Great Giveaway!

Check out the terrific giveaway over at What I Did at School Today! So pretty!

Swapping = Meeting Inspiration

As I mentioned a couple of days ago, one of the ways I got my craft blogging mojo back was by participating in a vintage swap. It was a great experience not only for the lovely goods that came my way, but also because I was paired with an exceptionally talented mama/crafter/blogger/art teacher named Jennifer. In addition to the lovely goods pictured above and below (pillowcase = already on the bed; small wooden box engraved with the name Chester Avery = my favorite little treasure of the year), Jennifer and I exchanged several great e-mails about the trials, tribulations, and great pleasures of parenting. She encouraged me when I mentioned that I was slowly working up to integrating crafting back into this brave new world of motherhood. I appreciated her encouragement so very, very much. Thank you again, Jennifer! I will post photos of whatever it is I eventually make from these vintage treasures. The great trim is just calling for a starring role on a bag or a pillow, I think.

To Market, To Market

I learned how to make yarn out of plastic bags from a friend. There's a good tutorial here, too. Although both cats and toddlers are fascinated by the stuff (making for very slow project progression), I somehow managed to finish a market bag for my wonderful friend Christa's birthday. (She's also here, and about a million other places online too.) Such a meta craft- making bags outta bags.

Halloween Craftiness

I decided to make a Halloween costume for my son this year because my mom always made ours for us when we were little. I remember how important it was to me that my mom would make my costumes from scratch and would always let me choose what I wanted to be. It's one of those things that I will never forget; I was motivated to steal hours away from other things (like laundry, dishes, or relaxing with a good book and a cup of tea at the end of the day) so that I might provide that same sense of security to little E. He might not know it now, but every step this little monkey takes is imbued with family tradition.

E. chose the pattern. We thought we might make him into a duck, so the three of us trekked to the fabric store to look for duck patterns. We were looking through the book and found the monkey pattern, as well as a very cute duck. I pulled both patterns and set them in front of E. He pointed at the monkey and laughed, and the choice was made. He's been wearing it most of today and seems pretty comfortable.

Pattern is Simplicity and I followed it pretty precisely... didn't make the feet for practical reasons, I added a dart rather than elastic on the hood, and I didn't make bands at the wrist (again, practicality).
Happy Halloween!

Getting My Crafting Mojo Back...

I don't know if anyone will even check this blog anymore, since it's been well over a year since I last posted. But I'm happy to virtually announce the rebirth of my crafting cool, even if no one actually reads about it.

Having a child, moving to a new house, selling an old house, doing renovations on both houses, and finding out that my crappy, crappy sleep patterns are actually because of a medical condition that I've likely had my whole life (sleep apnea) and not just the "normal" first-year-of-parenthood sleep deprivation... it's been a wild ride. And one of the first things to go during this roller-coaster-of-a-year were craft projects. Initially I started this blog to keep track of the ways crafting influenced my life (either through projects I created myself, projects that inspired me, or projects that others had given me). It seemed impossible to keep juggling that ball with all the new ones that came my way in 2008-09.

But- miraculously- I'm ready to start juggling again. Over the past couple of weeks, I started crafting in earnest again. I made a market bag for a good friend's birthday, I made a Halloween costume for my son, and I participated in a lovely Vintage Swap with a most excellent partner. More on all these small victories soon (including pictures)... this post is just to announce the rebirth of Craft Buff. Yippee!