Category: stuffies

stuffed animals

Posted by miss alix – 21 Mar ’11

stuffed animals Possibly the hardest secret to keep about our wedding was these little stuffed animals. These guys were our gifts to our guests, so I couldn’t share without ruining the surprise.

I started making them nearly as soon as we had set our date, spending any spare time I had sewing, embroidering and stuffing them. Not one is alike or from a pattern. While the task was daunting, and took several months, it was never unpleasant. Not to mention, I had a great deal of help from friends. I made them out of eco-felt and a good deal of scrap fabric we had at home. The faux fur is from a film Shawn made years ago. I think they were my favorite.

This is Bebop and Green Bean. We became a little too attached them, so they had to stay with us.

stuffed animals I really wanted to do something exceptional for our favors. I know it’s something that is last on the list for many weddings, but it is one of the few very memorable things for people. It’s the piece of the wedding guests get to take home with them. Ultimately we pinned little name tags on each and they became our escort cards.

IMG_3257 With them living and multiplying in our apartment for so long, it was a bit sad to see them all off to the wedding. On the other hand, they were pretty excited to go on a ride in the car.

stuffed animals In the end, we ended up with a few more than we needed so a handful still live with us. The rest found new loving homes with our guests.

Portland craft: Summit of Awesome

Posted by miss alix – 15 Jul ’10

How cute are these guys? While in Portland, we got to visit the show of awesome, part of the Summit of Awesome. The Doug Fir lounge was filled with so much creativity and craftiness. I wanted to buy one of basically everything.

Going to a craft show like this is just so inspiring. I couldn’t believe how much talent was packed into this room.

I loved these rings. I couldn’t decide which one I liked best.

I probably could have spent most of my day roaming around this place and checking out all the handmade stuff. I also got to meet Becky from Glue and Glitter, which was cool. It’s times like those when you realize you’re a total internet nerd. Oh well.

After all that crafty fun we checked out some vintage stores nearby and then headed over to the Bye and Bye. You know the Bye and Bye right? Only the coolest vegan bar around. I think so anyway. Check out that amazing mixed drink in a jar. So darn good. Oh and then some other awesome stuff happened.

I think I’m in love with just about every aspect of Portland. I suppose I should share some of the great food we ate as well…perhaps next time…

Bunnies and chicks oh my!

Posted by miss alix – 14 Apr ’09

Springtime means cute little creatures come out to play. Instead of filling the Easter baskets entirely with candy, although there was a great deal of that as well, a few little critters snuck in. Plans were made to make a bunny cake and some mini-mango cheesecakes but each endeavor was vetoed as everyone had had their fill of sweets for quite a long time.

These little fluff balls were made fairly quickly and assembled even faster thanks to my trusted hot glue gun. In the end, these are even better than chocolate critters as they last much longer than the time it would take you to eat the candy. Not to mention they’re adorable. I also made some little origami bunnies and furry bunny ears. Oh I think I would be happy making all things bunny forever.

Another very exciting thing is that I finally shelled out the money to buy myself a stainless steel bento box. Okay, it wasn’t that much money, but I’d been holding out. I try to bring my lunch to work with me most of the time, but throwing a sandwich or leftovers in some tupperware just isn’t that inspiring. Having an adorable metal bento box to put my food in, on the other hand, makes me want to fill it with delcious meals. It’s rare that I make a meal thinking about having it for lunch the next day but I was excited to fill my new little lunch box with rice, toasted seaweed and teriyaki baked un-chicken. It tasted great and was that much better since I knew there wasn’t any chemicals leaching into my food from a plastic container. Yay!

A bit of craft

Posted by miss alix – 19 Jan ’09


Today I’m bringing you all a completely food free post (eek!) but I’m just too terribly excited about my new lamp to wait. I had been wanting to put another light in one corner of our living room that was a bit dark. I often lay in read in this corner but the nearest light is one that shines directly into your eyes and is more distracting than helpful. Because of the layout of the furniture in the area, it seemed to me that the only option was to hang something from the ceiling.

I had been casually browsing for ideas of something to make for awhile when I found an option in a copy of ReadyMade that seemed like it would bring enough additional light while also being simple to make. My initial attempt did not come out as planned and I almost caved and hung some Ikea china balls that were hidden away. I did a little research to solve my problems and used just a mix of glue and water instead of fabric stiffener to hold the form.

I love this lamp! The warm tone of the yarn I used brings a warmth to the light in the area as well as diffusing it from feeling like a raw lightbulb. I’d like to make a few more in other sizes and textures to add in the area.

Here is another little stuffed octopus from the holiday season. There’s something really rewarding about making stuffed animals. It’s as if you’re adding life to your home. This little guy went to live with my nephew in Las Vegas.

Coming in the future, I have a few kittie creations to share…

2009!

Posted by miss alix – 14 Jan ’09


I know it’s a new year (first post of 2009 in fact) but I still have a few things left to share from 2008. For the holidays I tried to create as many gifts as possible instead of buying them. I made a handful of stuffed animals, knit projects and of course holiday cookies. While I started all of these ambitious tasks well in advance, there’s only so early that you can bake cookies without delivering them stale to their recipients. I had decided on snowflake sugar cookies and had even acquired some edible glitter to decorate them. Unfortunately, this cookie baking session was doomed from the start. I burnt whole batches and had other mishaps including dropping an entire sheet on the floor while burning my hand. In the end, the beautiful glittered and iced cookies I had imagined did not come into fruition. I’m pretty sure the end product still tasted good though, even if it wasn’t as pretty as I would have liked.


Immediately following the new year was Shawn’s birthday. To celebrate he got the dessert of his choice, which ended up being peanut butter cup cupcakes. I think my favorite thing about these guys is getting to say “cup cup.” Ha! As you can see, they’re chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter filling/frosting and peanut butter cups on top. They turned out super good. I think next time I will have to try a different way of frosting them so that they can have an entire peanut butter cup on top (and not look ridiculous). Also, I’d love to make the peanut butter frosting a bit more fluffy. It’s a great consistency for the filling but a little dense on top.

Meeme and Mochi

Also, we got two new additions to our home. We adopted two 4 month old kittens from the shelter. They’re adorable, loving and playful and I couldn’t be happier with them. Despite not looking alike, they’re actually sisters. I’m sure they will be making some appearances on this blog in the future. In fact, little Mochi is desperately trying to help me write this by walking all over the keyboard.