Tattoos and Drool

Wordless Wednesday – Baby Bus

My crafts, let me show you them

So, um. Crafty is pretty much my middle name. I can’t sing, I can’t dance, I can’t do math. But if it involves a French seam or a ruffle or some 100% cotton batting, I’m your chick.

My fabric stash is a little famous amongst my friends. See? Here it is.

Although it doesn’t even come close to touching the awesomeness of other stashes I’ve seen out in the blogosphere, it’s mine. I’m a little addicted.

I don’t have a really interesting and sentimental story about how my grandma taught me to sew dresses on her old Singer and she helped sew flags during the war and then she handed her machine down to me, or something. My story is much more boring and blah. I taught myself to sew (although it was on my mom’s old machine). Pretty straight-forward. I knew nothing other than how to thread the needle and press the pedal. But thanks to the depths of the internet and its wonderfully crafty collection of blogs, I learned. A lot.

Youtube also taught me to knit while I was pregnant with Avonlea. I still haven’t made more than a few hats, but meh. I like to dabble.

I remember the first thing I ever made. It was a “quilt,” as I called it, even though it wasn’t actually quilted in any way. I used the cheap polyester batting because I didn’t know any better. It was just simple squares, no pattern. I didn’t know that a rotary cutter or plastic quilting rulers existed, so I used a piece of plywood and traced it on the fabric with a ball-point pen. That thing was ridiculous. But someone thought it was beautiful (hi Lissa!) and that inspired me to make more. And more, and more.

I kind of used to have a pretty lucrative business sewing custom baby blankets, quilts and other accessories. I paid for my iMac in tag blankets. 1900 dollars in tag blankets, in a three-month span. True story.

Those were the good old days.

Now that I have less time and less sanity, I don’t sew much for a profit any more. I’m lucky if I get time to sew things for my own kids, or as gifts. It’s an easy thing for me to get burnt out on, so I’ve found that I have to keep the pressure of deadlines to a minimum or I’ll stop enjoying it. Every once in awhile I’ll accept a couple custom orders. Which then take me three weeks to fill. And I remember why I don’t do that any more.

The one thing that will never get old is the thrill I get when I create something new. There’s just something cool about making it yourself.

I’ve made blankets with fluffy sushi on them.

A ginormous slice of fluffy pie.

I made Babygirl’s crib bedding, and learned that I will never ever do a ruffle by hand ever again.

I have many works in progress, like this quilt for my sister. That was supposed to be a gift last Christmas. Oops.

I dabble in ginormous head-swallowing hairbows.

I knit my kid a hat. That thing took forever.

And I love it. All of it.

Wordless Wednesday – Dimple

Aptly named because it’s the first thing I notice every time she smiles. OMG DIMPLE.

Wordless Wednesday – My new favorite health food store.

Just a small sampling of their anti-H1N1 vaccine window decor. HEART.

Wordless Wednesday – Houston, we have a voice

Avonlea Talks from Alicia Melban on Vimeo.