Countdown: Make a special sewing basket

Most of you, my friends, already know I'd rather make a special prezzy for someone than buy something. Although I am partial to buying gifts when it comes to gifting something to my dad everytime I go to visit him. I usually go to www.manlymanco.com/products/bacon-roses and buy him his favourite Bacon Roses.The other day I was at Costco where they had Halloween decorations down one isle and guess what was down the other isle! Yup!!!So I was thinking, there really isn't a lot of time before Christmas and maybe we should get going on a few prezzies.Something I love to do is repurpose something old and vintage into something new and useful. I'd much rather do that than buy something new.Here is one of my favourite things to make; an old fashioned sewing basket. I'll show you how I do it. The baskets are made not only to serve as antiquity and emanate a reminiscence of village fairs and Derbies, but also are perfect for collecting offerings, typically from places of worship.My inspiration for this project is my grandmother's old sewing basket. It's seen better days...lol...but I love it.Any basket will do. Here is a lovely, small 1940's basket.Measure down the inside and measure the circumference. Cut some lovely fabric; here I chose a bit of chartreuse velvet.Cut a strip of the fabric longer and wider than your measurement. Turn a bit of fabric over the top and that will be the top edge. It helps to press it into place.Sew up the seam, and now you have a tube. Turn the top edge over and sew a seam 1/4 inch from the top to make the seam look pretty and finished.Cut the bottom into notches to fit the tube into place inside the basket.The simplest thing to do now is to glue the tube lining into place with a hot glue gun. The simplest thing to do about the bottom is to cut out a circle of light cardboard, like a piece of cereal box, line it with a little quilting and a circle of fabric cut larger than the cardboard. Turn the edges of the fabric over the cardboard and glue into place.Do the same thing for the lid. Sometimes I like to quilt a lovely vintage button thru the centre of the top lid lining.Now prepare your goodies. One thing I always love to have in my sewing baskets is a bit of bee's wax. For people who quilt and embroider, bee's wax is amazingly helpful and it smells soooo good.Here is a precious little mouse my daughter Chloe hand sews and a little clover my daughter Kerstie makes using vintage fabrics and buttons.Don't worry about filling it with whimsical, lovely non-sewing things. Your loved one will cherish everything in this basket, and who doesn't love lovely things.Something I always make for the basket is a special pin cushion. Here I made one from cotton batting and a circle of velvet inside a walnut shell half. (this idea came from a children's story book from my childhood) It's a bit tricky but once you get the hold of it, it gets easier to hot glue the velvet ball into the shell.And there you go! I've made this sewing basket inside vintage baskets with vintage materials and inside new Ikea baskets using store bought fuchsia silk. Any basket will do and the principal is the same. Wouldn't you love a gift like this? I know I would. :)

A handful of random

Friday the 13th fun!Milo is doing this crazy thing. He's running thru the house via open back door, into my bedroom, and jumping out my open window only to run back in and do it over again. He's determined to win best lap running cat in the lap running cat competition. Morgan runs after him and then turns around short of the 7ft drop and heads back to catch him up again. That got too tiring for her so she flaked out on the top of my chair and is just watching him do his rounds. She's entering the best cat for chair extension competition. :)I was just telling my friend Celi that nothing apart form herbs, a fig and some roses can grow in a little super-heated, south facing, against the garage, raise garden of mine. So I tend to grow way more herbs than I need. But this week I stuffed a bunch into the belly cavity of a not-so-delicious farmed salmon and it was out of this world good. So hooray for an over abundance of herbs!Usually we like to make gifts for family and friends instead of buying things and I've been looking at the boxes and boxes of craft prototypes I've saved over the years and thinking that I'll put more examples of arts and crafts with directions in case any of you would like to try something new. :)Robert and I have been looking at swatches and swatches and swatches....of grey paint variations to paint the new mini. It all gets a bit ubiquitous after a while. Thank goodness for Photoshop! I mocked up three greys: Farina grey (which was the colour of my lost mini), Tweed grey (which I think will be the new colour), and Mandalay grey (which was a contender because it looked good on someone's car) Tweed grey wins out!Where would we be without dahlias and hydrangeas in the autumn?Linking with Nancy for randomness fun and off to visit all the great gals and guys there. :)

Hemming the curtains

I'm such a procrastinator!Years ago my father bought five pair of the most beautiful, heavy, red velvet curtains form an estate sale in England. I always coveted them. He had gold velvet curtains in his house but bought the red ones in case his gold ones ever needed replacing. They didn't, and he eventually gave the red ones to me. I've loved them and had them in my houses for years. Undoubtedly, everyone already saw them in some of the millions of photos I take round here. :)But what you didn't see are the unhemmed edges of the curtains in the living room. You see, these Craftsman windows are 11 ft long and the ceilings are so tall, that the very long curtains needed to have the generous hems let down to reach to the floor. making curtains the right way is essential as even a single wrong fold can make it look odd giving it an unprofessional and asymmetric look to the room. Thanks to my dad's choices I had learnt a few things which I used while the place was going through renovation.I did that when I moved here, now two years ago, and thought that I'd get around to the hemming soon...like a year and half ago already soon.They were stored upstairs in the loft/office/studio/craft space for the duration of the floor renovations, and I decided that there was no way they were going to be re-hung without being hemmed.I took out the serger and threaded it with red thread. OMG! those things are hard to thread. In the end I snipped the threaded black thread, tied on the red thread and ran the chain till the red thread was thru all four needles. Two threads broke and had to be re-threaded, but better than four!Then the sewing machine came out for a blind hem stitch.In the end it only took about 15 minuted to hem those two velvet panels.Chloe came to keep me company and we watched some YouTube videos of X factor and Britain's got talent auditions. We never watch these shows and actually we very rarely watch TV in Vancouver and so have no idea if these people won the show or not, but boy these were wonderful. We watched an absolutely amazing few singers including the most beautiful 50+yr old woman named Lillie McCloud, who sang "Alabaster Box", wow we got chills, the loveliest girl named Alice Fredenham who sang "My Funny Valentine" and made me feel all weepy and a charming little girl named Carly Rose Sonenclar who sang "Feeling Good" and just ROCKED IT! Watch these talented gals if you have a chance.If you wish to find the best curtains for you and your family, I would recommend you check out the following link - https://aquietrefuge.com/best-soundproof-curtains/.I just figured out that it might be nice if the links were here, so here thay are:Lillie McCloudhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o3U4kxuBfIoAlice Fredenhamhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IChJ6eO3k48Carly Rose Sonenclarhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Uk5U-ui5lQ

Star catcher and other thoughts

I'm very aware of what day this is and I'm very aware that I feel very lucky to be alive and here in this glorious, warm September sunshine, on this lovely beach with C.There's this thing which happens in the afternoon. The sunlight fills the ocean with stars.I went swimming with the stars in the cool water, in the warm breeze,and each time I moved my hands thru the water, millions of stars twinkled around me.I watched my mermaid child swim around surrounded by stars.I saw her come out of the ocean dripping and happy that we have this longer warm summer.I built a fantasy sand castle beside me. Ephemeral though it may be, it stood firm while we were there.I thought about my troubles, which I could list in a never ending page, but decided that right here, today, just now, everything is just fine. I'm healthy and happy and enjoying being on the beach.And watching the stars.

Just a few minutes for afternoon tea

Ever have one of those days when the day just gets away from you and before you know it it's over?Yeah, I feel like I hit the ground running. That was me today.By the time I decided I really needed a cup of tea it was already after 4pm and I had to run out again in an hour.But I did sit down for 30 minutes with my cup of tea and some vintage magazines.Recently I found several absolutely brilliant 1964 to 1966 Mechanix Illustrated and Popular Mechanics magazines. Inside are directions for all sorts of projects.I'm intrigued with this self feeder. I want to build it and bring partridges and quails and pheasants to my garden. Wouldn't that be a glorious sight in the winter snow? (maybe not so much in Vancouver though :( )Yesterday I brought in some garden asters in white, pink and purple colours. I love asters and wish I had some better success with them. At the moment, there is some sort of something living in them which is eating them. I think it's a caterpillar because there is frass underneath.My father's brother is one of the foremost lepidopterists in England and has published several things including a definite book on British moths. I remember my father telling me stories of David walking outside and examining the front hedge, coming back inside, picking up his father's walking stick, walking back outside and trashing the hedge to collect a few chrysalis and leaving the hedge completely decimated, while his father looked on in complete shock. Lol.The little cup I chose for myself is this happy Ainsley cup with pink asters on it.I sipped my Earl Gray and examined the green monster racer that I can build after I build the bird feeder.These mags are great!Next I explored the possibility of a two man sub. Wonder if I could build one of those? Wouldn't that be so cool? I could just say, "I'll be underwater if anyone wants me." Talk about peace at last. :)This next article was something. This is a way to make logs burn with colourful flames by submerging them in all sorts of different chemicals. Whoa Nellie, I don't think so.My vintage gardening magazines and books are even worse. Do you know the pesticide spray guns used to be commonly called widow makers?Amazing the things we used to do without thinking about how many ways those things would kill us.So no coloured flames for me this autumn, but it's still lovely and warm outside and I'm having a little break with my asters and tea and thinking that, if the weather is this lovely tomorrow, I'll go for a swim in the ocean one last time this summer.And I've got the perfect thing for that...lol!Linking ever so late with Teri and Martha and Sandi and Bernideen.

A handful of weekend

I was talking to Robert yesterday and it finally dawned on my why this jet-leg has been so ferocious this time. Usually it doesn't phase me this much but I realised that is because I didn't have any No Jet-Lag homeopathic pills for the return trip! These herbals are absolutely golden and can't be bought in the UK. I didn't think much of it at the time, but it sure makes a difference in my circadian rhythm adjustments.So I decided that the only thing for it is to get loads of exercise and work it off.Saturday we, Clover, mom and I, went for a long walk on the beach.I wanted to photograph some mussels because I want to do a new linocut. This is a new to me process called reduction linocutting, where there are several colours printed as the lino is reduced (more bits cut away) before each print pass and the colours are layered on the paper. Not sure how it's all going to work, and it's a bit of the blind leading the blind here, but I think I have a fairly good idea of the process.This is the photo I'm going to use for the cut. :) I told R about it and sent him the photo and he said, "Go do it, I want to see it now!" He's so sweet.I love coming across these tepees! I always want to sit in them and do.Lol, OK, there are no words for this sign. This was in front of a pizza van on the beach. Their Latin was as bad as their English. :D Not sure if they were trying to get people to buy their pizza or stay away from it!I spent a few minutes organising their slogan into proper Latin and then proper English in my brain and then shrugged my shoulders and decided that life's too short for that...lol...carrying on...Sunday we headed out to the Fraser River. The air was so humid and so lovely summertime-y and everything had a beautiful pink glow.The Fraser almost looked like a European river in this light.There was a bride and groom being photographed in the old boat yards. I was wondering how their photos were going to turn out in all that strong shadow/light contrast. Hope the beautiful bride doesn't end up looking like a giant white meringue!I mentally decided that it might be nice to get a motor boat this fall from the free section on Craigslist. Fall is usually the time that people get rid of boats. And Robert and I can refinish it, fix the motor and spend more time on the water.(Robert doesn't know this yet :) )One last image: fresh cattails. My aunt used to always collect them and stand them in a horrid 1970's genie-in-a-bottle ceramic vase, (which is now once again the height of retro fashion), and they would eventually dissolve into a million fluffy seeds which her nasty cats always had the pleasure of batting around the house. I hear that spraying them with hairspray keeps them intact (Cattails not the cats...lol). Anyone have any experience with this?Hey, this would make a great reduction linocut too!Sharing with Mary and the gang at Little Red House for Mosaic Monday. :)

The Sunday Whirl thru jet-lag

Yesterday I felt headachy and blah when I started writing the Sunday Whirl. I finished it this morning and this morning I feel much, much better, but I thought that this poem was honest and still felt right so I didn't rewrite it. I finished it and let it stand. :)pay, stains, center, bell, dimension, intrigue,magic, only, used, avenue, answer, changeThey say the best way to survive an avalanche is to swim like hell, to go with the flow or you’ll pay for it, but I've spent several hours going with the flow and I feel myself sinking like lead.My head is spinning.It might be the air, it might be the water, it might be the fact that I haven’t been back long enough to actually realise the mountains aren't cardboard cut-outs and I can’t knock them over to smash the whole city flat, change avenue to field.Concentrate on shadow’s circle, sunny center.See a million leaves worship simple, becoming gold in their skin.Simplicity in yellowing, falling, swinging down to the path, another dimension of life, age spots, brown stains fraying around the edges.There is no right answer, no magic solution. I’m used to it.Leaning into the headache leads nowhere so I grab some water.Each cupped life coming in handfuls in the chop of late afternoon glare.A dog scrabbles after a ball, scraping and scratching his nails on the path, his tags tinkling bell, then crash cymbal then only bell until he turns back.My nails leave little half-moon marks on my wrist.Thinking is muddy, a muddy path and the splash of a step, intrigue in the spot of sun cooking rain from the ferns.Green ferns patient in their green, green with dna that once saw the dinosaurs stomp thru the muggy humidity.Brontosaur of a headache.Stegosaur, stegosaur with crash cymbals.SplashAND THERE the poem flops down exhausted, grateful, wishing for the headache to stomp away just to lie in the sun on the rug.Fancy that, darling.

Can't sleep so naturally I'm writing a post...lol

What I really need to do is hit the gym and walk down to the ocean and back up again. (Steep hill for about 4km round trip) That will make me tired enough to sleep thru the night.What I did was garden for an hour or two and I dug up our potato harvest.Now you might be sniggering at my so called potato "harvest", but it's not too bad for the seven plants plus a couple forgotten potatoes left in the ground from last year. I really try with this little urban space. :)Actually, it's not an intensively cultivated space. It's more of a potager; an ornamental veggie garden with a lot of flowers mixed in. But it's so fulfilling to grow my own food. (Oh, there are a few garlic bulbs too! Very excited about those!)Inside, the sun is shining thru the windows today and my things are back. (remember I left two months ago with all things still in storage?)There's still so much work to do on the house. Niggly little things, like, some nails have been pulled out of the old plaster walls during removal and the moving things back in crew said they weren't allowed to rehang the paintings if the nail wasn't there, so I have to patch the plaster, drill new holes and rehang the paintings myself.Over the past two months the floors have deepened the colour beautifully and I think that maybe I'll move the carpets back in for the winter. I don't think I need to keep the carpets off for a full year.The floor finish looks good and has that deep gloss of the original 100yr old floor, but the finish in the dining room is very shoddy and looks like an amateur job. There are spots of "crumpled up" varnish...do you know what I mean? Like if paint was left to drip and run down a wall. Like that. And there are spots where the finisher didn't have enough varnish on his roller and so it looks something like if you were painting a wall with not enough paint on the roller and the old wall paint was visible in places.I've called a meeting with the project manager and will see what is to be done. I can safely say that I would not recommend this floor company to anyone and I hope the project manager has a solution. (like a new and competent floor company to re-do the dining room)I'll chronicle the problems later in the daylight.I have to buy a long ladder. And this presents the problem of trying to find a place to store the ladder. Long aluminum ladders are ugly and...well...long, so present a tiny problem with hiding the darn thing so I don't have to look at it in my lovely space.I need one to deal with the Virginia creeper and English ivy which are trying to take over the windows, and also to deal with the leaves which will end up in the eves as soon as my two large maples and my neighbour's huge copper beech decide it's time.But for now I love looking at the fresh, green curtains and am looking forward to seeing the Virginia creeper turn red. Chloe made me this flower arrangement as a welcome home prezzie and put it in my bedroom. I put it in the living room because the chrysanthemums are too lovely not to be around all day.And here's Morgan. That little cat is being Velcro cat from hell. It's like, "oh good, you're home, I'm going to sit on you!" I was sitting there a few minutes ago and Morgan cuddled up and before I knew it, somehow I was relegated to three inches of the sofa with Morgan doing her "longest cat in the world" impression.Yeah, she does look smug about that. :)

Hey! Jet-lag is great for producing random thoughts.

There was a brilliant lightning storm yesterday evening. Lightning bolts blazing directly over the house. I went to the studio to try to photograph some of the display and, a few minutes in, the camera battery died. I grabbed another camera and that battery was dead too...couldn't believe it! My other cameras didn't have the quick reflex capacity and so I gave up and went back downstairs and sulked. When will I learn to always keep the batteries charged to the max?It's been the typical Vancouverness round here today. Rain all day and then it gets sunny just in time for the sunset.By that time the batteries were charged up on the cameras.People say that photographing sunsets is such a cliche. Stuff 'em all...it's like photographing kittens... and who doesn't like kittens? Okay, don't answer that...lol.I'm feeling alone, (missing Robbie), but then my good friend Julie posted this beautiful little spoken wordvideo. I had seen it before...several times...but forgot about it. So I played it a couple of times; once while watching and a second time with eyes closed, you know, just to listen to the words.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7X7sZzSXYsThank you Julie. XO           Feeling much better now.At night I played the old 2am game:Me: I want to sleep!Brain: Not just now. We haven't finished analysing every stupid decision you've ever made, and we haven't even started on the future scenarios which may happen as a result of future stupid decisions!Me: Okay :(Why is it that if a light bulb burns out I never have a proper replacement? It's not like light bulbs are expensive or take up oodles of room.It's probably a law like Murphy...say...the Edison Law: If you have a supply of light bulbs then the one which will burn out will be the one you do not have!This is a close variation on the Volta Law: You will never have a charged battery when you need one.I have a feeling this is universal.Linking with Nancy for all the randomness.(sorry for being a jet-lag grump)

Home again Vancouver

Walking around the house at 2am.Yup, jet-lag. :) Eventually I'll sleep. :)But it's all so beautiful and peaceful at 2am. Here, we have street lights so there is always a gentle glow outside. I miss the beautiful intense darkness of West Cottage but it's lovely to sit in the living room at night and look out of the window.There's raccoons!In the morning there's bed ferrets!Hello Milo my boy!Although there's rain in the forecast for the next two days, there's a little sun peeking thru the clouds here and there.The breaks in the clouds gave me a chance to get some tomatoes from the garden. I thought I'd go get the ripe ones and some basil and make a salad for lunch, but I wasn't expecting this many fresh ripe tomatoes.This one's for my salad and the rest will probably end up in a lovely fresh sauce or salsa or something yummy.