Last minute creating...

A friend's little boy had a third birthday party yesterday, and she requested a Thomas the Tank Engine drawstring bag to store all of the Thomas bits and pieces he was (hopefully) going to receive. "Sure!" I said, thinking, "I've made a drawstring bag before*, this'll be a piece of cake!"

So off I toddled to the anti-best fabric store in the country to pick up a Thomas motif. Of course, they didn't have anything like I was after, so I improvised with some other less-ideal-but-still-Thomas fabric.

Having got what I needed, I promptly put it aside until the night before the party. Enter sewing machine crisis. I don't know about you, but I seem to have tension issues. I can't work out whether it's the top thread or the bobbin, but every time I think I've got it sorted, I bugger up the start of the next project. Fortunately I still had a friend's machine that I borrowed while mine was in for a service (yes, that was a couple of months ago but apparently she never uses it!?!). I KNEW this machine works properly!

Or not. Apparently the tension thing is me, not the machine. I managed to replicate the problem almost exactly! So after several unsuccessful attempts to avoid swearing, I took a deep breath, checked the instruction booklet, rethreaded the machine and tried again. Fortunately for everyone's sake, this time it worked. I'm not entirely sure what was different (maybe I'd twisted the thread around the needle the first time(s)?), but we ended up with a satisfactory drawstring bag.

It's a tad smaller than expected, but that's what you get for not thinking about seam allowance. At least I have enough fabric left over for another one if required!

The moral of the story? CHECK that the machine is threaded correctly, especially that the thread isn't twisted around the needle. Oh, and start it the night before the night before the party next time!!

*From Heather Ross's Weekend Sewing

We made it!

This weekend has been one of the busiest we've had in a long time! In addition to the usual Christmas-related silliness that happens at this time of year, my little one turned 1 on Friday! For this birthday, we took the relatively-low-key-morning-tea-time-in-the-park option, which worked fabulously. There was play equipment nearby to keep the older kids entertained, and there was proper coffee (supplied by us) to keep the adults happy.

And I made and decorated a cake!

Which I thought was yummy, and so did uber goober!

I managed to finish the cardi in time, too, but it was a decidedly chilly summer's day and the lovely short sleeves in the cardi weren't going to do the job. Oh well, there'll be another opportunity, I'm sure!

I also somewhere found the time and a (semi) willing sucker to help me wind my yarn, which means I've now started a time-pressured project. Hopefully I'll find the time to finish it!

My creative space

My creative space is a tad overloaded today! It's mostly a function of 'that time of year', slightly complicated by a first birthday tomorrow!?!

I've only included the Need. To. Sort. It. Now. stuff: there's oh, so many other projects going on right now too, but SOMETHING must be put on the back burner!!

So today:

I need to finalise a birthday cake for a party on Saturday. I think for this birthday, the book is about inspiration rather than replication - I'm sure I have that to look forward to in the years to come;

I need to make a cheesecake today for a Christmas party tomorrow night. No time tomorrow;

I need to wind a skein of yarn for a Christmas gift project that needs to be started yesterday; AND I really want to get this cardigan finished!! All that needs to be done is the final edging and weaving the ends in. No more than an hour's work, but where do I find the hour!?!

Oh, and the in-laws arrive this afternoon for a few days, which may mean more or less time. We'll see...

Is everyone else's creative space this chaotic in the lead up to Christmas? Visit Kirsty to find out!!

Return from Never Never Land

I've spent the last 11 days absent from blogland while visiting my parents in Northern NSW. My husband was in PNG for a little over a week, and as I'm not a particularly good single parent, I took my daughter to hang out with her grandparents.

Other than a few hairy moments - one involving my nearly one-year-old and the chilli above (this is the aftermath!), we enjoyed ourselves immensely. Hopefully it won't take too long for the grandparents to recover!

I very nearly finished a crocheted cardi which is so close I might even have pictures sometime this week. But that depends on whether or not I spend too long starting to catch up on the 500+ blog entries in my reader. Gulp!

One of the benefits of temporary family separation is presents! This is a bilum that I received from my husband, and given my current interest in crocheting string bags, it's particularly appropriate! The stitch detail is really interesting, and I think I'd like to find out more about how they're made. You never know, I might make one myself one day!

A parcel in the post!

Early on in Blogtoberfest, I entered Tinniegirl's giveaway and somehow managed to win! The prize was a mystery, and was to be based on Cathy's exploration of my blog. Yesterday, an enormous parcel arrived on my doorstep. Here's what was inside....

A tinnie! With a lovely magical castle on it. I love it! But there's more. Inside....

Yarn (she obviously did her homework!), some trim (it probably has a proper name but I don't know it), a card of buttons, and another tiny cute little tin absolutely packed with vintage buttons! But there's more.....

A very generous pile of vintage knitting books and patterns....

And a pincushion! Now I have two, which is good, because the other one I made isn't very big. I've already filled it up and it's only got about 18 pins in it. So this one is not only lovely, but also useful.

Thank you, Cathy, for your generosity. This package will keep me amused for hours!

My place and yours: My collection

This is the tip of the iceberg.

I have a generous collection of recipe books in my house. And within this collection, I have a collection of delicious. magazines. Every single one. I subscribe now to ensure I never miss an issue, and this has worked well except for once when an issue came around the time we moved house a couple of years ago. Apparently even if you re-direct your mail, Australia Post doesn't redirect items over a certain weight. Seriously. Fortunately for me (and my husband who was having to put up with a wife having conniptions) the people who moved into our old house were people we know, so I was able to track it down. L.U.C.K.Y! Because the issue came with a tea towel, which meant everywhere I tried to find another copy had sold out! Did I mention conniptions?

This collection has very recently moved to a new shelf with a door in the kitchen to keep it safe from inquisitive babies! This shelf also now houses my most referred to recipe books. The rest are on another shelf that isn't protected from babies, though there are plans afoot. Fortunately first editions don't make it into my collection: I like using them so they tend to get inadvertently splattered with things. Oops.

Thanks to Kate for coming up with a brilliant theme, and thanks to Pip for hosting!

Could it possibly be....

....a return to acceptable knitting weather? Hopefully this cool change has come through with no adverse effects. Like bushfires.