I just realized the blog links on the right are not working! I have been a professional Web developer for 6 years now and I should have known better to fix the “quotes” in the code when copying from word to blog, sorry about that, they are all fixed now

I finally have my own sewing room! YaY! I have re-arranged the guest bedroom to be half sewing room half play area for Lara, that way she can play while I sew Before I was only using a corner at the guest bedroom now I have a huge table to work on YAY!!!

In my previous post I mentioned about making a table from the scrap wood we have, well that idea quickly died so I ended up using my 2 tables that I used for the craft show last year, with the same table cover and the banner hanging at the wall, my sewing room looks like a show setup, but I am quite happy how it turned out. The tables are big enough for me to lay down and cut the fabrics and deep enough to keep Lara away from all the *dangerous* materials. Also using my show tables makes it easier to set up my show table at home it will be a piece of cake to gather everything and re set the tables at the show

I am still working on those 3 dolls that I have started. They are going kind a slow as I have some gardening work to do these days. We finally decided on a shed from Home Depot. It is the right size/price and also easy enough to put together with out any help but the area we would like to have the shed in has some bushes, since we really do not want to kill anything green I decided to move one of them to the other corner of our house and have a little garden, so I spend some time everyday after dinner/before work at the back yard. it will all be worth the effort when we have the shed up

I love bread (actually, I love everything that contains flour, that’s why I am in a constant diet he he he) and love making them, so I was really excited when I stumbled upon to no knead bread recipe on the web. I had to try it, just had to So last Friday night I prepared the dough for the morning feast and early in the morning I shaped the dough, turned the oven on to have the loaf ready for breakfast. I just couldn’t wait to bake it. About 50 minutes later I took the loaf out from the oven, the smell and the sound of crust crackles as the bread cools were heavenly…and the taste was Yum-myyy, we dipped in olive oil, spread it with cheese/Nutella, ate it by itself…all passed the test and this bread moves in to the hot list after simit (A traditional Turkish donut covered with sesame seeds) for traditional Turkish breakfast on the weekend mornings.

As for the cleaning goes, we are still looking for a good deal on a shed, we have not made the trip to Costco yet but we checked out Costco’s website, there are a variety of sheds available in our price range, we just need to decide which one to get and from where. For the reclaiming the guest bedroom, I moved the mattress out already and will reorganize the room. I would like to have a long table for my dolls so decided to built one from the materials we have in the garage, it doesn’t have to be fancy or anything, just need a long top and 4(6?) legs, that’s it! If I can only find the charger of our power tools LOL

I have started on 3 more dolls. I would like to take around 13-15 dolls to the market if I got accepted. 2 boys 1 more girl I also would like to sew some shorts for Lara along with the summer dresses…

*sigh* Soooo many things I want to make and so little time…

Untill next post…

Happy Monday!

I have added the list of blogs that I visit regularly to the right :o)

The spring list I was talking about on my previous post, starts with a garden shed. We have a small storage space under the stairs and it is filled with all the small garden tools and with some items that needs to be thrown out. Our plan is to clean that storage space and put all the garden related items in to the shed and move all the baby stuff in to the storage. That way we will have an organized garage which became so cluttered, I feel ashamed every time I open the door. But first, of course we need to find a shed that suits in to our needs and budget. We have looked Lowes and Home depot so far and planning to look to Cosco and also to Sam’s club to compare the prices. I hope to have the shed up before it is to hot outside to build. So this is “cleaning the garage” item on my list, I also have cleaning and re organizing the house on my list specially (re)claiming the guest bedroom as my sewing/crafting room, right now I am only using the half of it.

And then there is our veggie garden that needs to be taking care of, last year I had tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers. This year I am only planning to plant tomatoes. And also have an idea of having one plant hanging upside down to see if it really helps to produce more tomatoes :o)

I also got the word about another Etsy at the market day here in Ann Arbor Farmers Market. I will not have lots of dolls but it was a lot of fun last year I applied anyway. I’ll know for sure if I get accepted or not by the end of this month. If I do, will have a lot to do still, making Lara&Me shopping bags for example. When, I went to the show last October I just did not want to hand my dolls out in an ugly plastic bags, so I bought %100 recycled postal wrapping paper from Office depot, and set down one night fold the paper in to the bags, add a hole for ribbon handles, glued the L&M design and Voila! a nice paper bag customized to my brand/dolls :o) They were a huge hit, everybody who saw my bags loved the idea of having customized bags of recycled paper. It is a fun and quick project, I should write a tutorial about it some day.

Oh! The doll modeling the bag in the picture is such a cutie, I think I am going to name her Ashley.

‘till next post, Cheers!

When I have a few free moments during the day I usually read my favorite blogs and do blog hopping, meaning I check out the blogs listed on other blogs or if the blog is a BlogSpot I just click to next blog button on the upper right corner. I found quite interesting and fun blogs that way. One example to that is forty-two roads. I love that blog mainly because the “MOM” is a crafty, Do It Yourselfer, writes wonderful tutorials and because there is a sweet, adorable 3 year old daughter named “LARA” and mom writes about Lara’s adventures :o) and the stuff she made for Lara. I just feel close to this blog and check it out whenever I can :o)

And from the 42 roads blog I found two straight lines. She too is a wonderful blogger and lives in Michigan :o) and I found IKEA hacker. Ohh! The love of IKEA! Back when we did not have an IKEA here in Michigan the closest one was in Chicago and we actually made the 8 hour round trip to go shopping, twice! Imagine our happiness when they opened an IKEA about 15 miles from our house :o) But despite the fact that we made those long trips to Chicago we seldom go to this closest one, I think because it gets really crowded especially on the weekends so the best time to go is weeknights, after 6 pm and giving my busy schedule and Lara’s sleep time that’s is not always easy. But we made a commitment and went last Tuesday night, there were so little shoppers there and that made the trip worth while. While my husband set down with few friends at the restaurant, Lara and I went shopping. I was really sad to find out that the chair and table set that I wanted for Lara was out of stock but was happy to get the other stuff on my list and about the short check out lines :o)

I actually took some pictures of the IKEA trip, but for the greener purposes we use rechargeable batteries throughout the house and my batteries were dead, this morning thinking about uploading pictures I left the dead batteries next to the charger in the kitchen counter and took 2 that I assumed had already been recharged. As I was driving to work I wanted take a picture of the beautiful sun shine over the trees, got the camera out, pulled down the window ready for the beautiful picture only to found out the batteries were actually dead, bummer! :o(

Writing this post made me realize I should list all my favorite blogs on here rather than having them saved under favorites on my browser, that way you can too do “blog hopping’” and see those wonderful blogs. I shall compile a list and add them here as soon as I can :o)

So the spring is here, finally! I have a huge to do list for the spring but I have to save that list for tomorrow, lunch time is almost over and I have to get back to work.

Happy Thursday!

I am still struggling with the raglan; I don’t know how many times I had to start over. Don’t get me wrong please, my teacher was/is great, I got the logic behind the raglan style almost immediately but the magic 6 style that she thought me, did not work for my dolls, starting with 6 stitches for the arms makes them too tight for my doll arms, so I have to figure out my magic number for the arms and the best way to do is try and error method. So the half done cardigan you see above will have to be started over :o)

I also dyed 2 skeins (wool and mohair with Kool Aid of course) of yarn for the hair this past weekend. Both are almost the same color, “reddish brown”. I am planning to sew the hairs on the dolls before this weekend.

Speaking of the dolls, I was watching Lara play the other day and one more time realized how fast she is growing and remembered that I was going to sew her summer dresses. But since I have so little time I can only work on 1 craft at a time, so I decided to finish up the dolls that are in the process now and gather my doll making materials and put them away for a while to concentrate dressing up my little girl for the summer. :o)

Happy Monday!

Well, that technicality about “mixing yellow and purple will produce nice dark green” is not true. Mix makes light, kind a reddish purple. Of course it is not the color I was after but that’s ok I can use this color too. :o)

I was knitting a cardigan the other day at lunch and one of my co-workers had suggested that I should learn to knit raglan style and I was like “what is that?” She said it would be easier for me to make cardigans. So she is going to teach me today at lunch, I am so excited! ;o)

Fortunately we did not get 5 inches of snow yesterday but it is still snowing, when it will end! (that is the view from my desk btw)

If you have read my previous posts, you know that I am a morning shopper. This morning I stopped by at my local store again with no intention to get any kool aids. After all I have tons of basic flavors at home. As I was passing by the aisle the colorful packets caught my eyes, I guess with summer on the corner my local store decided to bring more flavors :o) I know have lots of packets of berry flavors that I hope to get nice blue colors from :o)

I finished another natural cardigan today and for this one, I am after nice mossy green color by mixing 2 colors. Technically if I mix yellow and grape it should give me that color but you never know until try, I may just get something else :o) I hope to give you an update on the color tomorrow so stay tuned! :o)

Michigan weather being unpredictable, it is snowing outside. *sigh*

I woke up to 2 inches of snow this morning and snapped the picture above when I drove to work. By the time it all ends tonight (so they say) we will have close to 5 inches of snow :o(

Where did my spring go? *sigh* I hope this is the last snow we see for this winter.

On the doll front:

This past weekend we stayed at home and I was able to have lots of playing time with Lara and also knit and dye 4 cardigans. I love the colors of kool aid and the dying process is so much fun, I think I am going to get more of this natural yarn and dye from now on.

Here is how I do it.

Picture 1: you see my finished cardigan in natural uncolored yarn,

Picture 2: I soak the yarn/cardigan in cold water for at least an hour. Sometimes I use my hands to squeeze the yarn to get it really wet.

Picture 3: after an hour I squeeze out the excess water and put the yarn/cardigan aside.

Mix 2 packets of kool aid in desired flavor to the cold water in the pot.

Picture 4: add the yarn/cardigan to the pot and let it sit for about 5 minutes to start absorbing process.

Turn the stove in to the medium heat and let the pot simmer for about 45 minutes or until the water is clear and all the color is absorbed by yarn/cardigan.

Dump the excess water and let the cardigan sit in the pot until it is cold to touch. After that rinse it really well with cold water.

Picture 5: shows finishing the process… I use kitchen towel and lay the dyed cardigan flat to dry.

Picture 6: and this picture shows the 4 finished cardigans. The flavors I used for these (from top the bottom) grape, lemonade with a touch of orange, pink lemonade and tropical punch.

I love these colors, they are so nice and bright, just the way I like ;o) Now I am on to a new mission to figure out how to make different colors by mixing the available flavors and also to find different flavors :o)

Alright, I know it has been more than a week since I blogged but I have been really busy both at work and at home

I have put listing new dolls to my shop on hold till May 1st. I would like to make some changes, spring cleaning and such, so Etsy is on hold for a while. But that doesn’t mean I stopped making dolls, in fact I am going forward with full power, for the last couple of mornings I made heads. (You see some of them at the picture above and you also see my itsy bitsy tiny sewing machine, that’s right! I don’t have one of those big/commercial type ones, I use this small machine for everything and so far so good… Also I love its color, nice pretty baby blue) Tomorrow morning I will cut and sew the body parts and stuffing will be done on the weekend. I stopped by and got bunch of new fresh springy fabrics and I have lots of new ideas for the clothing, we are still not in to the spring yet here in Michigan but I am definitely in the spring mood

Making dolls is not an easy thing to do, I am sure if you ask another doll maker she would tell you the same thing. I don’t even remember how many times I stabbed my self with the needle. Some times I covered it with a band aid and continue working, other times it hurt so damn much I had to stop working. But I never had this kind a booboo (as Lara would say - picture on the left) before… I was pulling the string to make the eye line tight that’s when it happened. OUCH!!! It hurts! Oh Well! I love making dolls

I also would like to share happy news on behalf of my dear friend Astrid of karlchen-puppen. She too is going forward with her doll business. This is the kind of news that made me smile all day. I love it when good things happen to my good friends. Way to go my Friend! Congratulations!!

Oh! Here is her blog about the good news!

Finally spring is here… I think,

I mean I would like to think so. It’s still cold in the mornings but we had beautiful afternoons, sunny days for the last few days…

But one thing I learned about Michigan winters is that you never know what’s gonna happen, it may snow in April, May even in June! Well, I have never seen snow in June but I have friends who say, it happened! So you never know *sigh*

Anyway

I would like to talk about a friend today whom I met thru Etsy Chats, her name is Ferda aka Filo Fashion and she knits the most beautiful shrugs, scarves and neck warmers.

The reason I feature her in my blog not only because I love her work but because she has something from me in her shop You see, I offered my design skills to her and was glad to hear that she would be happy if I designed a banner for her shop

I just love the way it turned out!

Check out the lovely banner and her wonderful hand knitted items in her shop… Who knows you might even find something you like

Happy Tuesday!!

Oh! BTW, it was a nice weekend and I was able to assemble the 12inch doll and started another 15 inch, this one will have blue eyes and brown curly hair. I just need to sew some outfits than they both will be listed on Etsy