Wee Wonderfuls

Christmas + Chocolate

What Halloween really means is it's ok to start talking about Christmas now! While we were in Duluth we had a chance to visit this great store, Torke Weinachten. It is a Christmas store that specializes in European imports and there's an added bonus.. a chocolate and champagne shop in the back! First thing that sucked me in was a display case full of Wendt and Kuhn figurines like this and this. Then on to a whole tree full of wooden ornaments by Christian Ulbricht like this one we bought...

It's carved wood and is so smooth and perfect and adorable. I love it's little suede ears! This store had so many beautiful things. Some great Norweigan Tomtes that I was so tempted to buy my Mom (but I decided on a little Ulbricht snowman instead), a bunch of cute Midwest of Cannon Falls ornaments and many other things that we didn't get a chance to see because of the restless baby outside the shop with Grandpa and because we had to save some time for the Chocolate! We bought 2 YUMMY dark chocolate bars: Neuhaus from Belgium (a new favorite!) and one of our old standbys Scharffenberger.

I LOVE ornaments. This may be an addiction worse than fabric or yarn (or even chocolate). Definitely around this time of year it is. Although this Christmas I'm seriously considering a tree like this covered in just paper snowflakes. I just don't know how we can have a tree with a walking one year old tearing through the house. The ornaments will have to stay in their boxes I'm afraid. I'm definitely getting a tree though! And not a tabletop one. Maybe I can console myself by decking all the halls in paper like Elf!

Halloween Decorating

When history judges whether or not I've been a good mother I hope I get points for decorating for ALL holidays. Here are our pumpkin steps...

Also I hung this cute sign from Target on the door *and* this scary ghost! I might even buy candy for trick or treaters this year. My other Halloween project is a big bag of fake fur that I told everybody I could turn into a costume for Oscar..somehow. I really need to get started on that but I'm dreading it so...

Back to my kitty in a dress! She's coming along nicely I think. I've just got her cut out of muslin but I really like the shape.. she has funny looong legs. I'm working on outfit ideas now. I got out my 1969 Fall JCPenney's catalog for some ideas.

We stopped by the bookstore yesterday because I saw an ad for those Golden Book reprints and they had Doctor Dan! I was all excited because I was sure that was the book that was kept at my Grandma's house and was such a favorite of mine. It went missing years & years ago and I was so disappointed. Turns out I'm still disappointed because although Dr. Dan is close it was actually Nurse Nancy that we had.

Another book I found that is nowhere near disappointing is Windy. I was just reading about it on Craftlog and then there it was right by Dr. Dan. It is so CUTE! Now I need Sunny and Snowy and Chinook too!!

Recovery

We're in the process of bouncing back here at the Lang household. Tim was really sick all last week and then Oscar caught it. He woke up every 15 minutes from 8 - 3am on Thursday night. Very well timed because the next day we had to get up at the crack of dawn and start out on an 8 hour car trip to Duluth MN for a memorial service. After 16 hours in the car in 3 days we are wiped out. Luckily we were stopped in our tracks last night by a new channel on our cable, onDemand, including HBO onDemand. Instead of cleaning, unpacking, cooking, etc. we ordered a pizza and watched way too many hours of Larry David and Sex and the City.

Today everyone is better and it's time to get organized and back on track. I have a very long list of fun projects I want to work on this week including another kitty in a dress I dreamed up on the drive. I hope I can make it as cute as it looks in my head.

All the Fall foliage we saw on the trip somewhat softens the blow of coming home to find all the beautiful yellow leaves on the tree outside our window had fallen off. Somewhat.

Here's something beautiful to look at... Caroline Hwang. I love love her work. This is the kind of art I wish I could make. I love the collage/quilting influences and the embroidery and buttons! And check out the bags in her store - this is what I aspire to!

oh, and I found this show on her info page.. Plushtastrophe. I wish I could go to that! I'll have to try to hunt down some photos from the exhibit when I have more time.

I can't help myself!

More 70s children's book illustration I love, another animal story. This time Rosie's Walk by Pat Hutchins.

and more leaves...

kitty in a dress

I wanted to make another like cashmere kitty but this time in a jumper. The problem - no shoulders!

Woodland Creatures

Look at the book I discovered yesterday at the library! The Little Wood Duck by Brian Wildsmith. I am in love with it. As I was reading it I was gasping at the illustrations.

My illustration tastes go through different moods and right now I'm sooo feeling this. It's funny because this is exactly the kind of book I would have eschewed when I was a kid. Reminds me a bit of Eric Carle who I never liked when I was little. (I'm actually still a little shakey on Carle because of these residual feelings) But this I love. It's perfect! the colors, the ink-and-watercolor

... the subject matter. I've been very enchanted by woodland creatures these days. I find myself drawn to owls, squirrels, birds, foxes, etc. over and over again. And look - Brian Wildsmith wrote a book just on squirrels! I have to get it! More squirrels I love... the one Tim made for me in my header :), squirrel cards and this guy by Kirsten Ulve, this squirrel intarsia from a knitting for teddy bears book from the library. And I could go on and on and on. I haven't even started on owls, deer or bunnies yet.

I have the most excellent vintage 70s pattern for stuffed toys called A Forest Family. It includes patterns for a wolf, squirrel, mouse, skunk, rabbit and woodchuck! They are a little bit scary looking but I'm going to make one up next week and see how it turns out.

By the way I found Kirsten Ulve via Jasmin Chua at Spookyhouse, check out her cool illustrations and then her amazing links page! Led me to Kurt Halsey, Aya Kakeda (I love this, hmm wonder why, could it be the wolves?), oh and Nina Frenkel (check out the one I have bookmarked) and Tara McPherson, her band posters are great!

Eggs! Beautiful Eggs!

Yesterday Mr. Fedex delivered a package to my door. He stared deeply into my eyes for way too long when he asked me to sign for it. I thought "weirdo". But he must have known what goodness was inside and was thinking to himself "lucky lucky girl".

My beautiful Rebecky eggs have arrived!

A deal was struck a while back after Rebecca wrote the funniest post about my site. I made a bag for her and in return she sent me these eggs that she had blown out and to which she had done something fabulous. Thank you Rebecca!

I love the O, T, H (took both Tim and I a minute ... "aha! for Tim, Hillary & Oscar") and the custard/quiche is so cute. How'd she get that dashed line so perfect?! They're all fabulous. My crappy photos do not do them justice. Here's a photo Rebecca took of the made in usa one. I wanted to set them all out and photograph them together but we only had one double chocolate stout left so we only had one beercap this morning. A rare occurrence in this household.

I nominate Rebecca to take over while Martha is incarcerated!

Hazard!

Here's a little bear I made from that same big head kitty pattern. The bear is much smaller and made of this great soft velvety fur I found at Hancock Fabrics. I love it because it has sort of a vintage look to it. I used some cool buttons I found in the sale bin for eyes and I love them! So does Oscar. This is immediately his new favorite stuffed because it has detachable parts that can be yanked off and choked on. Guess this guy is going on up the top shelf for a while.

Yesterday was such a fun day. I had a 3 hour reprieve! Tim watched Oscar for me while I went into the city to have lunch with my best crafty girlfriend. We caught up and then did some scheming. In the works are learning how to silkscreen our own fabric, joining the local stitch n bitch, practicing our embroidery (which I really need!) and visiting a fabric warehouse she unearthed over in Pilsen. I'm so excited!! After lunch we went to this cool shop Penelope's that had great stuff including these excellent bags by Queenbee. I'm inspired now to finally try out a bag in the vinyl I picked up a while ago. Also at the shop was this great book Mascotte!... which lead me to Lulu. This is the bit that was in the book that lured me in.. cutyzoo. And be sure to click the icon collection too!

So, maybe after some practice I'll be able to embroider as well as this gal.. craftlog.

Pleat it!

(this is a new photo. the ones I took this morning were awful, not that this one is much better. I'm going to have to start waiting until later in the day to get better light)

Here's the new bag I was talking about. I was so pleased with the pleating idea that I was tempted to sew up every last bit of fabric I have into pleated bags. But then yesterday I was distracted from the pleating course by another bag idea I want to try out. This one I'm even more excited about (hint: I cannot resist the siren call of wool felt), but I'm going to need some help from my artistic husband so not sure when it'll get done.

For this bag I used a magnetic clasp that I got at Walmart on the cheap. It is super strong. Maybe too strong. The cheaper the clasp, the stronger it is? I'd better use my 3 remaining clasp wisely because it has been declared that we will "never ever go to that crapheap again!" so no more Walmart. Another bag-making item that would have helped out this bag and is essential for my next one is some better stiffer interfacing. I think I'll order myself some Timtex and give that a try.

Another thing I'm trying to order is fabric from Japan. I think I'm out of luck though. As info at cotton-bowwow informed me

Dear sir.
I am sorry, I am selling only Japan.
Sincerely.

sadder words have never been written :(

Is anyone out there living in Japan and up for a fabric trade?

Neighborhood

We actually got out and met some of the neighbors after living here for over a year. We were invited to an adjacent street's block party. I met a few other stay at home moms and a ton of kids. Everyone was so nice and friendly. And people actually ate my mushy pumpkin pie! How polite :)

Well I'm on the subject of the neighborhood...

look what's opening up a few blocks from my house!...Memento

and it's just down the block from the new yummy thai restaurant we've been waiting for all summer... Penny's

and check out this cool shop that recently opened in downtown OP...FlyBird