This and That

I considered entitling this post "Oh no, she's decorating again!!!" but thought better of it. I'm trying to stay positive. :) Anywho, in my constant quest to make a tiny house that is crammed full of stuff look cohesive and cozy rather than crowded and hectic, I am yet again rearranging the weird little space above my sewing cabinet. After deciding I needed less color and looking for all kinds of pictures on Pinterest of "decorating with white," I have decided to make a huge colorful collage of fabric hoops, as inspired by these pictures. Oh well, I guess I'm just not going to be able to get away from the color thing. I can't help myself. Do you see how she has hung hoops on hoops in this first picture? I can totally see myself doing something like that.



I love the curved effect of the plates on this wall, so I am copying it to make up for the fact that I have a super tall armoire next to a short tiny cabinet... And neither of these is too matchy-matchy, which looks effortless but is actually quite difficult to pull off. I'm working from the one tiny corner in my house that I like the look and colors of:



Plenty of white, but also lots of color, though nothing bright or over-the-top. It is a collection of my mom's old books, as well as some of my own. I love dilapidated old books, they have so much character. The more crumbly, the better! SO, here are some fabrics I pulled yesterday when the urge to do this project struck me:



I'm afraid the colors aren't looking quite true in this picture... the overall effect really is much less green. I've put some of them on the wall, but it isn't finished yet so I don't want to post a picture of it yet. It is nice to have something different up there, and I actually think that adding these different colors and patterns has calmed down and lightened up the space. Hm. As if I even know what I'm talking about!

And while I'm making a mess on that side of the house, I've managed to clean up one mess:



Over the weekend, that became this:



The only disappointing thing about this project is that my overdue book fines were more than the cost of the actual book that I got the pattern from (don't tell!). *sigh* I had to make a few tweaks here and there to make up for cutting and measuring flubs on my part, but this is the very first time I've managed to follow a pattern from beginning to end without making a royal mess of things and throwing the half-finished project in the trash. (I guess I made the dinosaur without a dramatic incident, too, so this is the second time.) It was super stressful because I am such a perfectionist and am completely self-taught and actually don't know much about sewing at all. But I learned a lot, and am in love with the end result. I almost didn't post pictures since this is a Christmas gift for somebody, but I just couldn't help myself. Aren't the fabrics gorgeous?!?! That Anna Maria Horner is the bomb, and I found that some of her Loulouthi prints mixed perfectly with a stack of Joel Dewberry fq's I recently bought. Love it when that happens.

And that's it for now. I have a ton more little projects in the works as Christmas approaches and I'll try to post pictures of the things that aren't for people who read this blog! Are you making hand-made gifts this year? I'd love to hear what you are making - I love handmade gifts!