Dress to impress

So. I'm probably the last person in the world to find out that just like fashion fabric has seasons and therefore extreme discounts when those seasons end.

But now I know, hurray! I want to make the girls a few dresses, pants and skirts to last through the coming months. They both have grown a lot so they need new clothes and this way I only need to raid the Hema for basic shirts, tights, socks and underwear that will fit with all the dresses, pants and skirts.

Look! 16 meters (17 to 18 yards) of fabric, ready to be prewashed. Today I'm going to find some embellishments and I still need to find a way to go to ikea for some solid colors.

These two are allready waiting to be used and hopefully the pattern for modkids Kyoko will arrive soon. I'm thinking of making both girls a Kyoko and a Sydney dress from Modkid, each an Insa skirt, Dortje pants and perhaps some simple dresses like the one Mme Zsazsa shows here.

Sadly I've decided to not participate in the monthly bag challenge. After reading the book I realized that all the bags I like take up a lot (and I mean a LOT) of materials. Even if I would only use fabric from my stash I would still have to buy a ***load of interfacing, zippers, buttons and thread. For bag that I probably won't use that much.

I'm still planning on making one or two bags (Cosmo could come in handy like I wrote before and Blossom still looks like the right kind of handbag to fit my wallet, huuuge Flow-planner, keys, phone, etc.) but only after the girls are dressed and ready for spring :)

Monthly bag challenge

The past holidays I've been staying over at my aunt's house a few times. Now that de girls are getting bigger a simple diaperbag isn't big enough for all the stuff we need to take with us!

So I've been looking for a big yet stylish bag to replace the big but incredibly UNstylish shopperbag that is currently doubling as a grocerybag and a travelbag.

I think I've found the perfect bag: Amy Butler's Cosmo Bag from her book Style Stitches. And since I still had 20 euro's worth of bol.com gift certificates the book is now on its way!

Thrilled with the idea of making my first Amy Butler bag I did some googling and I found something to add to the fun.

JemJam is hosting a great monthly challenge using Style Stitches so I've decided to participate. I will try to make all the bags from the book in one year. That's one bag a month. Isn't that fun?

Cosmo is the first bag of the challenge so as soon as the book arrives I will be raiding my fabricstash. I think some of the heavy fabric form Ikea will be perfect for this bag.

Oh, and 4701? I know you are huffing and puffing right now. I now you don't like fabric laying around and a the sound of the sewing machine and all that. And I know you will do your best to keep the huffing and puffing to yourself. So I will do my best to keep the sewing within your working hours. Deal? ;)

For sale!

I need to gather some funds for something so the last babycarrier I made can go to a new home.



It is a wrapconversion, meaning that it is made using a wrap. In this case a didymos calendula. Because of this it is more soft and supple than a mei tai made from normal fabric.

The body is lightly padded and then quilted, making it really comfy.
It has a rounded neckpiece that gives support to a sleeping head but can also be folded down to support a (newborn) neck.

The straps are 12 cm's wide on the shoulders but flare out to wide "wrap style" straps than can be used to give more support. Just like a wrap but without all the hassle!


The straps are 180 cm's long which is a bit on the short side if you are plus sizes person and you want to wear a big toddler on the front. It is, however, perfectly fine for a backcarry for all sizes and front- and backcarry for smaller mama's and papa's.

I.e. I wear a size 14 (us) / 44 (eu) and I can just squeeze in a wrapped front carry with my two year old toddler, tying in the ends of the straps.
A backcarry uses less fabric and so does using the straps not spread out.

In short: if you are wearing a size 14 (us) / 44 (eu) or larger and you want to wear your baby on the front then this is perhaps not the right carrier for you. If you are wearing a smaller size and/or you want to wear your child on your back then this carrier will suit you just fine!



I know that most mei tai's are not recommended for newborns or very young baby's but this one is extra wide. In combination with the wrapstyle straps, the padded body and the necksupport you can easily position a newborn in it.

Because of that extra width it is also very comfortable with a two year old!

I can haz sandwich?

The backing taped to the floor, batting and top rolled out on top.

I never taped the backing until I saw Elisabeth Hartman's tute and now I do it every time I need to make a quiltsandwich. It is so much easier to remove all the wrinkles this way!

The completed sandwich. Pinned and ready to be quilted. It took 80 pins which seems like a lot but I rather put in the extra effort now instead of having a nasty crease in the backing later.

I'm curious as to how the batting will hold up in wear and washing. It is 100% wool which will hopefully make for a warm and soft quilt. I don't think it will crinkle as much as a completely cotton quilt does though...

happy birthday gran!

See that cute little canvas tote bag?

This was in it:

A prepacked kit to make moda's "cherish nature" quilt. I was baffled by the way the kit looked. Not only did it came in a bag, it also contained labels (washing- and namelabels) to mark the finished quilt with AND more than plenty of all of the fabrics.

It was such a gift to open and even more of a gift to make!

You might notice that the fabrics are way outside my comfortzone when it comes to color and design. The reason for that is that this wil be a gift for my Gran and she is more into sober colors. This teal, brown and green design seemed a great cross between her taste and mine!

She also used to talk to me about birds when I was a little girl. I would sit on her lap and she would read to me from Rien Poortvliets book, the highlight of those occasions being counting the birds on the first page. Oh such sweet memories!

I just finished the top of the quilt. It had to be adapted a bit since the pattern is for twin sized quilt and I want it to be a cribsized lapquilt. This way Gran can use it while knitting on cold winter nights ánd I can use the rest of the fabric as a backing.

Off to sew the backing, see ya!

The food of love

The title is a bit melodramatic and the drawings are not the most refined. But I was once again stricken by this slideshow.

http://www.thefoodoflove.org/breastfeed-in-your-sleep.htm

It shows perfectly the difference between the first year with my first daughter and the first year with my second daughter.

I remember waking up every night at least once but usually two, three or even four times. I would breastfeed my baby sitting up in a chair or in my bed, desperately trying not to fall asleep and praying that my little girl would not wake up when I would carefully and sloooowly put her in her crib.

I would then tiptoe to bed for an hour of sleep before the whole circus would start again.

IF I managed to stay awake, that is. Most of the time I would just wake up cramped and cold sitting up with my sleeping daughter on my lap.

It is a miracle that she never fell of!

I think most parents can agree that nights like this will make you cranky if your lucky and plain miserable if your more like me. It sucked, it took all the fun out of being a mother and it made me doubt my parentingskills since *this* couldn't possibly be how it was supposed to be!

Her and my sleepingproblems were resolved when we, out of sheer desperation, stopped trying to get her to sleep in her own bed.

Seeing this we tried a different approach with our second daughter. No more separate bedroom, not even a crib! We took a hensvik crib form Ikea, removed the front panel and tied it to my side of the bed.

And you know what? We slept like babies (no pun intended)! I would breastfeed little Avalon to sleep and if I didn't fall asleep myself I would gently slide her a few inches to my right, into her own part of our bed. If she would wake in the night (IF she would wake at all, my direct presence was often enough of a reassurance to keep her asleep) I would simply pull her closer to me without completely waking up and in less than a minute we would both be fast asleep again.

It is unbelievable how much of a difference this made. Even though she was a *very* fussy baby that cried a lot during the day the solid nights of sleep made it all so much better to handle.

My heart aches if I hear fresh parents complain about sleepless nights and or fussy babies. Sure, cosleeping isn't always the answer and every parent should do what he or she thinks is best.

But boy, it can make such a difference!

If you want to read more about cosleeping, its advantages, some safety guidelines and other interesting stuff then I suggest you pay a visit to dr. Sears's website.

The result

See those Dala horse appliques? It took some SERIOUS selfcontrol to put the pink one on the purple suit and the red one on the pink suit, I'll tell you that! But sometimes you just have to let a four year old decide what she wants to wear.

Especially if it is probably the last year she will let her momma put her in a hippie-like coverall.

(Believe me, I've been there. Love your taste now Mom. Didn't when I was the one in hippie coveralls!)