January Monthly Make - I just made it!

I am taking part in the Monthly Make which is hosted by Annie The Felt Fairy and Phew - I Just finished this January project in time! I really enjoyed making this for my lovely daughter, who you will no doubt guess is called Isabel! The very talented Joan at Ninimakes was kind enough to email me the pattern for the toadstool house - I just couldn't resist it (no surprise there huh??) It was nice taking my time over making this, I didn't rush it and I didn't stay up all hours trying to finish it - a first for me! The little Bobbin is very pleased with her new "blinky" and took it to bed with her last night. 

On to my February project now! 

All Change!

I have had really a rather frustrating week as I have been without my car, I hate being stuck in, it usually leads to all sorts of crazy things in my house! Cabin Fever this week led to me deciding to put the two little Bobbins into the same bedroom and turning the now empty bedroom into a Playroom.I had this brilliant theory about all the toys being confined to one room, less tidying, more imaginative play (think it may have just been semi-lucid ramblings of a mad woman now though!!).

About halfway through this (right about the time I was single-handedly dragging the wardrobe between rooms) I thought to myself "what in the world have you started here you nut-case??!?" Yep - one of those. It has turned into a mammoth project - one that I still haven't finished yet. I currently have a hallway of homeless toys and books that I now don't have space for. Maybe it's time to get ruthless. The girls have loved sharing though and have so far been very very good at going to sleep - though watch this space, I'm sure the tide will turn!

I have been adding a few new items to my craft room (thank goodness for home deliveries or I would never have got through the week!). I ordered these lovely lovely things last week. Theme developing here perhaps???

A toadstool money box, spotty pencil tub and musical toadstools!

This has been on my wish list for a long time now, it plays the theme tune from Love Story!

I love the little grass painted on the bottom

I am having to watch it like a hawk though - it has fans!

I have managed to get some sewing done this week, not as much as I would like, but I am nearly finished my monthly make and will post some photos over the weekend - let's just say you won't be surprised when you see what it is! 

xx

Little Give Away Winner

The Winner of the Sew Darn Cute Book is....Drumroll......

Took me forever to figure out how to show the result - I got there in the end though!!

Well done Daisy Daydreams !! I hope you enjoy this lovely little book.

Thank you all for entering - have a great weekend everyone!

xx

Sweet Valentine Day Printables

Now my lovelies, aside from fabric, my other weakspot is giftwrap and cards. Beautiful wrappings, tags and invitations, thank-you's etc all make me go slightly weak at the knees! 

There are some very talented designers out there who are also very generous and share some of their work to be downloaded. It was only 5 years ago that I got married but the wealth of (free!) invitations, favour tags, etc that are now available makes me want to do it all over again (to Mr.Bobbin again of course...ahem!!)

I hope you don't mind, but I would like to occasionally showcase the lovely printables that are made so generously available, they appeal to me so much and I hope they will to you too. Do let me know your thoughts! I will mainly focus on Holidays and Birthdays - but if you are planning your special day you should definitely take a look at the sites I mention, I was stunned by what was out there from a Wedding perspective. 

So, to kick us off:

* Sweet Valentine Day Printables *

These very sweet pretties can be downloaded at Ucreate 

 xx

My Latest Fabric Hoard...shhhh!

As today is supposed to be the gloomiest day of the year I thought I would try to cheer things up a bit with some pretty fabric pictures. I spent the time first few days of January searching for new fabrics that I can make and create with. It was very, very difficult deciding what to order!! It all arrived a few weeks ago and I thought I would share these fabrics with you in their uncut form (a beautiful sight!). Which one is your favourite?

I mainly sourced these from two of my favourite on-line fabric shops:

 Seamstar and Fabric Rehab 

 They both have an extensive and up-to-date range, I could spend all day shopping there!

The next task is to get my creative hat on and start making!

Happy Gloomy Monday!!

*Don't forget if you haven't done so, enter the Give-Away on my earlier post to win a copy of "Sew Darn Cute" by Jenny Ryan*

A Little Give-Away!

I have decided to run a little give-away over the next week for all my lovely readers and I love this Jenny Ryan book:

To be in with a chance of winning a brand new copy of this very lovely and inspiring book all you need to do is leave me a comment below and I will enter you into a random draw on Friday 21st Jan (that gives me a week to work out the technicalities of such things!)

Good Luck Everyone!!

xxx 

Roll Up, Roll Up!

So this is the project I have been working on for the last week and it's finally finished! It's a very soft fleece blanket for my sister-in-law's new nephew. I have been sewing into the wee hours on this one! It's all hand stitched, which is definitely my favourite way to sew - each individual stitch is thought about and I find it a bit more creative than the sewing machine. 

I have based it on a circus theme, the red and white seems to go really well with the blue:

The blanket is edged in red wool using a blanket stitch (one of my favourite!)

I hope Dominic has lots of lovely cuddles with his blanket!

Now that I have finished that project I thought I would get started on my Monthly Make Challenge this weekend, though I think I need a few nights sleep first! 

Also, drop by here over the next few days as I will be putting together a little give-away for you lovely readers to enter. 

A Monthly Challenge

I have decided to take part in this challenge set by Annie over at the The Felt Fairy. It involves making an item every month for the next 12 months. Now I am usually churning out a few items on a monthly basis but what I have found of late that everything I make generally ends up in someone else's house! Which is of course lovely, but it does mean that the two little Bobbins are somewhat lacking in the handmade department. 

So I thought what a brilliant way to keep me on track to make them lots of things from my own fair hands this year! So if you fancy joining the challenge or just keeping up with everyone's progress the full details can be found on this posting and everyone's lovely makes will be displayed at this flickr group.  

Wish me luck!!

My Little Haven - Part 2

As promised, here are some more shots of the craft room, I have tried a few close-ups this time, focusing on some of my favourite aspects of the room. All this time taking pictures of it - I had probably better get on with actually doing something productive in it now!!!

My Scissor Pot

Bonne Maman Jars that I use for bits and bobs - I made the Bobbin's eat alot of jam for these! 

My felt cakes - they are very cheery, but do sometimes make me want to snack!

A small section of my craft books!

My beads and threads

One of my favourite postcards framed

I keep my die-cuts in these tins - I really love the top tin, I was given this years ago , it's from The Ghirardelli Chocolate Company in San Francisco - a city I love with all my heart!

My beloved Cath Kidston Radio - Mr.Bobbin gave me this for my birthday  a  few years ago

So there it is! I am going to get back to sewing today though I might try and get out and about with     the camera later. Hope you are all having a lovely weekend! xx

My Little Haven - Part 1

The sun finally came out this afternoon and I was able to take a few shots of my beloved craft room. Hurrah! I am the very definition of an amateur photographer (I know nothing!) and my new camera is way, way beyond my limited capacity but I am having fun playing around with it - I hope you can humour my pictures while I get to grips with it all. Having said that I did manage to take quite a few pictures so I will split this up into two posts, maybe showing the more detailed shots in the next post. 

So this is my little haven. It's the one room in my house that I can truly call me "just mine" - though the little Bobbin's are always trying to sneak in here and poke around! It's a modest sized room, hardly a studio or anything but I am very grateful for it's existence - I am a very lucky girl to have this space. I do wonder if Mr.Bobbin knew exactly what I had in mind when I asked him a year or so back if I could make a few changes to what was then known as his very manly "computer room"!! He has taken it all in his stride though and even put up the storage units and blinds and screwed jam jars to the under-side of shelves (this was a particularly stress inducing task for him!) 

It's a work in progress and I am constantly making changes and additions. I have a few plans to implement over the new few months - which will know doubt involve Mr. Bobbin unearthing his drill and hammer once more!

I hope you have enjoyed the little peak into my craft room - let me know what you think!

xx 

Friday Frolicks- Toadstooly Cute!

I LOVE Toadstools (not real ones, they sort of freak me out!) so for some Friday Frolicks I thought I would treat you to some sweet 'shroom pictures:

Wee Waldorf

Flickr

Hobro

Daily Mail

Etsy

Flickr

Madewithlovebyhannah.com

Flickr

I absolutely need to own all of these!

Hope you all have a lovely weekend! I'm planning on road-testing my new camera - hopefully share the shots with you next week!

xx

Craft Room Covets

I finally got the craft room back to it's former glory today and I have to say that I am feeling a little more centred. Hoping it stays tidy long enough for me to take some pictures! In the meantime I have been hunting around and putting together a little wish-list of all the things I would like to add to it to give it just that little more sparkle - a girl can wish right?!?

I'm running really low on wall space but if I could squeeze another print in it would be one of these

From Etsy

From Etsy

Jane Foster

From Etsy

These little trinkets would fit in really nicely 

Dotcomgiftshop

Ok, not so little a trinket!
Pedlars

Dotcomgiftshop

I really like the idea of displaying favourite pieces of fabric in Embroidery Hoops - I'm going to give this a go in the next few weeks:

I'm hopefully going to get back to creating this week, I have ALOT of fabric on order and some other lovely bits and pieces that should make crafting that bit more enjoyable. 

Back to the reality of running back and forth from nursery, ballet lessons and the general daily grindstone tomorrow! 

Looking Forward to a Brand New Year!

This lovely image is from Free Pretty Things For You

Happy New Year to you all! Just a quick post to wish you all the best in 2011! I am so excited to be starting a New Year and we have lots of plans for Bella Bobbin. The last few months have really been about finding our feet and it has been great fun being able to share with everyone out there. 

I am excitedly awaiting delivery of my new camera and will be putting it to good use when it finally gets here! I am having a reorganisation of the Craft Room and have been working on a little project with a pattern that was sent to me by the very generous (and talented!) Joanie over at Ninimakes. 

Right, back to that Craft Room and nagging Mr. Bobbin to put together the new storage unit for it!

All the best for 2011 to You and Yours!!

XX