Review: Fleecie Dolls

Fleecie Dolls (2008)

by Fiona Gamble 0896897346, 112 pages

Summary: This book gives detailed descriptions and patterns for making dolls from fleece.

Review: I happened upon this book at a fabric store during a time when I was just becoming interested in doll making. I was just learning about how to do hair, and I was fascinated that hair could be done so easily with fleece.

This book has patterns for dolls of different sizes. It includes patterns for clothing as well. It has a range of challenge levels for doll details. I've already planned to make several of the dolls and have ordered my projects by perceived difficulty level.

Recommendation: I would recommend this book to doll makers at the beginning to intermediate levels.

Kombucha Kraze

I've read about it, wondered about it, and have now started it. I'm on the bandwagon and, thanks to a good friend, started my first batch. I had never tried it, and had no idea what it tasted like. Kind of silly in retrospect! But I was looking forward to testing the rumored health benefits. Well, it ended up being really sour to my taste. I tried to improve it by adding juice. I'm not sure that it helped.

My batch was big enough to produce these jars plus a starter for my next batch and another starter that I've stored in the fridge.

I started my second batch with twice as much sugar and the intention of brewing for a shorter amount of time. I'll keep you posted on how it turns out.

Thrifting

As seems to be the trend in many places on the blogosphere, I have discovered the joy of thrifting.

What I’ve learned about myself is that I like vintage. I have to admit that I have secretly loved visiting Goodwill for a while. But I thought I was just cheap, and I would hide my rare tags and bags from my husband. But after discovering the Thrifty Chicks and the Frugal Fashionista, I’ve started to shop with my head up.

Recently, I seem to have developed an obsession with jars and storage containers. I’m sure it’s a result of participating in the kitchen cure and seeing these images of jars as storage. And this week I scored these vintage Tupperware containers.

Although I don’t recall seeing these specific containers in my childhood, they made me think of some containers my grandmother had. 

Set of 4 Vintage Tupperware Servalier Bowls,
originally uploaded by vintagegoodness.

And this lead me to ebay where I discovered toys that I had as a child but had completely forgotten about. What great memories. (I'll let you know if I win my bid!)

Vintage Tupperware Shape-O-Ball Baby Puzzle Toy,
originally uploaded by vintagegoodness.

I’m still trying to categorize what I don’t mind getting second hand. I have an obsession with chairs, so I’ve picked up a few of those. One day I’ll get around to attempting reupholstering them. I’ve grabbed some drinking glasses and a couple of blazers.


I've been on the lookout for a dresser for my kids' room, and I find that I gravitate towards antique styles. I'm currently loving old school storage containers and serving dishes.

When it comes to furniture, my more favorite second-hand option is Craigslist, but I’ll save that for another post.

Bloggiesta completion list

Here is my initial to do list along with what I actually accomplished.

• Write some book reviews. There are some kids fiction books with quilting as a theme that my kids and I have enjoyed. I didn't get around to getting this done. I did set up some template posts that are ready for me to fill in with the reviews.


• Write backup posts for a rainy day. I only got one of these done.


• Write that great post idea from three months back. It was great to me. We'll see what you think.


• Create template posts for your future reads (ie: title, images, linking, tags, etc,) so you can open up, write review and post without being bogged down with technicalities. I did some of these for future book reviews and for a landing page.


• Learn what a favicon is and maybe add one. I learned about this from Trish. Turns out I had looked at this a while back, but I didn't remember what it was called. This ate about 45 minutes of my time since the most talked about hosting site was down for maintenance when I tried to do mine. I went in search of other sites,but never found what I liked.


• Install those plugins that you’ve been meaning to do. I decided that I want a related posts widget on my block. I spent about 45 minutes researching and trying out code, but couldn't get any of them to work.
  
• Create landing pages (for example - an about me for Twitter readers page) or any other pages you might have. I've made a template for a landing page for the distant day when I get a big hit from a referring page. I spent way too much time on it for the simple results that I settled on. But I got great information from these two posts at Problogger.


• Go get a gravatar. I have to learn what this is, too This took me about 20 minutes. I'm not yet sure where I will use it since blogger already using this image for me. Learned this from Trish, too.


• Work on any specialized projects that you may have going. Think I'm going to turn this into a series post. I know what series of posts I plan to do, but I didn't to work on them.


• I also used website grader to run a report on possible changes to improve my search engine results. Thanks to Bookish Ruth for teaching me this.
  
• I also want to add myself to a directory. Got this idea from Infant Bibliophile.

In all, I think that I spent a good 10 hours on this. And in true challenge fashion, I did a lot of it through the night while my family slept.

Bloggiesta to do list

I've decided to participate in Maw Books Bloggiesta, "a blogging marathon with a fiesta flair.” Based on her suggestions, here is my initial to do list for this weekend.

• Write some book reviews. There are some kids fiction books with quilting as a theme that my kids and I have enjoyed.


• Write backup posts for a rainy day.


• Write that great post idea from three months back. It was great to me. We'll see what you think.


• Create template posts for your future reads (ie: title, images, linking, tags, etc,) so you can open up, write review and post without being bogged down with technicalities


• Learn what a favicon is and maybe add one


• install those plugins that you’ve been meaning to do. I want to try that related posts plugin


• create landing pages (for example - an about me for Twitter readers page) or any other pages you might have.
  
• Go get a gravatar. I have to learn what this is, too
  
• Work on any specialized projects that you may have going. Think I'm going to turn this into a series post.

This list is looking long for 48 hours. We'll see what I get done and how long it takes.

Fabric Quiet Book Lessons Learned - Part 2

In my previous post, I shared the things I learned from making my first fabric book. This post continues those observations.

My biggest issue is with the pages themselves. I found lots of sources for creating this type of book (like here and here). Since I wasn't in the mood to bind multiple pages, I treated my fat quarter like a single sheet of paper and created a foldable book, an idea I got from the book Cover To Cover. Unfortunately, my measurements were apparently off a bit because some of my pages are wider than others. This made it difficult to bind my book in the manner I had planned.

In spite of all the faults I've named, there are some things I do like – besides the fact that I actually finished a project.

I like the photos, but I'm afraid that they won't last. I went quickly and a couple seem to be peeling a little. Since I suspect I'll need to wash this book at some point, we'll have to wait and see how this turns out.

I like these bullion flowers that I learned to make here. I know that I will be including this in more things that I make in the future.

And I liked finishing the covers with ribbon that I've had a long time trying to find just the right project.

 

Overall, I enjoyed this project and am pleased with the results. I'll continue striving to make it better.

Fabric Quiet book Lessons Learned - Part 1

I finally completed my first fabric book. I did my best to keep it simple, so there are no moving or detachable parts this time. My eye sees all sorts of things I could have done better, but it turned out OK for my first effort. I'd like to share what I learned, and perhaps what I will do differently next time to make it better. Some of my pictures are a litlle fuzzy. Sorry!

First, I should have taken my time. That probably sounds funny considering that it took me forever to complete this project. My delay had more to do with a lack of spare time than with time put into the project. Since my time to sew is sparse, I tend to take shortcuts. The problem is that not all of my shortcuts resulted in a pleasing product.

I'm not so pleased with my applique. I started off trying to blind stitch. But my technique isn't great, so my stitches often showed. And then it seemed to take too long, so I switched to machine stitching. I think that I should have continued with the hand stitching. It takes practice to get it right, and I stopped too soon to get that practice. I also should have found a way to temporarily adhere the fabric until it was stitched in place. Since I didn't do that, a lot of my pieces are lopsided. I'm trying to play it off and hope that it looks like that was intentional. But it wasn't.

My embroidery needs a bit of work. I started using ideas from The New Crewel. I was really excited to get this book and was glad to have a place to try out the ideas. But some of my results don't seem as exciting as they appeared in the book. I'll keep playing with technique and color combinations. 

I also tried making lazy daisies. While this is an easy stitch for making flowers, my problem seemed to lie in my ability to place the petals in a circle. In trying to eyeball placement, my flowers were crooked and displeasing to my eye. Anybody have tips for making circular flowers by eye? I looked for ideas but was unable to find tips on making my flowers even. But I found a couple of people to aspire to be like here and here.

In the next part of this post (tomorrow), I will share my biggest issue with this project and some things I like.