A Scarf a day - brown & orange in the hair

This is a lovely brown & orange paisley scarf from Skip shopper's granny May that I was lucky enough to inherit. They were all nicely folded in a drawer all very neatly. I wish that I was that neat with my scarves...

I love my neck piece that Skip Shopper made for me from a found box of Singer bits. I just had to show it off!

Did I mention that on Saturday I went to Yarraville Market & saw Sew Hum & her gorgeous crochet work & lovely bebuska dolls & pencil cases, met Beccasaurus & saw all the fantastic baby mats that she has been making, pencil cases, tee shirts, and purses. Their stalls looked really good & their stock looked fantastic. I also saw Glenda from Reaburn who makes gorgeous retro fabric cushions & lampshades who said that she will be opening a shop over summer down at the peninsula (watch this space). The girl who did watercolours next to Sew Hum was amazing & I also met some locals from Kensington/Flemington who quilt and knit. And then I bumped into Curly Pops & met Tinnygirl! What a small world it is.

Must get on with the day...class to plan for the girls - 7 girls cutting out fabric at once. Should be fun.

A photo a day in august - day three

This is part of our collection of tins that we inherited from Skipshopper's grandparents. I really love tins to hide things in...like threads, scissors, buttons, knick knacks... and all sorts of other things! I especially love tins that already have stories to tell. I am sure that these tins could tell a great many stories.

You can head over to The Byron Life to see who else is playing along with A Photo in a Day in August or join in.

sorting the mountain

A great friend Andrea sent me an email last week wondering if I was interested in some old buttons & fabric from an old relative of hers & I have been having a wonderful time in lounge room since then going through many bags and boxes of this gorgeous lady's sewing history.

There was so much fabric that I had to sort it into colours (is this too anal?)

and then the buttons

and the buckles (can you believe the amount of them...! I think that I might have to make belts)

I feel soooo lucky. Bless her! There are are other treasures that I will share once I have got it organised and taken the pics.

Hip hip hooray

I know that things have been a little quiet here, but this is no reflection on real life. Kids have all gone back to school (yep! All of them now!) without too many hitches. Am trying to work out what this new life means... Working with school chicks to make a fruit & vegie garden.... Shell shocked about the bush fires surrounding our city & gathering everything I can to help out... Sorting out the 2 car loads of stuff we have inherited from hubbie's grandparents house...more to come still... Silently swimming in the North Melbourne pool trying to swim through my migraines.... Trying to find my sewing room again after the hol's have finished (have just remembered that's what I do!) as it has been filled up with with everyone else's things and bits I have gathered along the way :)...

Now I need to get ready for the Maribynong Makers Market on 14 March as I just found that I got accepted! Yay! Hip Hip Hooray. Time to sew.

here & not forgotten

School holidays are here and many projects have been ahappening o' here. Renovating eldest son's room...whilst he takes over my sewing retreat...driving up & down the Hume Hwy emptying out hubby's grandparents house in Wangaratta & finding great treasures...sitting at North Melb pool for swimming lessons...forgetting that we have a computer...making jelly...bucketing water on plants to try to keep them alive...lieing on the concrete floor with the fan on to stay cool...painting toe nails...late nights...catching up with friends
School will be back soon... life will return to normal...whether we like it or not

surprise package

I received a lovely package in mail yesterday from a clever girl, SaffronCraig & it was such a lovely surprise. I had forgotten that by just visiting her site she sent me a gorgeous piece of her hand printed fabric. Now I have the lovely joy of thinking of a project for it!

I will be opening the Salon again this Saturday between 10am & 12pm for those who are after last minute Chrissie pressies. You can call me 0407 124 553 for the address or email me megsthreads@gmail.com.

found fabrics

In this last week I have been really lucky to have 2 friends pop by with unwanted fabric and clothing for me to rip into and allow my creative juices flow which has been a bit of fun (and a little overwhelming). Some of it I may not touch for a while as my time is quite limited and it just doesn't "talk" to me yet, but is too good to chuck, some is too bad to store & has moved on already and some bits just got me thinking a little left of field (more on that later once I can get it to work...).

Anyway, I am pretty happy with the wrap skirt with the big pocket which was a great piece of fabric that I found at the bottom of one of the boxes (that will be at the market3031 on 22 November in Kensington and you can see me there!)

The other thing that I was inspired to make yesterday was from a great big pile of shirts that came from my second chance encounter. Now these clothes were huge which has some advantages on my part. There is HEAPS of fabric. So the first thing that came to mind was a light spring scarf as seen on my male model below.
Now what to do with all those collars and sleeves? Trust me, I'll think of something. I hate to see anything go to waste. Oh, and there are a few suits I have my eye on chopping and changing. Oh what fun!

and another thing

Have just joined Veg About, not exactly sure what this entails other than popping some more posts on about what I'm doing in my garden as well as in my play room.... Hey check out what the other creative half gets up to when he's let loose...hmmm

my busy week

I have had such a great time over the last week. First Matt decided to get handy on the sewing machine & have a go at putting bits of material that Aunty Cookie kindly chucked our way together & sew it onto a t-shirt. I'm too tight to let him near my stash!

Then on Saturday 19 there was the pop up as part of the Melbourne International Design Festival. As I have some stuff in bamakko I got to meet with some really talented people like Sixto from do yeah media and Peter from Really Whale who did the illustration on the window, and Laura and Jem from like butter. Worth checking out their talent.

It's on again next Saturday and there is a big hamper to be won if you visit each of the 5 places in projekta_57. The prizes are really good design stuff from the shops, 1 Keec bag, 1 Cubik ottoman from Design loop, 2 lumbi kustomade cushions, 1 street graphics book, plus a bag, badge, brooch, photo frame, doll kit from Kids in Berlin with total value of $1000, PLUS runners up are also awarded yearly subscription to inside mags. All you have to do is visit:
Kids in Berlin
Bamakko
Design Loop
Famous When Dead
Lumbi

oh, and Matt has stuff in the "ebay on freeway" exhibition in Design Loop so you might see him in there so say hello to him (about making stuff out of found stuff).

On Sunday we went over to the Design made trade with the kids & a little tip to any one travelling with kids to these things - make it a game "find the business card", we found it really helpful when we got home & went through to work out which were the ones that we had found really interesting and it certainly kept the kids occupied! Great to see Nick & Ben there looking happy but tired.

Then over to look at the "bubbles" of design, then hot chocolates on the way to the Melbourne Design Market. Great Stuff - Bamakko stall looked great. Everthing was really busy by the time that we got there which was really fantastic. There was such a buzz in the air still at 4.30 in the arvo. Maybe it needs 2 days..

The poster exhibition is good as well - worth a look and a vote - pop through if you have a chance. So many things to do and so little time.....

Just updated the shop with the market bags so pop in if you wanna grab one.

A taste of country

Ok, we might have left the camera at home, but we still managed to have a bunch of fun, and the images are left in our minds forever!

...and we did come home as always wondering whether living in the country would be a better life with three boys. A nice simple life - but would we miss too much of inner city Melbourne?

Sewing again

After 6 very long months of not sewing due to neck and shoulder problems, and finally coming clear of 10 months daily migraines, I picked up my sewing scissors and ... heaven. I felt so excited and peaceful at the same time. I am really excited about what I will be producing. I am looking at the most environmentally sustainable fabric available to use that is light & all I keep coming up with is "found fabric". I know that production wise it has it problems, however, all the research that I have done into bamboo, cotton, organic cotton, and hemp, leads me back to the fact that each of them have their issues AND, each of them need to be transported from somewhere, usually from overseas, which leads to emissions....So, more environmental issues to contend with.

Watch this space & see what I can do as I take baby steps forward with my sewing, researching and designing.



Don't forget that I am clearing out the stock in my esty shop while it is all on sale for 50% off!

clarity

It has been a very busy week and a half that has had a general theme of cleaning up the mess that my room had become and then once I got the bug, I couldn't help it, I got carried away and we had to declutter our back room.

I always find it incredible how "stuff" manages to accummulate until it starts to overtake your life. I mean, we are not actually big consumers, however, "stuff" still manages to find its way into our lives. The boys bring things home (artwork, found objects, nuts, bolts, bits of wood, old things), and this includes the young boys and the older one. All of these things get "popped" around the house and left there because they are interesting...and they are. I am not saying that they are not. They are the things that differentiate our house from anyone else's house and I DO like that. What I don't like is that it always looks like a tip.

So the point of this last weekend was for us to find a way for our back room in particular to look less cluttered, whilst still having all this really interesting stuff around, and enabling more interesting stuff to come into our place with all of its stories to tell. I think that we actually did it. It was hard work. My back was sore by the end of it. I did fall asleep on the floor on Sunday night at 7.30pm...

A new shelving unit (thanks Matt) painted white so that we can see all the colourful things, and the bookcases painted white do seem to show up all of the books and bits inside them.







I do like what Matt did with the plates that he has found on the wall, and also with the drawers on the wall.!!


















I am still slowly getting things onto Etsy - I did get a little distracted with the "decluttering".



Our friend had a baby and the boys decided that they all needed to sew a present for Zac all by themselves, so 2 blankets, 1 cushion and 1 migraine later, all was done - pretty impressive












sewhum helped me out again, this time with the machine sewing (as I am still obeying the osteopaths orders...) and we made baby Zac a gorgeous cuddly dog from vintage fabric. The boys have all put in their orders now.










The week ahead is a cold one - time to cook lasagna, thick soup, vaccuum the heater filters and get the jumpers out.