Handmade Halloween

This years Halloween was pretty fun.  I returned to my favorite mask designer, Oxeyedaisey, on Etsy and purchased her fox and skull mask patterns and went to town.  I made all the masks from wool felt this year, and purchased pieces from Prairie Woolens - what an amazing selection they provide!

I stayed with a traditional skull for my husband but worked embroidery into my mask and turned it into a Catrina theme with flowers and a veil.

The pirate designed and developed her own costume from the (sadly) increasingly neglected dress-up box.  My three woodland creatures took a bit of help from me.

The fox was straightforward and we added an improvised tail from flannel and fake fur.  The hedgehog mask was purchased from on The Masked Menagerie on Etsy.  I self-designed the body suit with lots of inspiration and a tutorial from Alida Makes.  The whitetail deer was improvised off the base pattern from the fox, with inspiration for coloration and details from Magical Attic on Etsy.

Overall the costumes turned out great and the masks will be heirlooms in our costume closet.  Indeed, this holiday I loaned out our wolf, rooster and hen masks to friends for Halloween fun!

"Who" knows what next year will bring...maybe a family of wise owls?!

FO: Socks and Oven Mitt



pomatomus socks (free knitty.com pattern by cookie a.)

The kids are finally back at school this week.  And I have to admit that this year I wasn't ready for them to go.  I miss them already.  They were in school up to the 23rd, so the holidays were quickly, and furiously upon us.  There was constant celebrating, eating, travelling, and present-opening for a week straight.  Then the new year. 

Then the quiet.  The reading.  The game-playing.  The sleeping in!  The lazy breakfasts.  The laughter.  The hugs and kisses.  The park visits and walks in the woods.  [The WI weather has been creepily mild, more like Thanksgiving than mid-winter.] 

And suddenly we became a family again.  I was Mom - not the morning John McEnroe-ish referee throwing backpacks, sack lunches and gym shoes across the living room.  My daughters were my sweet babies - not whining procrastinators who sprang from the earth to spill my coffee and draw on the checkbook.  My husband was my partner - not the blur moving out the door to catch the bus, nor an e-mail address I send mid-day planning e-mails to.

And I miss us - us as a family.  I am glad that we are going into this new year together - all of us holding these fantastic memories, collectively.  I hope that they can sustain us through the chaos that will unfold as these first weeks back descend.

My first two knitting projects of the new year are off the needles however.  I put the finishing touches on my pair of pomatomus socks.  And I am so happy with how they turned out.  The look like chain mail - like silver pillars of strength on my feet.

And my very own oven mitt (pattern here) came off the needles and was felted on New Year's Eve.  It took about 2 days to dry completely, so I didn't actually use it until after the new year.  I love this mitt, however.  It is very thick and works great with my style of baking and cooking.  I rarely go above 450 degrees F, and this mitt has worked great so far.  I did felt it quite a bit.  You'll see from the photo that it is considerably smaller than the standard mitts sold at stores, but I like that it is more fitted to my hand.  There's no bulk to get in the way.



out of the frying pan (oven mitt pattern by amy e. anderson)

Valentines Hearts

In honor of Valentine's Day my youngest and I put together a small decoration for the dining room, the place we gather everyday as a family. I free-cut the hearts while she chose the contrasting fabrics, their placement and the order I sewed it together.

This is quite possibly the first heart-themed craft I have ever completed and while I am not totally sold or inspired to do something like it again it did fulfill February's Rumpelstiltskin Challenge: Red. We are not big into this 'Hallmark holiday,' but having these little hearts in the heart of our home is a nice reminder of how much love passes through here everyday.

Acorns

It's fall around here, and inspiration is everywhere.



I made these up one night last week while hanging out with friends. It was my first try at needle felting. Can't say I am a huge fan, but it sure was fun to try something new. It was very simple: I waded up the roving and punched it with the needles until it was roughly acorn-shaped. Then I snipped off one end, filled the acorn cap with glue, and stuck the wool in. Simple, colorful and festive.

While it seems like a great project to do with kids, I wouldn't advise using the felting needles (ouch!) with small children. The little ones did help me collect the acorns, and acorn tops, however. If you wanted to involve kids, maybe you could give this a try with wet felting instead? I imagine you could similarly wad up the roving, felt it in your hands with a bit of hot water, and let them dry before gluing them into the tops.



The roving is from a trip to Stitches Midwest 2009, from the Village Spinning and Weaving Shop, and I love the color assortment. I was thinking these colors would also make a lovely necklace of small wool beads - or a garland of larger ones.

Holiday Gift Monday: Bed post pillows

This Christmas I decided to try something new with gift-giving. I asked each girl to think about a gift they would like to give their other sister. I didn't say it had to be handmade - rather I let them dream and we back filled with an idea that could be managed at home, with materials on hand. I was amazed with how quickly my mind adapted to putting an idea into action and am even more amazed with how important these gifts are to the girls.

Here are the simple gifts that the twins gave each other. One said, "I think my sister would like Rudolph," and the other said, "I think my sister would like a unicorn." I worked with each girl separately and quickly found images that could be used as templates. They each sat with me while I cut out the shapes from cheap poly felt. Then that was about it for their attention span and I let them go to play while I finished up.

I thought about framing the felt cut-outs, but wanted something more interactive. And the bed post/door knob pillow idea was born. I sewed the cut-outs to a piece of white linen (9-inch square), sewed two squares into a pillow, threw in some stuffing - just enough to make them poofy - and placed a ribbon in the top seam for hanging. The back is embroidered with their name and the date. The girls have taken to hanging them on their bed posts and the door knobs to their closets. But I also like them hung up on the wall. Wouldn't a whole series of these look great on the wall? You could do an entire theme - automobiles, flowers, whatever - and hang them in a row or group. I think they would look great. Art that is kid-friendly, homemade, interactive and beautiful.

Up next is the gift the twins chose for their little sister...

We come like trees

When the twins turned one I made each of them a book with photos of the immediate family members. Madeline's first year came and went. I realized I hadn't made her book. So I am technically making it for her second birthday, but will give it to her early.

They are simple books: embroidered felt covers with construction paper pages that are laminated with the photos. I punched three holes along one side and placed binder rings to keep them together. I also wrote in peoples names and their relationship to each girl.

I love these books for many reasons. Early on the girls used them to learn the names of family members that live far away. They are also a photographic record of our family and its changes over time. In the years since I made the books for the twins we've sadly lost some family members. But, with great joy we've also added a few too. There is also a quote, by Maya Angelou, that opens each book. It reads:

No one comes from the earth like grass
We come like trees
We all have roots

We do not practice or explore religion/spirituality in a formal, organized manner - this saying does, however, come very close to what I consider to be my faith. My faith that life and spirit endure; they were present before we were and will persist after we are gone. The saying is superimposed over a black and white photo of the gigantic catalpa tree that my husband and I were married under.

I've never kept baby books, not really even a record of things like first steps, first words or first foods. I feel badly about this, but hope that some of the other things that I've done for my kids during their first years of life will make up for this. One thing I do is take photos - lots of them - and I hope that they will fill in where memories fade.

...Finish another project?

Here are some pictures of three felted coin purses I have sitting on my shelf. I knit them up, sewed the seams, even made the accompanying flowers, felted everything (in our frontloading washer no less) and then let it all sit. I need to sew the flowers on to the outside and add the zippers - seemingly easy enough tasks, but for some reason it's just not getting done. Maybe I'll work on them this weekend. While the pictures don't do them justice they are the richest colors. I picked up the kit (from Pick Up Sticks!) at a small yarn store, Knitch, in southeastern Wisconsin while husband and I were on vacation with our youngest daughter (3 mos. old) in late December. I would be remiss not to mention the lovely b&b we stayed in - The Inn at Pine Terrace - their oversized spa tub made the entire trip worth it. I also picked up the felted poinsettia wreath kit for next year - hopefully I'll get around to that after the advent calendar (which I have yet to blog about) is complete.