inspiration : sheer

Dear friends,

I love delicate sheer things, fabric especially. Today I'm sharing the sweetness of all things sheer. Makes me smile. Take this as a celebration for us all, women of strength and grace :). Enjoy!

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hanky seed pockets

Sweet friends,
With Spring coming up so soon, may I influence you into a little gardening? :). Well, the fact that I live in a warm country I have more reasons to do so, am I ?. [Taking some baby steps here :)].

A few months back, I found these floral handkerchiefs at a local chinese store. I love vintage hankies but they are hard to come by. These ones are just as cool to make fabric journals or even simple curtains. Nothing too precious :). Today, I'm sharing a fun, easy, early Spring project with you ... seed pockets made of handkerchiefs and old book pages!. Perfect as gifts or to simply amuse yourself :).

I love the naive flower prints on them.

I used three pieces of hankies for making the seed pocket pouch. I simply folded them into half and then another half to create folders/inserts.

Stacked a few and sewed in the middle. Patched up scrap fabrics, laces, buttons and ribbons on the pockets. I used elastic string & a large button for closure. Lastly, decorated the covers with silk roses, ribbons and tiny beads.

The complete project, measures 4.5" X 5".

Sweet hankies, LOVE the scallop edging stitches!.

The back.

I sewed tiny beads all over the back cover.

some at the spine.

and on the front cover.

More stitches for this gardening pouch.

The most fun part is adding the details on these pockets!.

Playing with soft green, yellow and orange colors for a change.

And the fun doesn't stop there. I made pockets for the seeds from old book pages and drew botanical illustrations on them. You could opt this out and use magazine images instead :).

Old book pages seed pockets, before being painted on.

Pockets with fun drawings on them.

My grandmother used to keep her vegetable seeds in folded, old newspapers. She and grandpa grew all the veges and fruits for our home cooking in the backyard. I used to help water her plants as a kid, and making these pockets brought back fond memories :).

I got all excited and felt a need to have another small treasure in our pockets. So I made garden markers from ice-cream sticks :). They don't bear the plants' botanical names but some powerful words for the plants. I first primed the sticks with gesso, then painted with green acrylic and stamped sweet words. 

Ice-cream sticks are great for garden stakes/markers.

Hopefully my plants grow happily next to their new toys :).

Will my cactus bloom now?. Oh, ones certainly could hope :).

Okay, that's all I have today. I'm off now to buy some seeds to fill up these pockets. Ha!. If you decided to spend some time in the garden soon, do share your potting projects or planting. If it's not snowing, of course :). Wishing you, Happy Earth Day in advance!. HUGS.

springtime pages

Dear friends,
Is it still cold out there?. Do you wish for an early spring?. I'm enjoying sunny weather lately, with blue sky and gentle breeze. It's weird that some trees shedding their leaves now but it is pretty to see them blown by the breeze. I always smile at that. Today, I'm sharing some pages from my old book, little watercolor drawings that remind me of springtime :). Enjoy!.

This one is for all love birds :).

and new buds in the garden.

springtime in Paris :).

Spring break, maybe?.

make believe vine heels :).

saw a sweet flamingo in Molie Makes, I had to draw it.

I love meringues!. Though I can't bake, I certainly can buy :)

Have a blooming week, everyone. HUGS.

tiniest stamp album

Dear friends,
I still have a few pieces of crumpled brown paper bags left. And I felt like making a tiny book and do a little sewing yesterday. Itchy fingers, LOL. I collect stamps when I was in primary school and only last year I started collecting again. Sadly, they now have a shoe box to call home :P. 

Yesterday, I did a test. Sewing a tiny stamp album. I LOVE it, maybe I should do more of these!. For different themes, maybe. I'm so happy that these might just work. 

And this one, to house a few stamps from the British Royal family & castles. I just sewed some plastic sleeves to the paper bags to keep the postage stamps in place. This tiny album measures about 2.5" X 3.5", so small with minimal sewing :). I just stapled all the pages in the middle and decorated the cover with a piece of linen scrap.

 A little flower patch for the front cover.

A suede leather for closure.

A simple stamping on linen for the back cover.

Let me share a few of the pages inside; 

I also added pages with some rags & buttons, just for fun;

I love to keep little scraps, be it papers or fabric. You never know when you need to use them :). I think, tiny projects like this stamp album is a perfect way to use up junk mails with plastic windows!. Just stitch around to make little sleeves. Easy  & fun way to display your stamp collection and recycling. Hope you'd give a try :). Take care all!. HUGS.