Oh, Pinterest... where have you been my whole life?

I was thinking the other day that it'd been a long time since I'd been obsessed with something new and shiny... and then along came an invite from my friend Apryl to Pinterest! In my truly obsessive fashion, I'm hooked.

My Pinterest page

For the uninitiated, Pinterest is a place where you can 'pin' / bookmark / dog-ear anything you find on the web that's cool / useful / pretty / funny. Just like bookmarking in your browser, except (as I learned the hard way) you don't lose all the bookmarks you've fastidiously gathered over the years when your hard drive goes on fire. And the best thing is that it's dynamic. Like Twitter, you can follow people and their pins show up in your stream too so you can steal all their ideas and pass them off as your own marvel at how cool everyone else is. And if you want to search for anything specific, everyone on Pinterest's relevant pins come up.

Things pinned from my blog

There's a bonus feature for the self-obsessed (i.e. me), in that you can find out which things from your blog / shop content to find what people have pinned of yours. To find out, all you have to type is http://pinterest.com/source/kitschycoo.blogspot.com/ . Obviously you should replace the last bit with your address, unless you're my mum in which case you should leave my address and then phone me to discuss how proud you are of me that I have content worth pinning.


Speaking of my mum, I've made a whole folder of things she's going to make me! She doesn't know this yet. How exciting is that? So if you're on Pinterest please follow me so I can follow back, and together we can find loads of things for my mum to make me.

Disclaimer: Despite my extreme effusiveness, Pinterest didn't ask me to say anything about them at all.

Pin It

Tweet

'I have no words' Wednesday

This has been The Week From Hell. To respect the privacy of my Scottish family I don't feel comfortable elaborating at this stage but please send any positive vibes you might have surplus through the ether.

Batman Jamie says: 'Stay Strong'

Photo courtesy of my good friend (and the amazing photographer) Gustaf

Pin It

Tweet

Girl's Gone Geeky

There are friend's of Friend Sarah visiting all the way from Canada and, as everyone knows, a friend of Friend Sarah is a friend of mine so I made a tunic for their daughter. The last time I made a tunic for this little girl she was in the throws of Princess Phase One, but I'm happy to report that now that she is seven the Princess Phase has burnt out and the girl's gone geeky.

So I fashioned one of my all-time-favourite fabrics into a flouncy tunic with polkadot waist shaping. I have to admit, tales of girls going geeky gives me Hope for my own girly-girl.... maybe the glasses will help?

Pin It

Tweet

If Darwin was alive today he'd probably write about this evolution

Holy moly, guys... I only made the final four in the Spring Top Sewalong! I totally wasn't expecting that. I don't want to totally spam my blog talking about this top ALL OF THE TIME, but please forgive a tiny bit more navel gazing... The Train To Crazy mentioned on Twitter that it might be interesting to post the Evolution of The Never-ending Dress Quest (which culminated with the Spring Top) so here goes:

It all started with this Jamie dress, straight off the printer with no alterations:

After rotating the straps to vertical and removing most of the gathers along the neckline, I had this:


Then I removed all of the elastication from the neckline and lowered it heaps:


I didn't like the gathers, so I draped it to form darts. I also made it a v-neck instead of a scoop neck:


For my final(ish) dress I took it in as far as my body would allow without asphyxiating. I then failed to take proper pictures:


Don't worry this one is pretty much identical:


And, finally, I made it into a top with a lot more ease and greater neckline modesty:


So there we go then. Go forth and cast your votes! The other tops are fantastic so it's a real privilege being a finalist :)

Pin It

Tweet

The Pink Professor

Introducing the newest addition to Land of the Bespectacled:

She makes looking for the bus seem 60% more intellectual of a pursuit.

I'll admit that I was heaps a bit tearful when she first tried them on, she's still so little to me.

But I suspect she'll take it in her stride.

Pin It

Tweet

Of Kitties and Cake Pops

I know I've posted about the birthday suit but what of the birthday baking? Long-term readers will know that I haven't had a functional oven in over a year but that does not appear to lessen my ambition for elaborate last-minute baking using other people's ovens. And often a backpack.

I set my sights high this year after finding out about the existence of Cake Pops (from Regretsy of all places) a couple of weeks ago. For those unfamiliar with Cake Pops, they are small yet adorable confections on a lollipop stick, made from crumbled cake, binded with icing, dipped in candy coating, and then decorated with sweets. That right: Sugar x 4. They are so sweet that the roof of your mouth itches while eating them. A good kind of itch.

Unfortunately, you can't stick candle in them so I also needed to bake a birthday cake for Maia and at least thirty of her closest friends and family. Falling somewhere between the realms of terrible baking and not terrible baking, a Hello Kitty cake was born. For the record: making your first attempt at piping, at 2AM, without proper icing bags is inadvisable.

It was, at least, recognisable as a fair representation of Hello Kitty by a jury of four year olds.

Note: I am actually 'wringing my hands' in this picture. Who thought that was just a figure of speech?

Alas, the last of the leftover icing was dispatched today. By myself with a spoon.

Pin It

Tweet

I've made the cut!

I'm beyond pleased that my 'If it Ain't Broke' blouse has made it through to the Voting Round of Made by Rae's Spring Top Sewalong! How exciting is that? Heaps.


So, please head over to vote. I'm in a really strong pool, so I'll understand if you don't vote for me. I will, however, harbour a very bitter grudge against you. Kidding. Ish.

Pin It

Tweet