Belated Baby Quilt Squares

The only thing belated about this is my blogging of it. I'm excited to do so now, because the baby in question has arrived safely, and that is always joyful news. 

For both of my girls and for Hugo, my mum put together a quilt where special people who had been in our lives for long and short times contributed a square. I didn't blog about Sophie's, but Rachel's is documented here, and you can see both of them in use in this rather funny photo recreation post. 

My younger sister was expecting a (now arrived!) little one and so the girls and I contributed a quilt square for his quilt. It was really cool to have the girls old enough to really add some sewing to this one, rather than the drawings they have donated to quilts in the past (see here and here). 

Rachel, the more sewing minded of my girls, was quite dedicated to the different embroidery stitches and had lots to say about how her square would look. 

Sophie was happy to do some decorative running stitches and let me do the rest for hers. But she was committed do giving it a good go. Good on you Sophie. 

We took a lot of inspirations from the squares on the girls quilts, and added our own flare. I hope this little baby loves his quilt just like my girls love theirs. 

Under the Surface

People ask me how the holidays were, and I honestly struggle to answer. Sure they were, on the whole, good; restful even. I got time at home, time with the girls, time with Steve. We had day trips to South Bank, and park play dates with friends. I made a table, oiled the deck, sewed a jacket. There was delicious dinners and fun lunches. 

But there were also moment of discontent. Of frustration and annoyance. Of feeling like things were not quite right. On top, we were doing fine, but under the surface I was feeling unsettled. The truth is, when someone asks how it was, there is never a good way to bring this side of things up. 

I think this feeling is pretty normal, and I'm happy to say that even though I have felt like this before, I know it will pass. The sun rises and sets, the days turn into weeks and if I keep my feet moving forward, somehow, I walk out of this unrest and into feeling content again. 

This is part of life that reminds me that what I have here and now isn't perfect. It's not what we are made for. What I'm experiencing is brokenness. Like I've turned the bowl and discovered a chip on one side, reminding me that I'm not always patient and kind or gracious and self controlled. 

The difficulty is expressing this discontent in a way that isn't complaining. That isn't morose and depressing. It's just a part of life, but for some reason, it's inexplicably hard to engage with or share. 

So yes, the holidays were good, but I was also not quite right for most of it. And that's ok. These moments remind me that this life will always be a little less than what we are dreaming for. My heart is longing for the day of perfection which is yet to come. In the mean time, Jesus tells me the kingdom is here and now, and that if I come and lay my burdens down, he will give me rest. 

Made a Table

What I've learnt from this blog post is that I am absolutely terrible at documenting things with "before" photos, and that my life would be so much easier if I got better at it. That said, let's dive in for the post for today!

My kids have had this little table that they use all the time. It actually was originally from my childhood and my parents passed it on to me when I was running the Family Day Care in the early years of life with Sophie and Rachel. The original chairs had died, but the table was still solid. A quick trip to Ikea sorted some new chairs and we got on with our little table life. 

This is the best, most recent photo I have of it, early 2021. Solid frame, but the table top bit was just chip board and had started to lift where the chip board was swelling. It did not get better, but we just kept using it. I was convinced however, that if we just replaced the table top, the table could continue to live a long and happy life. 

Enter the day that Rachel's dressing table drawers finally gave up. Rachel's dressing table was also a relic from my childhood, again, sturdy wood construction, but the drawer bases had popped out and the plastic runners they were sliding in on had started to split and fall off. When I took out the drawers to move the whole thing out of the room, what I saw was a whole lot of wooden potential for a table top. 

My original thought was to reuse the drawer fronts, but they were all nicely bevelled, and in the end I wasn't sure the three of them would fit nicely across the table. Also (I'll be honest), I couldn't get the handles off easily. But, there was an excellent surplus of wood in so many other places, that I figured I would just need to take it apart and make it work. 

So that's what I did. Holiday time came around and I started with the table, and then I unscrewed everything I could on the dressing table, and we borrowed a circular saw to do the final dismantling. The two side panels of the dressing table put together, fit perfectly across the table top. 

I sanded back the old table and cleaned it up. Then I put the new top together, with some extra support wood also salvaged from the dressing table. Rachel helped putty all the holes, even the ones no one would see. 

Steve did the final secure of the top to the frame with some brackets underneath, and I added one more extra support under the top just in case. Then I sanded the whole thing back some more and varnished it up. 

This table lives again. It's heavier, but it looks good, and I feel good knowing that two things that were previously destined for the tip have had their lives extended just that little bit more. 

Maybe one day I'll be better at before photos too. 

Jacket Adventure

At the end of my reflections on Me Made May this year, I realised that one item of clothing that I wear all the time and love, is a black, Calvin Klein, jacket which my sister gave me as a hand me down. I wore it heaps in May, but almost every day through winter this year; all the time. I don't think I could love this jacket more. So what became a passing comment at the end of May, stuck in the back of my mind: could I make a copy of this jacket? 

Enter September. The weather is warming up, and I'm using my jacket less and less. To be honest, recreating it was not high on my priority list given the weather change; if I did make a second one now, I likely wouldn't even get a chance to wear it until next April at the earliest. Still, the thought of doing it niggled at me such that one night I just decided to get on with it. 

My thinking was that recreating it would take at least one, if not two draft attempts, to get the fit right, so I may as well start now. I took an evening to trace out the shapes from the original jacket. Lots of shapes. It had seams in both the front and back, as well as darts in the back. The sleeves also had strange extra seams, but I ended up not bothering with those. The original jacket is unlined, but with facings, cuffs and welt pockets at the front, and an extra fake pocket flap on one side too. 

I went through my storage tubs looking for what would need to be a substantial amount of fabric to make an entire draft jacket with and stumbled across this wrap skirt. It was 100% cotton, but also quite heavy, I guess similar to what you'd want in a jacket. I thought it had come from my friend Megan down the road, but she can't remember it. Makes me think it might have come from Carrie, which means it's been in the stash for at least 12 years. Time to do something with it. 

I unpicked the waist band and lay it out with all my pieces. It looked like I would get most of the jacket out of the skirt, but I realised I needed to unpick the trim on the bottom edge to get the facings out of it too. An hour or so of unpicking later and we were ready to cut! 

Putting this together was mostly me making it up - I mean, in some ways, it's straight forward; darts, seams, sleeves, side seams, facings. But on the other hand: cuffs? Lining? Pockets? A second time round, I would absolutely do some things in a different order. It didn't help that after the first time I put it on and found it was fitting really well. 

Given that I didn't actually need to adjust anything major (just cut a bit off the shoulder seam at the armhole), I decided I may as well make this jacket a wearable toile. And then I figured I may as well attempt to line the whole thing too. Pro tip - adding lining to already stitched on facings is not the way to go. 

Mostly done, just going to add lining and buttons now.

Back to the box for lining fabric, I found this blue stripe which I had nearly enough of, and then added the remains of a Lorraine Lea pillowcase for the sleeves. 

Since you can't see the sleeves at all, it's almost like it's all the same lining fabric. 

The cuffs on the sleeves were the trickiest part. (You can see me contemplating different cuff length options in the photo above where I'm wearing it. The verdict from my sisters was the non-watch arm length.) I wear the original black jacket with sleeves rolled up all the time. 

Since I never roll them down, I wasn't going to bother make a replica with long sleeves, which to me translated to a total waste of extra fabric. But then I wasn't sure how long to make the sleeves, or how to do cuffs, or if I should make them able to roll in case I thought they were too long. In the end, I'm happy with the cuff length, but I did face the inside of the sleeve lining with another strip of the outer fabric so that if I want to, I can roll it up. 

I watched a tutorial or two on YouTube to get an idea of how to do the welt pocket with a flap. I've done welt pockets before, but you have to cut into the actual fabric, so it's not something you want to accidently get wrong. 

A couple of finishing things - loop at the neckline to be able to hang the jacket off and lastly, the tag from the original skirt, stitched into the lining on the inside. Just for a little bit of history. I only had two black buttons that would have been the right size, but mum had three lighter coloured ones, and Fiona advised to go with that, so I did. 

Couldn't be happier with the finished trial jacket. I actually love that it's got a print, even though I feel that's not usual in a jacket. I'll definitely be keeping this to try out in May next year and I'm excited to make another with some more serious jacket fabric. 

Rachel's Lady Bug Jumpsuit

Just want to keep a quick record of Rachel's latest sewing feat. 

For her birthday, she was given some lovely lady bug print denim from her cousin, Hugo. We talked about what she wanted to make out of it, and she decided on a jumpsuit. 

It was actually kind of fun brainstorming it with her, and finding out what she liked in her clothes. She wanted shorts, but no cuffs. Zip and elastic waist. No sleeves. Pockets on the pants, but not in seam, and none on the chest or back. 

We also talked about how to achieve it all, and what sewing features it would need given what she wanted as an end result (things like facings vs linings, for those sewing people playing along from home). We traced a jump suit she currently has and then made a quick mock up in some random fabrics to check the fit.

 

Success, so on we went to the real deal. Rachel wanted to wear this at a family event that was three days away, so I did way more of the pinning and cutting than I would have usually, but we were under a tight deadline. Rachel sewed it all like a champ on the little sewing machine - even the zip and the elastic. 

The pockets are lined with some lady bug silk from a tie of my dads, and I had just enough of it to use for to bind the edges of the neck and arm holes. Zip came from the stash too. 

Rachel is super happy with her fun jumpsuit, and I'm pretty proud of this little sewer. 

Final Kimono

When my friend David offered me bolts of kimono and yukata fabric for cheap in April, I jumped at the chance. I was intending to only get a couple, but ended up with five. Of them, four were kimono length, while the last one is only haori length. I started with the cotton one, which I sewed up in a week and a half, all the way back in April. 

I then moved on to make the two that were wool/nylon blend into kimono for the girls. Rachel's is here, and Sophie's here. I took the final kimono bolt with us on our Winter Travels, after washing it out, for something to hand sew in the after dinner conversation time. 

Of all the kimono, that last one took the longest to make. I did sew it while we were travelling, but not nearly as much as I thought I would. When we returned home, I just took it to church with us each week and sewed while listening to the sermon. It was a nice little project to keep my legs warm each week, even if it did mean that it felt like it was taking a comparatively long time to complete. 

At last though, I did finish it. I was actually inspired to get it done so I could wear it to the Australia Japan Society 50th anniversary celebration at the Mt Cootha Botanical Gardens, so I spent two nights attaching the collar while Steve and I watched TV together. 

Unfortunately, even though I finished in time, I didn't end up wearing it to the celebration evening at all. The event was a picnic in the Japanese gardens, with traditional entertainment, but when it came to it, it had been cold and rainy the night before, and the friend I had been planning on going with bailed on me. Suddenly, I had two delicious bento made and no one to eat them with. 

So I did a call around, but the last minute notice left no one available. In the end I took the girls, thinking that if they couldn't handle it we would just leave early and no one would be worse for wear. Sadly though, because all the ringing around took time, and I was even on the edge of calling it and not going at one point, I left it too late to get into a kimono before we had to leave. 

Oh well. I put it on last week for photos, but being a 100% wool blend, I was feeling overly toasty pretty quickly. This will definitely be a kimono that is only for winter. Still, happy to have it done and it really is so pretty. Photos don't do it justice, but the colours are just lovely and the feel is beautiful. 

 

Looking back, sewing four kimono in five months is a pretty great achievement and I think has really sparked a love of hand sewing for me. I've always enjoyed the slower pace of hand sewing for a change, but I think having something that I can transport with me, and keep my hands busy while my mind thinks of other things is really amazing. 

The girls and I did have a great night together at the Japanese event, by the way. They were really delighted that I had decided to take them with me and were just so well behaved. We had our picnic, they listened to the speeches (a surprising number actually, but I think that's because I didn't realise it was a 50th anniversary event) and we enjoyed the traditional performances together. 

Ahh, delicious Japanese bento. So so good. 

Now I only have the haori to sew, but as I've never sewn one before, I'm taking a bit of a break before I tackle that. Also, I started another sewing project that I'm pretty excited about and that's taking up all of my brain space at the moment. Well, that and extra work days that I've picked up for next term, not to mention all the end of year performances that my choirs have coming up. And report cards. Can't forget those. 

Normality Restored: Planting Things

Now that the Nana Flat is done, and the turf was laid, it was time to start thinking about the garden beds. I especially wanted to get things into the ground before October rolled around and the weather turned hot and horrible. We had heaps of plants that we had kept from our garden beds prior to the renovation, as well as two of the four trees that we had saved. 

Excitedly, we ordered some soil and mulch and got going. The garden bed that had been created by the retaining wall that ran around the right side of our property (near the Nana Flat), we filled up and planted small things in. Maria has put lots of ground cover type stuff in the part that runs near the Nana Flat, while out the front where it comes down closer to ground level, I took advantage of the sun profile and planted lots of herbs. 

I wasn't going to plant anything in this garden bed, but this little section at the front actually has the most sun out of all of our garden beds now, and I didn't want to waste it. I also planted a jasmine vine to climb up over the fence. We had a jasmine vine given to us as a house warming present when we bought in 2010, and it had been thriving in that front corner of the yard before we had to dig it out for the renovations. 

In the ground in both corners of the front yard we planted the two trees that had managed to survive (RIP Blueberry Ash and Luscious Number One), the Australian Frangipani and the Luscious. These trees are so happy to be back in the ground and I'm just delighted they made it after nearly eight months of living in the confines of a big black rubbish bin. 

The day we planted, we emptied one and a half of our compost bins and I was practically swooning over the rich black soil. Most of the ground at the front we discovered was all clay, which isn't great for growing things. We had asked our builders to mix in some gypsum to help break it up when they levelled it off, which they did, so that's there, but it's not the kind of stuff that works overnight. As Steve dug each hole for the trees, I worked the gloriously alive, black compost into the clay before the trees went in. 

The small garden bed at the top of the driveway also has the clay problem, but the additional difficulty of only getting about three hours of sunlight a day. In the morning, this garden bed is shaded by the house, and in the afternoon, it's shaded by the fence. We were really not sure anything was going to grow there at all, especially with the damp clay/ground situation. 

But, it was worth a try. Eventually I'd like to plant a tree there (or at the top of the retaining wall) that will grow up and shade the house, but baby steps to start with. Let's see if we can get something small growing first. So I planted some little flowers, chives and a plant that Bunnings assured me was indoors-y and would do well with limited sun. 

Everything loves it's life there, which again, probably has a lot to do with the compost factor. Let me gush some more over the gloriousness of the compost! I feel I could write love poems to that compost. 

Anyway, thus far, the things planted in the front are thriving and it's really feeling like the renovations are over and we are settled in. We've also upgraded some of things that were living in the pots at the back of the house to larger pots, but most of them are still in limbo land as far as were we will eventually plant them.

I've got one native guava, which I'm guessing will do well in the sun, and a native something else I got at the school fete in 2021 which had Love in the name. I can't read the tag any more, and when I bought it, the guy at the plant stall told me it was a ground cover, but the way it's growing doesn't look very ground cover-y to me. Anyway, that's a problem for future Paula. Current Paula is happy keeping things alive and growing where they are. 

I Had a Moment

 hanhaba obi

Not 100% sure what inspired this, but in August, I had a moment where I wore traditional Japanese clothes every day; for a week. Since my post back in April, I've been wearing yukata a lot more. Mostly to school, probably once a week, or once a fortnight at least. But I was wanting to wear my kimono more, and so when the girls were at their guide camp, I figured I had enough time on the Sunday morning to put one on and get to church. 

Unfortunately, we had a car accident the day before, so I was not feeling up to the intense work out that would have been required for a full kimono and I just started with a yukata instead. Still, it was beautiful and comfy and I loved it. The August weather is so perfect for kimono and yukata in Brisbane, so when Monday rolled around, I wrote another one to school. 

On Tuesday, I wore another. I don't think I had initially started with a plan to wear one a day, but once I was going, there was just no stopping. I wore them to school, to the doctors, to get groceries, to have lunch with my sister at a cafe, everywhere! 

I tried out different obi styles, and combinations between obi and yukata. Most days I would start wearing a haori (a kimono jacket/coat) as well, and then layer off as the day warmed up. 

haori - Japanese kimono jackets/coats

It was beautiful. I did end up finishing by wearing a kimono, even though we had done some gardening the day before and my arms were like wet spaghetti noodles by the time I'd finished tying the obi. 

I didn't even wear all of my yukata, or obi, or haori, in that week of blissful Japanese-ness. I could have easily kept going, but I don't know if I'm ready just yet to make a full switch to completely strange.

Here are all the things I wore that week, sans shoes, since I forgot to pop them into the photo. I do have a modest collection of Japanese shoes as well, though I alternated with my converse since the days are still cool. 

Beautiful combinations, colours and fun. I hope I have another moment again soon.