Friday 30 December 2011

Making, Baking & Utility Sewing

We have had a fair bit of 'making' around here lately. The Christmas Crafting almost reached fever pitch at one point, but we really enjoyed ourselves in the process. At the moment we are enjoying some of the Christmas makes, for example, hats
And leftovers cooked up with some stock and barley into a lovely soup.
New wool arrived though and I have began a new knitting project, (its a gift, so not too many details at the moment

The point is though, I really want to carry on with a fairly high level of making things. It has helped bring some structure into our daily lives, and especially for Oscar who wont be starting nursery until April (unless I change my mind AGAIN *ahem*).

One of the nice parenting blogs I read is HOBO MAMA and a few days ago (and a few weeks ago), she was asking for people to sign up to The January Carnival of Natural Parenting (POST HERE). The basic premise is to take the challenge to go 'greener' in one aspect of your life. I had a look at the examples and some of them were too easy, go vegi for a week (we do that often), use only natural cleaners (vinegar and bicarb, we do that anyway), and some were not suitable or too difficult, use cloth nappies, (Oscar is nappy free, or don't buy anything for a week, (no chance, lol). The upshot was, I didn't sign up for anything, but I was thinking about it a lot. Then I remembered a sewing project I had seen on Jeanette's Blog, and decided this was the perfect time to get on with it.

The next bit of this post is about sanitary wear so please feel free to move on swiftly.

For the past few years I have been using a MOONCUP when its that time of the month, and on the whole I am fairly happy with it. The only thing which has been bothering me is that I still need to use a pad(s) as well as the cup for the first couple of days (due to heavy flow) and a pad only on the last day (due to light flow). So although I have significantly reduced the amount of pads I use, they are not eliminated completely. Jeanette has a tutorial for home made washable pads in her side bar and every time I see it I consider having a go and then forget all about it. Yesterday I was pondering what to make next, and thinking about the Parenting Carnival and it occurred to me than now was the perfect time to get the tutorial and give it a go. TUTORIAL FROM JEANETTE.


If you read the tutorial you will see mine are a slightly different shape because I drew them up freehand (my printer is playing up), and because I couldn't serge the edges mine were sewn with the inside out method and then I zig-zag stitched around the outside. Considering I am pretty rubbish at sewing, I am pleased with the results. Pretty they are not, but if they are functional, that really is the whole point. I used cotton for the outer fabric and fleece for a bottom layer (between the cotton and the soaker fabric), and terry toweling as the soaker fabric. I haven't sewn the snaps on yet, I will do that today (the pattern will explain where they go, if you are interested). Although I haven't signed up for the Carnival I am pretty pleased I have done something anyway, it certainly leads on to other thoughts. What else can we make instead of buying?

While I was sewing away, Duncan and Oscar were playing with Oscar's castle and at the same time

Baking bread instead of buying some. Isn't he good.


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Photo 29-12-2011 20 08 52

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