GIVEAWAY! - One Year Anniversary

Today marks one year since my first blog post and I would love you to join my giveaway for the chance to win a jacket or cape for your little girl or boy valued at $100!

My sewing journey has come a long way in a year... Of course at school we learnt the basics of how to thread the machine but I only remember making a pillowcase so there was plenty of room for improvement!

Over the last year I have learned all sorts of bit and pieces from the internet, tutorials, friends and books, but mostly just from simply having a go.  Everything from embroidery to creating patterns has been a learning curve for me and I'm so pleased I persevered!

My favorite item of clothing when I was a child was a cape that my Nanna knitted for me for my birthday.  She didn't have a pattern but I told her what I wanted and away she went. It was so gorgeous - a rich burgundy colour with little white flowers embroidered over the chest.  It had a secret pocket on the inside for storing my treasures (how cool) and I felt like the most special girl alive when I was wearing it.

No surprise when I wanted to design some special capes for little girls!   It seems like no time at all since my first cape was conceived (Mouse and his toadstool house pictured at top) followed by my first pirate jacket and since then I have never looked back and enjoyed every minute of designing and dreaming up new ideas.

To celebrate my one year anniversary I would like to offer a very special giveaway to one lucky follower...

A cape or jacket for your little one (or a friend's little one) suitable for a boy or a girl and the cape or jacket is available in size 1, 2, 3 or 4.
These are valued at $100 so a very special prize indeed!


To enter all you have to do is...
Leave a comment on this post or a comment over on the giveaway post on my Big Little Facebook page.   If you have a favourite childhood item of clothing I would love to read about it, otherwise any comment is fine!


For extra entries ...if you like you can 
-follow my blog
-'like' my Big Little Facebook page
-put my giveaway button on your blog
Just let me know in the comments section if you already do or have done any of the above- each one above gets you an extra entry :)

Entries close Sunday the 4th September, anyone can enter (non bloggers just leave your email address ) and international entries welcome.

Giveaway will be announced on Monday (my Facebook page needs to reach 100 followers by then), so be sure to tell all your friends!

Thanks and look forward to hearing from you all,


xx

Doll Making - Hair

Thanks for all the comments on my doll making journey so far!
You can read about her eyes here, and her lips here. 

I have been quite excited about her hair since finding a few balls of Alpaca and Merino blended yarn with a beautiful natural twist.  I was hoping it would give her hair body and a natural springy bounce (and which girl wouldn't want that...) and it really did!

The instructions from the original 1940's pattern from which I am basing my doll were somewhat brief although the illustrations gave a good indication.

I started with a center part as per the instructions, but she looked kind of 70's hippy or rag-doll or something, so unpicked it (eek... this takes about 3 times as long as stitching it in the first place) and moved it to the side which gave her a softer and perhaps more sophisticated look.  Once she had the side part, the bangs from the pattern just didn't happen!

So here she is pictured before and after...

The simple version of the process is:

* Her hair is stitched onto her head at the parting 

* Then tied into bunches with some tiny rubber bands 

* A few strands wrapped around to disguise bands

* Lastly the bunches are stitched onto her head.

There were a few things along the way I would do differently as the individual strands of hair are all slightly different lengths etc. but I'm sure I can get that under control with a bit of tweaking!  

Once I have mastered the hair basics - I am hoping to build on my hair repertoire so to speak, with a classic bun, french twist and perhaps even some Princess Leia style buns :)

Stay tuned for the next update which will be her clothes.   xx

You can now read about my entire doll making journey here:

1. Doll Making 
2. Lips
3. Eyes 
4. Colouring the Eyes
5. Hair   (This post)
6. Clothes

Snugly Goodness

Gorgeous sweaters ready for recycling into pixie hats, woolen dresses and some boys jackets.

Oh how much I love wool!
Snugy, soft, warm and the lovely feeling of "home" when you wear a wooly jumper.  Just such a good thing to be working on when the weather is chilly as it is at the moment.

I am planning on doing some botanical embroideries on the garments I will be making from these.  Perhaps some lovely woodland toadstools, flowers, acorns, pine-cones etc. The poppet's grandparents are visiting this week so a nice opportunity to do a little bit of hand stitching while enjoying their company.

Will keep you posted on the results!

Pirates

More "Piratey" fun heading out...  I love making all the little details for these child's pirate jackets and imagining the boys searching for treasure with their maps, staging duels with their pirate blades and storing "finds" in the pint sized loot bags etc.  Too much fun!

This week I sent out:

A denim pirate jacket for a gorgeous man here in New Zealand.

A warm wool pinstripe pirate jacket for a lad in Los Angeles.

Lastly...

A soft drapey grey plaid pirate jacket with black cuffs for someone to find in my shop.

Boys stuff can be cool...

Love

I love waking up and spending time with the owner of this gorgeous wee smile every day.  Such a delight and a privilege. 

Wooly Finds

I was like a kid in a candy stall when I found these awesome spools of wooly thread in the doorway of a local thrift shop the other day.

So many gorgeous colours I wasn't sure where to begin choosing.  I asked the lady how much they were, she said grab the ones you want and I'll give you a good deal...  She was very generous as I ended up with 15 large spools for just $5. Thank you kind lady! 

I simply cannot wait to begin using these, I have so many ideas for capes which feature embroidery, like this one here.  On occasion I use wool which I sometimes find a little too thick, and other times use embroidery thread, which on the other hand sometimes doesn't have the "body" I would like.  

These spools are in between and just so perfect, I was dreaming and debating my first project with them before I fell asleep last night.

Yay, for great finds which make you smile :)

Jasmine Pink & Snugly

Jasmine is blooming it's heart out in our garden at the moment.  Simply couldn't help but pick a few bunches to grace my work table, and yet another for the lounge.

The smell inside is intoxicating and according to aromatherapy, Jasmine is a very calming oil.  I can believe it as our little poppet (who slept amongst the blooms last night) had one of the best sleeps she has ever had!

This snugly set is about to be sent off to the USA for a little girl to be born in October.   The colour of the recycled sweater I used is such a pretty "jasmine pink" the remnants are calling my name to make something else in celebration of the gorgeous jasmine everywhere at the moment.

Perhaps another little dress for the poppet?

Snow Day

When I woke this morning and heard the forecast of snow falling in Auckland,

I was a little surprised, however, we had snow here today - for the first time since 1939!

Later in the day it got really cold, then the white stuff starting falling... 

So exciting!

Although I must say that it did look rather more like hail than snow at our place :)

Doll Making - Colouring the Eyes

UPDATE:  You can now purchase the pattern for my doll, including detailed tutorials for her hair, eyes and facial features here:  "Fleur" Doll Pattern 

In case you are just joining in on my doll-making journey, my goal is to create a classic 1930-40's style cloth doll, giving her a slightly more modern look while keeping those lovely vintage elements and clothing.

So far I am up to embroidering the eyes.  After deciding on the style of the eye I wanted for my doll here,  I then needed the colour.  

Aiming for as realistic as possible, I decided to photograph my daughters eye and use that as a guide.  Alas she was asleep (for an unusually long period) so my eye had to suffice.  Bit humbling seeing your own eye up close - I didn't realise I had that many wrinkles!

After studying the colours in the photo, I chose thirteen shades to make up the green, grey, brown and golden hues.  Working with a single strand of thread, I started with the darker ring around the outside then adding lighter more golden colours towards the center.  

Proportions of the pupil were made a bit larger than mine, as I figured I was looking into the light when I took the picture.  Lastly the light/highlight in the eye was added for the finishing touch. 

I am sure more experimentation and practice will see some improvements - like how the iris started off perfectly round but was a bit wonky by the end... but for my first attempt I am really happy:)   Yay!

You can now read about my entire doll making journey here:

1. Doll Making  
2. Lips
3. Eyes 
4. Colouring the Eyes (This post)
5. Hair
6. Clothes

Woodland Butterflies

A lovely afternoon for a ride on Daddy's shoulders...

gazing at the trees ...

pulling Daddy's hair...

Not to mention being a super cute model for this woodland butterfly baby cape 

which is about to be listed in my shop!

Mostly though, a wonderful afternoon of having a happy wee poppet.  Yay!

Doll Making - The Eyes have it

I'm so excited about making my vintage-style cloth doll - she is turning into a real little person! You can read previous posts on my doll making journey here.

Today's discovery is when making something with a "soul" the facial features really do make or break the overall "feeling" of the person or creature.

I wanted this particular doll to have very striking eyes and tasked my honey with helping me come up with some ideas.  He draw a number of very different eyes including square ones and ones that might look in place on a Jim Henson creation, but I wanted something a little more realistic.

We sat together on the couch whilst I explained I wanted her to look sophisticated, happy yet serene, pretty and friendly.  (Not much to ask from a pair of eyes is it?!)

I liked the realistic version in the first photo, and really wanted her to have luscious eyelashes, so stitched five lashes.  They looked great, but when I did the second eye they started to look a bit much.  Rather like a stick insect had crawled onto her eyelid...

It was unpicked and replaced with something halfway between the original and the slightly pared down version below - She did retain half the line underneath and ended up with four lashes!

Yes - There was a lot of stitching and unpicking going on today!

Will report back shortly with a pic of the result (when the air erasable marker has disappeared).
Update:  Click here to see her eyes finished :)

You can now read about my entire doll making journey here:

1. Doll Making 
2. Lips
3. Eyes   (This post)
4. Colouring the Eyes
5. Hair
6. Clothes

Doll Making: Lips

My vintage style, doll making journey continues...  I am starting on the fun part, working on her facial features. She is really starting to come to life and it really is so thrilling!  Posts on making her limbs and body can be found here and here. 

Her lips are the first feature I am to embroider, so once again the sketchbook came out...

I wanted lush lips, but not too pouty.  Smiling but not cheesy.  Happy yet serene. 

With a sketchpad full of lips and armed with an air erasable pen I marked on her little smile.  When I came to stitch, however, I did learn a few things.

I found out that a single stitch on the edge of the lips can completely change the feeling of the smile. After a bit of stitching and unpicking I discovered two more things.

• Lips look a lot more natural if they are not completely even from one side to the other.  Best to have one side of the lips neutral - as in quite straight and the other with a little upturn.  When I say little I mean just a single upwards stitch.

• Although when drawing the lips on paper the line where the lips meet is in the middle but when stitching it seems to look better slightly higher. 

Next up will be her eyes - stay tuned!

xx

You can now read about my entire doll making journey here:

1. Doll Making  
2. Lips  (This post)
3. Eyes
4. Colouring the Eyes
5. Hair
6. Clothes

Winter Gardening

I dream of having a beautiful potager with all sorts of vegetables and flowers growing side by side, with pebbled pathways leading into our home orchard of heritage trees where we can pick nutritious goodies for our family... however, in reality our tiny wee garden has only allowed us a few pots of herbs and tomatoes.  

This year we decided to put in a little raised bed where I can grow some summer crops and my honey can take over all the pots for his herbs.  He does most of the cooking at our place and herbs do feature rather strongly so growing more of our own does sound like a good idea.  

I am so excited about having a garden. Even though it is only two metres long you would think I had won the lottery :)  

We spent Saturday morning constructing and filling our bed with garden mix and by Sunday the sun was out,  so enjoyed a family outing to the garden shop for some seeds and herbs.

So far my honey has some pineapple sage, a few varieties of parsley and thyme, watercress, valerian, and mint.  

I'm looking forward to planting my vegetables when the weather gets a little warmer.  In the meantime I'll be digging in some compost so everything will be ready. I hope to share some more pics when the seedlings go in.

Hope you had a lovely weekend.

xx