wearable goodness » craft

A Tallish Keepsake

KarinaJean — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 23:08:10 +0000

A few months ago a very good friend asked me for my opinion on some hand made height charts she was deciding between for her little lass. None of them were quite what she was after but she was hesitant to make her own. So I suggested I make them one as their Christmas present. We discussed themes and details and I set off on my creative merry way, thinking all things trees, birds, hand-stitched string, buttons and leaves. Here is the result (a month late mind you), a fabric height chart that they can take with them wherever they go and keep for nostalgic purposes for as long as they wish.

The result is a sweet combination of calico, fabric pens, salvaged buttons, original bird artwork via iron-on transfer, pretty backing fabric and wool.

I began by adding all the detail to the front panel of calico. I choose the calico with the little specs in it and washed and ironed it to remove any residue. The original tree and bird were hand drawn in ink on paper and the bird was coloured digitally.

I had a basic plan I suppose, enough to know I was going to be doing a few different ironing steps and the order in which I did them was likely to matter. So I began by hand-drawing the tree with fabric pens (fabric pens are happy to be ironed over). I then cut leaves from the backing fabric and attached them with iron-on hemming tape (also happy enough to be ironed over). Finally I printed out my birds and numbers onto transfer paper (in mirror image of course), cut then out with my longtime best friend “medical scalpel with blade # 11”, and ironed them on…making sure I did not double iron any of the tansfers by accident (iron-on transfers definitely don’t enjoy being re-ironed).

I hand stitched little lass’s name and the circling wool with, ah.. wool, and added the buttons. Then after a good iron (reverse side only) I machined sewed the front panel and backing fabric together, added a few hems, added a rod to hold the top straight, doubled up some wool for hanging and my “tallish keepsake” was finished.

Oh, and some custom made measurement tags attached with salvaged garment safety pins rounded off a ‘job well done’.

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kindling to get started

KarinaJean — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 10:35:08 +0000

Back in may 2007, we embarked on a road trip around the Australian coastline with a mission to find a new place to live. We had a 4WD kitted out to sleep in and all manner of camping objects. My granddad, an avid camper and traveler himself, gave us an old green sleeping bag full of kindling, with the advice “sometimes you can’t find dry firewood, and sometimes your not allowed to take firewood even though it’s everywhere, so it is always good to have something to get you started”. We were slightly precious about the bundle, not wanting to use it up in an un-emergency. So at the end of our 9 month trek, we arrived at our new beachside home with half of his donation still onboard. So I decided to do something creative with it, something to capture the journey and the arrival…here is the result…

Dolly for a Little Lass

KarinaJean — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 00:51:48 +0000

Little girl S was turning 1. No longer a baby-as such, she needed a little lassie to march into toddler-hood with. So I made her Ms dolly. Ms Dolly; with her sooty eyelashes, pigtails, belly button and ruffle cloth nappy.

Ms Dolly was made a few months back and since then Little Girl S and Ms Dolly have been around the world and back again on a grand adventure.