SHIM + SONS

1/2 dozen

I know I've said it many times before, but making girly skirts is one of my favorite birthday gifts to give to our friends. Several months ago I made a few for a friend's birthday present and her mum, my dear friend, asked if I would make 1/2 dozen more before we moved. She left it up to me to pick out the fabric and I had so much fun! You cannot see in the photograph, but many of them have a contrasting fabric band on the bottom or top, a fun detail that I love to do.

And I made a few matching hair clips and hair ties for Miss G to wear with her skirts.

After finishing the skirts, I rolled them up and put them into a white box.

And stuck a personalized label on it!

silkscreening

One of these days I want to enroll in a silkscreening class, oh and a letterpress class, painting class, furniture making class...well, you get the picture. It is my dream that one day my products will be made using my own silkscreened fabric. But until then I am always on the lookout for beautiful + unique fabric. This is why I loved living in Busan, because a trip to the Jin Market always resulted in acquiring some fabric that I knew I wouldn't be able to find in the States.

As we were preparing for our overseas move last month I wanted to make some quick gifts for some of the dear friends we met in Busan. I like practical gifts and remembered that I always put the drawstring bag + tissue holder that I made for myself to good use. So I used my favorite silkscreened fabric to make a dozen drawstring bag + tissue holder sets. This is a fun and easy sewing project!

the paint chip skirt

This girl's skirt was inspired by a paint chip card tucked inside my sketchbook. I can't help but think of  Martha when I see this colorway. Although I have fun picking out girly prints when I'm making skirts for friends, this design is definitely more my style. This skirt has already inspired several new home accessory designs I hope to share with you this winter. I love how working on one project can lead to new ideas for new projects.

stacks of skirts

Lately I've been sewing quite a bit. I think I'm making up for the several months I was without my sewing machine during our move overseas. And now knowing my machine will be packed up for another 3+ months I'm quite motivated to work on all sorts of sewing projects.

Skirts are one of my favorite things to make for our little girl friends. They are fun to make and wear and require little time and supplies.

All of the skirts are made from fabric sourced at our local textile market. I'm definitely going to miss the Jin Market, but don't worry, I'm building up a nice collection to bring with me. 

grey on grey

:: new pillows for our sofa :: gifted lotta jansdotter fabric from leslie ::

:: more pillows in the works ::

pillows :: take two

We had loads of fun at Big J's birthday party over the weekend. Of course we're a little wiped out from the festivities and it doesn't help that another wave of colds has hit our house. [Please, oh please let this be the last of the illnesses this year!] I'll share photographs from the party later this week. In addition to preparing for Big J's party this month I have been fully immersed in spring cleaning. After a few trips to Goodwill I've been able to clear out some closet space around the house. I've also written lists for changes I would like to make in each room of the house and have prioritized the list. It feels so good to have a "game plan" and to dedicate some time each week to make it all happen.

One of the projects on my list was to make new pillows for our family room sofa + club chair. Last month I picked up the grey tree fabric from Bolt even though I wasn't crazy about the colorway.

Sure enough as soon as I made the pillows I knew they were not going to work for me. I love the print, but the color palette just doesn't look right in the room.

So earlier this month I ordered a few pieces of Cake Rock Beach fabric [designed by Joelle Hoverson of Purl] from Sew Mama Sew. I think these pillows are keepers, or at least until I can replace them with some textured pillows like this or this.

P.S. The shoppe will be celebrating its 1st anniversary on Thursday! I was originally planning to have a big update on May 1st, but I am going to push it back a week or so since this week is packed with volunteering in Big J's classroom, going on a field trip and working on a few project deadlines. Stay tuned!

covering up

Continuing with this month's theme of "finishing the unfinished", I made my first ironing board cover. I'm not sure why it took me so long to finish this project because I completed it in about 1/2 hour. I removed the old cover and used it as a template to cut out the new cover from my favorite Ikea print.

Using some white double fold bias tape I made a casing to thread some thick string through. [By the way, if you haven't checked out Amy's bias tape video tutorial, you must! It is very informative and hilarious, just like Amy in real life!] You could also use elastic, but I just recycled the string from the old cover. I placed the new cover on the ironing board and pulled the drawstrings, which was then clamped into place with one of those clamp-dealie-bobs [I don't know what they're called]. My ironing board comes with an attached mini board for ironing shirt sleeves so I also made a matching mini cover.

And you might have already noticed but I whipped up a few more calendars which will be sent out to some friends as soon as I track down legal size mailers.

You'll be seeing more of this paper + stitching combination around here, it is so fun!

And another project that has been sitting around since last year, a sewing machine cover. Yes, a bit matchy-matchy, but what can I say, I love the Ikea print. This was another project that took under 1/2 hour. Thank God for quick 30 minute crafting projects. [Ha, I sound like I'm the Rachael Ray of crafting.]

   

The yellow + grey is really popping up everywhere in my studio. Although I've had a life-long love of white + grey, the yellow + grey love was definitely inspired by Martha.

P.S. Thank you for all the Easter toolbox love. They were a big hit this morning! Quote from Big J, "Thank you SO much for the toolbox. I'm going to work really hard and make pretty things like you!" They also had fun hunting for easter eggs at church today.

P.P.S. Special spring break sale in the shoppe this week. Stay tuned!

new month :: new projects

I love how the beginning of each month brings a fresh new start. The first day of every month I write down all my projects + work deadlines + goals and post them on a pin + strip in my studio. I find it helpful to see all the things I need to accomplish in one glance. And I love removing the little strip of paper once a project is completed.

One of my goals for this month is to make a few birthday presents. The first birthday in March belongs to my mother-in-law and I decided to make her a simple pin + board. She loves green, so I chose green + grey linen leaves to embellish the pin + board.

I meant to make a batch of calendars for family + friends last Christmas, but never got around to completing them. So I decided to finish up one calendar to add to my MIL's present. I printed out some of my favorite photographs of the boys in 2007 and affixed them to the calendar.

Big J made a card for his Nana. Metallic pens + glitter pens are Big J's favorite tools these days.

Now it is all wrapped up and ready to be sent off. On to the next present!

preschool crafting

It is our fourth week into preschool and we're loving every minute of it. Big J has been working on reading different words he spots while we are out and about. The other day we were in the car while Big J was looking at a notebook which had a picture of a cute sheep and the word "mouton" on the cover. I could hear him sounding out each letter carefully until he figured out how to pronounce the word. Of course he immediately asked, "What's mouton?" Ha! Never thought he would be reading French at such a young age.

Big J has also been doing quite a bit of crafting at preschool, which incidentally means I've been doing a lot of preschool-related crafting. Wednesdays are sharing day, so a few weeks ago he wanted to bring a fish to school since it was "F" week. We don't have any fish, but I remembered Mama Urchin's wonderful go fish craft she had posted about a few weeks ago.

So I cut a fish out of two layers of linen and two layers of wool felt, stitched on some eyes, secured a magnet in between the layers of felt and then stitched up the entire fish. I made a fishing pole out of tree branch, put a little magnet inside a little felt pouch and tied it to the end of the pole. Big J loved it and he said the kids had fun playing with it at school. And as you can see Baby J has also been having fun fishing!

And for Big J's funny feet parade at preschool, I made him some little sock friends.

Which double as hand and foot puppets!

And today we went on our first field trip! Nothing is cuter than seeing a classroom of preschoolers hiking around a state park in their rainboots and jackets. Oh, being in preschool is so much fun!!

linen + leaves + lotta

The cooler weather has definitely put me in the mood to changes things up over here at Casa Shim. Most of you know that I have a thing for mobiles and floating objects in general. There has been a steady rotation of mobiles/floating objects in our kitchen nook over the past year and I've been meaning to replace the tissue paper pom poms I took down a few months ago. So a few weeks ago I revisited my favorite linen leaves craft and sewed some together to create linen leaf chains.

And since it is difficult to make just a small batch of linen leaves I now have a tray full of linen leaves waiting to be transformed into a simple little mobile.

I was testing out a few ideas for a freelance project last week and decided to make little covers for some glass cups I have sitting in a wood tray on the kitchen table. They were influenced by my pencil + cups and have now inspired me to make a few new pencil + cup designs.

It is no secret that I have a weakness for Japanese craft books. I am in love with the beautiful photography and styling of some of the minimalist books. Since I think I've only used one pattern from all the Japanese craft books I have, I usually don't even care whether the books contain patterns since so much of my inspiration is drawn from the handmade objects themselves. So when I saw Blair had posted about Lotta's newest book, I made a mental note to stop by our local Kinokuniya to check it out.

I picked up a copy this week and of course I was not disappointed. The projects are simple + modern and I actually like that fact that she doesn't include patterns for all the projects, that way every person can come up with their own version. And like so many of us who are influenced by Japanese craft books and find ourselves working on similar projects as other craft blog friends, I was pleasantly surprised to find two projects in her book that were similar to what I had just worked on. I love the pattern on her fabric mobile [in the book Lotta explains several ways to print on to fabric.]

And she has some really cute cup + flask covers in there as well as some spiffy tote bag designs.

Oh, and I also thumbed through her travel style book at the bookstore and it is chalk full of inspiration--definitely putting that book on my wish list.