little miss winter!

Little Miss Winter is all ready for her holiday travels!! She has her suitcase packed and ready to go!! But, shh, don't tell, as she is headed first to her new adoptive home!! :) I have her twin sister almost all stitched up as well too, and will get to enjoy all her holiday travels in the Northwest!!

Little Miss Winter was sew much fun to make!! I think she is one of my favorites!! I made her a bit smaller than the last few I've made and am sure happy with how she turned out!!

Her sweet little face was inspired by several of revoluzza's dolls that I've sure admired for quite some time!! For her body I enjoyed embellishing her with a couple cute polka dot buttons, some ric rac, and a little bit of crochet lace.

I used some of the sweet snowflake and polka dot fabric from this set for her hat. For the body I used some of the grid fabric from City Weekend for the hands and body, for the skirt I used the Swoon fabric from Bonnie and Camile. For the legs I used some Children at Play stripes for leggings from Sarah Jane, and some Gray corduroy from Joanns for the boots. For the face I used Essex linen, and wool felt.

I cut a simple little scarf out of the wool felt to keep her nice and warm during her travels. :)

Ta Ta!!

Well now I need to get some lovely packages shipped, and then tackle my huge pile of laundry...and when I say huge, I mean a huge mountain. It has been a bit crazy with my help gone the past couple weeks keeping up with everything. But I'm glad to say I've been making it through, and am even happier she'll be back for next week!! Hip hip hooray!! :)

PS. This week I got in the new Flower Sugar, and I already have it listed in the shop!! Go check it out as it is soo pretty!!

mushroom dolls!

I recently received these cute little mushrooms dolls!! They are super soft and sooo adorable!! These sweet little mushrooms girls were hand felted by the very talented Iris! I have always admired and adored all the wonderful and cute woodland pieces created by needle felting! One craft I am hoping to learn in the near future!!! These sure have me pushing myself to give it a try.

I just ordered these today!! They are the new Cosmo Cricket, Early Bird fabrics that should be arriving in my shop at the end of May or early June!! So excited for these yummy fabrics!!

Hope you are having a fantastic Friday!!

fun with swaps!

i've been having such a fun week with two swaps. a fabric swap with nettie, and celebrating handmade: the swap.

nettie and i are swapping some adorable japanese fabrics, hr fabrics, and some flea market fancy!! i feel so lucky to be doing this with nettie, and it has been so much fun!! thinking of all these fabrics just makes me feel so giddy! :)

for the celebrating handmade swap, i'm swapping with jessica yen, and it has been another wonderful experience. there is such a sweet story behind this swap, but it is kind of lengthy, so i hope you don't mind me sharing.

to start out, jessica emails me and tells me that she doesn't have any kids. since this is a swap where we are making a handmade toy she asked if she could gift hers to a little girl that lives next door to her. the little girl is here with her family from iran, and when i read that i started to tear up. i was born in iran when my parents were there with boeing back in the 70's. we had to leave quickly when the shah was taken over, and have never been able to return to visit. i've always had a longing to someday go there. (not right now though with all their political issues) but isn't that some coincidence?

and there is more!!! then jessica emails me a few days later, she tells me about how she just got back from dinner with some friends, and that they gave her a red envelope for chinese new year. jessica then explains to me how the elderly give the red envelopes to the kids for chinese new year, and how her grandmother did that for her. now this was dear to me as well since i lived in shanghai, china for a few years and knew exactly what she was talking about. i taught at an international school since my parents lived there while again, working for boeing. she then emails be back and tells me her brother is living in beijing right now, and she lived there a couple years ago, and that she loved visiting shanghai and is more a southern chinese girl! and of course since i was a young adult living there i have many more memories of china, than iran, and loved every minute while i was there.

hopefully you didn't mind finding out so much about me in one post. :)

little red riding hood~ i thought since little red riding hood is a western fairytale, it would give the little girl something she can take with her when her family returns to iran, that will remind her of living here.

i hope the little girl likes little red riding hood.

more lovelies for baby ava!

here are a few of the other handmade lovelies i made for tashas shower to also go in ava's nursrey. baby ava has the sweetest nursrey so you'll have to check out tasha's blog and see the adorable pictures!!!

the pictures from ava's nursrey are from tasha's blog! :) to see more click on the link above!!

yummy booties!! i made these ones from tanya whelans picnic rose in blue fabric

booties from the ohh, so cute japanese hedgehog fabric!!

i am in love with these vintage lamps!!! i found this at a second hand store and now have a couple for my family! :) and am still looking for more!!! this one though, was so perfect for ava's room.

for the banner i used this simple tutorial. the hardest thing with the banner was deciding on which fabrics to use since i could only use a few!!! i had too many cute ones to choose from. now that can be a problem!! :)

the ava doll!! i used bit of whimsey's doodle girl doll pattern for this adorable doll!

i also have to include one picture of the coin quilt in ava's nursrey! :) doesn't it go perfect with the adorable bumper tasha made!

i had so much fun making all the these lovely little handmades for tasha! she is one of my best friends and she has always been an inspiration to me. i would have never gotten into quilting if it wasn't for her encourgement. thanks tasha!!! :)