some first rate second-hand finds

it has been a great phase of second-hand finds for me.  I have been thinking more and more about the great, unseen costs of the kind of rampant consumerism I am often tempted by.  and, as a result, I’m paying more attention to how to buy things second-hand.  but, not just second-hand…also how to buy things that support all the things I love and believe in…like the proliferation of art and other ways to make my world beautiful.  so, I was thrilled when I chanced upon these golden guide books at our library book sale.  the boys and I have poured through them.  they are so beautiful.  I already have ideas about hand-carved stamps and printed fabric based on some of the images.   

I also picked up these art books…at $2 a piece I figured we can look at them or even tear them up for an art project.  why not?

later in the week, my husband and I took a much -deserved afternoon date to a local artsy town.  I saw these great wooden stamps.  I was tempted to buy them but ended up walking away from them.  as beautiful as they are, I just couldn’t add to the house clutter with an incomplete alphabet.
I did, however, take this guy home.  what an incredible stamp, right?  I can’t wait to play around with how this one looks stamped on fabric!  on a tote bag, perhaps? we will see.  I was drawn to this stamp and I’m running with it. finally, my luck brought me to a chest in the basement of a huge antiques shop where I found yards and yards of great wool fabric, a beautiful piece of lace/eyelet fabric(?) and fantastic red vintage buttons.  I couldn’t believe my luck.  I’ve had a few ideas rolling around to use wool so I was thrilled to snatch that up.  as for the other items, I’m going to let them inspire me…who knows what the outcome with be.

the staple dress

I made a dress.  it’s a real one. I will wear it.  I’m pretty excited.  my enthusiasm is a teeny little bit tempered by how much bloody effort went into making it.  but I’m still very excited.  by the way, don’t be fooled by this serene expression.

there was swearing (and not the quiet, under the breath kind…the loud thank-goodness-I’m-alone kind); there was kicking things and there was the “forget this! I give up”-ing.  it’s mildly embarrassing but sewing isn’t all unicorns and rainbows sometimes.

the pattern is the staple dress from april rhodes and I’ve been tempted to make it since it came out a few months ago.  the pattern is beautifully done and the dress is so simple to make.  plus, it looked so beautiful in all of april’s pictures.  then the women behind go make shit issued a staple dress challenge and I piped up with “I’m in!”. ha. the challenge ended at the beginning of april.  you could say I missed that boat.

my first attempt looked like a ridiculous hospital gown.  the first thing my husband asked me when he saw it was “did you leave it open in the back?”.  harumph was my response.  so, I attempted a kind of ad-hoc resizing and sewed a version in jersey knit fabric.  I resized it quick and I sewed it together quick and resulting dress looked like something quickly resized and thrown together.  not a huge surprise.  I did not take pictures, it was too depressing.  this was around the time of the “forget it! I quit”-ing.  so, the pattern sat there untouched for a while.

but, when I came across a beautiful plum flower print I decided to buck up and try it again.  this time I took my time and made it one full size smaller to xs (I am not an xs girl, I promise.  it’s a roomy dress and is designed to have more ease than I prefer in my clothing.).  I also altered the sleeves so they are tighter…the gaping hole as a sleeve thing just isn’t for me.

plus, I added a notch to the top of the dress. it makes it more comfortable for me and a little less ho-hum.  here it is without a belt, the gathers are formed using elastic thread in the bobbin.  I love the effect of these gathers and I love how simply it comes together but I have to admit that the feeling of elastic thread against my skin is not that comfortable…it will take a bit of getting used to.

as I mentioned, the print is what convinced me to try again.  it’s from the simply color line.  have you seen this already? the whole line is pretty impressive and include ombre prints that can be used to make some stunning quilts such as this one.  plus, the fabric is soft and a bit lighter weight than everyday quilting cotton. kind of quietly amazing if you ask me.

by the way, I’ve been on a little bit of a clothes-making kick lately.  not that you would know it since I haven’t blogged about any of it….that’s my bad.   sometimes when I’m in the swing of making things I just don’t have the energy to write about it.  it’s as if my ‘creating brain’ and my ‘writing brain’ can’t coexist. that happen to anyone else?  also, we’ve been really busy.  I know everyone is busy and it’s no excuse.  but, seriously?!  in the last six 7 weeks everyone but me has had a birthday and that means I planned and executed three kick-ass birthday parties; my husband changed jobs AND got his U.S. citizenship; and we moved my studio.  I’m pooped.

a lovely brown paper package

about a week and a half back we got quite possibly the coolest package in the mail.  a complete, out-of-the-blue, absolutely delightful surprise of two books…Bee and Bird and Lots of Dots sent to us by the author Craig Frazier.

we love these books.  Craig’s images are playful and fun, the books are visually amazing and playful. Bee and Bird doesn’t have words, just images that play with the concept of perspective.  it’s lovely and fun and, in my opinion, its striking but spare images stretch the imagination in all the right directions.

this whole thing came about when we did an art project based off the images in Craig’s book Lots of Dots after checking it out at the library.  we used dots stickers to make our own images, here is our project.  I emailed Craig’s studio to share our project with him.  I figured it’s nice for me when I hear of other inspired by my classes or projects, so it’s probably nice for an artist to hear they inspired kids.  I never expected to hear from him! but, he wrote back and asked for our address…then I kind of forgot about it.  until this package arrived!

he even signed the books directly to the boys.  isn’t that sweet?  and he busted out some awesome first letters at the top of the page!   both boys are thrilled.  these are really super special books in our family library now.

C keeps talking about how he would like to be an author-illustrator when he grows up (and a race car driver and a Dad, btw).  it could be the equivalent of my childhood dream to be a princess-President or it could be something more grounded in reality.  who knows?  but getting a surprise paper package like this from someone with his dream grown-up life is, at the very least, a seed of inspiration.  thanks Craig! we are fans for life!

look at this cute little bird and her bee!

moving into the sun :: the family art room

last weekend we moved my sewing space from the basement up two flights of stairs into an upstairs bedroom and transformed the room into a family art room.  it’s huge. it is still soaking in for me.  I will be honest, this is a big deal.

now, I have talked a lot about how important it is to make space for creative endeavors.  when you make physical space, you make space in your life…making things becomes easy and accessible and it integrates into your everyday.  I really believe this and I also believe that making things by hand can be life-changing.  so, making space is a big deal.  but our house is small and the basement (you can see the old basement studio here) was the only place I could commandeer.  and, I was honestly ok with that.  in fact, I was thrilled.  it was the first time I’d made room for my creativity in a permanent way.

but the fact is I returned from the makerie with a renewed enthusiasm for making things in a beautiful and inspired space.  amy butler is particularly to blame for my new yearning; her workshop included a slideshow with some stunning photos of her home and studio.  it is so beautiful and she emphasized that the world around her keeps her attuned to inspiration and color ideas and essentially full of life.  amy is undoubtedly a passionate and alive person, it is difficult NOT to catch her enthusiasm and be swept up in it.  she is a woman living with great joy and passion.  it was impossible not to catch some of it.  and, I’m so glad I did.

for my part, teaching and sewing is, after parenting, what I spend much of my time focusing on.  shouldn’t I treat it like that?  the basement just wasn’t cutting it anymore. it was time to move into the sun.

so, I suggested that for mother’s day I might take over the playroom and turn it into a home office for me.  this might sound kind of bad.  steal the kids playroom?  but trust me, it is not bad.  it is actually quite beautiful.

{the old playroom}

the backstory is this: the playroom came to being when the boys decided they wanted to share a room.  so, the extra bedroom became their playroom.  except they never played in it.  or they played in it maybe once a week for an hour or so.  it was definitely underused. we made it as nice as we could and they still weren’t interested.

frankly, they wanted to play near us and that meant toys carefully arranged in the playroom would come bump, bump, bumping down the stairs and spread out all over the kitchen.  it frustrated me so much. “why is this big mess here in the kitchen when you have a whole playroom?”  yet, as soon as I considered using the playroom for my sewing space it became so obvious.  I LOVE that I have two sons so interested in being around their parents that they neglect a room full of toys.  it won’t always be like this.  I suppose soon they will be creating greater and greater distances between themselves and us.

now is the time.

besides, I want to start living my values with the boys.  I want them to see me take myself seriously and bring what I do and what I am passionate about more into their world.  and, then I happened to pick up the book side by side by tsia carson.  tsia believes that parents and children can work side by side on art projects even if they are working on different things….art with children doesn’t have to be centered around completing one project but it can branch out and move in a new, different direction for everyone involved.  her words resonated with me and suddenly the new room transformed into a family art room.  we can make things side by side, of course we can!    I am just getting started arranged the room, it is awfully scrappy looking at this point. but I have moved a lot of the standard kid art supplies up…googly eyes, pipe cleaners, markers, sketch paper, assorted buttons are all accessible to them.  and guess what they hang out there now!  ha!  in the last three days they have worked on two different projects in the family art room…both of their own design.  yesterday, C brought some legos upstairs and worked on a building a fire truck.  the irony is not lost on me that toys are now being brought up the stairs…scoot, scoot, scoot.

{a view of the fabric cabinet with plants (!) and the right hand wall with books and supplies}

it’s funny, I can’t figure out what took me so long! everyone is happier with this arrangement.  especially me.  I can’t help but wonder if it was my husband working from home, would have taken him as long to establish a sunny spot for himself?  I need to keep reminding myself that it’s ok to take up room.  why is that?  for his part, when I suggested I take over the playroom, he was all over the idea.  it seemed so natural to him.  of course I should do that!  It would be great!  my classes are above ground now, it only makes sense that everything else is, too.  between him, amy and tsia…I think I am in good hands.

As I settle in, I will be sharing the decorating and arranging of the room and reporting back on successes and failures.  I’ll let you know how the well the rules about “things that we don’t touch in the art room” are followed.

in the meantime, I’ll be in the sunshine making things!

little linen wallets

on a whim, during a recent trip to the always-inspiring rock paper scissors I picked up the cutest pattern for a little wallet.  it’s from valori wells and the whole pattern fits on a little card called a ‘sewing card‘.  it’s a clever design and a simple project and it has completely sucked me in.  I had no real plans for making little wallets but now I can’t stop. 
these are the first three I made and, trust me, I have made more…I just don’t have pictures of them yet.  these three are made with the lovely hand-printed linen I received in the handprinted fabric swap at maze and vale.  these are made with fabric scraps that lamina from do a bit sent along WITH her fat quarter of handprinted fabric.  the prints are so beautiful and have a lovely quiet but lively style.   the best part is I still have an entire fat quarter of her amazing fabric left to work with!  lucky me.

while making these I was truly contemplating different ways to become a millionaire so that I could work exclusively with lamina’s prints.  her style is bang on…organic prints with a geometric leaning in a stunning repeat.  her color choices pop out at you but not too much and they maintain a wonderful sophistication due to being printed on linen.  it is luxurious.  I’m so happy I got exposure to her work through the fabric swap.  lamina has a great feel for color and she uses bright colors but somehow manages to keep the overall looks so soothing.  It also inspire me to keep hand printing.  nothing beats the look of hand printing, I tell you. 

as for these wallets, they are lined with regular linen and fastened with a cowgirl snaps I got on etsy ages ago (sorry I can’t remember where.).  I kept the grey and pink kitty one for myself and gave the other two as gifts.  

they make great gifts…one of those nice little somethings.  I’m thinking that some of the others I made are going to be great teacher’s gifts at the end of the school year.  probably with a bit of cash inside, teachers deserve a bit of extra cash, ya know.

as an aside, thanks to everyone that entered the sew mama sew giveaway.  you are all so sweet and witty.  it took great willpower to avoid replying to everyone’s comments.  I usually like to do that but I didn’t want to mess with the random number generator by throwing in my own comments.  but, I appreciated each and every comment and was warmed by how many of you thought of others!  then again, that is crafters for you, isn’t it.  we are a good crowd.

the garden state

scoff if you must but new jersey is beautiful right now.  it’s a well-kept secret just how stunning this state can get.  and I don’t mean like Carmela Soprano-on-a-good-night stunning.  I mean, really, truly naturally stunning.

it catches me off-gaurd nearly every year.  I love spring like crazy already but springtime in Jersey is something to see.

 it seems that everything is blooming but especially the boxwoods.  the new growth popping up everywhere makes it impossible to resist…feels like a requirement to sit outside; watch a few bees do their busywork and daydream a little bit.  for us that always means plans.

lots and lots of plan-making…from A NEW HOUSE! to big, huge international travels! right on down to carrots vs. lettuce in the vegetable garden!  most of the plans are just mental wanderings but I love these kinds of conversations so much…where are we going? what exciting things are coming next?

spring seems to bring with it room enough for all of these plans and more.  even if the planning never goes any further than the bottom of my margarita glass.  the ritual of dreaming out loud makes for a happy spring.  I’m hoping you got a little bit of that, too.