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Halloween costume fun

One of my favourite social events is a good old dress up party, I love that they really bring out peoples creativity. Thanks to my lovely friend Jess of Fox Parse for hosting a wonderful night and inviting excellent people.

For this party, I selected to dress up as the ever internet famous Keyboard Cat. I sewed together some arms, ears and a tail from about 1 meter of fur fabric, grabbed a $20 K-Mart keyboard, downloaded the Keyboard Cat song and put it on repeat on my iPod which connected to the keyboard (impressive for a $20 keyboard). I will also note that I did learn how to play the song as well… and played people out as they left the party.

Below are a some photos of me as Keyboard Cat and some of my friends in their wonderful handmade costumes.

Amie (that's me) as Keyboard Cat

Joel as Ash from Evil Dead with hand made cardboard chainsaw

That is one amazing handcrafted cardboard chainsaw all made straight from Joel’s wonderful brain. It probably took him about 5 hours all up. You can see the cardboard chainsaw in more detail on my Flicker.

Red Panda & Fox Parse as themselves (photo by Liz)

Character and costume design by Fox Parse & Liz

Internet cat friends Nyan Cat & Keyboard Cat

I was so excited to find an excellent internet cat friend at the party, many points to Bronte for coming up with one of those fab last minute costumes with minimal resources!

Captain America with amazing cardboard & gaffa tape shield

This is Matt in his great Captain America outfit and shield which he made using a Captain America shield Instructables tutorial, he also had some great cardboard scale mail which you can’t see in this picture.

Mike as the Count (photo by Liz)

Cape and Count head all handmade by Mike with things like fabric, felt, cardboard & wool.

Last by not least… here is me doing my best… or perhaps most special rendition of the Keyboard Cat.

Little shoes pattern

Just before my recent holiday break, I was given the opportunity to make and review some little shoes from the little shoes pattern Etsy store – with thanks to the Adventures in dressmaking blog.

Little shoes - Sporty shoes

So yesterday evening I whipped up these gorgeous little shoes from the Sporty shoes pattern. I’m not usually one to read every single instruction on a pattern (I’m too impatient!) but for the sake of properly reviewing, I actually did – yay me, I probably also saved myself a little unpicking along the way!

I made the shoes over an entire evening, in amongst doing other things, like making dinner, unpacking from my holiday etc. I think that if you knuckled down (sewing beginners included), you could get a pair of these made within an hour or 2. I thought the pattern was easy to follow, particularly with thanks to all the pictures. I did get a little confused in the last couple of steps which involve getting the sole on the shoes and finishing them off – I think this more comes down to the fact that little shoes are little and fiddly and I’ve never really made tiny little things before. I obviously still got there though and have some terrific little handmade shoes to send off to our recently born & gorgeous niece Jordi in Lismore.

In regards to materials needed, I used 2 fat quarters from from a local quilting store which I got for $2 each and I have plenty left over to make at least 1 (maybe 2) more pairs of little shoes. I used the only interfacing I had which was probably a little heavier/stiff than needed, I’d suggest going for a medium/soft weight interfacing, it would probably make turning the shoes in the right way etc a whole lot easier. These sporty shoes have a little velcro bits under the end of the straps, these are cute but if you don’t have velcro you could probably even just sew them down as they don’t seem to be there for functional purposes.

Would I recommend Little shoe patterns? Absolutely! At less than $5 for a pattern and around $3 for materials per pair of shoes, you really can’t go wrong. I am already planning the next pair I’ll be making and I’ve also got my eye on the Keeley pattern!

Many thanks to Little shoes pattern Etsy store for the opportunity to make and review these little shoes!

Plushie fun

On the weekend, I decided it was time that I made something from one of the the books I’ve collect for crafty inspirations. I made a couple of plush toys from my Meet me at Mikes craft project book (by Pip Lilcone).

Cuddly plushie friend

I have quite a few friends who are having babies this year and I want to make them all something similar for their new bubs. I’ve decided to go with this wonderfully simplistic little guy who was originally going to be a wheat-bag… then I decided he was way too cute to ever stick in the microwave… instead he might one day die of baby love and slobber… yay!

I’m very happy with his lovable little love heart nose which is my own original touch on the pattern.

Cuddly plushie friend

Back to basics knitting fun

Scaft project is go!

Knitting is one of those things I’ve dabbled with on and off (mostly off), every time I have started a knitting project since being a kid, I have tried to get to complicated and ended up with a big mess and quit my project. I’m quite proud to say that this time I went back to basics and am going quite well… I did restart this scarf project about 5 times in the first day… but hey, I am a creature of perfection and it had been quite a while since I had done any knitting.

If you are thinking about starting some knitting I completely recommend grabbing yourself some really fat wool, fat sparkly knitting needles (glitter keeps me motivated) and learning the most basic knitting stitch there is “knit stitch”. This combination makes a beautiful soft and slightly bold texture, I also think it has a nice kind of crafty lady/home made look to it.

There are some lovely video links from this Meet me at Mikes blog post which inspired me and reminded me know to knit!