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Happiness is a day of browsing at the thrift stores, with a little visit to the fabric shop for good measure.

 

My thrifting loot for the day included a huge roll of (unfolded) bias tape, a bunch of zippers in various colours and sizes, some long shoe laces, a 1/8th inch quilting ruler, a lovely pale green crochet belt, a green printed silk scarf and very best of all - a really super duper cute pair of nearly new pink sneakers for Emma.  All for $7.00, gotta love it.

From the fabric store, some bottle green fleece to make something for Jack and some cute pink printed jersey for Emma. I was very restrained, picking out several other things and then reluctantly putting them back on the way to the checkout.  Well done, me.

Oh, and I’m off to the movies tonight with my sister - we don’t get out very often so we thought it was about time!  We are going to see Running with Scissors at the new(ish) Dendy in town.

Some lovely little things for a Friday.

First up, some more sewing for Emma - bootleg pants in a dark olive drill. They have an elastic back and flat front and the pockets on the front are from a thrifted sheet. (I also have a skirt and a bag from that sheet!)

The pattern is New Look 6337 - it went together very easily. I would like to do that long sleeve top (the red one) next.

Next up, some wonderful new magazines. I am thinking of running a hot bath and having a nice long soak-and-read later on tonight. The Craft magazine came in the mail today. I recently signed up for a year’s subscription which worked out at quite a good price.

To Australia, it was US $49.95, which works out to about AU $60.00, or $15 per issue. I recently saw the very same magazine in a local newsagency here for $35.00 so I think I did the right thing, even if it means waiting a while for the latest issues! I also bought the latest copy of Adorn magazine (blog here) which is another great small-format magazine, also devoted to craftiness.

I was in a newsagency (ha! that’s unusual!) this evening and was looking at the home magazines when I recognised the name “Romantic Homes” and thought “hmmm… wasn’t that the one Alicia was featured in recently?” - the cupcakes on the cover tipped me off! And yes, it was the one.

Then as I was browsing the magazine rack some more, I found another one that looked interesting, flicked through it and lo and behold, I found Alicia’s name (and another big article on her) in this magazine too! Jeepers, some people get around! So I just had to buy them both.  oops!

The nice courier man had a box for me today - my new little pink flip phone! I didn’t really need to upgrade my phone, but I sure am glad I did. I love it and it makes me happy!

It’s a Nokia 6131 if you’re interested. Besides being a cute little pink flip phone (hey, isn’t that enough?) it also has a camera, video, radio, MP3 player, and a bunch of other cool features. I got it through Virgin Mobile for $0 upfront, and they even threw in a free return airline ticket (via their Virgin Blue airline) which for me was the real deal clincher.

It’s so so good to know that I have a return ticket to Melbourne up my sleeve - of course I will use it to visit my best best friend Yvette and her Dan. They recently bought their very first house and they move in tomorrow! I can’t wait to see their new house!
It’s going to get down to 2 degrees (celcius) tonight so I think that hot bath is looking very good!

You might remember this little felted piece I did a few months ago:

It was a lot of rolling between bubblewrap but I was happy with it in the end. I was never sure what to do with it though, once I had finished it. I wasn’t sure about the “grass” along the bottom either.

Yesterday, I decided to do a little embellishment to it:

I did some simple embroidery around the flowers and then trimmed the piece down to size. Then I backed it with a plain cotton and added some pink binding, quilt style. Now I like it much better - still not sure what to do with it! I might frame it.

Today I did a bunch of sewing.  And not for business reasons, but for my little girl.  First up, was poor little naked Angelina Ballerina.  I picked her up while out thrifting one day and it didn’t bother me that she was missing her tutu - I always planned to sew her a new dress. 

For weeks now, Emma has asked where Angelina’s dress is and today I finally got around to making it!  It may not be a tutu but it is pretty cute, nonetheless.

 

Isn’t Angelina so smiley now that she has a wonderful new dress. She’s ready to dance again.

I used this great tutorial from Molly Chicken to make the dress - it was super easy. And super reversible:

 

With the weather turning cooler, Angelina’s mummy (Emma) was in need of a few new clothes herself.  So I got busy with my trusty sewing machine - using what I have and putting plans into action.  Yay me!

First up, a hot pink fleece skirt with a designer fabric touch at the hem.  I love this one, though it is a little big on Emma, dammit.  She will grow into it soon though.

 

Next I wanted to use up some dark dark purple fleece that I have had hanging around for way too long.  I’m not mad on the colour but I did want to use what I had, and it looked good once I added some colour touches.  These are some everyday play bootleg pants, with pink ricrac at the ankles. 

  

I still had quite a bit of this fleece left so I made another skirt, this one fits better, though it still has lots of growing room.  Here is Emma (with Angelina) modelling her new skirt. 

 

This one turned out really nicely - the trim at the hem is some beautiful cord that I also have heaps of.  I love this fabric so much.  I must make her more things from it. 

 

Don’t you love the stripy socks?  She has always had big feet (it was one of the first things I noticed about her when she was born) but they look huge in this picture. What do they say about horizontal stripes?

 

Sorry, I couldn’t pick just one photo - she’s too cute!