Work In Progress

I have spent the last week cutting scores of fabric into squares so I can finally starting making my patchwork blankets. It's great fun then arranging them into the final designs. Here's a preview of the very first one, many more are to come.

Patterns Galore

First of all: this is not an offical product review, i.e. I have not been asked to review the following products or been offered anything in return for this. In fact I will never use this blog for any official product reviews, because this is not what this blog is for. So the following is purely something I came across and wanted to share.

I am not a huge magazine reader, they often just end up in a big pile beside my bed and eventually with huge delay I manage to get through them. But when I found myself in a newsagent's a couple of weeks ago with a few minutes to spare, I browsed through all the craft magazines that were for sale and two in particular caught my eyes, so I bought them - and have been very pleasantly surprised:

Both magazines offer a great selection of various craft projects, some of them I will be trying out myself soon. And amongst the advertisements I found a link to the Coats Crafts UK website, which features a large selection of free patterns for knitting, crochet, stictching and sewing. I am particulalry interested in all the patchwork patterns as that is next on my list so I can start using up my fabric scraps. What's on your list?

Colour Sorting

I bought this lovely wooden box on Sunday. 

In the shop it was sold as a Tea Box, which sounds lovely but you would need to be a regular tea afficionado and also have the space to display the box in your kitchen somewhere, which I don't.

So what should I use it for?


Thread reels?

Buttons?

Ribbons?

Family Market with Peas and Pods

So I've finally signed up for my first event here in Ireland and it will be right on my doorstep! I am really looking forward to it.

Peas and Pods also hold a family market on the second Sunday of the month at the Dublin Food Co-op, the next one is coming up on June 12th. More details about them can be found here on their website or on their Facebook page.

Every Girl Deserves A Dress

At the moment I tend to work on four or five projects at the same time - not something I recommend! I have also started signing up for a few events here in Ireland over the coming months so really need to get my act together and start working on my stock. But before that there was something else I had to do. A few weeks ago Louise from Sew Scrumptious wrote about the charity action Every Girl Deserves A Dress. I couldn't help but feel inspired and so decided to take part. In the process I also convinced my mother, who is a very talented lady, to take part and this is the result: four gorgeous little dresses that will go in the post on Monday.

Let's hope they will bring a little sunshine in some girls' lifes, wherever in the world they may be.

Easter Break

I haven't been able to post or read much this week. School holidays and preparations for the little boy's birthday party this week-end are keeping me busy, as well as several orders that I have worked on. So it'll only be next week when I will finally get to finish the new products, let's hope the weather stays as nice as it is now for some product photos. Hope everyone has had a nice Easter week-end. We spent time colouring eggs, but most of all growing our cress-egg heads.

Come And Be A Fan

I have finally gotten round to setting up the frogs+sprogs facebook page - click on the badge on the right and come and join us.


And with all the new fabrics that arrived last week, I now have a lot of new projects on the go that will be in the shop soon:

New apron designs ...

Funky Bibs ...

Mini Counting Bean Bags ...

New Crayon Rolls ...

Extra Large Toddler Blankets ...

Hope you have all had a nice week-end!

Meet Sanchez!

Somehow I doubt I'll be getting much done this week.

Fabric Love

Here is just a glimpse of what arrived this week. Now the task of cutting has begun, lots of new products will be in the shop this spring.

Have a lovely weekend!

P.S. This is the first time I am posting from my phone with a Blogger App - apologies if it looks funny in any way. But if it is good it will make posting a whole lot easier in the future.

Mother's Day Swap

A few months back I also signed up to another swap, organised by the lovely ladies on the Babyledweaning Forum - it was the Secret Mother's Day Swap. The only guideline was that it had to be handmade, cost you no more than £5 and reach the recipient by today. Now I was so much in a rush to get my swap parcel in the post before we left Spain that I completely forgot to take photos, I hope my swap partner will take some. But today I opened my parcel, and it contained this lovely bag:

I am also very pleased to have found a nice spot in our new garden for future product photos, and the sun seems to be on my side at the moment. Speaking of products, this week I spent an obsence amount of money to refill my fabric stash,  I am very excited about the parcels that should be arriving in the next couple of days. I have worked on a lot of new ideas for the shop and am now looking for a few nice craft markets or similar where I can start taking a table and get out there again.

Have a lovely Sunday, and to all the mothers out there,

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!

Postcards Part 2 Or Meet The Queen of Selvedge

There I was trying to figure out other designs for my postcards when I came across this blog where a lovely lady called Karen gives you all sorts of ideas about quilting and also what to do with selvedge, and she has a fabulous tuorial on how to make selvedge postcards. So now I have turned into the Queen of Selvedge ...

But I had great fun finishing my postcard project. I'm quite sure I will be making many more of these in the future.

Time to get them to the post office and start working on my next project.

P.S. This post has been edited - there seems to be conflicting opinion as to how to spell selvedge and I have now adopted the latter version. I'm sure every version is a little bit right.

Four Down, Six To Go ...

Here's a sneak preview of my postcards for the 2011 Postcards Swap. I finished four within the last 24 hours so should have no problems finishing the remaining six until next Wednesday.

For a few days I played around with my fabric stash and scraps, browsed the web for inspiration, emptied out my large basket of ribbons, purchased some stick-on gems .... until I finally found the right combinations.

I also, for the first time, started sewing on paper and gave the postcards a decorative stitch on the reverse.

I'm quite pleased with the result so far... I'd love to keep them myself I think! I hope the person who receives them will be just as pleased.

Another Swap? What was I thinking?

Well I just couldn't resist. It's the same every time - whenever I need a little kick to get my creative gears in move again, I find a swap. I don't even remember why or how, but the other night whilst surfing from blog to blog, as you do, I landed on the incredibly creative blog of ihanna, and ever the sucker for creativity that I am, I instantly fell for the Postcard Swap 2011. I have a few ideas but nothing started yet, but fact is that by April 8th, I have to have 10 completed postcards. I've never tried sewing on paper so might give that a try. Unfortunately registration is closed now but do keep an eye out for the results, I think it'll be fabulous, check out last year's cards here.

Better get started!

Forgive The Silence

Thank you for your lovely comments following my last post. It is difficult finding the right words and blog post subjects for the one after your baby has died.

We're doing ok.

I think that's probably the best way to put it. They say the pain of losing a child never goes away, it just becomes a little smoother aorund the edges, and I couldn't have found a better description.

We have decided to leave Spain, well as a matter of fact we had already made this decision at the end of last year but the plan was that Joshua would be with us. It has been for various reasons, mainly for additional support through family and friends as Mr Frog is originally from Dublin. Also we had made contact with the Jack & Jill Children's Foundation, a wonderful organisation providing care and support for children with neurological development issues. Sadly Joshua never made it to Ireland, but we arrived 8 days ago and have now more or less finished unpacking the boxes. We are in the lovely countryside of County Wicklow, but only 40 minutes from the centre of Dublin, our new house is lovely, the school is great, the sun is shining (that probably won't last long) and we're slowly recovering from the strains of the last 12 months. We are taking things easy and are being kind to ourselves, which is the most important thing at the moment.

So on the eve of our first St. Patrick's Day celebration on the Emerald Isle, here's to the future. Let's take it an hour at a time.

Lá Fhéile Pádraig Shona Duit!

In The Arms Of An Angel

Our beautiful boy Joshua Rafael passed away on Saturday 22 January. He never fully recovered from the pneumonia at Christmas, and that combined with all the problems from his prematurity and complications at birth just meant that he had fought for so hard for so long, but it was not meant to be. He died peacefully at home in our arms.

We have had 10 months and 3 weeks with him that were filled with laughter and tears, worries and hope and he will always be part of our family. We will forever miss him and love him, but we take with us his fighting spirit and the knowledge that no matter how hard the situation was, he showed us not to despair  but just to hold on and cuddle him.

Godspeed little man, sweet dreams.

Comfort Food For A Better New Year

Eight days into his battle on the intensive care unit, Joshua is a little more stable but still on the ventilator. The doctors have reduced his sedation and we try to spend as much time with him as possible. Christmas and New Year has gone by in a bit of a blur but we still maintained some of the traditions for Luca. Today we made some comfort food - pancakes with sugar, cinnamon and lemon juice.

I have also spent some time with my sewing machine - in these last days of uncertainty, sewing is like therapy and it is very rewarding to come away with a result, something that brings colours into our everyday life. I will put some photos up in the next couple of days.

In the meantime I wish everyone a Happy and most of all Healthy New Year 2011.