Artisania

This is just a little interview I gave some weeks ago that’s made it’s way to the Guest Designer Spotlight over at SewHooked! Check it out here, and here on my press page. Thanks Jen, I had a lot of fun!

And guess what was on sale at Michael’s last week?

Yum, lots of ribbony goodness!

A talented momma by the name of Fern posted some photos of her version of Gnomlette! Oh man, didn’t she do a wonderful job?

I’m so impressed

Fern runs the great website craftblog which is chock full of great little tutorials and interesting posts. She also has a little blog which you should definitely check out!

And thank-you all very much for your supportive comments about my father. His recovery, as it turns out isn’t going to be as smooth as we initally thought. But we’re all doing our best to stay positive and visit him as often as we can.

Isn’t that usually how it goes?

We’ve had a bit of a family emergency, as my father underwent emergency open heart surgery Wednesday evening.  He’s actually doing amazingly well all things considered, and is completely elated to have come through alright!

I’m going to be busy for the next while cooking nourishing food for him and and running back and forth to the hopsital, so until that all calms down I’m afraid blog posts will likely be put on hold.

Thanks for understanding and I’ll talk to you later!

Sonja

Banana fana fo fim, me my mo miiim, KIIIIMMMM!!!

That would be Calamity Kim of which I speak, one amazingly talented artist, as she has created this awesome rendition of the little mouse pattern she oh so sweetly tested for me:

ACK!! I love him!! She whipped him up in like 30 seconds too, I’m so impressed! It usually takes me days to sort through and settle on my fabric choices. But when you peruse her blog and her never ending flickr album, you’ll quickly understand that she’s some sort of visual, artistic genius! Thank-you so much my dear, I shall be calling upon you again if’n ya don’t mind! *HUGS*

So soon he’ll be ready for sale to keep Mister Gnome company in my Etsy shop. Kim did find a spot that needed fixing, and I think I need to add some ground definition under the grass on the left side…

In other crafty news, look what my 11 year old niece sent me this week!

Oh. MY. LORD!  How cute is this?? I’m now the proud owner of a handcrafted voodoo doll, a felt happy key, and a tissue holder filled with tissues! I love them, thank you so much Destiny, you so totally rock! And I am so totally sending you more fabric, and buttons! You must have more buttons!!

And are you ready for baby quilt progress report 4? Or shall I deceptively productive, as this was all done about a month ago… oh my poor poor hubby..

Mrs. Octopus can see!! Although she seems to have dipped a little too deeply into her hot seaweed toddy if ya know what I mean, as her pupils seems to disagree on what the heck they’re trying to focus on. Oy vey, maybe that varigated floss wasn’t such a good idea. By the time I saw this occurring it was TOO LATE, and I’m NOT RIPPING THAT OUT, I don’t care. Well I do care, a lot…. Really. It’s just that bloody h*** this project is taking too long!! AAAUUUGH!!!

*breathe in, breathe out*  See the lovely outline on the stripey fish?

And happy Mister Crab can finally dance!

I think he’s my favorite. There’s something about the way his eyestalks protrude that makes it look like he’s wearing a mustache. Maybe he’s French? Oui, et voila Monsieur Crabbe! Comment ca va? Bien? Fantastique!

Maybe now that Halloween is done, and I’ve reduced my Christmas sewing to 2 possible custom zippered tote bags, I can maybe get that quilt done before it’s really too late and my hubby files for divorce. 

But oh, have I been tempted! There is this place called Flickr. Where many a talented sewer congregate and scheme up ways of luring you into their craftily designed web of mini quilt swapping. “Oooh it’s just one itty bitty quilt, it couldn’t possibly take more than a few hours of your lazy Sunday afternoon! Join us, join us, it’s sooo much fun!! “ Yup, then you peruse the galleries literally wiping the drool from your keyboard as you imagine all the different little quilts and blocks you could be making and receiving. Oh have I been tempted!

Even the Lap Quilt for All Swap on Craftster is starting up again…

Hrm, maybe I should figure out how to piece together the blocks I received from the last swap? Oh! I didn’t post photos of those! Bad swapper, bad swapper! Ok, next post I’ll show you what I happily received.

Is it Friday already? Wow, what the heck have I been doing this week?

All I know is I’ve gone a whole week without sewing a thing. This is not good. I’m having withdrawl symptoms… must…sew…something!

Well at least Maya got some sewing done..

So cute with her head resting against the machine! She made herself a tulip shaped hat, which has disappeared somewhere so I can’t show you. It turned out pretty well though!

Lots of other creative stuff still happening over there at least. I’m having another original paper pieced pattern tested by the lovely Kim from Calamity Kim.

(If you are ever interested in being a pattern tester, please let me know and leave a contact email addy),

I’m also busy designing a new series of cute, cute patterns. The Mr. Gnome goes on Vaction patterns are also in the works, and my sweet, darling hubby just bought me a beautiful new Toshiba laptop with a truckload more ram and some lovely updated photo editing software. Hello Corel Photopaint 2x and Photoshop! Oh my, I am in heaven!

I’ve been sitting here for the past 2 days doing nothing but editing some of my most recent photos. Some from my Aunt’s birthday, and some of my son, taken about a month ago when that big ball of really bright light shone in the sky. What was that thing called again? Oh right, that would be the SUN, which has yet to make an appearance this month.

On to the photos!

Oh! And Maya lost both of her front teeth last week! Eeeew!

Introducing Pirates of the Callaghans Halloween 2008…

Oh we had a hoot!!

Here I am!!

Yes, I rinsed the dress out a bit. I was smelling a bit too swampy LOL! I spent the evening handing out treasures to the little kiddies. Well more like having fun with them  with my Caribbean accent.

To the child wearing in a zombie costume:

“Hey you are a dead child! What happen to you? Hey lady, what have you done with your child? She’s dead! You know.. you go home, you eat a nice big dinna, an maybe tamorrow you come back alive”

Close up of the bodice..

…and the back…

Here’s the shawl, which I lined with the whole back piece of the red velvet dress I used for the corset. I painted a white cotton lace table doily thingy as well. I ran out of black paint, so it came out a lovely grey instead…

If I never see another crazy, long, icky black hair it’ll be too soon. Each lock was dread according to proper dreadlocking techniques found on the internet..

Here’s a reference picture of Tia Dalma. Here’s another showing the corset.

My husband as Captain Jack Sparrow..

My brother Mikey and his fiance Analise with Maya..

and my sister in law Stephanie..

Yaargh! There would have been more pictures of the children if Liam hadn’t projectile vomitted after the very first group picture was taken. Yep. All over him, all over me, and all over the floor.

I hope your Halloween was as fun as ours!