Tea for Two... or Four

One of the projects that I completed in my time off from blogging was this wonderful tea set for one of the niece's birthdays. It was super fun to make, and while rather time consuming due to all the parts and pieces, it turned out beautifully. Hopefully my sister is not ready to string me up by my toes for invading their house with yet another toy with a million pieces. What can I say, I love felt toys and cannot stop myself once I get started on them. This project was inspired by my niece's love for all things girly and dress up. Her favorite colors of pink and purple are all over this set made just for her.

I got the main idea from the ladies over at Prudent Baby. I like the concept of the tea set that could be folded up in itself for storage. I found the cupcake fabric and purple dot fabric at the store and set to work. The sewing itself was rather straightforward and easy to do as their tutorial is very thorough with easy to follow directions. I did, however, use the serger to put together the double sided place mats as well as edging of the napkins. It was just easier on me to do it that way, so I did not have to iron under any of the seams. The rolled edges also gave it some contrast which I also liked.

In order to dress up the napkins more, I added a little applique style decoration. I used up some of the scrap from the cupcake fabric to add a little cupcake detail to one of the corners. Once I cut out the circles from the cupcake fabric, I simply zigzag stitched at an almost zero stitch length to cover over the raw edge. Doing this type of satin stitch in a circle can be challenging. Just go slow and take your time as well as perhaps adjust the bobbin tension a bit to ease around those curves. I liked this better for my personal project. It tied the whole thing together in a project specific way.

The tea set pattern was purchased from Ume Crafts on Etsy. She makes great felt food patterns that are just too cute to pass up. I have done several of her patterns, and this was just as high quality as the others. The only draw back to this pattern is the tea box. My nieces and nephew apparently really wanted a working lid on this. It resulted in much dismay when they could not put the tea bags back into the box. I don't think this is anything against the pattern, just a thing to consider if your particular tea party goers want super realistic functioning tea storage. I thought the tea pot was going to be difficult to put together, but it was just as easy as can be due to the wonderfully written directions. The set looks beautiful, and I love how it looks like a real grown up set versus the usual cartoon looking ones.

The other option about this set that is fun is the reversible sides. If the pink cupcake table cloth is too much for you on a particular day, flip it over and you have a more calm purple side. Then, you can flip over the place mats for a touch of the cupcake goodness. It makes the entire set look like a new toy, and I hope that keeps the kids extra busy with combinations of the colors and settings. This tea set also seems to have brought out the old cakes and even the sushi set that I made out of felt for the girls a few years ago.

Going with the princess and dress up theme, I made sure to add one more thing to the table, crowns and wands. I found these on the site of Lu Bird Baby. I tried to make sure that I had a color for everyone. There is green for the oldest as that is her favorite color, pink for the birthday girl, purple for Mom as I am sure she will be invited, and even this blue set for the younger brother or Dad. I was sure all would be roped into tea parties and wanted to make sure everyone had representation in the crown and wand category. The tutorial over at Lu Bird is also very easy to follow. This was a fun quick project that let me use up all sorts of odds and ends of saved ribbon.

All of these things can then get folded up into the table cloth that becomes a gigantic bag. The only drawback of the drawstring bag is the ribbon drawstrings. In order to make the strings long enough to gather up the whole cloth, they end up being way too long for practicality. Very whimsical, but also not super practical for the kids to use alone. Typically when putting this all away adult assistance is needed.

Overall I think this was a great project. The level of all the sewing/crafting on this is easy with a moderate for the tea set itself. The cutting level on this project is intense. I was very happy to have the Klick-n-Kut for this one. It makes felt crafting so much more fun due to not having to cut out all those little pieces. I hope this inspires you to put together something fun this weekend.

It Finally Happened

My mother told me this would happen one day, and yesterday was that day. I have a friend who is always concerned with exploding jam jars, and while that is not what happened, we did have one break in the canner. My mom told me that you will know when it happens by the sound that it makes as you lower it into the hot water. I heard it, and it is a difficult sound to describe. I would say that the best description is that of glass popping in a fire, not really a shattering sound like I thought it would be. Annie and I heard it and wondered. We decided to process the jars and then see what was cracked when we took them out. After opening the lid on her canner we saw:



That is right, floating bruschetta sauce. It was a bit of a disappointment. I was, however grateful that we broke a small jar rather than one of the pints. We removed the jars and then fished out the broken jar.



Upon closer inspection, it seems like the jar was mismanufactured. The markings on the bottom of the jar do not seem to match up to other markings. They look off center. Here is the jar after the accident:



We chalked it up to the canning gods wanting a sacrifice for all of our good results. I am happy with that idea. A sacrificial jar of bruschetta sauce. Annie and I spent the rest of the afternoon working on her winter garden and then some knitting. It was a wonderful day of girl time. I really enjoyed myself. Today I am off for some household errands and then some sewing on Christmas presents. I also got some of the supplies I ordered for another gift yesterday. It all seems to be coming together for a better start to the holiday crafting season. I hope I can keep up the momentum and finish ahead of the mailing deadlines this year with ease!

Must Complet List

The end of last week and this weekend really put me behind. The cold I acquired in the middle of the week is really zonking me out. I ended up making a semi major mistake with my present for Brenna's birthday, and I hope to get it all ironed out and both fixed and finished today. I am also going to finish dying the play scarves for her birthday present as well as getting her "birthday cake" finished as well. Needles to say I want to have her gift all wrapped and boxed waiting for the postage, so I can get it sent out in time to arrive for her birthday rather than its usual late state. My other goal for today is to finish my Grandmother's gift and start my Father-in-Law's gift. I will have pictures of those for the massive post holiday wrap up. Before any of that can be accomplished, I just want to finish off the pants that did not get done in time for Shadow Dance. I almost had them done, but not quite. Today also involves an errands run for both crafting supplies and household supplies. I may also pick up new pots and herb plants. I have decided to throw in the towel with my current set of plants that keep getting infected with slime molds. I cannot win, so I am starting over with new pots, soil, and plants. That is the plan, pictures tomorrow, I promise!