So Long!

I am going to the seaside tomorrow with my family. It's our last family holiday together before I leave for Montreal, which is weird for me because we go on so many trips each year. It's the end of an era!

What is better than drawing in the mud when you are waiting for the tram?

When you make a skirt for your mum and she doesn't want to take it off. 

.......kids these days!

Keeping Secrets

I  have lots of secret things. I like knowing that I  could spend a whole day locked  in my room looking at all of my hidden away boxes, old letters and diaries. 

I made this book-box when I was seventeen. I know it's not such an original idea- cutting the pages out of a book and using it as a secret box, but I think everyone should try it.

I used the felt that I made with silk and merino wool and glued it all with my favourite friend PVA!

I didn't know what would be fitting for a secret book-box, so I just put a nice deck of cards in there. They are the nicest full-set of cards I have. Sometimes I play patience with them, but I ALWAYS cheat! It's so terrible.

This is a box that I made when I was sixteen. I had bought a little music maker (I actually don't know what they're called!) with a crank that played 'La Vie En Rose'  and I thought that it was so quiet that whenever I played it I would have to hold it really close to my ear. But then one day I discovered that when you put it on a wooden surface it plays louder- It took me ages to figure that out, what with my limited knowledge of acoustics and all.

So then I decided to saw a hole in a cigar box for the crank to stick out of and then I made a little platform out of a Whitlam's Samplers box to conceal the little 'music maker' - if someone could tell me what they are called, I would be eternally grateful.

Do you like my little friends? The snail is a present from Molly and the bird is something I found at my grandparent's house on a dusty mantle piece.

First

I made this when I was sixteen. It was the first dress that I finished. My Mum got the fabric at an Op Shop and it has faded a lot since it was sewn. It was my first attempt at pleating and I made the bodice by pinning the fabric to my shape, which I suppose is some sort of uneducated attempt at draping? I didn't really know what I was doing, but whatever I did seems to have worked! It's a funny dress and I don't wear it very much anymore, but it will always be my first.

Veins Full of Disappearing Ink

Aghh! I couldn't keep my eyes open in the shining sun! I made this dress a few weeks ago- I was cleaning my sewing room and the fabric was crumpled up with the blue velvet ribbon. It was like I HAD to put them together, they chose each other!

The skirt is half-circle and the top is sleeveless with a shallow peter-pan collar and two little ties (if you can see them!) You can really only see the top details when I wear a cardigan over the top.

Thanks for all of the comments recently! I am so overwhelmed by all of the great people in blogland, it's so nice to be a part of the community.

Tiptoe through the Tulips

This dress was made last year when I finished school. I practically lived in it all Summer and now I wear it all the time with tights and cardigans. I love the fabric- brown with little sage green leaves and flowers all running up and down.

I pinned all of the tucks until they moulded to my shape, and then I made the neckline with some cranberry velvet I had in my scraps box.

The pile of fabric next to me on the chair will be made into dresses to sell this week. 

Thank you for your comments everyone! It is so nice to read what you all think.

 I will put some more pictures up of my creations soon. Until then I am going to my friend, Laura's house to watch films!

Birthday Box

A Christmas dress for my Mum's favourite childhood doll, Sasha. I think that they are worth quite a bit of money, actually. She always looked very cold without any clothes on, so I made this out of some scraps from a dress that I made for my Theatre Studies Monologue last year.

This is a book-box-bag that I made when I was sixteen? or seventeen? Anyway, it was in year 11. I made it using an old cardboard book of farmyard animals and I punched holes in it and sewed the squares together using blue ribbon.

The lining is some flowers with a black background and the clasp is from a blue vinyl 60s beauty case that was so broken that I couldn't use it anymore.

The handle is from a square bucket that had slugs in it.

This is my most recent dress- a birthday dress made from delicious floral cotton. I made it by tracing a shirt onto paper, and then altering it as I sewed. I finished it with some shocking pink velvet ribbon and some buttons that I cut off a couch in the street when I was fifteen.

Knitting+Monkey

Here are some things I have made.

A beret-scarf combination. I made the beret from a tiny kid's pattern and the scarf is my own design.

I like them because they just go so well with my house, you know!

A sock monkey for my brother- I also made a chocolate brown monkey, but I gave it to a baby called Sylvie who moved to Byron Bay at the beginning of the year.

He's still in pretty good form after six months of Ownership By Sebe. Although he looks a bit surprised at the camera flash!

This is a letter-jacket inspired cardigan that I knitted. It is my first cardigan and I started off using a pattern, but as always I strayed so far from the path I couldn't find my way out of the woods, so I just built a little cabin and lived there forever.

I really loved knitting the "R" part on the pocket. My tension was awful and it is crooked, but that pocket is certainly not bereft of character!

Also, do you like my walls? My Dad painted every single unicorn by hand, they go all the way around my room, which is L-shaped, so it covers more wall than the average bear.

And now I have to go to work. And it's not my nice job, where I don't want to leave and I love everyone and I get to be a bartender! NO! It's my shit job where I am the youngest and everyone is mean to me and money-hungry. Where they change the times on my timesheet so that it looks as though I have done one hour less of work. I'm pretty sure that's illegal!

But tomorrow morning I get to wake up early and go to my nice job again and see everyone in St. Kilda wake up! 

Sebe just made me a soundtrack for my train journey. He sat in his room for an hour recording all of these songs on his guitar!!! He's the coolest.

Ladybird

This is a dress I made for Cathy- hot off the machine this morning. I finished the hem while she had a cup of tea actually! I think it turned out really well, and it looks wonderful with her gorgeous hair and skin.

The bike she is modeling is one that my Dad found in the alleyway behind our house. It is called the "Ladybird", it's very nice I think!

I am going to start up an etsy account in the next week or so, and I will be selling dresses and toys and maybe some pictures as well. I will also be selling custom-made dresses for people who have specifics about what they want.

I am very excited to be a shopkeeper for the first time, even if it is on the internet.

In the next couple of weeks I will be posting pictures of all of the dresses I have made- the photo-shoot is on Monday... Yippee! I really love having my picture taken- I am such an attention seeker. Really, someone should just tie me down or something!

Family Portrait

[EDIT] I deleted lots of this post because I am silly and overly dramatic all of the time!

Look at this family portrait, The scanner wouldn't fit the whole thing in, basically it says "Once ther was a dragon called Trevor and he lived with his Wife called Philippa and She lived with her dog Ruby and Trevor had a cat Sebe."

It's pretty nice spelling I think. Also I just remembered that when I was really little I used to think that humans were really ugly- I thought that I was really ugly and I used to wish that i was a dog and that I had a dog's head. I always wanted one of those beards that dogs have, like the soft silvery beards... Haha that's really good! I wish that I still felt like that.

The wagging tail is the best oh and the dog beard definitely comes second.

Mes Parents

Here is a picture of Me and my little babies. Humphrey and Sebe have been submitted to years of torture- just look how tight my grip on Sebe's collar is- and what on earth is that orange plastic thing???! It looks like I am about to gouge out one of his eyes, luckily he is wearing those stylish safety goggles.

This is the most genius thing I have ever done and will ever do. I remember so well drawing these portraits of my parents in their bed in winter. I would have been pretty young,  judging by both of my parent's hairstyles, maybe eight? The weird thing is, that I drew each portrait on one side of the paper- now they will never get lost. 

This speaks for itself;

Who told me to put a crucifix up there? It's really creepy how it sort of sways... it looks like it's going to crush that lion!

MY SPESHAL THINGS

or 

MY HOBBY

I love this- actually I remember all of these things so well, especially the lizard, which was stuffed and flaky and I always used to close my eyes and squint them open to see if it was really alive and just pretending to be dead- you know how that happens sometimes?

 

                                                I LOVE   "please read this mum and dad!!!"

Isobel and Me

Reckless Ruby

"Ruby! You must stop being so Reckless, or we'll wrap you up in cotton wool and only let you out on special occasions!"
That was my favourite quote from a book for most of my childhood. My mum used to put on the BEST voice when she would read that line- I suppose I was pretty lucky having a children's librarian for a mother.
But I always thought that being wrapped up in cotton wool would be really nice, and I never knew why it was a punishment- I think I would quite like it, especially if the wool was a lovely pink like in these pictures from a long time ago.

And this is a picture of my old friend Taylor and I at my birthday diggs. The dress I am wearing is a new one that I made- in fact I have made soooo many dresses and things since I got this blog that I haven't put up. It's not a very descriptive picture of the actual dress, but you get the gist.

Don't smoke in bed

Never tried it, but it's the name of a Peggy Lee song and also I was very upset when I found some stale cigarette butts in my pale pink bakelite smoking table that is never supposed to be used for it's original purpose! Also, I didn't even have a glass ashtray in the little bulby-bit! It was bare and gaping, ready to be defiled by any wandering hand, with pinched cigarette!
My wrists really hurt because I was working for da weekend. As in working the entire weekend. BUT I got to go to cocktail school and learn all these neat little drinks, so now when I get to Québec, I will waltz into a bar and say "Gimme the best job you got!" and they'll say, "Why, you look tougher than a 65 cent steak and we'd be pleased if you would be our barmaid."
And I'll sparkle and shine and do a little dance like our good friend Josephine Baker, you know. I don't remember where I got the picture from, I am trying to be a good blogwriter and not spoil things by using images without credit where credit is due, but it is incredibly difficult, it seems!
Okay, so I am absolutely ridiculously at the moment pro---crastinating because I really do have to go and do a little bit of housework, or chores if you will, so if you don't mind I'll just begin to end this post by finishing my sentence, it shouldn't take too long...
Maybe I'll just go on a healthful walk instead.

wrapped in plastic

This is a picture of my disgusting ventriloquist dummy's head. I made a body as well, but I only took photos of the head-as it is fully operational. Her eyes move from side to side and her mouth opens and shuts (if you are willing to stick your hand into the back of her head).
I made her with silicone and lots of other things, pink silk eyelids, brown wool for hair, ridiculous suede eyebrows. I really like her, but that is only because she's practically my first born child. I know that she is deranged looking, and I have set her up for a life of people telling her that she has a warm personality, but with a face like that, how could you develop a cold one?