Crafts N'At is Saturday!

Stalk me this Saturday at the Pittsburgh Craft Collective's Crafts N'At. "N'At" is Pittsburghese for "and that." So come by from 10 - 6 at the Union Project on N. Negley. Baby Lemon will be home with the grammas so it will just be me and the Lemon Loot.

I have some new polka dot romper guys that I made special just for this show. They are awesome.

More info here. I have to say that this logo is, by far, my favorite of any of the craft shows I've ever done. It's so cool.

I'm in booth 19, at the end of the row that will be facing you when you walk in.

A new dress.

After much success with the Simplicity pattern, I decided to pick up something a little shorter, a little more casual. I can't find the pattern right now or I'd tell you what it was. It was not Simplicity and it was not simple. I thought it would be easy but I had a lot of trouble with it. The instructions said to do things that didn't make sense. When I would look up the words they were using, I still couldn't figure out what they were asking me to do so I just did what seemed right. I guess that's why sewing classes are useful. I've never really had one.

I love how this turned out. I used yet another Alexander Henry fabric that is fabulous. It's called Traffic Pattern. I paired it with a dusty blue polka dot that I picked up at the local quilt shop. Instead of buttons, I used snaps. I still don't know how to use my machine to make a button hole and what toddler is going to sit still long enough for you to button them into something. Mine sure doesn't.

Mr. Lemon assisted with the photo shoot on the porch by blowing bubbles to entertain the little one. More pics on flickr (link to the left).

Other Crafty Endeavors

This summer I took advantage of semi-lax summer hours and a cooler-than-I-ever-remember-it weather pattern, and made a whole bunch of stuff for my kid:
This is a little drawstring bag lined with a shirt I bought at Gabe's just for the print. I appliqued these crazy animals onto it. They're from some fabric someone gave my mom. It's very weird and safari-esque. We put the finger puppets we bought last year at Old Navy into it.





I love this little fabric book. I cut out the animals from the new Eric Carle fabric that my local quilt shop surprisingly had in stock. I appliqued them onto some of my favorite prints from my stash. The facing pages are all solids. The inside of the cover also uses some of the fabric from the Eric Carle yardage. I didn't have a pattern or directions to follow so I just sorta went with it and I think it turned out well. I improvised a Japanese stab binding and it has started to come apart from toddler abuse so I'll have another go at that with some thicker thread or I'll double up the embroidery floss. That number print is Alexander Henry.

This is a travel highchair. If you do a google search you'll see what one looks like in use. I used some more fabric my mom gave me (her church quilt buddies gave it to her -- you can't buy stuff this amazing). There is also some polka dot and corduroy from my stash and that paisley print is a fat quarter I got free when buying from an Etsy shop that was having a sale. Oh, and of course, that Joel Dewberry pink faux boix that I can't get enough of (literally). I like the way the prints work together.

Small for Big

My screenprinted yeti onesies were featured on the awesome Small for Big blog that features really cool stuff for kids.

These onesies have been really popular and I'm considering making more. I have my friend Dorsey, who prints all my yeti shirts for me, print some onto fabric. I iron my fusible interfacing to the back of them, cut them out, then iron them on to the onesies and use the sewing machine to do the applique like I do for my other designs. His press is too large to print directly onto onesies.

People had been asking for these for a while so I made some up. It's so nice when someone else "gets" your stuff. I want my stuff to have an edge without being snarky. I want my kid to look good without announcing her parents' sense of humor to the world. I have so far successfully avoided buying baby clothes without witty (or not-so-witty phrases on them) and I'm hoping to keep that up and make it possible for others to do the same.

New Projects

I've been on a crazy crafty roll lately making lots of things for Zadie. We're going on a little trip soon and I wanted to have some really fantastic toys to take with us. My favorite is this 21" cat doll. I bought the pattern from mmmcrafts on Etsy. It was a pdf and Larissa emailed it right away. It was an incredibly easy pattern to follow and I really enjoyed making it. I've been sewing a lot of stuff lately and with some patterns, I spend more time reading and re-reading the instructions to figure out what the heck they're telling me to do. That was not the case here. It was well written and the drawings were perfect.

The best part was picking out the fabrics. I couldn't decide between this teal corduroy and some red that I also had. I put them both on the couch and let Zadie decide. She pretty much charged at the fabric from across the room (this is a toddler who isn't quite toddling yet so it was funny to see) and jammed her little pointer finger onto the teal. She made her choice very clear. I didn't even realize that she could understand what I was asking.

I don't think I altered the pattern in any way (although I did embroider the face instead of using felt). The sleeves are cool ladybugs I picked up on Etsy for the Mod Sampler Quilt-Along project that I haven't finished yet (all the blocks are done, I swear!). The funny thing is that the sample cat in the pattern is wearing the same sleeves in a different color. I thought they were polka dots until I saw a closer picture on her flickr. The skirt was a challenge since I had never sewn elastic in like that but it was cool to learn something new -- and it was pretty easy. I used a Japanese house print that I got at Purl in Soho, some Echino, a solid -- really all just stuff I had. I didn't have to buy anything new (although I did and didn't even end up using it, as usual).

The shoes were my favorite:

Handmade Mart

We headed out to Silver Spring, MD (next to DC) for the first ever Handmade Mart. It was one of the best craft shows I've ever been to. When we got there volunteers helped us unload the van and some other people helped us set up the tent. There were bagels and some fruit for us too.

All of the tents were set up along one side of the street down at our end. I was surprised at the amount of traffic. It was really crowded! But because the street was so wide, it didn't seem bad --everyone had room to walk and for most of the day, we were in the shade. We were across from a noodle shop so lunch was amazing. Perfect weather, great music, frozen icy stuff, yay!

The rompers I made in May were a big hit at the Squidfire's show so I added some new designs and people again really seemed to like them. I have two of the designs photographed so I'll add them to the shop this week.


As you can see, they are really comfortable for both romping when you're supposed to be sleeping, and for a short snooze:


We decided to only bring one table to make room for the pack n play.

I put the beans in front of the table in one of our laundry baskets and that worked well. We used both clothing racks so there was plenty of room for all the goods too.

The yetis hung from the back wall of the tent and they were almost all gone by the end of the day. My friend is printing up some more of these and I'll have them soon.

Squidfire's May show (yes, May)

Better late than never, huh?

There have been some major computer issues here in Lemonland. Finally, the new computer is loaded with programs and files and several hundred pictures that have been molding in folders and on the camera.

The Squidfire's show was amazing. As usual, Baltimorians are super nice and very friendly. We had a great spot with a nice patch of grass behind the tent so we could chill with the little one in the shade.

We shared a spot with Kim of Shortees/Smartee Pants. We had so much fun. It was really nice to hang out with a fellow crafter and mom all day. Her son is just two months older than Baby Lemon so I got the scoop on what's coming next (one nap, beastly teeth, walking...). Kim makes amazing clothes from recycled t-shirts.

The best part of the day was a visit from one of our biggest fans:
She is the daughter of Sweet Pepita, a really amazing crafter.

Thanks to everyone who came to the show! The new rompers were a big hit so I made more for the Handmade Mart. Now that we're technologically stable again, I'll get some photos of the new stuff and add it to the Etsy shop.