Play room, hell yeah!

So, I recently read an article that outlined what those without children hate about those of us with children. One of those things was having to see kids toys and paraphernalia in the houses of those pesky friends who have bred.

Now, I too must admit that I used to say smugly to mr twice giggle thrice that we would never allow our house to become overrun with toys when we became parents. He would smugly agree and we would then happily live in our as yet childless delusion that this was in fact possible.

Fast forward a few years and I find myself falling over things on a regular basis, and stomping on beloved crayons that were in the shape of a much loved cat or monkey or hippo AND had a name, and don't I just feel rather guilty that I have smashed my child's beloved crayon pet into 1500 pieces?!

Something had to give.

Cue a midweek visit to the toxic kingdom of ikea, a few expedit cubemythingies and some castor wheels and we have a pretty awesome playroom. May it save the lives of many more crayon pets.

Oh, and to those childless beings that hate having to see children's toys and such, the playroom is right there when you step in through our front door. If it offends you, feel free to step right on back out!

Busy quilting

I am ever so proud this week - I dismantled my bobbin case and sorted out a major tension problem on my machine. My top layer of stitching was perfect, but the bobbin thread was all over the place.

I had tried all the usual things of rethreading the machine, new bobbin, et cetera.

Nothing worked! So, I bit the bullet and dismantled a few things, cleaned them and put them back together.

And it worked!!

So I sewed and sewed and sewed - and now I have a lovely organic baby quilt all ready to be bound.

The verge, footscray edition.

A long while ago I posted angrily about the council spraying chemical weed killer and having the absolute gall to say it was natural and safe.

And they sprayed my violets.

The violets have grown back and are flowering beautifully at the moment. They have lovely delicate white flowers. Their foliage is still showing the effects of having been sprayed though. It is unevenly pigmented and a bit deformed - this says to me that these 'safe' weed killers are not safe - they do continue to have adverse effects on plants a long long time after they have been sprayed.

So, in an effort to discourage spraying by the council on our verge trees, we have adopted the closest tree to our house. I cleared all the surface mulch which has been repeatedly doused in these nasty chemicals, and then added a big bag of organic mulch.

Next, I planted out blue pansies, trailing yellow pansies, white alyssum and white primulas. Then we all watered them in with some Seasol.

I hope that by keeping this small patch of garden well tended and weed free, that we will reduce the pesticide use by the council.

Play dough!

Did YOU know that it was so easy to make your own play dough?

I did not. Until now.

Twice Giggle Thrice Jnr is now fully stocked with red, pink, brown, green and sky blue. All of which I managed with some unloved and unused red and green food colouring left over from Christmas several years ago, and an old tube of blue writing icing.

We've been playing for about an hour and a half with it, so I would say that play dough made at home is rather a hit.

It is so nice that I know exactly what it is that my child is playing with, because we made it ourselves.

Goodbye commercial play dough, it has been great, but we've moved on to the home made eco friendly variety!

Big news in Footscray!

Twice Giggle Thrice is making the move from hobby to business, and we're all really excited about it.

I plan to sew between 9pm and midnight for four nights a week. I will see what that results in and adjust accordingly.

I have bought some quality woven quilt labels from Fancyweaver and I can't wait to sew them on some quilts. We have a great big shipment of organic fabric on its way too. I don't think my Etsy store will know what hit it!

Speaking of Etsy, I have updated my policies to reflect my change from hobbyist to business and one big change I have made is flat rate shipping. I am hoping this will result in more sales, because I hate paying for shipping so I assume that everyone else does too!

I need to decide whether or not to continue making change mats, because I only have enough coated linen to make a handful more. Unfortunately I cannot source this amazing fabric here in Australia, and the next best thing available here is much lighter (though comes with written safety certification).

I'll also be investing some real time in this blog, which will mean photos!! I know, I can hardly believe I have had over two thousand hits when I have been so slack in the photo loading department.

So that is what is happening here on the sewing front, along with two Oliver + S Explorer vests from the book Little things to sew.

Stay tuned, I may even post photos...