Be Excellent To Each Other

That's fantastic.

If that's a copy of your house, you've got way too many doors. Must be a bloody nightmare to lock up in the evening before you go to bed!

It looks incredible, and it's nice to see an advent calendar with a 25 on it - seems not many do these days!

The worst bit is when you take a wrong turn and walk straight out of the upstairs.

And thank you

Lovely!

That really is smashing, the something that will be brought out year after year, forever.

I made us some family Christmas stockings to hang by the fireplace. They’re a cotton velvet, with a cotton lining and loop, so they should last a long time, and prevent any ‘catches’. I made them from a narrow 1m length of velvet, and managed to get four stockings out of it from a pattern that I drew up specifically to leave as little fabric waste as possible. I drew the pattern to cut on my curing machine as well, so that was very exciting as I hate cutting fabric!

They look lovely, and what a beautiful colour too.

Thank you. I’m glad you said that. I ordered four different samples of similar greens and it took me a long while to finally settle on this. I’d just decorated the living room so wanted something that would fit with it.

Meems you are so so talented

Those are awesome. People (I) would pay good money for something like that.

Aw, Dr Z, thank you! I like making things for Christmas as we reuse them each year and it’s nice to take them out each year.

I sewed gingerbread gift tags for all the children I know and buy gifts for, too. Hopefully they’ll also double as a little personalised decoration for the tree. These were simple and I just sewed them in front of the TV. My favourite think about them is that I used a layer of quilt wadding in them (instead of poly fill toy stuffing) so they are lovely and squishy but still
flat, and exactly the right thickness for a gingerbread person. I think I made 12 or 16 in total.

I’m making a World Book Day costume for Darwin. I’m not much a fan of World Book Day, but a while ago someone (I think it was Curio) posted something on Twitter asking about the best coat in film or TV. I said it was Gene Wilder’s Willy Wonka coat, because it is. I always wanted a coat like that when I was younger (in my teens, really).

Anyway, when the school sent messages home about World Book Day I asked Darwin who he wanted to be and he said Willy Wonka. So, as he’s missed the last two World Book Days due to Covid, I decided to go all in and do the thing. I made the trousers, waistcoat, bow tie, the hat, and I made the coat. These pictures are a bit crappy as it’s been a dull and rainy day, but hopefully I’ll get some better ones in the coming days.

The coat is 100% cotton velvet. The fabric is beautiful and I wished the photos did it justice. The coat is fully lined. You can’t see in the pictures but the back is pieced from 16 panels in total. It’s been a kind of ‘project of a lifetime’ for me and I almost cried when I had it done just because I’m so proud that I managed it. I’ve shortened the hat by 7cm after taking the pictures to better match the scale of the Gene Wilder hat height:face ratio. I’m really happy with the fabric I found for the waistcoat.

I apologise in advance for putting it this way, but I don't think any other way does it justice:

HOLY FUCK MIMI!!!

Great job! How long did the coat take you? I think my first jacket took me roughly 50 hours

Woah! Seriously fantastic.

That is utterly incredible. Just need a photo or ten of Darwin showing it off, now! Bonus points if you can get him to do the limp-walk-somersault move

Amazing!

Will you be my Mum next time round?

You’re on, Mr Paz! Thanks everyone for your kind words. I feel incredibly proud at seeing it through, and I can’t imagine making something I love as much as this again in my lifetime, partly because it isn’t a necessary pair of pyjamas or similar, so I could make it just for the sake of making it.

The coat didn’t take as much as 50 hours, Trooper, but it was a lot of work. I counted the pattern pieces on the coat alone and there are 53 pieces including the lining. It always feels like kids things should be quicker to make as they’re smaller, but actually that just means it’s far fiddlier, especially fitting sleeves in those tiny armscythes. I hand basted the whole coat (because I hate pins and didn’t want the velvet to mark), bit by bit, going upstairs to sew between the tacking sessions.

The trousers and waistcoat felt like really short projects after that. I made the trousers in about an hour and a half yesterday even though I had to pretty much wing it as I never had a trouser pattern with a fly.

I made the hat this morning. It’s made from cereal boxes and felt I hand sewed the cardboard and then sewed ten felt to the cardboard. Pushing that tiny needle through the cereal boxes really was tough on my fingers, then I decided (after the pictures) to shorten it, so my fingers are a bit sore now

Then the bow took ten minutes. That was satisfying.

When I finished the last piece I almost felt a bit teary, I think partly relief that I got it done in time, and partly because it was over and I’ll likely never attempt something this silly but fulfilling again.

I’ve got 30 little chocolate bars arriving on tomorrow’s Ocado order to make little Wonka Bar wrappers for.

Absolutely amazing Mimi, what an amazing feat of crafting. Just shows your skill and talent.

That's superb!

Darwin asked to try the finished costume on today. I’m really happy with how it came together.

Mimi, you are amazing. I am lost for words, that is just awesome...

Can you adopt us all.

I’m not sure I have enough fabric or sanity left for all of you

I assume you'll be hand carving the cane

I have what would be the perfect basis for a cane but thought his school wouldn’t appreciate me sending him in with a big stick

Amazing work Meems! Darwin looks awesome!

You could modify a cheap plastic sword into a cane by removing the cross piece. Nice and light and no danger to other kids. Teacher proof!

That's incredible work, something to be treasured.

I’m only posting these as they went with the costume pictures, but I made some chocolate bars for Darwin to take in to school today and maxes little cardboard shipping box to put them in.

That's bloody amazing!

Your drive and eye for quality are brilliant, Mimi.

Now - to bring things down a bunch of notches, I'm both embarrassed about this and a bit chuffed that I can relax enough to get this far in one evening.

Instead of just enjoying metal videos with the silly voices I decided to see if there's anything about doing it oneself. Throat singing and the like.

Silly, awfully-lit videos ahoy!

Turns out I could've been in Ghostbusters.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/ACuaACb6ysuc7nqL7

Though I won't be quitting my day job to be the lead for pink Floyd or Electric Callboy just yet
https://photos.app.goo.gl/3Djm2njpqDQd1SUk7

But it does seem that
https://photos.app.goo.gl/XVPi4KQubrP2wci29

All very silly stuff (which I'm cringing about), but it is nice to be able to have relaxed control of myself in some form, instead of being unconsciously tense the whole time (my personal trainer is quite exasperated by my ability to suffer effects of an exercise in totally the wrong place because everything is tense all the time)

That's incredible. You can hear it coming from almost the depths of hell.
Also, big kudos for posting yourself.

I hope you’re well stocked up on fishermans friends!

I think I must've done it approximately in the right way because no soreness or croaking today

Not quite embarrassed enough to delete the post.

Very spooky!

Ideal for your ringtone.

Pffft. Nothing at all to even start being embarrassed by

I echo what has been said above. That's pretty impressive and I'm pleased you felt comfortable enough to post it on here too.

Do you listen to Phurpa, by any chance?

So, Bean is going to his school ‘fancy dress as royalty’ Jubilee party dressed as the wolf from Red Riding Hood (who is, of course, dressed as a grandma). There’s probably some social commentary to be had there, but really it’s because of terrible organisation and communication.

Back in April school sent home a newsletter saying that this week was going to be ‘Fairytale Week’ and that they were having a fairytale themed Jubilee party for the last day of term, and it was fancy dress on the theme of fairytales, and pupils could come dressed as princesses, dragons, etc.

Then last week they sent home a reminder but this time specified that it was royalty themed fairytale costumes. :headdesk:

We had discussed and agreed a costume with Bean based on the fact that he needed a new dressing gown anyway, and I didn’t have much time, so would just need to make a hat and paint his face. Now this new info changed things, and I did a quick panicked message to the other parents in his class who said that their little ones were all going in royal themed costumes. I hadn’t started Bean’s costume and a crown/cloak ensemble wouldn’t be much work and would be technically simpler to make, so I told him that the rest of the class were going as royalty and what did he want to do? ‘Still go as the wolf, of course!’ So, here is grandmama’s night cap with wolf ears poking through. Lol.

Could tell him to growl ‘eat the rich’ really menacingly for added effect, but probably shouldn’t.

It's his clever and satirical tribute to Isabella of France.

Love your creativity Mimi. First Wonka, now a Wolf. Keep them coming!

Ooh, nice knowledge. I think you can play any mistake out if you have enough knowledge at your disposal. I actually hate the repeated fancy dress things, but if I agree to do something I find I need to lean fully into it.

If you’re going to do something, do it as extra as possible.

Fancy dress day is today. This wolf is off to eat the rich.

Grrrr!

Looks awesome.

.

It was Bean’s birthday this weekend, and he had a party for the first time ever (he wanted one last year and the year before but Covid made things difficult), so I made a few little bits for the party. I didn’t get photos of a lot of it, but there were some dinosaurs for the invitations I made (they all had Googly eyes to finish them off)

I made little lunch bags for each kid, full of party food, which said ‘Dino food’ on them. Some little cupcake decorations for the cupcakes I made


And I made personalised little goodie bags for each of the kids to take home, filled with lots of little treats and a t-shirt each



There were 14 tees in all and I tried to make them with a different dinosaur each.

It was at a dinosaur adventure golf course. A fab, noisy day!



The kids were great but it was EXHAUSTING. A few of them were a bit of a handful to deal with.

Not that I'm much of an expert, but I can't tell which might be a handful from those photos - they just look like a joyful, joy-filled bunch! I particularly the photo of them all shouting (roaring?). It looks like a day they'll remember for ages!

They were roaring. It was loud!

Actually, this roar was even louder!

You honestly can’t tell who is going to be a handful. There is one little kid who always looks so incredibly sweet, but my goodness he wanted to smash those dinosaurs with a club at every opportunity he got, and was just purposefully knocking his ball in the stream so I’d have to fish it out at every turn.

..and his name?

...Russell

The variety of dinosaurs and how well adapted they typically were to their evolutionary niche is an excellent opportunity for a wonderful learning experience. You want your ball out of the stream? Grow flippers, kid.