Some quiet time

Since yesterday afternoon I've had really bad pain again, and then during the night developed a shocking headache (again on the right side) and then to top it off my sewing machine is jammed and my overlocker is making a knocking sound!  Not good. 

Hopefully the Sasha's will have fun at some stage this weekend, so I can post some pictures...in the meantime I'm just going to be quiet...

Pretty in Pink & Beautiful in Blue

Yesterday at quilting group I made four little dresses for Sasha.

The first is modelled by Bethany my pretty pale blonde hair Gotz girl.

The next is modelled by the lovely hand painted by Shelly brunette that Margaret sent me last year

Here are the two girls pretty in pink.

Next up is my lovely early 70s blonde in blue

This time with a slightly shorter version of the skirt.

Emily is modelling the other blue dress...

Beautiful in Blue

All these dresses will be available to purchase if anyone is interested.

Coming next...some clothing for the boys.

KAL - Knit A Long

Although Sasha are by far my most favourite doll, I have  a few others that I also enjoy making clothes for.  I belong to several groups on Ravelry and enjoy knitting various outfits.  One of the best things on Ravelry is the KALs (Knit a longs) that the have and I love joining in on these.  The most recent one was to make this Shawl Cardi to fit American Girl 18" Dolls.  I used one of my New Zealand balls of wool I bought over there while on holiday.   This wool is 'Naturally Aran Tweed' and is 95% NZ Merino 5% Wool Knops.  It knits up beautifully.  I'm really please I have a couple of these American Girl Dolls now.  I wasn't really sure what I thought of them and bought the two I have off Ebay in order to make some clothes for  a charity (of which I have nearly finished a little collection to post off) and they have grown on me a bit.  They will never quite manage to get close to Sasha, but they are part of the family of dolls that reside here.

I now need to make her a suitable outfit to match the little cardigan.  I was thinking of a skirt and a t shirt.

Thursday's are the day I go to my quilting group, I was going to work on finishing my NZ quilt today, but of course left everything until this morning to get together and couldn't find the black wadding/batting so took fabric to make some more dresses.  Will be taking photos of them tomorrow in the daylight and will probably list some for sale as well so please don't forget to check out my Clothes for Sale and Dolls for Sale pages.  I am open to offers as well, so if you are interested in anything, please do ask.

Like many other people I have succumbed to the allure of a Sasha on Shelly's site and am frantically trying to raise funds to purchase her!  It is times like this that I wish I was able to still play and teach music, so much harder to 'feed a habit' when you don't have an income LOL  Or is it an obsession?

Henry says good bye to New Zealand

I've posted over here today on our walk to Fairy Falls in the Waitakere Ranges, New Zealand for those who would like to see some wonderful scenery.

Sadly it seems all good things must come to an end, and all too quickly as well.

Henry manages to snatch a bit of last minute fun at the airport...

Having a ride on a giant 'buzzy bee' - on of New Zealand's favourite children's toy.

He admires the wall mural of the Pukeko

Feeling sad to be leaving...

Henry and I have a giveaway we are preparing with a New Zealand theme...it will take a little while to get together, but will be posting about it soon...  It will include some greetings cards featuring Henry in New Zealand, a New Zealand souvenir, and an outfit made from Kiwiana fabrics.  

FOR SALE Pretty Spring Dress

Lovely Spring dress for Sasha, perfect for Easter.

Elasticated short sleeves, lined bodice with pretty lace detail & panel,  overlocked seams and does up at the back with little press studs.

£12.50 + pp (£1.00 1st Class post, or £1.50 registered in the UK For overseas, please contact me for a price).

This dress will also fit 18 inch Sylvia Natterer dolls as shown below.

It rained and rained and rained!

Rain, rain and more rain, we certainly saw a lot of it while in New Zealand.  Up North they had a months worth of rain in one day!  It still kept raining...

Henry was pleased I had made him a rain coat after all, although he wasn't that impressed with the rain as he had no gumboots/wellington boots to wear to splash around in the puddles.

Will it EVER stop raining?

I'm getting fed up with the rain...

Holiday Knitting

While in New Zealand I had quite a lot of opportunities for knitting and was rather glad I had taken a load of patterns to try and some wool with me, although of course I did purchase some lovely New Zealand wools while out there.  As it was the worst summer they have had for a long time it rained rather a lot so there were some days there wasn't much else to do but knit and read, oh such a hardship!  I also knitted in the evenings while Mum, Dad & I watched television, not something I usually do not having a TV, so needed something to do to keep my hands busy.  I made several little cardigans and jumpers/sweaters, of which I have taken photos of three so far.

First up is a lovely pattern by the talented Deb of Debonair Designs and her patterns can be found on Ravelry.  This one is called Archipelago and is modelled by American Girl Kirsten.

I made her matching denim skirt from a cut off of my DS2's jeans.

I love this combination and think it looks great on her.

Next up is a lovely cabled cardigan being modelled by Ellery, a gorgeous repainted  blonde Trendon from the late 70s early 80s.  She was repainted by Shelly and was a rather naughty self bought birthday gift for me.

I think Shelly has really worked her magic with this Sasha.

Next up is another lovely design by Debonair Designs called Sakura and it is modelled by my Catz 'n' Kidz doll Camille

I now need to make her some more clothes as she only has the trousers she came wearing.