Kids, grrrrrrrrrrr!

One of the perils of being a Mum of school aged children is having to (usually, at very short notice) come up with various costumes for events on at school.  This week's is Superhero Day.  Lucy's class have had lots of fun this term doing projects involving Superheros, and today the whole year group (plus teachers) have gone in costumes.  Now, as always in our house, the children decide what they want to go as, and I try and come up with the goods, although I have to admit defeat on a couple of occasions when we've just gone out and bought something instead.  The biggest problem I have is with them constantly changing their minds.

Last week, Lucy was going as Wonder Girl.  She drew a design,

we went out shopping for a red t-shirt and green skirt, she decided Wonder Girl needed a logo, so I stitched a 'W' onto the top, and also made some green wrist bands too.  

There we go, sorted.  Until...,

this week, we met Cheetah Girl.  I would normally stand my ground on this and say no, already having made one costume, but she won me over after drawing a whole cartoon strip for the new character.

So, this was me last night,

Luckily, we already had a yellow t-shirt, which is now covered in Cheetah spots, oh and also a logo, because all Superheros need a logo, right?!

So, here she is, Cheetah Girl (although she is wearing Wonder Girls wristbands as a compromise).  The next costume I make is for me.  Supermum.

ps, it's July.  Countdown to turning 40 begins here!

I am a mole,

...and I live in a hole.

(or in this case, a garden in dire need of some weeding!)

Score!

I'm not talking about football (sorry, am not a football fan), no sir-ee, I'm talking fabric.  Best kind of score in my opinion.

Earlier this week I nipped out and met up with Al for lunch, advantage being there is a small patchwork shop not far from the university which I've been to before, but not in a long, long time.  Best thing about this shop is they are in possession of a bargain bin...,

I got some browns,

black and greys,

yellows with a splash of turquoise,

and also some pinks and green.

Most of these pieces are roughly fat quarter sized and only cost about £1 (about $1.50) each as they're offcuts, end of roll pieces.  Ideal for me as I was on the lookout for some more animal/nature colours after a large project has pretty much cleaned out my fabric stash, and as I work quite small, I don't need much.  A little goes a long way which makes any patterns I design quite thrifty.

I also spotted a basket of pure wool felt on my way to the till, and couldn't resist as it is much nicer quality than I had at home.  Bizarrely, later on, I had a quick look at my bloglines list and spotted this post on Treefall, I'm pretty sure it's the same stuff, can't wait to have a play with it now.

On my desk today,

Hello, long time no post..., it's been a mixture of a missing camera (now found, don't tell the husband I mislaid it!), being a bit on the poorly side (on antibiotics) and a flood in the kitchen resulting in the book giveaway being left open for a bit longer than originally planned (leaking washing machine hose, fixed now but damage has been done).

Have all you Blogger bloggers noticed the new template designer feature?, it's fab, been a long time coming, but very welcome now it's here.  Also, static pages, look, see the tabs up at the top ⇡⇡⇡.  The pages are still blank, and I'm not done fiddling around with the layout yet, too much to play with!

Like this, which is in progress on my desk.  It's my new pattern for a Mole.  This is the second body as the first was not quite right (too big, although they could end up as Mr & Mrs Mole) and now I'm having trouble deciding on how to create the claws so in the meantime am tackling an easier part and adding the tummy.

Right, book giveaway winner.  After weeding out all the spam comments (is anyone else getting loads or is it just me?!), the winner is...,

number 53, which is Alibobbles.

Now, back to sewing Mole claws!

Book giveaway...,

My copies have arrived!, it is a lovely experience holding a book with your work featured in it for the first time.  The publisher has sent 3 copies, and as my shelves are a little crammed already, I have decided to give 1 away..., to you lot!

You know the drill.  Leave a comment, that has some way I can contact you, and I'll pick a winner.

Closing date for comments will be midnight on Saturday 5th June GMT.

What's that?, it's uncanny how much I look like Michelle Pfeiffer in my author photo, yeah, a lot of people say that to me...!

EDITED TO ADD - THE GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED, THANK YOU