Muesli Slice

This is a very yummy muesli slice that I have made twice in a manner of weeks. It is that good!


I've taken the Recipe from the Women's Weekly Babies and Toddlers cookbook and made some modifications.

Muesli Slice
125g butter
1/3 cup firmly packed brown sugar
2 tablespoons honey
1 cup rolled oats
1/2 cup dessicated coconut
1/2 cup sultanas
1/2 cup dried cranberries (craisins)
(original recipe asks for 1/2 cup each of chopped dried apricots, dried apples, sultanas)
1/2 cup self raining flour

1. Combine butter, sugar and honey in a large saucepan; stire over medium heat, without boiling, until sugar dissolves. (I microwave butter and sugar). Remove from heat; stir in remaining ingredients.

2. Press mixture into greased and lined 20x30cm pan. Bake, uncovered, in moderate oven (170C fan forced) about 20 minutes or until golden brown. Cool in pan; cut into squares to serve.

Fun in the kitchen

Lemon Meringue Pie:


Inside:


Recipe taken from a lovely baking book I bought in the US when we travelled through 4 years ago. I have also made the easy brownies from this book which turned out fantastic. I have quite a few pages ear marked for future cooking endeavours!

Hot Pink

Happy Mothers Day to all the Mums out there. Aren't hand made presents WONDERFUL??! Boo's childcare made up a little plaque with her handprints and a photo of her on it and I absolutely adore it. I will treasure that one forever.

Here are some beautiful flowers that I received:


I have been back working on the baby quilt. I think I am doing something wrong with the quilting part.. the lines aren't straight, the stitches just don't look nice and there is so much puckering.. sounds ominous doesn't it? Hope I'm not scaring too many quilting people..

About Time!

Okee.. I have been a bit slow in popping this on my blog b/c I was waiting until my blog hit the stratosphere and had won a few awards.. Ah-huh.. not likely! So... after winning Karen's Pay it Forward a while back, I am finally putting my own Pay It Forward up. The PIF goes as follows:

"I will send a handmade gift to 3 random people who leave a comment on this blog post. I don’t know what that gift will be yet and you may not receive it tomorrow or next week but you will receive it within 365 days, that is my promise! The only thing you have to do in return is pay it forward by making the same promise on your blog."

Hand Quilting Lesson

Just recently, I attended a lesson on hand quilting. There were six of us and we sat around working on our stitching and had a lovely little chat about many things. It was so nice and casual and relaxed, as any get together should be. Here is a picture of my piece of hand quilting including the basting stitches that are weaved through the piece in purple. I didn't get very far and have not sat down with it since. I'm amazed at what an art form hand-quilting is. You have to move the tiniest little needle in a special rocking motion in order to get through the batting and to create the smallest stitches possible. You have to get used to using a thimble or you will wreck your fingers. All, in all, a lovely day out!

Special fabrics

I have received some thrifted sheets which I think are absolutely adorable.


I also received the following three aprons. I will keep the second one in the stack as an apron - its a gorgeous shape/design. I'd really like to make something with the fabric from the first. I am thinking of making a case with it or maybe keep it simple and just edge it as a tea towel. There is not very much usable fabric so it will be a challenge.

Beautiful Knots

I have been so inspired by the wonderful knitting on blogs like retromummy and Kylie's, that I have bought some wool and knitting needles! I went to the Bendigo woollen mills as recommended by retromummy. This is my sampler. My mother in law helped me get the hang of it. She is a fabulous teacher and taught me how to read a pattern so that I can get started on a project. I am going to start off knitting a hat which will hopefully be sized right to fit Sarah. She desperately needs a hat for winter. I have been looking in the shops and have not seen many winter hats which is disappointing but which is good as its motivating me to have a go at making one of my own.

Doll's Basket/Bassinet Tutorial

This doll's basket is very easy to make. I've used the pattern from an old Family Circle sewing book ("Family Circle Treasury of Dolls & Cuddly Toys"). The instructions weren't very clear and caused me to make a jumbled mess before I realised where I was going wrong. I've now re-written the instructions and taken lots of photos while making the basket and I hope someone might find it useful. If you do use it, please drop me a line and show me your basket!

Materials:
I used denim and the book recommends garbardine.

Cut 1, 136 X 30cm piece of material for basket sides & matching interfacing
Cut 1, 136 X 4.5cm piece of material for reinforcing strip
Cut 2, 30 X 10cm handles
Cut 2, 52 X 27cm rectangles of material to form the base of the basket. The material base will have a 1cm seam allowance bigger then the masonite/cardboard base. The corners need to be curved.
Cut 1, 50 X 25 rectangle of heavy cardboard or masonite to use as the base of the basket. You will need to round the edges.

Step 1 - Cut out the basket pieces. Use heavy-weight interfacing on the basket panel as you will want the basket sides to be strong enough to stand up on their own.



Step 2 - Fold the handles in half and then fold each edge into the middle to create a casing. Iron these edges. Sew along the length of each handle a number of times to reinforce them.

Step 3 - Fold the basket side in half and iron it to mark a line that we will work off for the rest of the tutorial. Unfold the basket side panel and lay it flat on your work area. Allow for a 1 cm seam line at each end of your length of fabric, then mark half and quarter markings along the length of the fabric.

Step 4 - Sew the handles 6 cm on either side of the quarter markings and 1 cm below the fold line. Reinforce the handle stitches as you see fit.



Step 5 - Take the reinforcing strip and fold it in 1 cm on either side. Lay the strip right sides facing onto the basket side and match the upper reinforcing fold line with the basket side fold line. Sew this edge to the basket so that it will then fold down and meet up with the basket side fold line (and hence the top of the basket edge when everything is folded down later on).



Step 6 - Turn the reinforcing strip down and then sew the bottom edge of the reinforcing strip to the main basket.





The unit should look as follows:



Step 7 - Pin the edges of the basket panel together to form a large circle. With right sides together, sew 1cm from the seam.





Step 8 - You will work with everything inside out for the next few steps. Open the basket panel and place upright on the table to create a circular shape. Take one of the basket bases and pin it to the bottom part of the basket panel (the handles will point to the top of the basket, so the other end is the bottom). I marked quarter marks around the basket sides and around the basket base to help me distribute the base evenly. Sew all the way around - right sides are facing. Use a 1cm seam allowance. This part will become the basket's "outer" wall and base.



Step 9 - Turn the unit over and pin the other basket base to the top part of the basket wall. Only sew half way around this end. This part will become the basket's "inner" wall.



Step 10 - Turn the basket inside out by pulling the fabric through the hole you have left while sewing the base. Do you remember how we put a fold in the basket walls at the very beginning? Now you can use this fold to create the sides of the basket. You now have an outer and inner part to the basket.



Step 11 - Insert your piece of cardboard or masonite into the base of the basket. Hand stitch the opening in the inside of the basket closed.



Step 12 - Well done! You have finished your doll's basket!

Busy Bee

OK, a bit of a catch up. There has been a birthday party - see pic. We managed to fit 9 people around our dining table which is the largest number of people we've ever had around it!



We have been busy doing some painting. Our lounge and dining were a glorious shade of orange when we moved into the house and its taken us near on 2 years to get that colour painted out. Admittedly we've been pretty busy fumbling our way through Boo's first year! So this is our new lounge room. To go from a dark colour to a very light colour really did make the room feel twice as big afterwards. I've always thought it very cute when bloggers snap their work and find "little helpers" in the shot afterwards. Boo, right on cue, grabbed a toy I'd cleared away and zoomed into shot.



Here is a teaser for a project I am working on. I've used some very heavy-weight interfacing for this project and I am wondering if I need to go and buy some stronger sewing needles before I start sewing.



I have another teaser for something special that I am doing tomorrow.

Muscling in on the action

Here is part 2 of the dolls project. I finally got his face sewn on today and my niece helped me stuff him.



I hereby present the dynamic duo:

My first bag

I am DIZZY with excitement at having made my first bag! Whoop-de-dee!!!



The most exciting thing is opening it up to see the lovely pockets that are included in the inside of the bag! I made them!! To *my* specifications!! Admittedly I'm not too specific as I just cut some rectangles and bunged them on! ;)



And here is the inside of the bag with my mobile phone in the "phone slot" and a space for my glasses and keys. Am I the only one incredibly excited at the thought that I can just make up my own pockets to go ANYWHERE I WANT rather then being confined to some other bag makers idea of where I should put my stuff? OK.. shall calm down now. :D



I followed a mix of instructions to make this bag. I intially had the Amy Butler Messenger bag pattern but I decided I did not like that the bag closure was narrower then the actual bag. I found these instructions at craftster which was more of the type of bag I wanted, so I loosely followed those instructions and referenced the AB pattern for when the craftster instructions weren't quite clear (bag straps and inserting the lining - I had already sewn the lining together so AB's turning out instructions worked better).

I have used a stretched denim and a nasty print from SL. The print is definitely a polyester blend and it was horrible to work with for this type of project. The material seemed to stretch when I ironed it which meant that when I put iron-on interfacing onto it, it then warped when it cooled! There wasn't much I could do about it. I soldiered on but would definitely only use cottons in the future.

Bib for Bubs

The characters in this material are so cute! I bought the material ages ago to use for a quilt. I don't think I would ever use it nowadays though - its a little too bright for me, but it looks fantastic as a bib for bubs.

Potholder

I don't think you call these things potholders, but can't think of what they are called. I put batting in the middle, made a quilt sandwich, put bias binding around the edge. Fun :)

Fun in the garden

I was so chuffed with the tee that I gave it to Miss Boo to wear straight away.

Applique Elephant

I have finally had a go at putting an applique onto a tshirt. Thanks to Karen for all the advice she passed on to me. I have used vlisofix to attach the applique to the tshirt, then attached some vlisene to the back of the applique area to help with sewing the applique on. I have used various quilting books on advice of how to machine sew appliques in place. My Mum gave me the book that had this design in it - a US book from when she was in a quilting group there. I am very happy with the results and love the thought of being able to make one-off originals for my daughter! Plus, she needs some new tees!

Wishing

Who said that every wish would be heard and answered
when wished on the morning star?
Somebody thought of that
and someone believed it,
and look what it's done so far.
What's so amazing that keeps us stargazing?
And what do we think we might see?
Someday we'll find it, the rainbow connection,
the lovers, the dreamers and me.

I was looking up some song words for my daughter as my memory is a bit lacking from all my childhood songs and I found the Kermit song and the snippet above.. how gorgeous are those words? If you want a link for the melody - try Rainbow Connection

Love Musk

Two things in one day?

Well, I have made another pouch. This time I did the stitching differently.

The closed pouch:


The inside of the pouch:


Spot the error? Its actually too small to fit the wipes AND the nappy in at the same time - its not quite wide enough to fold. I actually had plenty of material to make it properly but forgot to include the seam allowances, folded the side flaps over too far and thoroughly stuffed it up. Not to worry, its all a learning process and I had lots of fun trying to work this out - turning it inside and out and I used double sided interfacing, ironing the second side as I felt appropriate and using it to help me position the panel. It was all good fun! So now all I've got to do is work out what to use this pouch for! I have made progress photos and will try to write it up as a tutorial.

Thoughts for next time:
* include a fastener of some kind - either velcro or a snap tab

Not sure what is wrong with me but I am obsessed with making stuff today - I have so many sewing ideas and I have some cooking to do and I obviously do not have time for this! I will probably be curled up in a ball, chanting, by the end of the day and be surrounded by dodgy cutting, scraps galore and burnt food.

Nappy Pouch

I have been wanting to make one of these for a while. I took some ideas out of a quilting book that I had and mucked around until I came up with this:





Its very simple, looks fantastic (love this Michael Miller fabric), and does the job I wanted - just a simple little pouch to take when we are visiting friends/ go to a cafe etc.

Here is the result of some baking we did during the week. Boo kept coming up and hanging around my legs waiting for another pikelet. I gave her two and asked her to give one to Daddy. She didn't understand, and went to eat both! I rescued it and I took the other to Daddy. The second time I asked her, she understood and would take Daddy's pikelet to him with her arm outstretched saying "Daddy, Daddy!" Sooo cute.

Luscious Books!

I mentioned back in January that I was ordering some post-Christmas craft books. We got them through Amazon and they arrived about a week ago (slow-mail to keep it cheap!). It was so exciting opening this box of books - so much crafting to pore over! There were also some cool children's books that I'd ordered. Our fave book is Millie Moo which I've purchased a few copies of to give to friends as gifts.