Waiting room

Sitting at home, waiting for the baby to make up her mind on when she's going to come out. Fine with me. I'm not in a hurry. Weather is fantastic and I have plenty to do.

I'm sewing some final items -  meaning the final things that we think she might need. An overall suit, a hat to match, the new bugaboo cover (yes, still), a little crochet cardigan (which is turning out very hippie stylish), a nursing bag to match the stroller. 

And them lets see what else she'll turn out needing once she's here and can give us some feedback.

My gut feeling tells me she'll turn out to have a big, big need for wonderful little French outfits. I have some very cute fabrics that scream "Pleeease, please make me into a tiny little wonderful super impractical dress!" everytime I look at them. And I can't bear things that scream. I just want everybody to be happy..!

I can't show any of the stuff I made since my boyfriend has our only camera, so I'll just share some of my french dreams with you.

Well spent money

I had so much trouble recently with for example German paperwork, Swedish paperwork, misunderstanding midwifes and full hospitals. 

So today I got a crazily expensive, extremely nice, high quality, made in Germany, Easter bunny from my boyfriend as kind of a a compensating present. 

(And also because we both are five years old at heart and none of us

could resist that little face looking at us from the shelf.)

Look at those details: the ear! the folded paws! Much happier now.

And PS: baby can just dram about borrowing it. Mine!

Hängselbyxor

More little impractical cute pants.

Very soft though and will look good with a white body.

And very small - size 50 actually!

First suit!

Just in case baby doesn't like her pants, we'll bring a romper to the hospital as well. This one is so tiny! And again I found usage for my favourite bears. (If I keep cutting them in pieces this size, I can use them for everything for the rest of my life, haha.) Pattern from Ottobre magazine. 

 

I love this model and has made a few of them for people. Then I've later on heard them insinuate that "it's wasn't really that practical..!" Short legs and not possible to open for diaper change. 


Well well. What I take from that is "Think twice before you ever make stuff for people who don't make stuff themselves" and "I'll sometimes dress my baby in good looking, impractical things until I'm proven otherwise." I can't wait to try this one on!

First pants!

Baby's first pants! These ones goes to the hospital with me. They are already in the bag waiting.

In the universe of Swedish sewing blogs (huge!), about a bazillion of people has made pants looking exactly like this already. But these ones are made by me! Same model as the black ones but this time with elastic waistline. Size 56, from Ottobre magazine.
I am curious to see if feet on baby pants are really a great idea or really not - I heard both. At least they're easy to cut off.

Remade T-shirt baby pants

My baby has a lot of bodies now in various sizes, and I realized that perhaps she'll also need some pants. I looked through my pile of old t-shirts and found a black one, that I made into pants size 56 from a pattern in the Ottobre magazine. (I love remaking clothes, I feel so awfully clever.)

You're supposed to have an elastic part in the waistline, but I think the pants turned out kind of tight anyway and I didn't have a good color, so I put a tie ribbon instead as an experiment. Idea is that you can tie them (not too tight, of course), and that in combination with the stretchy material will make them fit without being uncomfy.  And I like the fact that they are black but still kind of cute and girly.
 

Birthday flags

A little friend of mine is turning two. (Or is it three? No, can't be.) This is the present which I'll now pack and send, hopefully to arrive in time so his parents can pimp the birthday party table with it.
My secret hope is that it will turn into an all-purpose celebration decoration for a long time, just like the birthday breakfast cup we has at home when I was a kid. But let's see what the gift recievers want. You never know. At least I think the birthday kid will like it, golden flags and all.

It was fun making it anyway, and it's a great way to show off your best pieces of tiny scrap fabrics - (I now think especially about the blue piece with the yellow bird. Love it.)

Saturday serpent

Saturday inspiration:

An amazing way of displaying your imaginary creatures.

Found at the very talented black apple, though the snakey if I get it right is made by a girl name Sadie. 

Caviar ring

Quick crochet: A ring made of elastic thread and 20 black beads.
I had a pattern somewhere, but couldn't bother to find it so I kind of freestyled this ring.
It looks very much like a spoonful of caviar.
Later I found the pattern and realized that the ring looks a lot neater if you make it the proper way. Perhaps I make another ring some day. But I like the caviar-ness of this one, so again perhaps not.

Stroller cover part 3

Today I will continue making my stroller cover. Despite the fact that I could buy the end result ready made. (But isn't that the case quite often anyway?)
It's going to look very beige in the end. That's for sure.

Couple crochetting

Like me, my boyfriend is a designer and as such a very competent one. 

He knows how to mill steel with a tolerance of 1/100 of a mm, and how to cut foamcore boards and how to spray paint with precision. 

But like a lot of men, he pretends to understand ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about how the world of sewing works. Sewing machine: COMPLICATED!  (Precision mill: Not so complicated.) 

The other day he was overwatching me crocheting, got inspired and started sketching on an alternative rabbit design. Came up with a very cute rabbit sketch.  Then he asked me to make it;  I told him to make it himself, and then he said with a small voice and kind of big eyes..."but I don't KNOW how to crochet..!"

I told hime exactly how ridiculos he was, since he normally learns how to do anything steel-,  wood- or paper related within a couple of minutes and since crocheting is, honestly, not THAT hard. 

(The beginning of a beautiful Rabbit)

Fair enough. He got my point, then he learnt some basics and is now crocheting his rabbit. We're now sitting side by side crocheting in the evenings. Very cozy, I think. 

(Even though he murmured something the other evening about "feeling castrated."

Felt Origami Box

Remember the boxes I made around Christmas?

 I made another one out of felt the other day. Worked really well. It's a bit thick and totally shapeless compared to it's crisp paper cousins, but whatever. I stitched it here and there to keep it together, but am thinking about some big fat stitches as a decoration. Or embroidery.

  

It's standing on the baby table and I think will eventually hold baby stuff like, eh, what do I know, skin oils and wipes? For the moment it holds a sheep and some other things.

Teenage crochet rabbit

The other evening I started cleaning out my yarn basket and found some wool yarn that was left over from knitting a Norwegian sweater a million years ago. Some white and some dark gray. so I started crochetting it, kind of thoughtlessly, and after we'd watched one movie and a few episodes of Dr. House I found myself sitting with yet another rabbit in my hands. (I don't know what's going on with rabbits, I just cant' stop making them.)

The next morning I threw her in the washing machine and she came out slightly smaller and thicker and a lot fluffier than before. I stuffed her, made some clothes and there she was.

 My boyfriend laughed a lot and claimed she looks like an obnoxious 12-year old girl who wants to look really cool. (The kind that shoplifts and smokes with her friends at the playground and listens to Marilyn Manson. Or whatever obnoxious teens do these days.)

f The clothes I found in my secret sock jar, full of quite disgusting old socks that might become useful. And yes - suddenly one of them did!

Always keep everything forever!

Sock monster

 

 A sock monster is being made here. Today he's looking like this.

Crochet hearts

Oh right, so I learned how to crochet hearts. I don't have a clue what to do with them, but they take like an hour to make if they are small. Seductive.

Bimbo rabbit

This is one of many prototypes for the perfect toy rabbit. She has been hiding in a cardboard box for at least a year, yesterday I found her while cleaning boxes and decided she could come out after all.
This morning she finally got eyes and a nose as well, which made her take the step from unmade prototype to some kind of creature you have to treat with some kind of respect. (I still instinctively tend to think that everything around me has a soul, especially things with eyes.) So now she proudly sits on the toy shelf with the other toys.
This was the original rabbit that we once successfully bought, gave to a kid who loved it, and then got the idea to improve. I think it's too chubby, I have this vision of a rabbit that you sort of drag in any body part. Like Christopher Robin dragging Winnie the pooh down the stairs in one leg, you know.
Sad rabbit was our first prototype. He turned out too sad. Bimbo turned out too slim, and kind of - bimbo.
We have a few more prototypes in the boxes but not the perfect one yet. It's on the to do-list for the rest of our lives, probably.

Tiny amigurumi bear

Hi, I'm Tiny McBear. I'm here from the staffing agency.


One minute please, I'm trying to make a phone call here.

...Yes, I just need some time to get a hang of it. If you could just give me a minute, please?


You mind if I just sit here for a while instead?

Summer baby dress

Here is the third dress I made the other day when I was in a French dress mood.


A very simple pattern - it's a couple of squares, really!
Fabric: Again from my mom's secret stash that she's been hanging on to since the old days.
Size: I estimate it to fit sometime around July, but who knows?
Next: What about some underpants to go with it?

Simple dresses

I've done a massive amount of baby stuff. Massive. And It's mostly things like practical, retro-ish, unisex jersey rompers in colors like brown. Which I do like.

But the other day I just felt this URGE for making something very girly, cute, non practical, adorable... I mean, if I'm having a girl and I DON'T take the opportunity to dress her up like a little parisienne once in a while, you know with flowery cotton and crochet and little leather shoes - just how stupid exactly would I be?

So I got up early one morning and made some dresses. These are not exactly french, but still. The flowery fabric is from "Mom's big black bags of good to have-pieces of old fabric", in which I dive every time I go visit her. The bear fabric is my absolute fave, from retrodepot. I love, love, love, the silly looking faces of the bears.

Bugabugger

After Christmas I wrote a proud post about my attempts to pimp my new stroller with a personally sewn cover. Do you remember? Anyhow.
I showed you this fabric then, one of my favorite fabrics with foxes and berries. Expensive, but nice. Waxed, water proof, very cool looking.

So since that post I've been struggling with making my own pattern for the stroller, using old sheets. I've been sewing and pinning and figuring out. Then cutting the fabric, sewing and measuring and trying on.
And now, finally the cover I made from scratch with so much love is nearly done. A lot of work, but it's personal. It's gonna look SO great. Totally worth the effort. One of a kind.

So what do you do after all that hard work? You decide that you deserve a break. You make yourself some good tea, you sit down in the sofa and you decide to watch an episode of a Swedish sitcom. It's a quite funny sitcom about 30-something couples living in a semi posh Stockholmian suburb. You giggle at their attempts to reach status and impress the neighbors with expensive stuff and by doing everything right. It's SO TYPICAL. They are such STEREOTYPES of THOSE kind of PEOPLE.

And then, suddenly:



How ironic is that?

Spring

It's spring. We're reorganizing the flat. Building wardrobes, sorting fabrics, framing pictures, moving things to another cupboard, putting them in boxes with labels.


For the moment it's a mess. But it's a nice mess. I love my stuff.

Sewing again

Hi, I have made a bunch of things again.
And I found the camera cord for my boyfriends camera so I can take pictures and upload them again.
And I'm home from work since two weeks and have approximately four more weeks to do whatever I want before the Kaninchen comes out and asks for my attention. Hang in there, this is going to be fun!