Felted mushrooms for Christmas

I made these adorable felted mushrooms for Christmas ornaments this year.

They look really cute and woodlandy on a tree especially with a little squirrel nearby. They remind me of the art and Christmas books by Jan Brett. (You should really check out her webpage for a lot of great craft ideas!)

I found this mushroom pattern on ravelry, and if you're not a member you should become one! The pattern is by Kathryn Ivy and is available free on her website here. I followed the patterns as directed and I used Cascade and Lion's brand yarn because both of those felt really well. The Lion's brand is cheap at Beverly's. Here is a picture of my finished specimens:


The Amanita mushroom turned out well. I needle felted the spots on, impaling my fingers several times in the process. Despite that I decided to make more for gifts.

bento box quilt

I am such a pathetic blogger, thank God only a couple of live human beings even know about this.This is the quilt I made for my third child when he went to college, about six weeks ago. I really like it, although he seemed seriously underwhelmed. I finished it the night before we had to leave, and I washed and dried it that night! The pattern is called bento box from Tracy Brookshier.com. It was challenging working in basic black and white. Now back to Hawaiian quilting!

she can do a handstand

Today is the first really rainy day of the season. The grape crush is in full swing, and my husband Mark and niece Vanessa are out there crushing in the pouring rain. A good time to be had by all.
Camilla can now do a handstand.

I've been busy sewing this week. My friend Regina and I took a trip up to Santa Cruz last week to Hart's fabrics, and we came back with lots of ideas and fabric. I made this skirt from an Amy Butler pattern- go to www.amybutlerdesign.com. It's the barcelona skirt made from a Kaffe Fassett fabric.

O.K. This is the painting of Honaunau on the Big Island. Somehow I managed to cover it with another image on the previous post.

Hi all this is my first foray into blog land, at least trying to do my own. I hope people out there will enjoy looking at my art.

I did some painting when I was last in Hawaii. Here's one of a place called Honaunau or place of refuge


This quilting design is called anthurium. It was probably one of the easier ones.

This design is called blue jade. The pattern is one I bought in Hawaii by a talented woman, Sonja Oberosler. There are nine designs in her package.She also puts out an instructional video.