Counting down to Christmas

Each year the boys and I make an advent calendar in which we include a small treat and a Christmas themed activity to complete each day.

Last year we made folded paper envelopes with sparkly pegs on a red Christmas ribbon.

 Prior to that we have recycled cardboard rolls to make our advents calendar (inspired by Maya Made)

This year I found these cute little house which I thought would be great for this years advent.

Unfortunately I printed them a little too small so they are a bit fiddly for my little ones to put together but the boys have helped me come up with our list of 24 advent activities and we are looking forward to lots of Christmas craft and fun over the next few weeks. What are your favourite Christmas crafts?

Wordless Wednesday - puggles very late birthday present!

Maybe it will end up being a Christmas present? Wish me luck!

Favourite Things

My dear friend and ex-neighbour is about to move internationally so last night she organised a favourite things dinner at one of her favourite restaurants. The idea of a favourite things party is to think of one of your favourite  thing with costs less than $5 and then take along 5 of them to swap with other guests. I have been trying to avoid too much sugar so I decided on tea (rather than chocolate) and made up these little gifts with a tea infuser and a small sample of my favourite Melbourne Breakfast tea. We all had a lovely evening and took home a sweet little stash of gifts to make our week a little more special. Thank you  Jennifer - we are all going to miss you so much. 

Last minute Advent calendars

I am so disorganised this year that everything seems to be last minute. Yesterday the boys worked on an advent calendar along the same lines as last years although Junior was in charge this time and did the bulk of the work himself.

 I did plan to make something a little more elaborate this year but time just got away from me.

Then this morning I saw this delightful Tea advent bunting and I had to make a couple for my dear tea drinking girl friends - not quite as elegant as I would have liked but I was working with whatever I had to hand and dragged the boys to the supermarket after school to pick up some extra teabags.

I just have to deliver them tonight so they arrive in time for December 1!

 The madness of the festive season has officially begun! PS Yes I did make a beer advent for Aussie Dad as well!

Costumes, costumes and more costumes...

Over the last couple of weeks I seem to have been making nothing but costumes (and I'm a bit over it I must say). First a clown costume for school assembly - I made some rainbow pants and a star t-shirt to match.

 
Then a late night Frankenstein costume for a school monster disco.

I was lacking inspiration so a felt covered box for a head with some toy nuts and bolts stitched to an elastic strap for the neck bolt and lots of green face paint. This photo was taken after the even so half of the face paint is missing but you get the idea.

Finally a Halloween themed birthday party (which should have been easy except I had opted out on Halloween and sent the boys trick or treating in their superhero costume). A quick trip to the party store for a Wizards hat and a simple hooded cape (made from my lovely Growing up Sew Liberated book) along with a pumpkin bag and improvised wand and we are done!

Please no more dress ups for a week or two!

Last minute trick or treat bags

Like everything in our house lately our Halloween preparations are a bit last minute. After a busy morning on school duty I quickly nipped to the supermarket to stock up on some treats and then zipped up some felt goody bags for the boys using scraps of felt.I roughly followed this Purl Bee Easter Egg bag tutorial.  I would have like to make orange bags with black bats on them but I didn't have enough orange felt so they ended up with black bags and orange pumpkins (a bit wobbly because they were cut free hand and sewn in a hurry before school pick up. Hopefully they will do the job for a bit of trick or treating this evening. 

 

Enjoy your Halloween but don't eat too much candy!

Making gift bags

I like to make re-usable bags to wrap childrens birthday presents but I'm not so good at keeping a store of them ready for last minute gifts. I'm also not the worlds fastest sewer so I have been looking for a quick method of making simple gift bags. I think gift bags look much nicer with French seams but I still haven't worked out a quick way of doing this when I make draw string bags (which I usually use for gifts). Recently I tried out a new style of gift bag.

Last Christmas I saw Soul Mamma's design for Christmas bags and went out and bought a whole pile of Christmas fabric in the January sales with the intention of making these simple bags this Christmas. Last week when I was finishing off a birthday crown as part of a little girls birthday present I thought I would try out that bag design and it proved to be very quick and simple.

To make this simple gift bag;

1. Press and cut the fabric to the required size adding a couple of inches for seams.

2. Fold fabric in half right sides out and press

3. Sew French seams down the sides of the bag (ie sew a 1/4" seam down either side, fold bag inside out, press and sew a 1/2" seam).

4. Fold top edge over 1/2" and then fold again, press, tuck two lengths of ribbon into this seam (for  securing the bag) then sew seam around top edge of bag.

5. Turn right side out, press, put present in, fold over top edge and secure with ribbon at the front.

Super simple and neat! Now I just have to get cracking on my Christmas bags!

Tiggr

 Don't you just love having to make costumes for book week?

Nothing like a costume made with stockings, felt and duct tape! 

Thankfully I only had to make one this year - I dread the day all three of my boys are at school and need a costume!

Happy Birthday Puggle!

Last week my baby boy turned one - where did that year go! On the weekend we had a little party to celebrate but I was so busy I didn't actually remember to take many photos. The birthday boy was actually feeling a little under the weather with a cold but rallied gallantly and made a nice appearance to eat lunch and cake, and mingle with the guests before retiring for a wee nap.

I returned to work part-time a couple of week ago and so despite having a long list of plans for this party (many due to a new Pintrest addiction), most things were left to the last minute. As a result I was up late the night before finishing the extra birthday bunting and binding a new birthday table cloth (what was I thinking - surly sleep is far more important?).

 

Anyway on the day the sun was shining, the kids played happily and Aussie Dad came to the rescue and made lots of sandwiches and organised the sausage rolls. I even got to enjoy a little drink and chat with our guests. 

1st Birthday Present

Yesterday Puggles' little friend turned one so it was time to dust off the sewing machine and whip up a little birthday crown and bib in double quick time.

I started the birthday crown last week but I also started back at work this week so I had not finished it. With an hour to spare after taking Junior to sport this morning I quickly finished it off and then made a dribble bib to match. I still had a draw string bag left over from making Nappy Bags last year so I popped in the crown and bib along with a book and a hand made card by Junior. 

Such a cute last minute present.

Gruffalo Crumble

A couple of weeks ago my mum gave me a large box of Granny Smith apples which has resulted in lots of fruit crumble making in our house. If Junior had his way we would be eating "Gruffalo Crumble" (as he likes to call it), every night but we have tried to restrict it to the weekends. My favourite fruit crumble combination is apple and raspberry with the following favourite crumble topping;

Ingredients

6 Granny Smith Apples

1 1/2 cups of frozen raspberries

1/4 cup wholemeal flour

1/4 cup brown sugar

1/4 cup rolled oats

1/4 cup desiccated coconut

1/2 cup almond meal (original recipe called for chopped nuts but the almond meal is more kid friendly)

60 gm butter

Method

• Peel, core and quarter the apple and put in a saucepan with a dash of water and the lid on. I bring the water to the boil and then turn it off and let it steam while I prepare the crumble
• For the crumble I put the dry ingredients in a bowl and then rub in the butter.
• Place the apple in an oven proof dish (6 cup capacity) spread raspberries over the top.
• Sprinkle crumble mix over the fruit and bake in a 180 degree oven for about 30 minutes or until the top is crisp and golden.

Enjoy warm with lashings of cream or custard (or both).

Another birthday cape

These capes are becoming a bit of a standard gift for little boys birthday presents. This weekend our friend Nicholas turned 3 so I made him his very own super cape.

When I started making these I added a superman or batman logo but now I make them a little more generic so little ones can be who ever they want to be - Super Nicholas or Star Boy perhaps? Hope he likes them as much as my boys do.

Dribble boy!

Puggle has always been a dribbler but with a new tooth on the way (number 8) he is constantly drooling. If he doesn't wear a bit all day his shirt is soaked in no time so I go through a lot of bibs everyday. Being the third boy in the family a lot of his bibs have seen better days so I have been playing around making some new dribble bibs for him.

The first off my sewing machine is this little hippo number. I think it is very cute so I will be busy this weekend making a few more!

In the bag

On the weekend I finally got around to doing a little bit of sewing. I have been planning this project forever and once I started it really took no time at all - in between the meals, nappy changes and refereeing squabbles between three little boys.
I made this as a lego sack using this tutorial but it really is a bit small for the volume of lego we have in our house. This one is being used for Puggles blocks and I will make a bigger one for the lego.
Hope you found a little time for your own projects this weekend.

This moment

{this moment}: A Friday tradition with Soulemama. One moment from this week, one that you want to hang onto and not forget. No words.

Caped crusaders

Juniors best friend has just turned 5 so we made him a little batman cape for his birthday.

Junior and Rascal love the superman cape I made for Rascals 2nd birthday so hopefully this cape will see plenty of use as well.

Now I just have to find the time to whip one up for Junior.

Birthday presents for girls

Junior has been invited to a double birthday party this week for two girls in his pre-primary class. Having three boys I'm a little clueless as to what to get for little girls so I asked a friend who has two gorgeous girls of her own.

Her standby for school birthday presents is a nice book and a library bag, so last night I whipped up a couple of library bags and I added two of our favorite books - Imagine and the Magic Beach.

Junior made a couple of birthday card this morning so we are all set for the party this afternoon. Hope they like them. Do you have a favorite present for school birthday parties?

A little gift

This weekend a very sweet little girl we know will be turning 3. The boys helped me put together a small gift for her.

An Aussie Mum made pencil case with her initials, a coloring book and crayons, some rascal made wrapping paper and a Junior made card. Hope she enjoys it.