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I've been baking all day (Nigella's certosino at top and these christmas biscuits among them), with just a little more to go this evening. Audrey is in bed, hopefully asleep, having prepared a plate for Santa and the reindeers earlier. She insisted that the beer be included (cheers!) A few more presents to wrap, and we're ready to go.
If christmas is celebrated at your house, may your day tomorrow be peaceful, merry and bright. Happy christmas! xo
Yesterday... Finished up Luigi, a monkey for the Kim family benefit. He'll be auctioned on ebay starting January 3rd. Like so many, I was moved by the Kim's story earlier this month and am so glad to be included in this benefit. The auction has been generously organised by Lisa, Stephanie and their mum, Gerrie. There are going to be some incredible pieces up for grabs, and all proceeds go to the family. Wonderful stuff.
Today... Finished this little doll, Lucy. She'll be off to live with the daughter of a blogging friend soon. That's it for dolls before christmas, I've officially run out time!
Tomorrow... Not sure. We had planned to see friends in the morning and stay home for the afternoon to bake (sugar dusted spice biscuits, recipe from a Donna Hay christmas issue a few years back but the exact same recipe can be found here... scroll right down) and wait for the forecast thunderstorm to roll in. But Audrey just woke only a couple of hours after her bedtime, all grumbly, so I'm hoping all this won't be canned in exchange for sickness. So for now, a fortifying cup of earl grey and early to bed. Night, all!
Yet again Christmas has crept up on me. It happens this way every year, and I know I'm not alone. Between gift shopping (not even close to finishing that yet), get-togethers, etc, etc, there's not been nearly enough sewing machine time to conquer my grand plan of a shop update before December 25. As it is, I think I'll probably have 3 toys up there tomorrow, if anyone is interested.
This little girl, Bridget will be among them. She is made from the thickest, sturdy and soft wool flannel. A few people have asked me what I use for my dolls... it's usually some kind of woven wool or wool blend fabric. My local fabric store calls this white one doctor's flannel. I have no idea if this is a widely used term, but it's wonderful, wonderful stuff. It's only weakness is it's price, but since doll making only requires the smallest quantities, a small cut tends to go a very long way. (Is that enough guilty justification?!) Ok, just did a google search for it - lots of leads to find it in your area if you're interested. This place currently has certain colours of it on special.
Also, there was a guest post by me yesterday over at Kiddley about some little garlands that Audrey & I made last week. Please be warned, glitter is involved.
This is a picture of Audrey this morning, doing a little dance in front of the newest addition to our household. Frankly, on this side of the camera I was tempted to do a little jig, too.
Apologies in advance... this entire post will be spent relaying a story about polyfil. Boring? Probably, but I know there are lots of you who understand the lure of a favourite crafting tool only too well. Late last week I discovered that my local polyfil vendor had stopped stocking my favourite brand. After a bit of investigation, it seemed that no one else in my state stocked it and the wholesaler no longer had any either. My favourite stuff! With just the right amount of spring and weight! What to do?! After a few calls, I wound up on the phone to a woman named Julie from an insulation company on the other side of Adelaide. Usually, I buy my polyfil in 1 kilogram bags, and at best I was hoping to scrounge a couple of those from the back of someone's warehouse. But, no... at the back of Julie's warehouse was 30 kilograms of it! More than 7 months worth, apparently sitting there untouched for years. Sold! So this morning at 7.45am, a very friendly courier man delivered my 30 kilo enormo-brick of polyfil. We can't fit it through the front door! But, at the end of a long week full of everything that makes this time of year so busy, I'm not afraid to say that this makes me quite happy! Abby, this is as close to that silo as I'll ever get! Merry christmas, indeed!
I updated over here a couple of hours ago. With monkeys,
girls,
kittens,
and bunnies. It'd be fair to say that I'm feeling really quite floored by the response - thankyou so, so much to everyone who helped re-home one of these chaps/chapesses. But they're not all gone: as of right now there are a couple of kittens and a bunny left. Normal blogging will resume soon. Cheers!
Still lots to do, so no shop update today. Today... ha! What was I thinking?! So, I'm obviously quite delusional when it comes to estimating how long it takes to finish this many toys, but I'm so happy with how this litter is coming along. There are a couple of more evenings to put in before they'll be ready. But this is where I'm at as of this morning - dolls with pins for eyes and half clad monkeys. If I steal a bit of time over the weekend between picket fence construction (our other big WIP here at the moment - thanks again and again, Dad!), I'm hoping they'll be ready sooner rather than later. I'll send a message to the mailing list.
Have a lovely weekend!
