Merry Christmas from Whale and Sailor Boy

We wish you a merry Christmas, 

We wish you a Merry Christmas

We wish you a Merry Christmas

and a Happy New Year! 

Gulp the Whale and Sailor Boy! They finally exist after a year of stewing around in my head. They will be off on adventures with my best friend's baby very soon! So happy they turned out so cute!

I Spy A Great Kid's Gift.

I spy with my little eye, a great project for you!

Eye spy bags are perfect toys to whip out when you need a bit of distraction. I wanted to make some that were small enough to throw into your purse. I'm not giving you directions for how I made mine because I think I put them together the hard way, using fabric scraps I already had cut. Melly Sews has a great tutorial on sewing vinyl windows that is much better. You can just ignore the lining and rest of the pouch directions...
Basically all you are doing is sewing two squares, rectangles, whatever shape you want together, you just have to put a vinyl window in first. Here's a couple of my other random thoughts on making these:

1. Make the bag THEN write the list on the back. This way it doesn't end up bigger than you wanted. Just make sure you use a pen that doesn't need to be heat set. 
   
2. Apparently there is a debate on how big a window to use. Keep it small so only a few things can be seen at a time or let it all hang out. I didn't realize this until afterwards. My small windows were sewing oopses.. excuse me, DESIGN FEATURES. 

   

   Folded on left, full vinyl window on right.

3. Find LOTS of stuff. I wish I had found more things to put inside. I wish I had put more filler in them too but I was worried about it being too full and heavy. Whatever.... it works.
4. Don't let anyone tell you this is a good quiet time toy. The filler rattles against the plastic and if you whip this baby out in church, people are going to start looking around for the noise.

Pebbles, has a lot of fun with the first big one I made. She was a young two year old when she discovered it and loves crawling up in your lap and showing you what she's found. You can really draw out the distraction time by asking what it is, what color, what shape, all that good stuff. 

So there it is! Another quickish project for you. I think these would make great stocking stuffers. What do you think?

Ps. Just found this sewalong and am TOTALLY doing this! Just the kick in the pants I need to start my fall sewing. Anyone else in for it?

September An aMAZEing Month

I first ran across the marble game idea from THIS blog post. It is as super simple and as super fun as the author said. I although, couldn't make my games as simple as hers. For my mazes I cut a 6 x 8 inch rectangle and drew my own maze/path that was roughly one inch.

I make one side colorful and one side solid. Thread color is up to you
whether you want contrasting or invisible.

I used fabric markers to add start and finish shapes to opposing corners.

The solid side allows you to show the maze and let the kids see which
way to go. Different "start" and "finish" symbols are a must otherwise
they'll get turned around and forget which corner they are working towards.

I've watched the Pink Princess play with these and at 5 1/2 she really seemed to grasp the concept and enjoy moving the marble. This is a great fine motor skills activity as well. Before that she didn't show too much interest and got bored with it. Maybe the simpler ones would be better for a younger age? I'm also wondering if these would be a good pocket exercise for adults with ADD? A small one wouldn't take up much room in a pocket and whether you have ADD or not once you pick one of these up you have to move the marble.

So what did YOU stashbust for September? Cindy has taken time from her busy work and student schedule to post her adorable project and open up the link party for us all! Head on over so we can see what you've been making!
I'll be back on Wednesday with my September Flickr roundup and our October challenge details! See ya then!