My creative space

It's all about the circles at the moment.......  I'm spying them everywhere.

I'd decided earlier in the year that I really wanted to take some time to work on some textile art, so when the February Finki challenge was announced, I was completely inspired (just not inspired quite enough to get it all done in February)..

I took along my new pen roll to the market on Saturday, and spent the quiet times doodling circles, and cutting out vinyl circles.

The textile piece is going to have a chocolate brown linen blend fabric as the background, with lots of circle embellishments. I picked up this very beautiful hand dyed wool felt from Trudi a few weeks ago. Trudi has a brand new blog - Me & Ewe, and Etsy shop . The colours are truly amazing (I'm also loving the bright purple, bright leaf green, and jade green. I can't wait to cut out lots of different sized pink and orange circles and lay them out all together....

With any luck, I may even make some progress before next weeks My Creative Space rolls around!

The home of My Creative Space.

A Wacing Car Twack

I whipped this one up quickly today for Moo Moo, and took it over to him thisafternoon. The best thing about making a second version of anything, is that you can modify the design to make the construction quicker and better.

I found a tiny bit of car fabric in the stash.... only enough for the top pockets, so I had to substitute some green and blue spots for the bottom pockets.

Moo Moo was very excited, and was finding it very difficult to close his eyes and put out his hands (something that myself and all my siblings were taught as kids.... passed on to the next generation - scary) to wait for the big suprise!

He even gave his daddy a quick demonstration of how it worked when he arrived home from work.... except that he got a bit confused and was trying to roll it longways!

Predictable

Predictions.... they can come true.

Nikki Cardigan predicted that Moo Moo would want one too. I got a phone call at 8PM Monday night.... and a little voice on the other end said "Hello Cam, can you please make me a car roll up too?".

How could I say no?

So this mornings job is to search the stash for some cute boy friendly fabrics.

In other boy news, I received a very nice email from Spotlight Customer Service on Monday. Although my local store currently has nothing in stock for boys, I'm assured that they do have three new ranges which are being released in early April. There's one named Bot Camp (think robots) which looks pretty cute. I appreciated their very quick response.

Sometimes my budget just can't stretch to expensive designer fabrics, and I need something cheap and cheerful to fall back on (especially when it comes to birthday pressies for three year olds)!

The Goodies

I always love to come home with a gorgeous handmade goodie after each market....   and Saturday was no exception.

I'd spied these lovely needle felted brooches on Holly's blog last month, so I couldn't resist bringing one home!

I also bought this lovely Squirrel cushion from Flickettysplits with the intention of giving it as a gift..... but I think it's feeling right at home on my couch, and might need to stay.

If you'd like to find out a little bit more about little ol' me, there's a featured blogger interview over at Handmade News today!

The reason for the BOY fabric

So after my complete waste of time trip to Spotlight* yesterday, I came home and searched through the stash instead.

I couldn't find any car fabric, but I did find an offcut of this cute little heavy machinery fabric... plus the stripey fabric for the binding, some navy cotton drill, and blue felt.

....so I set about making a birthday pressie, loosely based on this tutorial.

There are eight little pockets for Hot Wheels or Matchbox cars, and you can fold the flap over.....

....and roll it up. Perfect for a bit of play on the run.

I decided to use velcro for the closure as the birthday boy is a bit too young to be tying things up just yet.




* I have sent a complaint email to Spotlight to find out what is going on.

** Message to Moo Moo - don't worry - Aunty CurlyPops will not be including your hot wheels cars with the pressie. They're all heading back to your toy box!

The Northside Wrap

Melbourne turned on the most perfect weather for a market yesterday...

I have to give a huge thankyou to Tinniegirl for helping me to set up, move my car for me, and coming back to help me pack up again. Without help from friends and family, I wouldn't be able to participate in markets, so I'm truly appreciative of the help.

I requested a stall near the cupcakes.... just for sustenance of course!

I forgot to take the correct camera with me, so I have to give a huge thankyou to Jennie for taking all of these photos and emailing them to me.

I did make a couple of purchases, but I haven't taken photos of them yet, so I'll save them for later this week.

In the meantime.... I probably should start unpacking my suitcase!

An endangered species

Little Cars Fabric available from Retromummy

I tootled down to Spotlight today in search of some fabric with a car print as I have some little boy birthdays coming up very soon...

I searched the entire shop and couldn't find anything AT ALL for boys. No camo prints, no skull and crossbones, NOTHING!

So I decided to ask what happened to the teeny tiny section that was called Boyzone. I was told that the boyzone fabrics have been discontinued, and they have nothing is stock, unless I could find something on the clearance table. They said that the decision had been made by Head Office.

What the????? Have boys all of a sudden become an endangered species in the fabric world?

New Flickr Group

I've created a new Flickr group for photos of creations made using my tutorials.

Feel free to pop on over and add some!

Northside Makers Market Tomorrow

Todays post is all about blatant advertising!

I'll be peddling my wares at the Northside Makers Market tomorrow alongside lots of other fantastically talented crafty peeps.

Mosaic courtesy Northside Makers

Alannah Banana Designs
Babushka Baby

Betty Jo
Buttonlicious
Celia Adams
Chuckles Designs
Clifton Hill Pottery
Crafted Things
CurlyPops
Daniela Carvacho & Liliana Remedi
Elmie
Ena Designs
Finki Handmade
Flickettysplits
Hawthorne Cottage
Holden Street Neighbourhood House
Kate's Stuff
KCamilleri Handcrafted Jewellery
Konstant Kaos
La La Hi Prism
Little Cooties
Little Waltz
Me & M'lee
Mecino
Melbourne Epicure
Mrs Beckinsale
Nice Biscuits
Pepperberry & Co.
Piccolamia
Pink K Designs
Pivotal Xpressions
Polly Pratt
Rabbit & the Duck
Rebound Books
Red Parka Designs
Sarah Neale
Susan Cusinato
Sylvia Segon
Tiges and Weince
Twisted Stitches
Two Cheese PleaseTwo Bits Patches

Come along for a browse and a cupcake, and make sure to say hi!

My creative space

Stack of bibs still needing snaps and labels

This weeks creative space is all about finishing off the works in progress to get ready for the Northside Makers Market this Saturday.

Plateful of brooches still needing brooch backs added

I'm a bit of an attention deficit crafter.... so I always have half finished projects strewn all over the place.

Gadget pouches - cut and wadded

Boredom usually sets in after an hour or so, and I'm looking for something new to make.

Here's hoping that I get it all finished!

The home of My Creative Space

On My Wall - Part 2

While cleaning up on the weekend, I discovered another hidden treasure.

It had fluttered itself all the way home to my house..... only to get covered in a pile of fabric!

But now, this beautiful Betty Jo Lino Butterfly wall hanging has pride of place next to SuperPops, and all is well in the world....

On my wall

It's only taken me four months (which is pretty quick considering my procrastinating habits), but after picking up a cheap pine frame on my recent op shopping adventures....

.... and painting it a nice bold red, with some bright orange matting,...

.... my original Hoppo Bumpo SuperPops artwork has joined my art wall.

Isn't she a beauty?

Tinniegirl went to San Francisco and all I got was......

.....just these completely amazing pressies!

I would have been happy with a postcard, so I had a wonderful surprise when I popped over for a visit yesterday and there was a huge pile of goodies waiting for me.

There's a pair of very cool socks from Gap, Matroyshka Key Toppers, Space Needle Mints from Seattle, a beautiful flowery fridge magnet from San Fran, and my long awaited postcard!

But wait... there's more

A beautiful selection of fabrics!

From Left to Right:

Wave print - Ocean Songs Collection - Laurel Burch for Clothworks
Deer Valley - Joel Dewberry for Freespirit
You got the Notions - Robert Kaufman

Thanks so much Cathy - you're the best crafty partner-in-crime a girl could ask for!

** Check out today's SNAP moment

Ahoy there it's done!

It was a crazily busy day yesterday, but I made the most of the spare hour that I had in the afternoon to finish off the Little Houdini's sleeping bag.

I pulled out some binding scraps to finish off the armholes.... then cut it right down the middle to add the zip.

I've been collecting zips from the oppy for the longest time - I even had the exact perfect colour and size in the zipper stash.

Thanks to everyone for all of their tips yesterday.... especially the one about adding a tab to cover the top of the zipper so that he can't unzip himself!

I delivered it yesterday afternoon, so I'm hoping that the first test run worked lastnight.

My creative space

In my creative space today.... a little bit of trial and error and making it up as I go along.

Little Zaney (my nephew) has worked out how to hook his leg over the side of the cot and jump out in the middle of the night, so my sister is going to have to start using a sleeping bag to prevent it.

The sleeping bag that she currently has is made from polar fleece, which is far too hot for the current weather, so I'm whipping one up using some cotton flannel for the outside, and some cotton print fabric for the inside.

I just traced around the existing bag and constructed it in a similar way to making a handbag. The armhole construction didn't work in reality as I'd planned in my head, so there was a little bit of unpicking while sitting on the couch lastnight watching The Real Housewives of NJ that I'd IQ'd.

Now I just need to bind the armholes, and add a zip down the front and I'll be finished.

In hindsight, it would have probably been easier if I'd constructed the front of the sleeping bag in a similar way to a dress bodice, so that I could use snaps instead of a zip.... but oh well, too late now!

Visit Kirsty, the Queen of Creativity to play along.....

In the News...

From L-R - Liz, Myself, Jay, Cathie

The Northern Craft Bonanza is in the Northcote Leader today.

We had lots of fun at the photo shoot last week, and it was the perfect excuse to head to Chair 14 for a coffee and a muffin!

The dates got a little mixed up, so I'm going run with the dates in the newspaper which means that the next one is tomorrow night - Thursday March 4th from 7 - 9 PM.

Please come along and say hi!

Getting stiffy with it

Head on over and visit Gypsy for a guest post from me!

Ahhh... now that's better

I should have been making brooches and gadget pouches thisafternoon....

But I just had to whip this up instead....

Beautiful linen tablecloth outer courtesy of Stacey, teamed with my one of my favourite op shop finds of all time (vintage floral bedspread), and some random offcuts of binding for straps.

Now my new pens are very happy!

On the bandwagon

I found these at Officeworks last week...

Now it seems that stationery companies are jumping on the crafty bandwagon, and creating ugly plasticky rolls for our pens and pencils. Thank goodness I can create my own pretty fabric one instead!

More skirts...

After the success of my first a-line skirt from Sew What Skirts, and then helping Bec to make one too, I jumped at the chance to make one for Liz.

Liz found the front panel fabric at the oppy, and I just happened to have the perfect brown fabric (some sort of linen blend I think - also from the oppy) in the stash for the back two panels.

After the first fitting, it ended up being a little bit short.... so I added a strip of brown velour type fabric (also from the oppy) right around the skirt.

My original mistake with the length has turned out to be a design feature instead!