Thursday 19 February 2009

More Buttons?

Oh yes I'm afraid so - another batch of vintage buttons has arrived in the cloudhopping household.

Where they will live remains an uncertainty due to my already bulging button boxes (all 6 of them) who cry out "no room at the inn!" each time I arrive home rattling little bags and boxes full of button delights.



So button sorting awaits, a strangely therapeutic task, and I promise not to buy any more buttons for at least...erm...a week?

Wednesday 18 February 2009

A Hair Curling Day

Youngest sat in the hairdressers and pointed to one of the large, glossy images hanging on the wall.

"I want my hair like that" she whispered to me.

The picture showed a mass of long wavy locks. Long hair - no problem. Curls - oops. Daughter has the sleekest straightest hair ever. And is obviously too young to venture into hair perming.

Kind hairdresser didn't flinch and offered to put waves in using one of her heated implements, and little one was delighted. And the result and her smile was a lump in the throat moment.



Curls glorious curls - for one day only - and worth every penny to see her skip through the town, checking her hair every 5 minutes just to see if they were still there, and breaking into a delighted grin to find they were still there.

Friday 13 February 2009

Hip Hugging With Belts

Inspired by the large amount of vintage buckles I seem to be accumulating, I decided to start some belt making in order to give at least a few of the buckles a new path in life.

I love knitted wool belts, there's something rustic and textural about them, and I used a pure black wool for these two belts:





Both belts are hand knitted, and both the red and black buckles are vintage too. I've made them long enough to drape around hips too - I think belts look great just slung casually around your hips. These two belts are for sale in my etsy shop, but with the ever growing buckle collection I sense more will be on their way.

Saturday 7 February 2009

Sorting Out The Stash



It was a combination of a few things that prompted me to have a fabric tidy up - new fabrics were waiting to gain entry into the fabric cupboard, and I had a few recent requests to make custom gadget covers so needed a way to show the fabric choices I have.

So today was fabric sort out day - I emptied the cupboard, grouped them into sets, photographed them, then uploaded them onto my flickr page (under the photo set "fabric catalogue"). Also along the way I discovered how to create a photo mosaic so you can see all my little fabric groups on one photo:



This isn't all my fabrics either I have to admit - I haven't included the plain fabrics or the small little pieces I collect - but sorting them out will have to wait til another day!

Wednesday 4 February 2009

I Am Not Allowed To Buy Fabric Anymore

I have a cupboard that is very very full. Very very full of fabrics. Lots of them. Plain fabrics, patterned fabrics, vintage fabrics, tartan fabrics....I could go on. And every time I pop into a store that sells anything of a material variety I just have to buy the odd metre of something adorable that I must have.

So I imposed a ban upon myself - no more buying fabrics until I've at least used a small portion of the cupboard (yes, bags and gadget covers are queuing up waiting to be stitched into shape).

But then today I just happened to be walking past my favourite fabric shop (OK so maybe there was a small detour involved). And true to my word I did not buy one scrap of fabric - instead I stumbled on a lovely collection of these cotton trims.



I'm not normally a lace sort of a person but I couldn't resist these - all cotton loveliness. I really liked the one in the middle too which is a great shade of chocolate brown. I have a few ideas of what to do with them - something that will involve wool and crochet too - that will hopefully come into fruition this weekend.

Which also goes to show I can resist fabric (at least when there is something else to distract me anyway....)

Monday 2 February 2009

Buckle Up

I have been shopping again. Not your usual jaunt down to the supermarket to stock up on teabags and muesli, but a foray into the world of vintage buckles.



Over the past week little parcels full of buckles have been arriving, and I'm really pleased with some of the colours, shapes, patterns and general cute buckleness of them.



This latest obsession of mine started off with a fondness for buttons, which somehow has expanded into buckles...where next I wonder?



I've used some of the buckles for some wool belts which I've put in my Etsy shop, I'm also working on a way of adding them to my clutch bags - I'll post pics here when I come up with a good design.
Meanwhile I have vintage shops to scour....