Surfin' www

I'm gonna be honest and include another activity that I do in my spare time - surfing the web. Here are links to some blogs or sites I follow more or less regularly:

My girly side:
Cake wrecks - when professional cakes go horribly, hilariously wrong.
Post Secret - confessions on life, death and God.
Etsy - my place to buy (not yet sell) all things handmade.

My other side:
The Big Picture - news stories in photographs by the Boston globe.
Dark roasted blend - weird and wonderful things.
Strange maps
Rebekka on Flickr.

Who-ho-hooo

I'm ready for Christmas!!!

Well, almost. I received a wonderful package full of Michael Miller Christmas fabrics so that theoretically I can start making Christmas cards! I know it's still September and in fact way to early and too warm to start thinking about December - but nevermind. I still have to decide whether I'm going to glue the fabrics together, or onto a blank card. I could also sew them entirely. Hmmmm, tempting!







I received my package from lovely and wonderful Spice Berry Cottage via Etsy.

More boy's trousers

I was so busy sewing this weekend that I forgot to take pictures while sewing so I only have photos of finished boy's trousers. If you remember, a while ago I posted a photo of Jersey fabrics: four different fabrics and a long way to go. Well, now I finished two pairs of trousers and plan to do four more. But first the photos of the ones already made.


Almost happy with these seams:


Crazy shadows:


Of course, my son should not forget that these were made just for him!

Boy's trousers

My little one enjoys running around and therefore needs comfortable trousers. These were made without a pattern, just approximate cut - and turned out superb! Made of striped cotton Jersey and a broad elastic in the waist.



Even the lines match perfectly!


The finished trousers.

Just for me... for you... from me.

After sewing clothes for over twenty years, I finally decided to get my own custom labels. I ordered them at Namensbaender and love them!



I actually thought about making a label that would work on both sides - but could only come up with AHA or OHO... if you have a better suggestion, feel free to share it with me.



Yap, I ordered plenty of them - now I only have to sew clothes to use them!

More drooling

I just have to share this with you - the latest German edition of AD:



and the house on the cover... Not to mention the garden in the Provence and the house on Bali that you cannot see. But one day, I swear, I'll have a nook in my house looking just like the one on the cover!

So what I'm doing when I'm not doing something else? Looking into other people's homes (only the ones who make it into AD) and wish I was rich!

More reading

I guess I must have fallen in the summer-laziness mood. Instead of actually doing something, I admire things that were done by others. So I just finished reading "Die Leber wächst mit ihren Aufgaben" by Eckart von Hirschhausen (no joke, this is his real name) and quite liked it. I'll roughly translate and describe some of the ideas given in this book.



1) I've learned that Aspirin is of natural origin - the salicylic acid can be found for example in willow bark. I learned later from Wikipedia that in 1853, acetylsalicylic acid was synthesized, which was less irritating than the original acid and just as effective. The compound was patented in 1899 under the name Aspirin.

2) The monks live in average five years longer than men outside of monasteries, living actually just as long as women.

3) I love this one: The best entertainer in the world is our own cerebral cortex.

4) I have to agree with the author when he claims that in the good ol' days of snail mail, we checked the mailbox once a day - and were disappointed once a day for not getting anything we hoped for. Now we constantly check our email mailbox - and get to live in constant disappointment.

So, drop me a line, reader, and make me happier :-)