My New Zazzle Shop

I finally decided to open my own zazzle shop up, and I am glad I did.  Some of my creations are spectacular, I especially love the shoes.  Just in time for Christmas.  I will continue to add more and more designs so keep checking back!
*note 1/10/12 shoes have been discontinued as they bring in new styles*

Floral Sizzler Case by coveredbydesign
Make your own ipod touch cases

Pink Rose by coveredbydesign
Make a card on zazzle

Bowser, Alligator and Red Riding Hood

This year was full of requests from my children about what they wanted to be for Halloween.  Most of which were requests for custom costumes.  But alas only one got that this year.  Cory has been wanting to be Bowser from Mario Bros for a long time and would have been the most devastated to get anything other.  Aiden saw the alligator costume and fell in love with it and Hannah made a perfect Red Riding Hood, and not the silly little girlish one!
I did a lot of research on what the bowser costume should look like and finally got it together.  I had the yellowish knit in my stash forever and this was the perfect application for it.  I used an ottobre hooded sweatshirt pattern for the top, adding cut up bias tape for the red hair in between the seam of the hood.  Then I glued on some styrofoam cones with hot glue for the horns.  The pants were green fleece and based on an existing pair of pants.  The shell was the most difficult.  I ended up using a small bead filled pillow, round, and then I cut out the green fleece slightly larger to make the shell.  I then added some white bias tape around the edge of the shell.  Its hard to manipulate the stuffed pillow under the sewing machine for this part, lol.  I added some string to make the shell like a backpack, because with the spikes he wouldn't be able to ride in the car with it attached to his back permanently.  After adjusting the strings I added styrofoam cones to the back placing them strategically.  Even after numerous trick or treating events last week we never lost a cone.  I glued them both on the bottom and also ran a bead around the edge of the cone to help cement it in.  The costume is not a perfect match but certainly made my boy happy.  I hope everyone had a wonderful Halloween!

A quest for a stylish lunch

So the kids came home today from their first day of school and were very crabby about not having lunch bags/boxes.  Yes lunch got sent in a plastic sack because for the life of me I could not find one of the million lunch bags we already have.  So to appease the little fashion nuts I did some {throw it together designing} of some lunch bags.  Not perfect but they will do and hey they are better than plastic bags right?  We'll see how the kids react in the morning.  But right now its way past my bedtime and I have an early morning again.

Easy Canvas Prints . com the Best Ever!

Original Photograph

Earlier this summer I was contacted by Brendan of Easy Canvas Prints .com about doing a review of one of their canvas products.  I was thrilled!  Originally I thought I would do a family photograph to send with my husband when he goes back to school this fall but instead I fell in love with this photograph of orange poppies in my moms garden.  Her birthday is coming up and the orange and green of the photograph would look stunning in her livingroom.   The Easy Canvas Prints website makes it super easy to navigate and design  your canvas, much easier than some of the other photo product places I have been too.  I received a confirmation email with an estimated arrival date was the 18th and I received the canvas on Friday the 12th.  I always love when packages arrive early and I get to open them!  The canvas is very well packaged and labeled for safe shipping.  I almost wanted to keep the canvas for myself it turned out so well, but my mom is very deserving!  I love how the mirrored wrap turned out and the colors are gorgeous!  The canvas is wrapped nicely around the frame and secured and the hanger is set evenly.  Mom put it right up on her wall and shed a few tears!  It is such a wonderful thing to be able to take a special photograph and make it into art!  A big thanks to Brendan for offering such a great service and how fabulous to be able to talk to a live person!  I urge everyone to hop on over to www.easycanvasprints.com and check out their great products.  This phone pic isn't the best, when I get my real camera some batteries I will update the photos as this doesn't do the art justice!

Add caption

Big Thanks to The Fabric Fairy!

 I found out that I am the winner of the $100 gift certificate!  WOW!  It couldn't have come at a better time either, it was a real pick me up!  But now the big dilemma is how to choose what fabrics I will buy, or patterns, or notions.  She has such a wonderful selection that I just love it all!  I think I will certainly be getting some of the luxurious bamboo velour for some lounge pants, I have been drooling over it for a while!  And of course my other favorite knit fabrics are the David & Goliath collection!  So big thanks to Caroline and her crew over at The Fabric Fairy!

The Fabric Fairy Makeover

If you haven't done so yet, you should definitely go check out the new look of The Fabric Fairy! www.thefabricfairy.com Talk about a fabulous makeover. So head on over and share some love on the blog,enter the giveaway, or add to your stash with some new delightful fabric.

~Christine~

Los Angeles RAW official bikini photo

The professional photos from the Los Angeles RAW Interactive fashion show are finally posted.  I think the bikini looks fabulous, but I have to admit I think that I prefer a less serious modeling style.  Maybe its because bikinis are something you wear when relaxing or having fun on a beach.  You can see the rest of the photos from the show by clicking here or here.

Bikini Photos

Here are a couple of photos from the photo shoot today!  Fabulous!  I am just in love with how my fabric looks on a bikini, but then I am not biased at all;)

LA RAW INTERACTIVE fashion show Backstage Photos

Here are some photos taken at the L.A. RAW fashion show of my fabric design on Cat Thordarson's Bikini design. Including backstage photos. According to Cat the show went fabulously. More photos are available at Milk Baby Bikini's Facebook Page.  I am hoping that we will have access to some professional photos as well.

Cat Thordarson the Bikini Designer for Milk Baby Bikini is in the black dress.

Sneak Peek Bikini for Los Angeles RAW

This fabulous bikini by Cat of MilkBaby Bikini, using my Floral Sizzler fabric design, goes live tomorrow at the Los Angeles RAW show!  I can't tell everyone how exciting this is for me.  I am really nervous,thrilled, scared and well I don't really know what all the other emotions are! I don't know how Cat handles everything so well.  More to come after the show! 

My fabric goes to the LA RAW runway

If you have been following my blog you know that I entered a bikini fabric contest through Fabric on Demand.  I was selected as one of the top finalists and voting went to the public.  This is the nerve wracking point for me.  I wanted so badly to win but didn't want to force my design down peoples throats.  So I shared what I could and left it to fate.  When I opened my email this morning, i was cautious, there it was the email with the winners.  I opened it, and was thrilled to find that I am one of the runner's up.  I won $100 and my fabric will be modeled on on a MilkBaby Bikini during the LA RAW fashion show on June 9th.  I can't even begin to describe how excited I am.  Maybe partly because I am a little in disbelief.  Thank you to everyone who took the time to vote and who supported me in this journey.  I can't wait to see how the fabric looks on a bikini! 
http://www.fabricondemand.com/bikini/custom.html for the full article.

Bikini Fabric Design Contest

Finally a blog post about fabric and sewing, right?  Life has been exhilarating, exhausting and perfect.  But this leaves little time for sewing and fabric design.  Recently I received an email from Fabric On Demand asking for submissions for fabric designs for a bikini contest.  I was intrigued by this and thought I would give it a shot.  I came up with several designs and submissions.  I have entered Spoonflower's fabric contests before but with no winning designs.  Although its been great fun to have the challenge of coming up with the designs.  If you don't put yourself out there you will never know your true potential.  This morning when I checked my email I had an email from Fabric On Demand, letting me know that I was one of the top 20 finalists chosen by them and MilkBaby Bikinis owner Catherine Thordarson.  Come to find out Cat is a Missoula, MT native!  Cool right?  So the winner gets $500 and their fabric design featured on one of her bikinis for a fashion show June 9th.  The winner is chosen June 6th.  There is also an added bonus of the bikini line featured on The Ultimate Bikini for summer 2011.  I am still in awe that my design made the top 20.  I wanted to jump for joy this morning,well, I may have done a little happy dance anyhow;)  So I would love it if everyone would check out the designs and hopefully vote for my fabric. "Floral Sizzler".  Just click on the fabric swatch below to vote.  Its very easy I promise!  No scrolling through pages etc...  I am going to have to stop being a Hermity Farmer-Women long enough to do some more fabric designs so I can keep this up!

Mice are invading!

Well our house is coming together finally and we have started moving stuff in and getting organized.  But last night we ended up with a mouse in the house. Arghhh.  So I am not moving any more fabric in until the problem is gone.  Mice just love fabric and making a mess of it!  I so do not love mice right now.  I am very anxious to get sewing.  I have lots of new curtain projects for the house as well as lots of other projects that I just want to do.  I think once we get the mouse problem taken care of I will be in a lot better shape.  Anyone have good suggestions for dealing with mice.  We live in a mobile home (well actually 2 that are joined together)?  We have sealed every place we could possible think of.  I am headed to town for more mouse traps this morning, time I could be spending getting ready to move the sewing area in.  Damn mice anyhow!  We even have 2 cats who are good mousers, but they aren't used to hunting in the house. Our cat Velcro saw the mouse that we saw but lost it when it ran around the corner out of the bathroom. He stalked around the house for quite a while with no luck.  Clorox is also going to be my best friend.  We really don't need hauntavirus. Ok well I really will come back to sewing and blogging, I promise!
~Christine~

Velcro

The Hermity Farmer-Women

Mom and I decided that it was time to blog our adventure in the family commune/farm:-) We plan on having recipes, stories and life adventures. We also have a facebook page as well. I hope my readers can check out this new adventure!
www.hermityfarmer-women.blogspot.com
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=102116&id=1137921319&saved#!/pages/The-Hermity-Farmer-Women/159166044131104