SouleMama

four totes

Just a few little totes that have made their way out of my studio these past weeks. These two above, for our mamas for Mother's Day. We feel so lucky that our babes know their grandparents so very well - three of them living just on the other side of town. And so spending a bit of time with each of them on Mother's Day was a very special and lovely part of our day.

Another Mother's Day giftie, to my little sister. Recently she asked me to show her how to embroider, and she was completely hooked in a matter of minutes. So sweet. So this was for her - some things of her own to get started with.

And this one, headed to another Mama who inspires me greatly. I think this vintage green floral print is my favorite fabric of the moment, and so just as this bag was finished up, I cut into the last piece to make one for myself.  All that green - I love it. I realize now looking at these last two bags that I've been inspired by Lotta Jansdotter's Simple Sewing more than I realized.

Did anyone catch the PBS series Crafting in America last night? I was seriously wishing we had cable, or at least some bunny ears so I could see it. Jennifer at Craftsanity did her most recent interview with the director of the documentary - I was so inspired just listening to her talk about the process of making the series. I don't know if it will be rerun, but the DVD is available for purchase here.

Happy Thursday! (Short weeks are the best).

so good

We had a lovely weekend away. Calvin was more than fine on his own, and only mildly happy to see us (which I'm taking as a sign of success). There were s'mores, first swims of the season, kayak adventures, plenty of time spent in the hammock, lots of lounging and reading (being deeply moved by this book), and delicious camp food. We didn't get carried away by black flies, though at times I wondered. It was days full of that hard, outside camp play where the kids (and adults) literally fall into their beds at the end of the night dirty and sweaty and smelly, and don't move until the loons call in the morning. I'm so grateful to my parents for the foresight to find a treasure of a spot like that so long ago, and I'm grateful to them for sharing it so kindly with us now. The kids are counting down the days until we go back (um, 34).

Nearly as lovely as the rejuvinating time spent in the woods, is the clarity that I always seem to come home with. In all that silence of the woods, there's plenty of time for the important things - play, sitting, thinking, dreaming. Good stuff. I feel clearer about my/our priorities, big decisions and little decisions alike, and full of ideas, too. But mostly, I feel calm, centered, and connected. The woods will do that to you.

Jeffrey Yamaguchi just did a little interview with Heather Menucicci, Author of Let's Get Primitive: The Urban Girls Guide to Camping. The book looks really fun - I quickly ordered a copy for a certain urban sister of mine who I'm hoping to drag home and back into the woods with us in a month. Perhaps if I bring the sushi...hmnn...or no, maybe this will work:

It's calling you. Katie (and anyone else who needs a visit to the woods) - can you hear it?

what I love :: everyday rituals

Ah, morning rituals. Like tea, and toast and on Sundays - the crossword puzzle. A little moment of peace amidst the chaos. If I had taken this photo a little wider out you would see the full picture - the boys eating their third bowl of yogurt of the morning with granola spilling over the table, the babe opening the fridge and pulling out her own rice milk (onto the floor), the cat scratching at anyone nearby to be fed, and the dog underfoot and picking up the remains of the morning. Usually there's enough 'still' time to at least finish the toast, and to dive into just a corner of the puzzle. No worries - I figure I've got years ahead of me when mornings will include a full crossword puzzle without interruption. Until then...I'm content with my morning ritual of stillness just the way it is. All two minutes of it.

We're headed North into the woods later today - to retrieve my babe, and frolick by the lake for a few days.  I'll be back here on Wednesday! Have a lovely (long, I hope) weekend!

what I love :: Boy

I love hearing language develop, and new words being added to Adelaide's repertoire each day (this week's favorite: 'ca-co-cone,' or telephone). I love hearing her play around with words in her mouth, rolling them around until they come out just as she'd like - "Poppy," "Momeeee," Zazie". She can't say "Calvin" the way she wants, so she calls him, "Boy". Love that. We've all taken to calling him "Boy" now (himself included), which pleases her to no end.

The Lady A and I are missing our Boy today, as he's off with Grammie and Grampie on his first overnight adventure sans parents. I've been talking (and talking) with him about what he can do if he gets sad, misses us, etc, which has only been met with puzzlement, and a matter of fact, "But Mom. Why would I miss you? I'm going to see you tomorrow."

Right. I guess I'm the one who'll be doing the missing.

what I love :: summer food

It can't be found locally yet, and not even organically...but I couldn't resist a little dive into the season with corn on the cob, cooked on the grill. With pasta salad, and grilled burgers (for the meat eaters among us). Eaten outside, naturally. Where else can you eat your dinner in between swings on the swingset and cartwheels on the grass? It's one of the only times that our busy little babes partake in the kind of leisurely hour-long meal celebration I always dreamed about having with my own family. I love it.

And in just a couple of weeks, our first CSA share of the season will be ready, and then come the berries, and the rhubarb, and the watermelon and.....Oh my....

what I love :: color

I love arriving home from a day of thrifting to find a surprise color theme amongst my treasures.

(I'm doing some what I love posts - a photo and just a few words - for the rest of the week. The spring air and our garden are calling my attention elsewhere!)

my red kerchief girl

Ah, Superbuzzy. How I love thee. And how dangerous you are to my (not growing very fast) Paypal account. Sigh. I fully drained my account with last weeks big update over there. Good stuff. Soooo much good stuff. And I had no idea that the red kerchief girl (link is to PINK kerchief girl. Red is sold out - read on) would be so fabulous until it arrived here. One eensy little half yard of it's goodness. I used every little scrap of that half yard about two hours after it arrived in the mail (just enough time to wash and dry it...barely). And then I promptly hopped on over to purchase a wee bit more ("but the paypal account is drained?" you might ask. Um, that would be the 'household' account I dipped into. Bills, schmills. I've got red kerchief girl fabric to buy. Priorities, please).

I took that new favorite fabric and put it to use on a pattern from my new favorite pattern book. I'm not alone in my love for Girly Style Wardrobe - Amy shared some photos and thoughts last week. It really is fabulous. I have a copy on loan from a friend, and I'm soaking up every single minute of that loan, studying all of the patterns in hopes that I'll remember them when the book is gone. In a very risky move, I cut right on into my new favorite fabric to try out the pattern above. Who has time for muslin, I ask? (I know, I know...one of these days I'm going to pay dearly for my impatience).

Miraculously (rather, unbelievably), it worked. My version ended up with some pleating at the shoulders (to avoid a sagging neck that was happening), which the pattern does not. Otherwise, it's pretty true to the pattern, except of course, that I couldn't actually read the pattern. This is the first time I've tried to precisely follow a pattern from a Japanese craft book instead of just using it as inspiration. I may be cursing myself by saying this - but I thought it was really fun - kind of like putting a puzzle together. Of course, I can say that because in the end it all worked out. (This time.) Edited to add: Jennifer, of moving hands, just put up a great informational post about sewing with Japanese patterns.

favorite fabric + favorite pattern book + favorite girl = happiness.

bigger than a crow

Each spring, thousands of alewives make the journey up the the fish ladder from the River to the Lake, where they will then spawn. When they're running, the fish swim upstream, having been born *knowing* just what to do. It sounds completely magical to me. I've lived here my whole life, but this is something I've never seen.

Yesterday, we took a little road trip up the coast to Damariscotta to try and catch the running of the alewives, having heard they were running earlier in the week. Do you see what we saw? Yeah...not much in the way of fish. A few little handfuls of fish - not the thousands jumping about that we had thought we'd see. I think the cold temperatures this week have kept them away - perhaps later in the week they'll be running again.

So we were just saying "oh, well" and casually starting to make our way back to the car, when I heard an excited, "Mama!!". It's a bald eagle! And since just two hours earlier in the day, he had told me he wanted to see a bald eagle today, I assumed he just had it on the brain. "No, Mama, it's bigger than a crow!" (that cracks me up). But I should know better than to question one of my kids about a bird - of course, it was a bald eagle.

Apparently, we weren't the only ones looking for the fish - in our afternoon visit there we watched the bald eagle for an hour as it moved about in the trees closeby, and then saw pairs of osprey, followed by other birds of prey we just don't see everday. On the way home, we were pleasantly surprised once again to find a bald eagle nesting. Right in the middle of a very sweet coastal town village, intending to watch fish on their journey, we were instead, the happy guests of a magical show of soaring, flying and dancing by some truly amazing creatures. There are few moments where all five of us are 'still' at the same time (we need a few more years on us for that), but there were moments yesterday that felt suspended in time, as even the 1 year old among us seemed to be fullly aware and in awe of the magic we were watching. The long car ride home was a rare quiet one - with a few 'wow's' shared here and there.

There's so much magic out there to witness, isn't there? I hope your weekend includes a small moment of the magic of the natural world around you. I'll see you on Monday!

 

slowly sewing

Since the studio has been ready for working in, there's been a nice little groove of sewing, more slowly than before. Something I didn't predict, but that I'm quite happy about. It feels much more thoughtful and mindful. Because I can *see* everything, I already seem to spend a lot more time in the planning/thinking stage of making things. Like this:

Yeah. I'm wearing a hole in the floor in that spot, I'm sure. Just standing. Looking at it all. Planning. And thinking. No longer just grabbing whatever happens to be on the top of the pile becuase digging around for something better would be too overwhelming a task. I can actually spread things out, match them up, put them back when they're not right, and on and on. Ah...I do hope this lasts (my new mantra: I will pick up my mess after a project. I will pick up my mess after a project.)

Oh, and see that cute shiney head on the left? He's the other contributing factor to the productivity slow-down. With this newly mixed up space, there's comfortable room for two (he's on my laptop getting his daily You Tube fix). Nighttime sewing is much more fun with someone at the other end of the table making me laugh, and yes, slowing me down. So yeah, maybe there's a little less sewing, but there's a lot more fun. I'll take it.

summer's coming...

It felt heavenly yesterday to work on a summer dress, listening to the sounds of the spring rain outside my window, and my babes (with Papa) hopping outside and then back in when the sun would appear (and a few times in the pouring rain). Ah...spring really is here and summer is coming. I've got two little ones telling me every day that I need to make them shorts (it's true - how is it that they each have just one pair that fits?), and a little one (who insists on dressing herself now, by the way) who could use a few easy-to-pull-on things too. This little dress was a start, of sorts, on the Soule Kid Summer Wardrobe project.

Calvin and I have been flipping through a few kids clothing catalogs looking for inspiration - Mini Boden, and Garnet Hill mostly, and he pulled a few things that he wanted to try to make, or have me make for him. The canvas, zippered, multi-pocketed, cargo pants? Probably not. But the elastic waist pants, and this little sundress (i think it's actually a top in the catalog)? I can do that.

This was really just a trial, so to speak, of what I have yet to make, as this particular dress is headed to my local (and family!) Bernina shop for them to have as a sample of the Ruffler foot. Will work for sewing machine feet? Yup, that's me. (Thanks, Uncle Ron!)

The sun is shining. I'd better get sewing...dresses, beach pants, and cargo shorts, oh my.

random musings on the fabric sale

Oh, thanks for all your sweet studio love yesterday! It's fun to share it, and definitely fun to be in right now. I added a few notes to the Flickr photoset with some details if you were looking for that.

Moving backwards, I'm a little late to blogging about last Friday's fabric sale - Meg already shared her beautious fabric porn - good stuff. This would be the annual Salvation Army fabric sale that I'm talking about (held in many cities, I hear - check your local SA) - past years' motherloads here and here. This year did not disappoint - with plenty of long lines, crazy crowds, and vintage goodness around for all - even with all the fellow crafty Portland gals I spied around the room (hi!). With a newly purged and cleaned studio, I was so very mindful when picking up fabric this year - knowing that each and every piece I brought home would need to find a home in my hoping-to-stay-clean studio. Yeah, so with that in mind, let me show you my problem:

Exhibit A. My sweet little bundles of newly purchased vintage fabric and goods.

Exhibit B. My sweet rack of neatly stacked FULL fabric shelves. You see? The new stuff has nowhere to go. A conundrum, I tell you. A conundrum I'm happy to live with. But a conundrum nonetheless.

Anyway...my favorite bits from the sale were these quilt pieces. I can't stop picking up these unfinished pieces - I love them so. Some of the fabrics here make me slightly out-of-breath. That brown with the dots? yeah, that one. Oh my.

This would be the 'what the hell was I thinking?" purchase. There's always one. Yards of this polyester craziness. I think this was snagged at the end of the sale, far beyond when I should have Gone Home, but didn't....bad choices are made at that point, I'm convinced. What will I make with it? I have no idea. Moving on...

One more random observation from waiting in line at the fabric sale, watching the women around me and remembering my own grandfather's presence there before he passed away: I've decided that the ultimate sign of a good partner would be one that, at the age of 75, will drive the other one to such a sale as this, set up the lawnchair with coffee for the long waiting line, wait patiently for said shopper (crossword and coffee in the car, perhaps?...or sweetie, the Big Jab, a latte and sudoku?), and then drive right up to the entrance to pick her and all of her fabric goodness up to go home. I was feeling all nervous that this never made it into our wedding vows, so as soon as I spoke to Steve after the sale, I asked if he'd do this. Thankfully, he said, 'okay, sounds fun'. I ignored all sarcasm, and felt much relief.

come on in

So here it is. My little room. I actually feel a little shy about sharing it - isn't that funny? I've stalled on photographing it - making up excuses of little details that needed to be finished first (I never did install the vintage milk glass doorknob I scoured town for - see that hole in the door on the left?). When the truth is, I think, I just wanted to sink into it, and settle in and call it my own for a while. Before I shared it and before the work in it began. This weekend I did just that - broke it in, so to speak. There was some sewing, some writing, and even some entertaining (thank you Betsy, and then Jen, for letting me lock you in my room for a bit - you were both so gracious while I gushed on and on).

I could tell you about the color choices, or of my new obsession with chrome shelving, or the history of a gazillion things in here, and on and on (check the growing Flickr photoset for some details), but more overwhelming to me than those details are how the room feels to me. I mean, it's nothing grand - it's nothing that will be in a magazine spread - it's not like that. It's quite small and rather simple - but oh, it's so perfectly 'me' and I love it so. It's full of things I love, of things that are important to me both now and in my past, and has plenty of space for plans and dreams for what is yet to come.

 
Every night last week, when the house was dark and quiet, I went in and sat on the middle of the floor and looked up and around in a bit of wonderment. I didn't do any sewing or writing. Just sitting. Still and quiet. And forgive me for heading down the road of sap once more (I know, I do that), but being in here feels pretty amazing to me. Amazing in the way that I'm overcome with awe and gratitude about why I even have this room in the first place. Tremendous gratitude for the four people sleeping outside that door who give up a lot of space, and much patience to make my crazy dreams come true, and make the ride much more fun along the way; for the absolute honor and privilege of being a writer (is it really true?); and for the joy of making things. Dream, Write, Make - that's just what I plan to do in here.

More photos of my studio here.

Mamas Day

From my Flickr favorites: 1. bisous, 2. Day 12: What Not To Expect, 3. pregnant with my daughter, April 2004., 4. old stories, 5. Mother and Child, 6. Untitled, 7. wrapped in blue, 8. Sarah and her family framed by rainclouds, 9. The World's Most Perfect Person., 10. hutch 3 079, 11. kangaroo mother, 12. just born, 13. image4, 14. James and Carmel Birth Stool Contraction 8, 15. my legend., 16. Mama & Daughter

Now That I Am Forever With Child, by Audre Lorde

How the days went
while you were blooming within me
I remember each upon each--
the swelling changed planes of my body
and how you first fluttered, then jumped
and I thought it was my heart.

How the days wound down
and the turning of winter
I recall, with you growing heavy
against the wind. I thought
now her hands
are formed, and her hair
has started to curl
now her teeth are done
now she sneezes.
Then the seed opened
I bore you one morning just before spring
My head rang like a fiery piston
my legs were towers between which
A new world was passing.

Since then
I can only distinguish
one thread within running hours
You, flowing through selves
toward You.

(Yes, I'm sharing this one again. I could read it every day.) I hope all the Mamas - past, present, and yet to be - have a beautiful weekend, surrounded by those you love, and those who love you - be they little or big, or still in your dreams. And I thank you for sharing in this journey of motherhood with me every single day. I feel truly honored that you do so.

first, it was a very large hat

Upon my first flip through Lotta Jansdotter's Simple Sewing, I immediately marked the Sun Hat for a first project - it just seems the perfect hat for this time of year.  Yesterday, with two accidentally-napping babes (when Ezra naps it means an all night party later on), and one who wanted to sew on his own machine, I jumped into the Sun Hat sewing. Sweet. I miss naptime sewing.

Except....I had no idea how small my head was. No, really. The hat was HUGE. (And yes, I got the seam allowances right - really, it must just be my head. Gosh - what do you think this means?). I tried the big hat/big sunglasses look for a minute, but that didn't work. Hmn... Naturally, my ridiculous hat (and my persistant Dr. Suess quoting of 'Do You Like My Hat?'), had the babes cackling with laughter and ideas on just what the hat would be perfect for. A complete head cover? A pirates cap? An umbrella?

Calvin suggested I try it like this. Hmn. Not so much.

It was clear that it was too much hat for me. So I cut it down to this size by taking it apart, and taking off two inches on the crown (really - two inches! I'm telling you - SMALL head). I thought about cutting the brim as well, giving it frayed edges, but worried the interfacing would make that all funky.

So now that it fits, I'm loving this hat. I bought the fabric with this project in mind - it's from Heather Bailey's Freshcut line (Crysanthemum. Yum.). And the pattern - despite the sizing issues (that I'm assuming are only the fault of my small head, though I'll be happy to hear if the same thing happened to you when making it) -was very easy to follow. And those gazillion rows of topstitching called for on the brim?  Love that.  Topstitching is my friend.

just because

Because we were at my alma mater and that always freaks me out (who wants to go back to High School, I ask?).
Because my kids linger in public bathrooms and it grosses me out (to cries of, 'but you tell us we have to wash our hands!').
Because I was bored and antsy and full of coffee (so I got the camera out).
And yes, okay, because my studio is not quite done yet, and I've got nothing else to show you. That too.

Just because... this is what you get today: an almost-family portrait in a high school bathroom mirror.

Carry on.

a matter of perspective

I was blessed with a rather silent day yesterday, as the babes had a date with Grammie. I mostly finished my studio, and I spent a good deal of time cleaning up the domino effect of a mess I've created throughout the house. Scattered amongst my messes were the regular, day to day messes of my littles. Walking through the empty house, I stumbled upon drawings strewn about in the same flurry of creative energy in which they were made; a handmade 'sparkler' from one who I know is anxious for the Fourth of July; a meal for three in progress that seems to have been interrupted in a hurry; and the evidence of a face painting party in the bathroom.

Little relics and piles of creative play and fun. Suddenly, in the silence that is the house without them, these little messes became more than just 'a mess', but something quite beautiful. And if I think about it just right, they become not just work for me to pick up, but little gifts and reminders of the life we live together. Funny how that works.

on the outside, looking in

Calvin and I wish to thank you all very much for all the fun, enthusiastic and kind words that you wrote this weekend about his little blog post! We read through all of them, and it tickled him to no end, as well as his mama. I think you all gave him a further push on his chainsaw, as now he's now convinced he can devise something to make the pull-cord retract like a real one. I can't imagine how, but I have no doubt that he'll come up with something. It's such fun to watch the little creative minds at work, isn't it? - so full of energy, and ideas and always sure that it will work. Love that. He may be back to blog again if he wants to, but mostly I think he'll stick to the dreaming and the making.

I snapped this picture of Adelaide this weekend in the Old Port. She was sooo excited to see this toystore window, and so mystified that it was closed and she couldn't go inside to play! Instead, she stood at the window - near drooling - and enthuaistically pointed and named all that she knew.

I think I get that. I'm feeling exactly that way about my studio right now - I can see all the good stuff at the end, I just can't get there yet. The painting is finally done (and I love it!). And after a weekend roadtrip to IKEA (which by the way - this time with a friend was a completely different experience than my first trip there with three tired, hungry and overstimulated kids that haunts me to this day. Oy.), all the storage and supplies are here and ready. Now it's just a matter of putting it all together, cleaning up, putting everything in it's new home (and cleaning up the domino mess throughout the house), and settling in (Manda and I are leading parallel lives this week!). Lots of little important details. You know, like sorting buttons into jars by color - important things like that. I really am getting there - maybe in another week I can call it 'done'.

Today's task? Find my sewing machine. I need to get it out - not just because I'm twitchy for it (god, I am) - but because I need curtains for the room, and then later tonight there will be some collaborative sewing with a friend. I think I might need to refer to this photo as my map to get to the machine - I think I see it somewhere back there!

Two hours later:
I can't bear to leave you with the image of a mess on a Monday morning. Who needs that? So I'll share with you the light at the end of my tunnel. I've been buying flowers for my studio - even though most of the room looks just as it's pictured above, at least there are little pockets and corners of hope, like this one:

Now I can properly wish you a very lovely Monday morning.

He Blogs!

HI. This is CALVIN. This is a butterfly. I made this for my first ever friend Caroline because she had a butterfly party. First, I drew it. And then I drew it on fabric. Then I cut it out. Then I sewed it. Then I put the patches on. Then I put the ears on, or whatever they are. Then I put the eyes on. And you probably know how I drew the card. Oh, and I used glue to glue the ears on.

These are our Wilburs. Do you know who WIlbur is? Wilbur is the pig in Charlotte's Web. I made the one on the bottom. First things first, I drew it. Then I drew it on fabric. Then I cut it out. Then I sewed it. And stuffed it. It took a loooooooooot of stuffing to stuff it. Then I sewed the top up.
After that, Ezra wanted one too, so Mama made him one like mine. That's the one on the top. I like the tail better on mine.

This is a cradleboard. I made it with the sewing machine mostly but I forgot how I did it. But it took a loooooooong time. I used fabric, cardboard, string and beads, and more fabric. The beads are for the baby to play with so they don't get bored. Oh, and rope for the shoulder straps.

I made this chainsaw because Mama says I can't use the real one. In this picture, I'm cutting a piece of wood up. I used cardboard, and plastic, and stickers, and duct tape and string. Oh, and I drew on it with wax crayons. I found some of the things in the recycling bin and the rest of it was in the art cabinet, except the plastic soda cap was in Grampie's recycling. You can't see the bead, though, in this picture, but it's right by my foot on the end of the pull - cord. It says ECHO because that's what Grampie's chainsaw says.

That's all I have to say. Goodbye.
CALVIN

 

A Studio Progress Report

I started on Sunday. Let me break it down into numbers for you:

Number of hours it took to make a total mess of my studio (see above) in preparation of the big re-do: 1
Number of hours it will take to put it all back together: Shall we count in weeks?
Number of trips to Lowe's: 5
Number of carabiners purchased as bribery sharing the torture joy of shopping at Lowe's with my 3 little ones: 6
Number of boxes of purged stuff packed up for Goodwill: 4
Number of boxes that should be packed up for Goodwill in order to avoid the clutter that started this whole thing: 10
Number of middle-of-the-night paint color freak-outs: 1
Number of nights we've been up past midnight to put 'just one more coat' of paint on: 4
Number of vintage dresses I spilled paint on: 1
Number of times I've stepped in the paint tray: 2
Number of splotches of spilled paint on my gorgeous hardwood floor: 18 (Ezra counted, and yes, I'm using dropcloths - I'm just messy)
Number of times I've cursed putting the shelving together: Oh, a lot
Number of times I cursed putting the shelves together after reading the instructions: Um, none
Number of spousal renovation spats: just 1 {Steve just read that and called me a liar}, Okay, 2
Number of times I've twitchily begged asked Calvin to let me use his sewing machine because mine is buried: 2

Number of times I've said "Oh, Sweet Rhapsody, I love you so": 65 (give or take a few)

To be continued...

the necessity of coasters

Remember this? The storm, a.k.a. the 48 - hour embroidery marathon. The bibs, the picnic sets, and then this coaster set all came from that session. We didn't have any coasters previously, and I'm fairly certain there is no furniture here worth protecting with coasters...but still, everytime I've seen coasters pop up out there in craftland, I wanted to make some. I don't really know why, I guess just because coasters are little and cute and I've certainly got enough linen scraps to make them with. Why not coasters?

So I made some. (Adelaide is showing you her favorite tree - that would be the yellow one. She likes yellow.) The embroidery is all of the tree variety on linen, and has pieces of that fabulous tree fabric from Superbuzzy. I fully enjoy doling the fabric out this way - you know, making my one little precious yard last for a gazillion projects by only using 2 inch squares or smaller. Ha.

The boys gave me a look when I suggested they use the coasters. A look as though I had just told them their undewear really did belong on their heads. I think Steve outright laughed at me.  And my friends? Well, they refused to use them because they didn't want to spill red wine on the coasters. But I made them. And the next time someone sets a drink down on top of our peanut-butter encrusted, water-stained, 50 year old, falling apart coffee table? Well, I'll offer them a coaster, naturally.

Picnic Time

I'm so happy to finally be sharing these, even though there are far fewer than I had originally envisioned. This has been a project that I've been thinking about for ages, but it seemed to take a while to materialize for one reason or another. I suppose the biggest being the amount of time that each one took - far more than I anticipated.

 
In the depths of our February funk I began dreaming these up - thinking of what I'd like to make for spring, thinking of our most treasured picnics by the shore, of embroidered napkins and the 'perfect' picnic tablecloth. These are the results of all that daydreaming.

The daydream materialized into a generously sized, patchwork quilted, double sided, and embroidered picnic cloth. With coordinating, embroidered napkins, and even a little pocket on the back corners for rocks, you know, to keep the cloth (and your food) from blowing in the wind. Or for storing your napkins. Or treasures from the beach.

I used linen or twill for the front of each of these, vintage and new pieces for the patchwork, and they're backed with vintage sheets that remind me of summertime in a big way. Ah, Summertime.

I'm quite pleased with how they came out, and I'm even more pleased that it's finally springtime and there is no more simply dreaming about picnics, just attending of picnics to be done. Bliss.

There is of course, one for us, and these two that are in the shop now. sold, thank you!! I'll have more in a few weeks!

I'm sure you all know, but there are many very exciting shop updates and openings happening today by some very talented artists and crafters. You much check out Port2Port, Sally's new shop, Shanna's new blog and shop, and some new treats over at Underdog Ink, among others, I'm sure that I don't even know aobut. It's all very exciting.
Buy Handmade today!