Goodbye 2014

As another year draws to a close, I find myself getting reflective about the past year, the new year ahead, and work and life in general. 2014 was a good year, all in all. I probably never worked so hard in my life (and that's saying something considering I used to be a senior director at a big investment bank in London in my 'previous' life!). When you have pre-school age kids you tend to work when they are asleep, and with an Etsy shop to run as well as this blog, midnight sewing sessions became my 'normal'. But despite (and if I am honest, because of!) all this hard work 2014 was a fun and productive year for Down Grapevine Lane. I learned a lot about sewing, needlework, crochet, blogging, photography, and running an online shop. Here's a quick round up of my 'makes' from the past year (you may notice there are one or two things here I haven't had a chance to blog about yet!).



What better way to bid the old year goodbye with than this cute trio of festive animals. Meet Jingles the Reindeer, Pepe the Penguin (with his Santa hat), and Jolly the Snowman - all patterns by Little Muggles.



You may have noticed the semi-naked babies keeping Jingles company - they are little dolls made by Sonny Angel in Japan and we are all nuts about them in this house. Alice in particular - she has a sheep 'babee' and she can't sleep without holding it in her palm. There are many different styles of Sonny Angels, ones with animal, fruit or cake hats, or limited edition dolls like this Christmas set. The Japanese sure know how to do 'cute'!



These sweeties tend to hang around my sewing desk, keeping me company (at the moment whilst I am indulging in some hexie paper piecing therapy, making a doll quilt for Alice).



Season's greetings and my warmest wishes for a new year filled with happiness, good health, and cherished memories!

Lil Quack

In February last year I discovered the world of amigurumi whilst browsing Pinterest - and I was hooked (get it? Ha ha! I know, I am so lame). I must have pinned several hundred amigurumi that day, including these (links to all pics and websites they came from are on my Pinterest board here). For those who aren't familiar, amigurumi is "the Japanese art of knitting or crocheting small stuffed animals and anthropomorphic creatures" (thanks Wikipedia).



So I learned to crochet a few months later via an online video school (details here) just to have a go at making these. I have already shared pictures of some of the dolls and bunnies I have made since then. Those following me on Facebook and Instagram would have seen lots and lots more 'amis' on my feed (incentive to join me on social media?). I know, I know I have been really naughty not sharing them here sooner. Time to rectify!



One of my favourite amigurumi designers is the wonderfully talented Amy from Little Muggles. I didn't know this at the time when I made the collage above, but quite a few of those designs are hers, you can see more in her shop. This one is called 'Lil Quack' and is one of my faves.



Has anyone seen a cuter sailor duck?



More amigurumi cuteness coming very soon. I am determined to enter the new year with my blog fully up to date with all my latest work, and there will be some exciting changes too (including a shiny new blog design, and changes to the way I run my Etsy shop to allow me to have more time for blogging, and life in general. Sleep would be nice too.) Stay tuned!

Down the Rabbit Hole...

The November issue of Homespun magazine is out today! Featuring my third project for them: a set of Wonderland hoop art.



The editor's intro made me giggle - it says:

"The time has come," Sedef Imer said, "to stitch up Alice things: the queen of hearts and her royal guards, and mad hatter in Wonderland rings." (with apologies to Lewis Carroll)

Great rhyming there Homespun!
 


The feature has a full step by step tutorial over 10 pages. The characters are felt applique and entirely hand-sewn. There is some light padding behind the felt pieces to give the hoops a 3D finish.




I showed my picture in the magazine to Alexander, who said: "Mummy! How did you get into the book?! Am I in the book? I want my picture in the book too!!" (cue tantrum - oh the joys of three year olds). Bless him.



If you would like to make your own Alice hoops, Homespun's November issue is available in the shops from today (also available digitally for those outside of Australia, in various formats including Zinio. Follow this link).



ps - If you like this project, you may want to check out my Little Red felt applique which was posted here in April 2014.

Happy Halloween!

Instagram is my new addiction, I am seriously hooked! My insta-feed has been full of Halloween crafts lately, which have been inspiring me. Unfortunately I didn't have any time for a big project (seriously buried under a mountain of custom orders, lots and lots of late nights here - yawn). So I decided to start a new tradition and make a few super-quick Halloween-y ornaments. I am planning to add to these every year, until I have enough to decorate a tree (and by tree I mean a collection of bare black twiggy branches).



These are really quick to make, took me 15-20 minutes each so they were all done and ready to hang in an hour. I mean seriously, how cute is that baby ghost?!



Pattern credits and links as follows: the baby ghost is by A Morning Cup of Jo, Jack Skellington is by Little Things Blogged, and the witch hat is by Lion Brand Yarn. Enjoy!

Alice turns two

Two years ago this cheeky girl was just a few days old, and had already won our hearts. Look at her now, baby no more! (Every now and again that fact hits me when I'm looking at her photos or when she does something really really grown up).



If you were to ask her what her favourite food in the world is, she would reply 'those'. 'Those' is her word for mini marshmallows, the little ones from the baking aisle you put in muffins and rocky road.

"Mummy! Mummy!" (pointing at the pantry door)
"What do you want Alice?"
"Those." (cheeky grin)

So I simply had to make her a cake covered with 'those' for her birthday this year. Who knows what she will be into next year, but this year, it's marshmallows. Now, I am no Nigella in the baking department, and it's been a while since I made a cake. Luckily for me decorating a cake with marshmallows is HIGHLY forgiving. I am quite pleased with the overall effect (don't look too closely!).



And then a couple of weeks ago I was browsing in my local Target and I spotted this chiffon dress. At the risk of being disowned by all my dress-maker friends in the hand-made world, I put it in my basket. It was too good a match with her (at that stage, planned) cake not to.



We had a little family celebration just amongst ourselves. As predicted, she LOVED the cake, and was picking marshmallows off it before it even hit the table.



As presents she got a doll, a little pram, and a straw hat. All of which were huge hits. She was also going to get a little wooden bed for her doll and a patchwork mini-quilt and pillow, but I couldn't finish them in time (sorry, my love!). She will get them for Christmas.
 




My gorgeous little girl, my sweet Alice - happy second birthday darling. Thank you for choosing us as your family, and for all the laughter and joy you have brought into our life.

Spring | Scrappy bookmark

I blinked and spring is here in South Australia! One day we had the heating on and were still sleeping in flannel PJs, the next the kids were running around in summer clothes and sandals! The change in seasons has come upon us very quickly this year. The kids are absolutely loving it though. They are inspecting the leaves on our local vines daily (did I mention we live in wine country?) - we are all looking forward to this year's grape crop.



I have made some lifestyle changes recently, and one of these was to get back into book reading. I have been a book worm ever since I learnt to read. My husband is the same, we have a big library in our house, floor to ceiling bookcases, brimming. We are quite old-fashioned I suppose, no e-books or Kindles here, we both like the solid feel of a book and the pleasure of turning real pages.  Before I had kids I would read at least one novel a week, often two (thanks somewhat to the loooong commutes to work in London, where I used to live before moving to Australia). But since having kids and setting up Down Grapevine Lane I get so little spare time, and when I get into bed at night I am so tired I just collapse in a heap. Without books something big was missing in my life. And then I discovered Good Reads a few weeks ago - I must have been living under a rock not to have come across this website before! It's a social networking site for book reviews and discussions, where readers can upload their libraries by scanning them and give them star ratings and so much more. It re-ignited my love of books, so I picked up a book I have been looking forward to reading for a long time - Tracy Chevalier's latest novel: The Last Runaway.



The Last Runaway is set in Ohio in 1850 and is about the story of an English Quaker girl who emigrates to America and her experiences of adjusting to life in her new country, and how she gets involved with the Underground Railroad, a network helping runaway slaves from the south escape to freedom. The best part of the book is - it has quilts in it! The heroine is a quilter, and there are wonderful comparisons of English patchwork style of quilting versus Ohio applique quilting - quite fascinating. I get the impression that Tracy Chevalier must be into sewing as one of her previous books, The Lady and the Unicorn, featured tapestries.

When I had a spare hour last week I sat down and quickly sewed up a zakka-style scrappy bookmark, to make my book-reading experience doubly enjoyable. I took some pictures during the making of it so a tutorial will follow soon.



In other news, the cover of Homespun magazine's September 2013 issue featuring my umbrella and gumboots embroidery has been nominated for best magazine cover of 2014 in The Maggies awards! I couldn't believe it, what an honour for me! Voting closes in 10 days, I would be eternally grateful if you could click on the link and cast your vote for Homespun, it's a quick check box voting system.



And last but not least, I am finally on Instagram. I don't know why it took me so long to sign up, I love it already. Follow me there on @downgrapevinelane for more of an inside scoop and behind the scenes pictures of what goes on at Down Grapevine Lane headquarters.