on sewing
I must be the slowest (I was going to write sewer, but that just didn’t sound… right 
) seamstress on earth. It took me one whole morning to complete a strawberry! And I’ve been slaving away at a donut all evening today… Phew.
Yes, you guessed it, December in August. And at the rate I’m going, it’s a good thing I’m starting early this year, or I’ll never ever get those December presents ready in time! We’re planning on gifting the little ones a play kitchen (which still *ahem* has to be built as well, unless we decide to be lazy cowards and get the IKEA one), and while I’ve been squirreling away various objects over the course of this year (kitchen utensils, a cake stand, the sweetest porcelain polka dotted tea set), what has been sadly lacking so far is food. Which will be remedied in due time. One hopes. 
I’m back to my stitching now, but I’ll leave you with a link to a VERY useful tutorial on making a neat blanket stitch, essential for slow sewers seamstresses.
Futuregirl’s Hand Sew Felt Using Blanket Stitch Tutorial.
on augustus 17th, 2009 at 11:14 pm
Meike, don´t worry, a gardener needs more than just half of the day to get a strawberry…
And guess why the seamstress is called seamstress and not seamrelax
on augustus 18th, 2009 at 8:44 am
Ha! I have to remember that one, Juliane – a seamrelax indeed… Hee hee!
on augustus 21st, 2009 at 3:36 pm
I may just be your toughest competition for the slowest seamstress award! I feel your pain on making your (very cute) strawberry… I have been known to spend hours on a teeny tiny project. Maybe if I sewed more and watched the telly less…?
on september 1st, 2009 at 8:39 am
Ohhh. I have a book on felt mascots that cover some food such as fruits, lollipops, delicious cakes… If I haven’t put them in my moving boxes yet I could see if I could scan some for you. By the way, do you have some doll-cloth pattern book suggestions?
And I love your blog! =)
on september 1st, 2009 at 8:54 am
Hi Wiske! Thanks for your sweet offer! I think you’d better not scan them because of copyright issues, but if you’d like to let me know which book it is, I’d be a very happy girl!
My favourite doll pattern book is ‘Die Waldorfpuppe’ by Karin Neuschütz, in German. Er is ook een hele goede Nederlandse CD-rom, o.a. hier te bestellen: http://denieuweboekerij.nl/webwinkel/product/2152/zonnekindpoppen-cd-rom
Succes!!
on september 1st, 2009 at 10:57 pm
I have the following books:
http://www.yesasia.com/global/handmade-felt-mascots/1004036652-0-0-0-en/info.html
http://www.yesasia.com/global/felt-mascots/1004493597-0-0-0-en/info.html
http://www.yesasia.com/global/small-felt-mascots/1012397772-0-0-0-en/info.html
but if you look for Felt on the website there are some other books of which some specialize in foods. (http://www.yesasia.com/global/cute-vegetables-and-fruits-felt/1011162384-0-0-0-en/info.html)
Just look around some, they have A LOT of very cute books. In my experience they are really easy to use and with your sewing experience they’ll be pie. I just started crafting when I bought my books and had no troubles.
The book and cd are on my wishlist now, I’ll order them when I get back from England
. What are your experiences with that japanese walldorf book? Did you like it?
And do you also have some booksuggestions for knitting patterns for dolls?
Thanks!
Oh wait – one more thing. Can you pretty please write a tutorial on a doll head? The shaping is pretty easy but I have troubles shaping the wool. It always remains too soft and I can’t get the head to be firm enough no matter how much wool I put in! I’d really love to hear from you
on september 2nd, 2009 at 8:16 pm
Hi Wiske,
Thanks for the links! I’ve actually got the last book, cute vegetables and fruits, it’s excellent.
Yes, I really like the Japanese Waldorf doll book, it’s so inspiring! The patterns are definitely doable if you’ve got some experience in Waldorf dollmaking. I wouldn’t recommend it to the novice dollmaker though. Because it’s in Japanese, you’d have to have quite a good grasp already of what it is they’d like you to do.
Unfortunately, I haven’t got any real suggestions for books that specialize in Waldorf doll knitting patterns, as I’ve never found one of those so far. There are quite a lot of patterns in the Karin Neuschütz book though, and, more importantly, on the Dutch CD-rom I mentioned before. I usually either make up my own patterns or take patterns for baby clothing and adapt them to Waldorf doll size.
*grins* A tutorial on headmaking… Can’t help you with that at the moment, but perhaps this is useful:
http://moonchildhandworkstudio.blogspot.com/2008/04/how-i-make-waldorf-doll-head.html
The trick is to roll a ball of strips of wool roving, as tightly as you can! A bit like you would wind a ball of yarn. It’s hard to explain… sometimes it works for me, sometimes it doesn’t. Depends on the weather is what I think sometimes, ugh! Good luck!