Star Tiger

I'm yet to post about Sophie's Book Week costume, but her Tiger was an integral part. As you can see though, Tiger is looking a little worse for wear. 

Even more so than when we celebrated his birthday in February. Stuffing is now coming out of almost every paw. I mostly blame the very low quality felt that I originally used for all the white, which was certainly been the first thing to go. But, he has holes in other places too, which were from my inexperience in sewing soft toys. Poor Tiger.

We debated heavily about what to do, but I just couldn't figure out how to resurrect the original without taking him completely apart, and there was no way of telling if the stripy tiger fur would last that and be able to be reused. So in the end, we began again.

I had just enough of the original tiger fur left for another Tiger. For the white, I found a flannel cot sheet with stars on it in the stash, as well as a white t-shirt that we really were not wearing. Sophie loved the idea of her Tiger having stars; sold!

I also decided to line everything with multiple layers. Even if this meant a lot of extra layers to sew, I figured it would help Tiger last the rigors of playing a lot longer than his predecessor. For his tummy, I cut one of the flannel and two layers of T-shirt fabric and stitched them together around the edges. His inner ears are two layers of T-shirt fabric, as are his eyes, and the white patches on his paws are sewn directly over the tiger fur.

I think he looks pretty good, despite some minor errors in sewing. (Time pressure people, I had less than a week!) I feel his white paw parts are a little long, so they really do look like someone has sewn socks on him. Meh. The real problem was when I sewed the eye patches to the face pieces incorrectly, and then had to rotate the face pieces to make the eyes face the same way. Then they weren't fitting into the pattern correctly any more. But I just tucked and eased and made do. His face is definitely a different shape, but he's still a tiger right?

He is fluffy and cute. I am not 100% happy with his eyes, but I had stupidly put moisturizer on my hands before hand sewing them and the needle kept slipping. Doesn't matter. Sophie loves him.

We call him Star Tiger. May he live a long and happy life.

Gift Quilt

Some good friends of ours recently announced that they were expecting a third baby for their family, and after two boys, this one is going to be a girl. My mind instantly went to the quilt top I had made last  year, which you can read about here. I've been working through material in my stash, and it felt good to get this quilt top out and get it ready to gift, knowing it will be going to a lovely home of it's own.

Because the quilt top was done, it was a fairly easy job to finish it off, although quite time consuming. I decided to hand quilt it, as I still don't have a walking foot and results with machine quilting have thus far been questionable. I had recently read a tutorial by Meredith at Olivia Jane Handcrafted, which was pretty encouraging, so I took the plunge.

Overall, hand quilting is pretty fun, and it does not feel time consuming at all, because you can do it while you watch/listen to a movie or whatever. Two birds, one stone right? After quilting, which took a good two movies, a I also hand bound it with some self made bias binding tape, using a tutorial from Make it Love it. The binding took nearly as long as the quilting I think, but man does the quilt look so swish now.

These photos are so much nicer than the shots I took of just the quilt top last year. You'll see what I mean, if you look at the original post, about the color difference. I recently read a post on gifting a quilt and how you should always make sure to take photos of it, and I'm glad I have because even as this quilt goes to a new home, it's still special to me.

Mum donated me some fabric for the back of the quilt, again in the name of using up what's on hand, rather than going out to buy more. She had this lovely Japanese cotton bear print in her stash for I think at least five years, with no real idea of using it soon. The creamy background color suited the front of the quilt quite nicely, and matched the binding fabric too. I also figured if my friend gets sick of pink, it's a nice break for her to turn it over.

I embroidered the words "Love Wins" onto the quilt top, because it was made from a time when I needed to remember that God's love would always win, and I wanted this quilt to reflect that. Parenting is hard, and adding another child to the mix is absolutely going to bring lots of joy, and just as many tears. I know the family who will receive this know God's love already, but we often need the reminder.

Goodbye beautiful quilt, as you go on to live your life, may you remind people there is good in the world, even as a baby pukes on you.

Book Week: Round 1

I feel like Book Week really encompasses pretty much all things I love, because it celebrates reading by encouraging people to dress up in costumes. What a great idea. Why can't there be book week for adults too? Maybe that's why teachers get into it.

This year, Rachel wanted to be Peter Pan. I think she just found her old Peter Pan hat in the dress ups and suddenly remembered she loved it. Although, I did also take her to a Peter Pan play day in the park and we did watch the movie that week too, so maybe it's more than an old costume.

Anyway! All we had for a Peter Pan costume was the hat, so we needed to add to it pretty quickly. Luckily, I had purchased a bit of green fabric from Spotlight for this exact purpose, I would say probably two years ago, but had never got around to making it. So now, all I had to do was find the material and make the tunic. Done!

Rachel sat at the machine with me and guided the material through. She also got to press reverse and lift and lower the presser foot. A budding seamstress! Hooray! Given that Peter Pan is a boy who runs away to Neverland and never grows up, I felt justified not lining or hemming this at all. For the pattern, I just traced around the top part of an Izzy Top Pattern and then extended it. I assumed it would work because the one Rachel has been wearing from Easter is really big. I was right.

She's also wearing her belt from her Luke Skywalker costume from last year's May the Forth. We attached a little jingly bell to the belt, so it was kind of like having Tinkerbell with her the whole time.

The day of Book Week at kindy, Hugo decided he would be a crocodile to match Rachel's Peter Pan, and Mia changed from being a Princess to a Fairy. It was really cute to see them team up together like that so they could play.

Sophie's school Book Week parade is actually next week, so even though I've made her costume, we will wait until then to go into it. She's pretty excited though.

Ongoing and Never Ending Reading

I seem to have started a number of posts about reading of late and it seems to be remiss of me not to mention a book that I am always reading. I've read it countless times now, and I'm still going back.

It's The Bible.

Since I committed to following Jesus in 2004, I've read The Bible fairly consistently. Sometimes with a plan, sometimes not. In some seasons of my life, I'm there every day, other times, not so much. I'm still amazed that I can read it and find new things, and that I'll still be learning new things.

The times in my life that I've been doing a quiet time (which is to say, intentionally spending time reading God's word and praying each day), are absolutely the times that I have had the most growth as a person. It seems strange to me that there are times where I prioritize other things above it, and then usually decline, but I'm only human I guess.

After reading The Bible through chronologically (did you know that it's not actually chronological to start with?), in 2012, I had a huge break from reading with any kind of system or routine. I guess that's what having a baby or two will do. In 2017, I completed a "Through the Bible" reading plan with the help of being accountable to a friend and an app that told me what to read each day.

Last year I did a Bible Project reading plan, again, through the whole book in one year. I think I did the Psalms twice actually. If you've never heard of The Bible Project, I can not recommend their videos enough. For beginners or old timers their resources are so fantastic. Go check them out. Do it now.

This year I'm doing another Bible Project reading plan, but this time just the New Testament. It's a lot slower going than I'm used to. If you go through The Bible in a year, you are reading about four chapters of the Old Testament, a Psalm and a chapter of the New Testament a day. Only doing the New Testament means so much less daily reading.

But it's been good, to go slower. To spend more time with Jesus directly. To really think about what he is teaching, and how it is so upside down and counter cultural, both then when he said it, and now today.

Next year I'd like to go through the whole lot again, but read the Message version, which is a different translation of the original. Just to mix it up.

Have you ever read The Bible? It's pretty full on, but has so much to say about the story of a creator God who loves his people, and time and time again, wants to build a relationship with them. It's something that I will read again and again, because I need to be reminded all the time.

This quote that a friend shared a while ago really resonates with me now as I reflect on this:

"Some truths we only need to hear once, and they sear themselves across your soul like a red-hot iron, changing your life forever. 

Other truths we need to hear again and again, like water dripping on a rock, slowly washing away the sediment of lies that keep trying to build up, until finally the lies are forgotten and only the truth remains. 

The Gospel is both kinds of truth."