Create 'n Date Late

Hello to you!

Even though it has already been over a week ago (oh how time flies), I wanted to share a little something about the wonderful Sunday I had in Amsterdam at Create 'n Date. This creative event was organized by my dear friend Maaike from creJJtion.

The day started at 10 am and ended at 14 pm. In those 4 hours 45 women (bloggers and Instagrammers (IG'ers)) came together in Amsterdam to enjoy latte's, lovely cakes, fabulous lunch, lovely sunny weather and we were able to partake in 3 different crochet workshops!

One was by Annemarie from Annemarie's Haakblog and her workshop was about making a lovely flower.
The second one also was a flower, by Saskia from Haken Bij Saar en Mien. Biggest difference to Annemarie's flower, was the use of the magic loop.
And last but not least, Claire from Haken en Meer, did a lovely bracelet in her workshop.

As it turned out, the weather was wonderful so we sat outside in the sun all morning and afternoon. It was absolutely amazing to meet a lot of people that I see and read about in cyber world (blogs or through IG). The atmosphere was amazing and it felt like we had been sitting on that Amsterdam terrace every Sunday for the past years, like old friends, crocheting our hearts out.

Result for me was practicing my crochet abilities again as I had sort of neglected them and was afraid to get started again. With help from Claire, Saskia and And I ended up with the cutest bracelet! And I took up my crochet project which I started a long time ago, which is a shawl for my daughter.

As for pictures... I hardly took any as I was so caught up in chatting and crocheting ~smile~ Create 'n Date was fabulous and I will definitely be at the next one!

Love xoxo,
Maartje

Packages and presents - winning the Ladybug & Co Give Away

Hello again!

Picking up where I left you in yesterday's blog post, there was not just 1 present in the envelope I opened, but there were 2!

Not only the lovely blue and white Audrey Pouch with Flower, but also the package contained a present with Annemarie's Give Away in it!

Because it had been a while since I entered her Give Away, and another winner was announced, I did not quite know what was in it anymore. 
But then a while later, the original winner did not claim her prize so she announced a new winner, ME! How great is that!!!

I opened up the package and in it was a lovely fabric envelope! Again a lovely and very stylish creation by Ladybug & Co! On the outside a lovely blue polka dot and on the inside a pretty flowery lining. Inside there were 4 pieces of fabric, 2 of them were used to make the envelope. She also added a bright pink polka dot and a blue flowery fabric. I LOVE all of them. My mind immediately went crazy thinking of things to make with these lovelies!

Here are the pictures of my prize Give Away, I could not be happier with it! So Annemarie, thank you so very much for this double treat! Will keep you and all of my readers posted, so you can see what I will Make with these pretty fabrics.

And to my readers make sure you check out her blog Ladybug & Co (in Dutch, but with a translate button ;-) )

See you again soon and have a lovely weekend!

Love xoxo,
Maartje

Packages and presents!

Yesterday the doorbell kept ringing here. Several packages and parcels were left with us for our neighbors but also there were some for me! How I love getting packages through snail mail ~smile~
I hoped that at least one package would come for me, as Annemarie from Ladybug & Co posted a message on Tuesday that 4 out of 5 parcels from her Pay It Forward (PIF) in April were sent that day. 

When Annemarie posted her PIF blog post I thought it was a very nice idea! She said the first 5 people to leave a message on her blog would receive a present via snail mail over the course of the year. I saw there were four responses already and immediately left her a message. So yaaayyy, I was no. 5! And yesterday our mailman delivered it to my door, yaaayyy again!

The package in itself was already a present and I was quite surprised to find not one but two presents in the envelope! Not only did she send me the PIF present, but also her give away, which I also won as the primary winner did not respond to her winning (aren't I the luckiest one ~smile~). More about the Give Away package in tomorrows blog post!

So this is what it looked like an what was inside, the cutest little zip bag for make-up or other small stuff. It's an Audrey Pouch and I totally LOVE the colors and style. And most of all, the flower she attached to it, can be taken off and used as a pin to liven up any jacket, shirt or dress!

So Annemarie, thank you SO MUCH for the present! You are truly a very talented woman. I would seriously consider buying the little bag if I saw it in a shop!

And I will also start a PIF, so stay tuned, because more is coming!
Have a lovely day!

Love xoxo,
Maartje

Inspiration for future projects

So hello stranger, how have you been? 
The past three weeks went by so fast, I cannot believe it! When the weather was good, I took our little guy outside and enjoyed the sun while it lasted. So no sewing, a little bit of crocheting, but mostly I spent my time reading, catching up and finally sitting down with a huge pile of magazines and some lovely books I bought myself as well as reading up on my favorite blogs and web shops.

And while reading, making a list of new Makes to be done in the next few weeks/months to come.

So stay tuned for some skirts and dresses for my girl, some pants for the little guy and I want to make a cover for the bouncer chair, so our little boy is totally snug and comfortable.

See you soon!

Love,
Maartje

Happy Hippo: sewing a garland for charity

Hello you! So how was your week? Did you do anything special? Or are you, as I am, looking forward to a long weekend?

Besides enjoying the lovely weather we had for a couple of days this past week, I really wanted to finish up the garland for Happy Hippo Foundation. For the birthday boxes they provide to underprivileged children up to age 12, the lovely Annemarie from Ladybug & Co and one of her friends came up with the idea to start sewing garlands to add as an extra to the birthday boxes, so their birthday could be even more festive! And it's a lasting and reusable item as well, yay!

On her blog you could download the templates to three different patterns and instructions were provided how to make them (all in Dutch). Goal was to gather 300 garlands.

As I do not know if my garland is for a boy or girl, I decided to use a red polka dot and a bright blue starry fabric, and a white bias tape. A fresh and happy looking combination I thought. 

Following the instructions I cut, sorted, sewed, turned inside out, poked, measured, pinned and sewed some more. And then my garland was finished! I took our lil B-boy out for a walk to the postal office yesterday and sent my contribution to Happy Hippo to the provided address.

I knew the goal of 300 garlands was almost complete and thought, would it not be great if mine was the 300th one. And what do you know, today I got word that my garland actually was no. 300 ~smile~

Some 30 more garlands can be sent in for this charity, so if you have some fabric left hanging around your house (scraps are great for this purpose) and feel like some sewing, sign up!

Wishing you all a lovely weekend!

Love,

Maartje

Spring inspiration!

Hello you! Spring really seems to be here now where I am, so I have been enjoying breakfast in the sun and the outdoors a bit more the past week! Is it as lovely where you are?

I did some weeding in our garden as that was growing with leaps and bounds and the husband put in several new bushes to green up the place, yay for him ~smile~ !!
So there has not been a lot of Making going on here... or blogging for that matter, as I hope you can imagine.

But hey, Spring is here, so I am not complaining! Some of my walks outside had me going to a lovely shop nearby where I treated myself on some lovely and inspiring new things. Several fabrics, a new book on decorating the home and Green Gate wrapping paper which was on sale!
At another store I got some folding paper and paper punches for my daughter to use and very nice washi tape to add to my collection ~smile~

I also went to my fabrics lady where I could not resist the cupcake and macaroon fabric and the blue one with roses on it. With the rosey one I want to make a dress or skirt for my daughter, so that one will be on the blog when it's done.
Any suggestions from you guys for the macaroon one?

So I am headed off outside again with the little B-boy, enjoy your week and see you soon!

Love,
Maartje

Pillowcases... final touches for the nursery

Hi there, so nice to meet you here on my blog!
As you know I have been busy the past few weeks to catch you up on all my Makes for the nursery for our little baby boy.

The final bits were some pillowcases to finish off the look. I found a great pilow cover tutorial on the lovely blog of MiekK, which you can find here (in Dutch).
Even for me, with only a bit of sewing experience, it was very easy and it turned out very well, if you don't mind me saying so ~smile~

I made two pillow covers, one measuring 50 x 50 cm and the other slightly bigger at 60 x 60 cm. 
Following the instructions step by step, I measured, cut and sewed both pillowcases, using a navy canvas and some left over fabric I used to reupholster the roman blind (blogpost can be found here) for the 50 x 50 pillow.
The second one I made from the same navy canvas and another left over piece of the postal bag fabric I used to make the memo board (blogged about that one here) and I only finished that one last Friday. Therefore you get to see the results now and not last week as I had planned ;-)

As you can see, the white Ikea chair got a completely new look and feel. By adding the postal bag fabric, it really lifted the color scheme of the room with the little bits of red and the sandy color of the pillowcase.

So here's a little peek into the nursery. Since the nursery is on the Northeastern side of our house, light is a challenge when taking pictures. So hope you can see how it all combines so well.

See you next time!

Love,
Maartje

Wall Art for a little boy's nursery

Oops, over a week has passed without posting a thing on my blog! I suppose I could say, life happened ~smile~
I have been enjoying our little boy a lot, getting to know him, which is so wonderful. His big sister is very loving towards him, I love how she has totally accepted him as part of our family! Since I am recovering well, I can spend more and more time out of bed and around our house. And that feels great!

I wanted to share a great and easy make with you today, the wall art I made for the nursery. Here goes!

So with the nursery almost turned around from a girly girl nursery to a baby boy one, I wanted to add some final touches to complete the look.

I wanted to make some wall art, using a blank canvas, some fabric and flock foil (grey and navy). I ordered the flocking material here and two days later it arrived in the mail, yay for fast deliveries! 

Since the birth announcement card had elephants on them, I wanted to include them in the nursery as well. A couple of weeks before J was born, I bought a lovely blackboard garland at Leen Bakker, shaped like elephants.

I used one of the elephants to outline the shape and cut out the pattern.

Then I placed the pattern on the flock material and using scissors, I cut out the elephants, one in grey and one in navy.

Then, using my iron and two pieces of fabric cut to fit the canvasses I wanted to use, I ironed the flock elephant onto the fabric. The grey elephant was ironed onto plain white fabric, and the navy elephant was combined with a grey and white gingham fabric. Make sure you use a tea towel between the flock and the iron when ironing the flock onto the fabric of your choice.

I let the fabric cool for about 15 minutes, before stapling them onto the canvasses. Finally I placed the canvasses onto the console in the nursery, where they will sit temporarily until I decide how and where to hang them on the grey wall ~smile~

This make was a lot of fun to do and not hard at all. Everyone can do this, so why don’t you give it a try. I would love to hear about your flocking projects!

Love,

Maartje

Reupholstering a roman blind

Hello again,

Has spring sprung where you are? Here, 15 days after Joppe was born, it is still very chilly. With a fierce wind blowing from the East, I have not taken our little boy outside yet. Hoping it will get better next week... 

On the upside, it gives me some time to catch up on blogging. I still promised you a post on the reupholstering of the roman blind, so here goes...

So, before Joppe was born, I wanted to make sure the nursery was suitable for the arrival of a little boy. Therefore I wanted to redo the roman blind, which was in the room. It was fuchsia pink and at first I decided to dye it a lovely navy blue, but unfortunately, as it was 100% polyester, the dye did not take at all.

So I had to think of something else to do. As the lampshade in the nursery was a navy and white-checkered fabric, I went to my favorite fabric shop and bought a few meters of matching fabric. Using fabric glue and my sewing machine, I reupholstered the roman blind.

The curtain has four stiffeners at the back of the curtain, so folding over the fabric where the tunneling is and using the fabric glue, was not an option. I cut into the fabric and sewed the seams.

Then I folded the fabric around the original curtain and using glue, I attached the seams to the back of the blind. That way I could secure the fabric before stitching it with my sewing machine. Using my crochet hook, I stuffed the fabric into the tunnels.

Then I turned curtain with the back facing forward and using the original stitching, I sewed the curtain so the horizontal panels were visible. If I did not do that, the fabric would look very weird when I would hang it back up in front of the window. It was a tricky job, because I was sewing with the back of the curtain facing up and it was 120 cm of straight sewing, it was quite hard to keep it straight. In the end, I am very happy with the result, even though the stitches are not perfectly straight.

And when hanging them, the nursery immediately turned into a boy’s room!

Have you ever done anything like this? Would love to hear from you!

Thanx for stopping by today!

Xoxo,

Maartje

Birth Announcement Card

Hi there!

Hope you are doing very well. Is it Spring already where you are? Or are you moving on to Fall if you are somewhere in the Southern hemisphere?

In The Netherlands the weather has been up and down, spring-like and with some snow showers as well. So Spring, get here already! I want to take our son outside for a walk!

In The Netherlands it’s custom to send cards with a birth announcement. There are so many cards, styles and prices to choose from, that it can be quite the challenge to find something suitable.

First up, I checked our supplier that made our daughter’s card two years ago, because we wanted the same card, in blue. Unfortunately they did not stock that specific card anymore, so I needed to think of an alternative.

We really wanted a card, which had navy blue in it, so with everything being open again, we could pursue that idea. Most cards for baby boys here are in baby blue, beige or maybe even light yellow or green. Only a few cards I could find, had navy in them, but I did not like them all.

I also wanted a card that had elephants on it, just the silhouette, but I could not find anything suitable. I made a secret board on Pinterest to collect ideas and I took those ideas to the printer’s. I drew the outline of the card on a piece of paper and the girl at the printer’s took my idea and worked out two different lay outs. My husband and I were unanimous that the one with four elephants on it, was nicest. I wanted them to be a bit smaller than the girl had suggested, and so she adapted the design for me.

I choose the ink colour that would be used to print them and we decided to make the elephants all in a different blue, making sure they we all the same colour, but the saturation would vary. One would be 100%, the second 75%, the third 50% and the fourth 25%. When the cards were printed and the husband picked them up, we were both very happy with the result!

And since the card has arrived overseas within one week, I can now post this on my blog ~smile~

Thanks so much for stopping by today!

Xoxo,

Maartje