Another weekend

Goood Monday morning to all my lovely people!

A warm welcome to Linda from Linda's Craftcorner - love her blog and her knowledge about crochet is really practical and very useful!! , Marta who is very talented  and you can find her blogs here and also a welcome to Paula from ~the ramblings and musings of the "fur-babies" momma. 

Hope you all enjoy your stay in my diaper world!!


Saturday and sunday just whooshes by and before you know, the Blue Monday is upon you. We had a fun weekend. 

Met a few celebreties..

 

 The Queen and the Prince..

 He didn't seem interested in us, the same holds true for little miss also :))

 

Did lotsaa running around at the highest point in HK.

Baked some yummmy finger food...

She could not keep her fingers off it..

I also managed some finger crochet. Meaning Motifs..

I am going to scold myself..Bad bad girl..have not done a lot for the Beyond the Square challenge. I am going to make up for this.. For sure, be tuned in to this space :)

Motif #7 from CIRCLES.
Please see the side bar for more on this challenge from Barbara of Made in K-Town.

Ending the post with one of my favourite crochet items made for my little miss. This t-shirt was greatly enhanced by the crochet collar. I don't quite remember the pattern but it is really easy.

I cant believe this, but this Monday i am truly missing the BLUES. No more office means no more monday rushes and no more blues. I used to have long coffee breaks to get winded up for the week ahead @ work! Do you guys miss work? Maybe i am missing it now, after 2 years..hopefully will get back to it...hopefully..once the kids are out of diapers and start schooling...

Hope you guys have a great week ahead, if you are working and having the BLUES, go and grab a coffee from my side!!

Taata..

Love,

xxx

Summer Dress

Hello my lovely people!
Hope you are having a good friday and waiting for the weekend to relax and unwind :)

My new friends from blogger land - Sophie from Sophie's Paradise , Hyfah al, Beck from Beck to Vintage - love Beck's photographs and cute crochet items! and Mau from Creative Mau .

Its so good to make new friends everyday and get inspirations from all corners of the world don't you think?

I have not been doing any big project recently. Plan to amend it very soon.
Stitched a summer top for my little miss. Inspiration came from many sources, but had a picture of a wavy yoke stitched on this fabric, topped with some flowers. Turned out exactly how i imagined it. Its sooo so good to have a picture in your mind and then craft it from your own hands. A look at the dress rather top now..

Yes i used Picasa widely for these photos..
Did a round of blanket stitch and then followed it with this:
1 SC, 2 DC, 1SC in 1 loop. Slip stitch in the next. Did this all around for the edging.

 

Coming to the yoke...It is really simple actually. Did 5 rows of chevron wide wave pattern. Thats all!!

The straps are 1 row of SC in the center flanked by a granny stripe row on both sides. That's followed by 1 row of HDC. My favorite stitch for straps these days seem to be the HDC. It is a very cute and sturdy fellow..

Enhanced the joins with 2 ready made fabric button centered flowers from my stash.

Here's another click...

 Used 2 simple buttons for an opening at the back.

Picasa again, enhancing the strap and button for you..,

A close up of the edging. Can be used for any other crochet item too..like a towel or dish cloth..

 

Well, i am hanging up my hook for the weekend. Have a few outdoor plans and some family/weekend time to spend before my little princess is off to school!!

Hope you all have a happy fantastic weekend ahead. Loads of fun - hooky and otherwise ::)

Love,

xxx

PS : I haven't used a sewing machine for this ;)

Joint Venture

Being crafty is a joy and a pleasure to the craftier.To be able to gift a part of your time through hand made things with love is indeed not a joy which can be written about.

Imagine my joy when my mother-in-law also is equally, if not more, interested in all things crafty!
I have a lot to learn from her, craft being one of the lesser things. She knits beautifully and my children have been warm in her lovely hand knits. I should do a post about the sweaters she has knit soon. She is also into origami, sewing, paper crafts and anything else crafty :)

Apart from craft we also share a lot of common interests. When we are together we watch a lot of crime/murder mysteries series. Many a bleak and dull weather days in HK have been passed watching Monk, White Collar, Leverage, Castle and such other series. This entertainment always is fun when we have company right? Be it shopping eating mushrooms - much to the chagrin of the Banker - we do have a way to get to him!!

So when i saw this pretty frock i knew i had to do it. I have done the crochet part and now my MIL has kindly consented on do the sewing part.

The fabric to do the sewing bit is below. I am waiting to finish this WIP :)

 A joint venture for a very pretty girl who is loved more each day!

India Calling...

..we are off for our summer vacation!
Yipeeeeee!!!!!!

Leaving for India tonight. I may have accidentally finished my packing..he he..no no wait, i still need to buy a couple of things. Haan, yes i do need to get some covers and some bags. That's more like me, doing things till the last minute :)

All the clothes, with kids you never know when enough is really enough. ?Thankfully its summer so i don't need more layers. You just dress them in tees and shorts and off then can flutter away.

The goodies are packed in bags, the shopping done and the sorting done :)

Empty closets. I am thinking how it will be when we finally leave HK. Its gonna be like packing so many memories. Both the children have spent their infancy and one is spending her toddler-hood here. It may not be my country of origin but family is where my kids are right now. Hong Kong is not so bad after all :) and the best part being you can afford frequent trips to India.

The only clothes in the cupboards now are the winter wears and full sleeves. So good to see the little people in sleeveless and short sleeves.

  

The below 2 Upsy Daisy T-shirts are my daughter's eternally favorite ones i think. God bless the day i painted them. She has used it so so so much. She used to either wear it or she used to carry it. I could get her to bathe, eat and in general obey me with them. In fact she has even carried it on her flight to India in our previous visit :) Every family member has asked her for it and she says that she will buy a new one from market and give it to them! 

The short sleeve one is "tight Upsy" as the shirt is really tight for her. The other one is "new Upsy". Its new only in comparison with the tight one. One day i need to get these framed!

Well, last few hours before we all set off, i am all super excited! Not sure how much crocheting n crafting i can get done. But want to do a lot of scrap booking as paper is really cheap in India.

Going to try my best to blog and motivate myself.
Before i am off, one more link - a great DIY crochet T-shirt dress idea. Amazing in fact, going to try my hand at it pretty soon.There is one for the mommies as well here.Hope to get this done as its tooo beautiful.

Off i go to catch our flight :)

T-shirt Makeover - Part 2

Girl.
Pink.
Flowers.
Buttons.

As a full time mom now, the creative space has become my outlet. It is said that an idle mind is a devil's workshop. Well with me, there is no time at all! There are so many crafts i want to try, to experiment and to put into good use.Having a little princess is every crafty mom's dream come true. You can pour all you art where your heart belongs. And nothing gets better than this :)

So this is the second makeover DIY Project. The first one is here.
I wanted to try ribbon embroidery for this t-shirt. Also had a huge stash of ric-racs and decided to combine both of them for this piece.

The centre flower is actually a sun-flower pattern. I have done it in polka dotted ribbon. Looks like polka dots is in these days, i see them everywhere. On shoes, hats, caps, dresses, frocks, tops, socks..you name it and it is there. So here's my version of Polka dotted sunflower

This was a ric rac in shades of pink. Did a simple running stitch through the edges of light pink shade first. Pulled the thread, plugged in a button and sewed it on to the shirt.

Did the same thing but from the darker shade of pink this time for a different effect. Added the white flower and the wooden ones on request of my girl. Hey! Its her shirt, she can pick a few mismatched stuff right?

This sunflower really looks good, tho i feel a good deal of credit does go to the ribbon itself. It was just too beautiful not to be in my ribbon stash! Stitched on a few leaves using this pattern.

Here's the ta-Daah!!
Pink.
Flowers.
Buttons.

I really should get back to my rug/blanket now. Its looking at me and i am feeling very guilty that i have side-tracked it. But the shirt looks soo pretty now, waiting to see her in it!

T-shirt Makeover - Part 1

Sewing projects are fun. Mainly because they get done in a few hours and there are so many things you can do with a needle.I don't know know to use the machine, maybe will learn it one day. But for now, can manage with hand sewing itself. Picked up a few plain t-shirts from Mother Care for the Little Miss.

One aimless day, when i was browsing, i came across this DIY project. I knew i had to had to had to do it for her!

Cut out a 5hearts, made up a buttoned flower on the go. Used simple back stitch to attach four of the hearts in the front of the fabric. She was waiting on her toes for the heart t-shirt. It was all done in under an hour and here are the results.

 She has to make sure that mamma has had a good click.

..and the fifth heart is on the back of the t-shirt.

One happy hearty t-shirt. One happy girl and one happy me :)
Watch out for more t-shirt makeovers coming up.