what I do.  And so the cleaning never gets done.  Poor daddy has been coming home from work late for weeks, so by the time it's baby's bedtime, he's ready to sleep too.  So I sit in my disarray, feeling like a failure because I can't do it all by myself, but unwilling to accept help because I don't want anyone else to see my disorganization.  And so ends another night.

More craftiness!

I have recently fallen in love with felt.  I love making little hand-stitched projects with it.  Alas I have been unable to find real wool felt locally, and have yet to buy any online, so these again are made with the eco-felt I have a large stash of.  I got the idea from Made by Rae and have been wanting to make these for my nieces and my son for ages!  Originally they were going to be for Christmas, but I didn't even get to the point of taking the felt out of the bag I brought it home in.  Then they were going to be Valentine's gifts, but again, ran out of time.  This time they were going to be for Easter, and I got 3 of them done!  Yay!  I decided I wanted to add embellishment, so they took a lot longer. 

Check out Rae's tutorial by clicking the link above, or read on for a quick rundown on how I made mine.

To make them I selected a font I liked, in a size I wanted (I made them big enough so that I could fit 2 letters on 1 page horizontally...I ended up using Cooper Std with the font size at 505, and in an outline style), printed them and cut out the letters, then traced them onto the felt with one of those disappearing fabric markers, then snip snip snip, cut out 2 of each letter.

After I cut out the letters, I sat down (at my parents', so someone else could keep an eye on Harry while I worked on them), made up the embellishments, cut them out and stitched them on with embroidery thread.  Then I spent a few nights sewing and stuffing the letters, then stringing them up on fishing line.  I used a blanket stitch to sew them together and matching thread.  I have Harry's done to the point of the sewing and stuffing, which I will hopefully get to soon.

I love the way they turned out, and everyone was very impressed when the girls opened them as part of their Easter treats.  As I was halfway through, I had a thought that would be quite a time-saver...rather than stuffing them, they'd look just as cute slapped onto a nice board and hung on the wall...I suppose I'll debate which way to finish Harry's now!

Sew, have you done any crafting lately?

I've been wanting to do a little catching up here for a while, but either haven't had time, or haven't been sure which of the many thoughts swirling through my brain to single out for a post!  So here's a quick one while I have a few minutes to catch up on some crafting I've been up to that are non-crochet related.

For my dad's birthday I made some glass marble magnets.  You can do a google search and find a whole lot of tutorials on how to make these, so I won't go into any detail about mine.  The only problem I had was in finding the flat marbles in the size I wanted, with a clear finish.  These have an iridescant finish to them, which can interfere with seeing the image clearly.  If I'd have had enough time to wait, I could have ordered some online I'm sure, but I had to go with what I could find locally.  (We have a serious lack of craft stores here...other than Michael's, all we have are the craft departments in Walmart, Zellers and dollar stores...boo!!)  I think these still worked out pretty well.  I made 6 in total, with pictures of the 4 grandkids plus 2 extras I made using clipart.

Since Harry came along I've found myself wanting to craft more, and oddly I'm getting the itch to sew rather than crochet.  Maybe because sewing is faster than crocheting...although the things that have caught my eye in my weekly craft-website perusals have actually involved some hand stitching rather than machine stitching.  Which is ok, because I don't really have room to pull out my sewing machine right now!  I made this little owl out of felt a couple of months ago, thinking perhaps I'd make my nieces some for Valentine's day.  I found the pattern here .  I didn't bother to make it a measuring tape cover like she did, I just made it as a little stuffie.  I might just glue one of my left over magnets from the above project on the back and stick him on the fridge.

I didn't realize how popular owls are.  You can find lots of projects and ideas with them, whether as stuffed animals, appliques, or even little bags.  Spurred by the way this little guy turned out, I decided I wanted to try making Harry a few little stuffies out of felt, based on characters in his favorite book.  I started by drawing out the characters in a notebook.  As it happens, I decided to start with the owl in his book.  Here is my drawing, which I took a crappy picture of, printed out to fill a sheet of paper, then traced with black marker.

Once I had it outlined in black marker, I was able to put another sheet of paper over it and trace out the pattern pieces and cut all of the pieces out in felt.  Then I got to put it all together! I laid the pieces out to decide how I wanted it to look, then got to work sewing it all together.  I used embroidery thread for the stitching. First I did the tummy in pink, with purple thread to make feathers. 

Then I sewed that to the body with pink thread, adding a little stuffing and some crunchy plastic from a package of crackers before sewing it closed.  Harry likes his crunchy toys, so I wanted to add some crunch to the owl too.  Next I added some detail to the beak.

Then I started sewing the layers of the face together.  The eyes - white to black, then black to blue, then blue to purple.  I didn't have my straight pins handy so I just used a bit of scotch tape to hold things in place while I worked.

I put a bit of stuffing under the beak, but left the rest flat.

I added some wings on top of the body piece.  The feet were to be sewn in between the front and back of the body, so I basted them in with a single strand of embroidery thread to hold everything in place, which I removed when I was done sewing.  I stuffed the body with fibrefill and more crinkly plastic. 

Then I added the head, which also had some stuffing and plastic in it, and voila! He was finished.  I think he worked out really well, and best of all, Harry likes him :)

A blurry shot of the back...

I made him out of the eco-felt that you find in the stores, made of recycled plastic bottles.  I wasn't able to find real wool felt anywhere here, even at the fabric store, so I used what I had.  He's holding up ok so far, but it starting to pill a little bit.  Now I want to make more of the book characters...let's see...there's a moose, another bird, a fish, a bear, a star...oh then there's the fish and whale on his highchair cover that he likes to look at...I have actually cut pieces for a fish out, just haven't had a chance to get stitching on that one yet.

When I get a little more organized maybe I'll post my pattern pieces should anyone be so inclined to try making an owl too! :)