Monthly Archives: October 2014

Things 229 & 230

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My baby, my firstborn. Isn’t she precious?

Martina had a school party this evening, so Esther offered up her Dementor costume.

Esther wore Martina’s pumpkin costume that I made a couple of years ago (still love that hat!) and went trick-or-treating in the neighbourhood.

 

 

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Every year we get a few stragglers at the door. This year a few ambitious families tried to organize Halloween in our area, sending out flyers asking families to stock up on candy and welcome trick-or-treaters at the door. As a result we had a record 14 kids. (This tradition may take a few more years to catch on…)

Now I have a big bowl of leftover mini KitKats and Twixes. Must. Not. Eat.

 

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Let’s change the subject.

 

Today’s Things are another set, this one for my niece, Nicole.

 

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I used the fabric from the box I made for Martina’s desk to make a flat bag and lined it with yellow cotton from an old shirt.

 

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And yes, I made a tissue pouch to go with it.

 

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Cost of these Things: 0
Cost of all Things to date: €279.74

 

Things 227 & 228

Look who lives in our garden!

 

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We’ve seen this guy out and about even in broad daylight, though the most action happens after the sun sets. We’ve also seen offspring, so we’re pretty sure there’s a whole family settled in. As an added bonus, the slug population has taken a beating. Hooray for hedgehogs!

In less prickly news, today’s Things, taken from the summer backlog, are a set I made for my niece, Christine.

I used the leftover purple flower fabric from Martina’s summer pyjama set to make a gusseted zipped bag. I think I may have interfaced the outer fabric since it’s so thin, but as Christine has since carried it off to New Zealand I can’t check for sure.

 

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I lined it with the solid purple that exactly matched the zipper. (At some point I stocked up on zippers at the Haagse Markt and consequently seem to always have the right colour in stock.)

 

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And of course I made a tissue pouch to go with it.

 

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It’s what I do.

 

Cost of these Things: 0
Cost of all Things to date: €279.74

 

* Bonus hedgehog pic. You’re welcome.

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Things 225 & 226

Today’s Things, taken from the summer backlog, were made for my niece, Emily.

The fabric is left over from the great tissue pouch marathon. (The supply is endless. I will be making Things with this fabric until the end of time.)

I picked two sections of fabric with lots of crazy stuff going on and kept the bag simple and flat. The hot pink zipper and pink polka dot lining don’t do much to tone it down.

 

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I whipped up a matching tissue pouch and this gift was ready to be packed.

 

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Cost of these Things: 0
Cost of all Things to date: €279.74

 

 

Thing 224

So I’m back from another vacation. Life is rough. We spent the October break in Croatia with friends, enjoying the last few days of summer on the Adriatic coast before we prepare for the winter ahead.

 

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But now it’s time to get back to real life. I mean it this time. I’m still determined to finish this 365 project, which means making and posting about just over 140 Things before the end of December. Pshaw. Easy peasy.

Today’s Thing is another little project from the summer backlog. I wanted to give Thing 44, a Swarovski necklace, to my sister, Heather, when I went back to Canada. It just needed a gift bag.

I rummaged through my Liberty scraps and found a tiny piece of the blue flowers from my Sorbetto blouse.

 

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A silver velour lining cushions and protects the pearls and crystals.

 

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I used a length of blue satin cord for the drawstring and the gift was ready.

 

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And happily, the bag also just happened to be the exact right size for Heather’s sunglasses. Multi-purpose, baby!

 

Cost of this Thing: 0
Cost of all Things to date: €279.74

Thing 223

Today’s Thing is the first of the summer backlog. I made this keychain back in July and meant to attach it to a gift. That didn’t happen so it’s still in my stash. No worries, it’ll find a home.

I’ve used this pattern before (Things 212 and 213), but this time I added a small flower button.

 

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These flip flops are quick and fun to make. I brought my crocheting supplies to Canada for the summer and fully intended to crank out at least half a dozen.

I made none.

In fact, I haven’t crocheted at all since I made this. There are at least ten unfinished projects in the basket: a dodo, another flip flop, a maple leaf, a shawl, Christmas ornaments…

In good crochet news, the weather has turned and it’s definitely fall. Cool weather brings out my crafty side. I hope.

 

Cost of this Thing: 0
Cost of all Things to date: €279.74

Things 220 – 222

Hi! I’m back. That was a longer hiatus than intended. It’s so much easier to keep going with a project when the forward momentum is in place. My summer break was glorious but it’s been hard to get back to real life. However, I have only two and a half months in order to finish this 365 project, so the panic is now sufficient to kick me into gear.

I made enough Things before the summer and had all the best intentions to post about them throughout July and August. By September, of course, I would be back in my disciplined daily routine. Ahem.

On the up side, I have lots to post about. And, since my beading ladies and I are back to our Wednesday evening ritual, I even have some new bracelets to show. I’ll start with those.

I don’t have much beading wire left but I did find an unopened 25m spool of elastic. Stretchy bracelets it is, then. I pulled out boxes and baggies of glass beads of unknown origin and sorted by colour.

I started with black. There were enough beads for three elastic bracelets. Then I had the idea to attach them with a pendant from the same stash. This reduced the Thing count from three to one, but I like it much more.

 

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Next I went for an assortment of aqua glass. I had enough for two bracelets, but again, I liked them attached with a pendant, this time a (fake) gold heart with an aqua enamel centre.

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The final bracelet used up some flat glass ovals I’ve had for far too many years. I separated them with some large black seed beads left over from the black bead pile, and had enough for two bracelets. I attached them with a large antique coin pendant.

 

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And that’s the story of how I made seven Things but ended up with three.

 

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The pre-Christmas sales start in a couple of weeks, and I hope these end up in someone’s stocking this year.

 

Cost of these Things: 0
Cost of all Things to date: €279.74

 

Note: I have temporarily disabled comments. Spammers, the bottom feeders of the blogging world, have overwhelmed my pending comments box. When I got back from vacation there were over 7,000 — 7,000! — spam messages awaiting approval. I can only delete them 100 at a time. Ain’t nobody got time for that. So until I figure out how to repel them without upgrading to a paid-for blogging platform (I’m cheap like that), comments are closed. Sorry, Mom.