Long time no see!

So... Hello you!

It has been a while. Unintentionally almost nine months passed without any blogging... ~oops!~

That does not mean nothing creative was going on, although I must admit the creative process has been slow in the past few months. Some sewing here and there, some crocheting as well, but nothing special. Did a lot of frogging in the crochet area ~LOL~! Still learning, but there is some progress ~smile~

During the Summer most of my time was spent in taking care of my family. And I love that so much. Adjusting to life with 2 kids has been about finding new balance in everyday things. And there was also my knowing I would not return to my former job which was a blessing on one hand, and a burden on the other. What was great about it, was being able to enjoy my kids so much, especially my baby J. Having him home for over 4 months straight after he was born, was such a joy! And when he started daycare I had some time for myself, which was also very nice.

Simultaneously, my new job and I found each other quite quickly after J was born, so that was such a nice surprise. After lovely summer holidays and after not working for over 6 months (including maternity leave) I started a new job in September. Starting a new job and settling in took more energy than I anticipated and at the same time, I wasn't surprised at all. And I am enjoying it all so much.

That being said, I found myself wanting to get behind my sewing machine again and finding the time to sit down and blog. And all in all the sewing started again when I also took on my new job. Those of you following me on Instagram (@maartjelinnea77) have seen some crafting, creating and crocheting but the blogging was a different ballgame.

So what better way of just starting today. Picking up where I left off. During the next few weeks I will have a show and tell and catch up with you.

Well, I guess that's life for you there and making do with whatever it brings. Have a lovely weekend and hope to see you back here 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

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

Makes by Maartje: Crafting a memo board

Mid February my maternity leave started and I wanted to spend the days my daughter is at the daycare, with an updo of the nursery. That meant three days a week of me-time, for a period of three weeks, giving me a chance to craft up a storm here ~smile~.

One of the things I really wanted to do was to decorate the wall of the nursery with a memo board. A friend of ours gave us one she made herself when our daughter was born and I really liked the look of it. Especially when we got to hang her drawings and birthday cards on it. But to have a pink memo board hang on the wall of a baby boy nursery, well, that's not quite what I had in mind hahaha!

I looked up various tutorials and thought, hey, I can do that! And using a painter's canvas instead of a panel of mdf, made it a lot less heavy to hang on the wall. So this would be one of my projects for the nursery.

At one of the local fabric stores, I found the coolest fabrics, canvas with postal bag print on it. I thought it would just be great for our son's nursery.

The color scheme I had in mind for the room was navy blue, gray and white. And the color of the fabric, a burlap type beige with the Dutch flag on it, would be great for this boy's room.

So I decided to buy a panel of the fabric and got some padding as well. Then I went to Action, which is a discount shop with fabulous stuff for creating and crafting. There I bought a painter's canvas measuring 60 x 80 cm, for only 3,99, so I was very happy about that!

At home, I covered the panel with fiberfill and then fitted the fabric around it. Using a staple gun, I attached both layers to the canvas. Then I left it alone for a couple of days, because I was searching the web for some nice ribbons to use for the memo board. Online I came across the website of Marieke which is filled with all kinds of cute fabrics and haberdashery. I ordered three different kinds of ribbons, one of which could be used on both sides. When they arrived a couple of days later, I made an outline of all of the ribbons and using the same staple gun, attached them to the board. Finally I used several wooden buttons to secure the ribbons to each other and to the canvas, allowing me to put different cards and decorations to it, without losing grip.

I have to say, I am very happy with the end result. And having some of the postal bag fabric left, I want to make a pillow to put in the white chair in the nursery. But that will be another post, probably in a couple of days ;-).

Would love to hear your adventures in these types of crafts. Thanx for visiting my blog today! I am looking forward to seeing you again soon!

Xoxo,

Maartje

Welcome!

Hi there, and welcome to my blog!

On this blog I want to share parts of my life with you. Especially the creative part that is!

The past couple of years, basically since my daughter was born in 2011, have sparked the creative flame that I wasn't all that aware of. 
Always having been interested in styling our house into a home and reading up on home decorating, I was always fascinated by the idea of creating and crafting. Having never had the courage to just do it, I only thought of what I wanted to do, instead of just going about doing it!

Over the past two years I thought, why wait and just give things a go! Last year I bought myself a sewing machine, because I wanted to make my lil' girl some skirts and dresses. My mother-in-law could teach me a thing or two in that area, so I thought, just start! Also my husband was very encouraging, which helps!

I ended up making a cute flowery dress for my baby! Unfortunately the not so nice summer of 2012 meant that she only got to try it on for size.... Hopefully this summer will be nicer so she can wear it again (with some alterations because she has grown quite a bit haha!). Other fabric, meant for a tunic and legging, is still sitting in my cupboard, waiting for another chance ;-)

Last year my husband did an international project for his company, which resulted in him going off to Toronto, Canada for almost four months in total. I stayed in Rotterdam, with our daughter. And having a daytime job, I just could not pack up and leave of course ;-)
Fortunately I was able to fly in on two different occasions to spend a couple of weeks there with him and our daughter. During that time, Maaike, wife of a Dutch colleague of his, who had moved there in 2011, sent me an email with all things nice to go do and see while in the TO-area. We arranged to meet, so she could give me a guided tour. We had a great time and has become a very dear friend ever since. She's a very talented designer and crochet lover, last September she taught me the basics in crocheting! I still have not managed to finish my first project, but I will not give up and keep persisting ~smile~

The crocheting sparked another craft I had not done since I was 8 or 9, which was knitting! I knitted myself a very comfy cowl, and have several skeins of yarn lying around, waiting to be knitted into something pretty!

Being pregnant now with my second child, a boy, to be born mid March 2013, has me crafting around our house, preparing it for the arrival of our baby boy!

Since my maternity leave started mid February I reupholstered the fuchsia pink roman blind in the nursery, sewed a mat to put into the playpen and made a big memo board to hang on the wall in his room. I also made matching garlands to hang on the playpen and in the nursery. 

And these things combined have made me think about starting this blog. To share my Makes with you and maybe even to inspire others to start crafting and creating.

So, during the next week, before our son is born, I will post some of the projects I have been working on. I will also try to figure out how this blogspot thing works, so I can personalize my blog by adding photo's and that sort of things ;-) And after, I will obviously continue blogging ~SMILE~

So thanx very much for stopping by and hope to see you again soon!

Xoxo,
Maartje