One Inch World

We have a baby friend who likes to chew on velcro, he’s teething, and I was inspired to make something now while he was over here playing. I made this out of six inches of silky blanket binding, a bunch of ribbons, and some velcro strips. With whatever thread was already in the sewing machine, obviously. If you want to make one too here are the basic steps:

• Open up the blanket binding, and sew a strip of velcro to each edge, leaving about 1/2″ of binding at each end to fold over the edges at the end. Only sew the edges of the velcro along the outside of the binding.
• Cut up a bunch of ribbon pieces and slip them under the edges of the velcro.
• Sew down the edge of the velcro towards the middle of the binding, securing the ribbon ends.
• Fold down the non-velcro edges of the blanket binding and stitch them down to cover the ends of the velcro.

There you go. I think this is neat, because the baby gets to chew on the velcro, grab the ribbons, and you can fold the ribbons to the inside, velcro it shut and stuff it in your bag.

This was supposed to be another vaguely Earth Day playgroup, but it didn’t really work out that way. Rebecca and I trimmed her grass and Earth Day arugula sprouts, and then when everyone else got there we squoze paint into paper plates.

My original idea had been that we would make No Time For Flash Card’s Earth Tambourine, but I was overruled. Which is fine, it’s really all about making a mess as many different ways each Friday as possible.

I saw some beautiful work on an appliqued table runner by Calamity Kim and while I couldn’t hope to match it without devoting a year of my life to it, I was inspired to make something mushroomy and house-y with raw edged applique and freehand machine embroidery.

This bird is my favorite part of the machine embroidery I think, some of it is really awful. But that’s what I get when I don’t do any planning or sketching, and just stitch – really wonky stitch tension, and a broad spread of accidental awesome to ick.

When I started out, my goal was a skirt. By the time I was done with the applique, I didn’t think it really looked like a skirt anymore. But I forged ahead anyway, even though I’d put mushroom roots down past the hem line and birds up past the elastic casing fold line. Obviously I should have done a little more planning than “don’t get too close to the edges.” Because that didn’t work so well. But whatever. I used the ribbon hem binding from the oliver+s lazy days skirt pattern. That may have been why I secretly wanted to make a skirt, just so I could try out that ribbon binding, it’s so cool.

Earth Day is next week, so we did some Earth activities today. While we were waiting for Rebecca’s friends I drew her a wobbly circle to paint green and blue. She painted over the letters too.

Then when everyone got here we painted small terra cotta pots with acrylic paint, and planted some seeds in them. (Any activity is more fun with a bag of dirt, right?) If we are lucky we’ll get some sprouts for Earth Day next week.

By far the most incredible thing about starting this blog has been seeing other people making things with my patterns/tutorials. (I also think it’s curious that for the most part they don’t comment or use trackbacks or pingbacks, so I have to hunt them down myself.)

But it’s thrilling. It’s the best confirmation I could get that my ideas are making a real contribution to, uh, creative knowledge? I’m going to have a pattern published in One Yard Wonders this fall, but really? Seeing someone has actually taken the time to make something I’ve designed is even better. (Presumably the book will result in someone making my box pattern, but it’s so much less likely that I will ever find out about it.)

So thanks! Here’s my own list of linkbacks to the awesome people who have made my day by sewing some of my stuffable eggs:

Gingini

Makin' Projiks

Fleurinette

Mountain Mama

mikausa

Made for my 4

If I missed you, or you don’t want to be here, please let me know.

Ginger of Loves To Dream sent me a blog award. And this is dumb, and not her fault, she has a sweet blog, but it kind of ruined my evening. Who makes these things up? Ever since getting my first chain letter, in the mail no less, I’ve hated the you-must-do-this tone, and the sometimes subtle sometimes blatant message of if-you-don’t pass this on, you are some kind of looser, will have horrible luck for the rest of the day, or are just no fun. This one in particular pats itself on the back for being ‘cleverly-worded’ while at the same time praises the people propagating it for being uninterested in self-aggrandizing. Huh. Who are you Mr. Awesome-Invisible-Patronizing-Voice? Seriously, who writes these things? Am I being mean? Sigh. I’m just bitter about how these things always make me feel. So, yah, I’m not passing this one along. Someday maybe I’ll make, or get, an award that says, ‘Hey, I like your blog! If you feel like it pass forward the message to some blogs you like, spread the sunshine.’ With no you-musts, you-have-to, or you-will. Because I guess I’m a billy-goat or something. I should do it today to balance out the karma, but really, that’s what leaving comments on other people’s blogs is for, which I try to do on a regular basis, and I’ve already wasted enough of my evening stewing over this, and I have to go put my daughter to bed. Excuses Excuses. End of rant.

But hey, if you’re reading this, maybe, if you feel like it, if you have time, and it isn’t too much trouble, because I never want to make work for people, go and leave a nice comment on someone else’s blog, telling them how awesome they are. Every day this week if you’re feeling really motivated. If you’re feeling super motivated, take jojoebi’s Comment Pledge. I thought that one was such a sweet idea.