Christmas at home

I feel so lucky to be able to spend Christmas with my lovely family this year. My Mum always goes all out to make Christmas a very special time for kids and adults alike. The house always looks incredible and she saves all the little bits and pieces off each years gifts to add to the wrapping and decorations in following years. I love that old is mingled with new.

Because she does all the hard work with the food preparation well in advance, we are left to enjoy ourselves and our children (and I get to spend more time making my gifts look pretty). I found the wonderful jingle bells in Countdown supermarket of all places and the felt personalised hearts were made by Stephanie of Liberty Lane.

Mum always decorates her cakes so beautifully, there is a lot of egging on for someone to be the first to cut into it.

I'll post more photos of her beautiful Christmas table later. Merry Christmas everyone!!

Pretty skirts

One of my lovely friends commissioned me to make four skirts for her daughter and neices for Christmas. I've just finished them and grabbed some quick photos before I give them to her tomorrow.

The bow is sewed on to a safety brooch so it can be removed for washing or for a different look.

I love the fresh colours and retro look of this one.


I made matching t-shirts for the little skirts. The embellishments are covered buttons in contrast fabrics. I'm thinking of doing this on a couple of my t-shirts!

Domestic bliss

Today I have been busy in the best kind of way.

I made mince pies from scratch with Maddy's help and raspberry and mint vinegar (yum!)

I used some gorgeous Alexander Henry puppy fabric to make skirts for my girls last night.

They wore them to the BEST puppy themed birthday party this morning. I loved the puppy birthday cakes and the shrinky dink dog tags the kids made. The party food was hot dogs (of course) and gingerbread dog biscuits. They played puppy training (for treats) and pin the nose on the puppy. Just fantastic! Happy Birthday Skye!!

Tonight is Craft Social and I've made a beach house for the swap. Some of the mince pies are coming too. Hope to see you there. 7.30pm. Devonport Community House. The swap theme is Summer Holidays if you want to join in.

Summer Holiday cushion covers

I've been loading up my Felt shop today and I'm offering a Christmas Special on these two "Summer Holiday" patchwork cushion covers. The special runs until Monday 14th December so get in quick. Click on the picture to go to my Felt shop.

Thriller

This is my amazing daughter at her dance recital tonight. She and her classmates did fantastic renditions of "Start the Party" and then "Thriller" which is what this costume is for.

She has practised and practised all this week with her friends and again this morning. The whole recital went on from 5.30 until after 8pm and she did her two acts without complaint. I am so proud of you Madeleine!!

It's another busy day for our family tomorrow. Maddy has a place in the Santa Parade (dressed in the Madeline costume in my last post) and I will be down in Devonport from 7am to set up for the Devonport Craft Market. The market opens at 10am and will be on until 3pm. There are lots of wonderful other events happening concurrently as part of the Devonport Christmas Festival.

Hope to see you there!

Madeline

It's the Devonport Santa Parade this weekend and my oldest daughter, Madeleine, is going to be part of her school float. The theme is "Literacy Garden". They planted a wonderful garden at the school earlier this year that the children can go and sit in to read at lunchtime. They have been asked to dress up as their favourite book character and Madeleine asked for a Madeline costume. I really hope its not too hot on the day or she will boil in the felt jacket!

Taking time

If you follow my blog, you'll know that I've been feeling pretty frantic recently. There have been a lot of markets to make for, markets to organise and a very special birthday party and I have been spending every spare moment restocking for the rest of the Christmas markets that I'm signed up for.

I can get very caught up in the process and panic of making enough stock for each market and sometimes I forget about the important things like enjoying the build up to Christmas when there are two wonderful little girls in the house.

As I lay awake at 4am the other morning trying to work out what I had left to make and when I was going to fit it in, it suddenly dawned on me that I was getting stressed out for no reason. Even if I spend every spare moment I have making everything I think I need to make, I am never going to feel that I have enough.

My main reason for selling at and organising these markets is because I love to create and have others share what I have created, so what am I stressing about? I have two little girls who are getting REALLY excited about Christmas so I have made it my mission to make time more time for them instead of making more stock that I have plenty of already.

We started with Christmas cookies and the school Christmas concert today and there's a trip to see a Christmas tree display tomorrow. Much more fun than all the stress I've been putting myself through!!

To do list

This time of year is always pretty crazy. I bet you have a list of things to do a mile long don't you? Me too.

There has been a special birthday in our house too.

We had 15 children over on Sunday for a party. Lots of fun but totally exhausting!

I've also been doing lots of making for Christmas fairs and markets. Here's my stall at last Friday's Devonport Creche Christmas Fair. It started at 7.30pm and involved large amounts of wine. A fantastic way to do your Christmas shopping in my opinion!

I got my Christmas cards out to our international friends and family by the skin of my teeth. I dragged the girls down to the beach last week to take some photos to put inside the cards. My plans to include a lovely picture filled newsletter fell by the wayside yet again but the photos came out great! Here's a couple of the best ones I took.

Sisterly love.

I've been indulging in little personalised gifts for the girls (really for me!) recently. Have a look at these stunning embroidered heart decorations by Stephanie of Liberty Lane. They are meant to go on the Christmas tree but I think they may stay where they are all year.

I also bought these fantastic fridge magnets from HJRD Design. They look gorgeous and they are a great way for kids to learn to spell their name (if you can bear to let them 'mess up' the design!

This Sunday is my last market of the year thank goodness. Much as I have loved all the thought, design and creativitiy that has gone into creating the goodies for all the Christmas markets, I'm keen to spend a little time making some gifts for my girls and the rest of my family. This Sunday's market is part of the Devonport Christmas Festival which is set to be huge. We have 20 stalls on Windsor Reserve in Devonport from 10-3. There will be a Santa Parade (11am) and loads of other entertainment including a bouncy castle, fire engine, kids rummage sale, food and the wonderful Dance in the Park. Hope you can make it!

Sneaky Peak

Crafternoon Tea tomorrow. Here's a sneaky peek of a few of the new goodies I have for sale.

Hope to see you there. The address details are in my previous post.

Frantic

Last Sunday's Devonport Craft Market was so much better than we could have imagined. Sarah and I had several late nights prior to it to make sure it went smoothly. We had a fantastic day with around 1000 people through the doors and an awful lot of spending. With lots of other markets coming up fast, including the wonderful Crafternoon Tea this Saturday, the late nights are continuing as I rebuild my stock levels. I'll be launching a few new goodies at Crafternoon Tea on Saturday so look out for:

Baby tape measure brooches

And sweater bunnies (and bears).

I've been working on some kids t-shirts today too but you will have to wait a day or two to see photos of those.

In the meantime, here's the flyer for Crafternoon Tea in case you fancy popping along.

Christmas Spectacular

Most of you will know that it's the biggest Devonport Craft Market of the year tomorrow. I really can't wait and Sarah of Songbird Designs and I have been crazily busy getting ready for it. I've managed to grab 5 minutes before we head down to the venue to set up to update my blog with some pics. I also amazingly managed to convince my beautiful daughters to do some modelling for me (gingerbread bribery!). So here you go. This is what I've been busy doing this week:

CUPCAKE TEE AND FLOWER FILLED FAIRY SKIRT

NEW APRONS

CUPCAKE PINCUSHIONS... good enough to eat!

AND A TEDDY.

Hope to see you there tomorrow!

The Devonport Craft Market, 32 Clarence Street, Devonport. 10am -3pm

Catch up...

Phew. It's been a busy old week this last one. It's our biggest Devonport Craft Market of the year this coming Sunday so we've been running around like crazy things sorting that all the little bits and pieces that need to be done for that.



Sarah of Songbird Designs (who organises the DCM with me) and I shared a stall space at a wonderful school fair last weekend. It was at the Michael Park Steiner School in Ellerslie which is an extraordinairy and magical place, full of beautiful wooden buildings and lovely grounds.

It was great to meet lots of lovely new people and lots of our things went to new homes.

That means a lot more sewing and making before this Sunday!

After all the excitement and exhaustion of the weekend, I ended up with a horrible migraine on Sunday night and missed out on the Craft Social. Sarah very kindly took my Santa for the Christmas themed swap down and I was lucky enough to get these beautiful beaded decorations from Helene of Mira Design.

And if that wasn't enough excitement for one week, it was my birthday yesterday.

I wasn't "seventy something" as my darling daughter told someone at school. Still 30 something but edging very close to the big F word! I had a wonderful day with great friends who made it very special for me. My lovely other half managed to come home far earlier than I expected from the event he was organising and brought me these stunning flowers.

I wish you could smell the roses. They smell like gardenias. Just beautiful!