Farewell

At the end of April we threw a party for two of the Bees, Jenna and Melanie who would soon be leaving Hamilton on new adventures. Jenna and her husband Jeff have moved to beautiful Lanark Highlands to run Back Forty Artisan Cheese. Mel and her family will soon be moving to a new home in Norfolk County that is just minutes away from their garden. We had the farewell party at Jen and Mike’s house. (Unfortunately Mel wasn’t able to attend.)

It was a potluck affair so of course almost everyone brought cheese! The Bees love cheese. Hollie paired her cheese selection with homemade apricot preserves. Yum!

The host and hostess offered us grilled sausages and some excellent homemade burgers.

Of course a potluck wouldn’t be complete without dessert. Thea, who was home taking a break from her studies in London, made some delicious rhubarb galettes. There was also a good selection of pastries from local bakeries.

Once everyone was stuffed with all the tasty treats that were on offer, we surprised Jenna with a gift. (Mel’s gift was delivered to her later.) The gift was an embroidered bee that is part of our logo. Many of the Bees had a hand in the embroidering making it truly a group gift.

Although we wished Jenna and Mel farewell, it was not goodbye. Jenna and Mel will be Scout Bees, along with Anna, who will be occasionally reporting back to share their adventures on the blog.

PS. This is Steve, one of Jen and Mike’s cats, the life of the party.

A New Dress

I'm not totally sure how, but as a mother of three small children I can find time to sew - usually things for the kids. Projects range from clothes, bibs and quilts to dolly diapers and dress-up costumes.

I was recently given a gift from a friend who specifically said that I am always making things for everyone else, so now I can make something for myself. I was so excited to recieve a Colette Pattern, not only to make something for myself, but also because these patterns are simply beautiful to look at and hold. Well printed on good paper in a compact little booklet. The pattern was simple enough for a hobbyist sewer to follow.

The Macaron Dress has what they call a "sweetheart top with a contrasting top yoke." I just call it cute.

I like the pattern so much, I decided to trace it onto freezer paper before cutting it out. This took more time, but I think it was well worth it. Within two days, I had assembled the dress, with a few little distractions.

My favourite part in any dress is finding out it has pockets, so when I noticed the pockets in my pattern I was over the moon. When I finally tried it on, I found it a little tight in the bodice, but letting out the seam allowance fixed it up great.

I am very pleased with this pattern, and I am definitely going to sew it again and again, now I am just searching for the perfect material.



I would highly recommend Colette Patterns, and if you head on over to their website they have a lot of really informative tutorials.

And if you live in the Hamilton area, You can check out Needlework, rumour has it they will be carrying Colette Patterns! Their grand opening is February 10th at the James St. North Art Crawl.

Aviator

I always get excited when summer draws to a close and my most favorite season approaches. Fall has so many great things. Wool sweaters, apple picking, garden harvest, warm drinks, fires in the wood stove, and Halloween!



Growing up, my mom would make us the best homemade Halloween costumes - Pigs in Space, Frogs, Toasted Westerns, Pippi Longstockings, Care Bears, She-ra, and so on.

Now, as a mother myself I pride myself in making the coolest costumes for my kids (at least, what I think are cool). It sometimes takes some negotiating, to convince my three year old that he doesn’t want the generic store bought Halloween get up. And I always wait in anticipation to see if the tough critics will approve. Last year they wouldn’t put on their Red Riding Hood and Big Bad Wolf costumes until the actual day, and I am not going to lie, I was a bit worried.

So after convincing my son this year to be an Aviator, I got worried when he told me he was going to be a kitty cat or Wall-E only days before the big day. Luckily we both came through and the costume was not only simple but I’d say a hit.

I made the hat out of vinyl lined with fleece, I made a rough pattern and then shaped it to his head for a perfect fit. I borrowed my friends snap press to add a few finishing touches.

The goggles are a pair of welding goggles we had laying around the house (I just took out the darkening lenses). I found the almost perfect fitting jacket at a local thrift store added a fleece collar and pilot patch to the sleeve. A scarf and a mustache were finishing touches to our simple but very cool costume.

Bee's BBQ

When I wrote this, Mel (one of our very own Bee's) was about to have a baby, but right before I posted I found out that little baby Margaret Jane was actually born early this morning! How exciting! A few weeks ago, we thought we'd celebrate by hosting a Beehive BBQ in honor of this little one.

We gathered at Kate's place, and had a lovely time chatting, and enjoying so much amazing food. Kate made a totally delicious rhubarb rosemary spritzer (you can find the recipe on her blog, here).

The rhubarb spritzers were wonderful, but my personal highlight of the meal was Kate's fiancé, Erick, rocking the BBQ. He grilled veggies, Black Walnut Lane sausages, and divine rosemary chicken burgers - amazing! All of the meat came from local farmers, and you could taste the difference. Everything was so yummy!

It was just so nice to sit together in the afternoon sun and, instead of talking about the craft fair and our knitting project, we just got to relax and learn more about each other. We even invited the boys to this event - that's a first!

The BBQ was completely delectable, and so much fun. By the end of the of the evening we broke our own rule and started talking Beehive projects. We can't help it, it's just too exciting!

Perhaps we should just make all of our meetings barbeques?

Photos courtesy of Meg and Kate

Edith's Dollhouse

I had been spinning my tires searching for the perfect dollhouse for my 2 year old, Edith (and her big brother). Once you start looking, there are so many well-designed ones out there. It can be a bit overwhelming and a little prohibitive financially. 

I was having a hard time finding something affordable that wasn’t plastic and that we wouldn’t want to hide whenever company came over. And I didn't know if I wanted to go for something clean and modern, or something more classic.

I decided to be a little creative and come up with some different options. I came across this gem and fell in love with the legs. I think I went to every Value Village and thrift store from Brantford to Burlington looking for the perfect side table to transform into a dollhouse.  

Since I had a bit of a due date, Edith's birthday was only a week away, and the perfect piece of furniture wasn't presenting itself, I opted to build (with the help of my handy husband) one myself. I built the frame based on this dollhouse.

We bought two pieces of pine shelving for the framework, and a piece of masonite for the backing. I printed some vintage wallpaper images that I found online, as well as some scrapbooking paper and spray glued them to the back and walls of the house. The wainscoting and paneling were made from coffee stir sticks carefully cut and pieced together. For the staircase, I used cove moulding nailed it upside down to an angled board.

There is something fun about working in miniature. I made a makeshift doll bed from the bottom half of a hinged-wooden box, cut a mattress from some foam and sewed up fitted sheets, pillows and a blanket.

Even though there is a lack of accessories, the dollhouse was a huge hit. The kids play with it daily, and it excites me to know that I have an ongoing project that I can work on and furnish. I've been dreaming of miniature lighting, furniture, mirrors, picture frames and even a sheepskin rug. Although, it does make two houses I have to maintain!