I made the carrot cupcakes and success! Well almost. They didn’t come out wet sodden messes but they didn’t poof up as much as I was expecting. They are, however, delicious. I don’t even need the frosting. Yay! Less work for me. I only frosted two of them.

And also, YAY, I got three new Japanese craft books. THREE. As if I needed more. Alan actually asked me why I don’t take Japanese classes since I have so many books. Yeah why don’t I?

So where is the picture of the new books? Here. One picture for you. Of one book, ISBN 4579111494.

Am I being mean and teasing you? No. So why only one book? I had this brilliant idea of taking pictures of each project to share with everyone. That way you’ll know if you like it before you buy it. But damn that took a long time. There are 28 projects in this one. TWENTY EIGHT!

The light was bad and Isabelle was all underfoot. As a result the pictures just turned out a mess. But I had decided it was a brilliant idea so refused to give up. I then tried taking the pictures with a tripod. Still didn’t work. I would not quit. I ended up scanning them all in, all 28 projects. Then I laid them all out six to a page because I didn’t want to upload 28 pictures. (I believe I have my account set up so you can click through to the larger size.) Updated * I deleted the 6 projects to a page. I readded them as 2 projects to a page. Yes it means more pages to click through but they’re larger pictures this way. * And when I was done, I WAS DONE. Too tired to scan the other books. Too tired to finish this post properly. Another day. sleep. now.

Last month we were in the bookstore and I was flipping through Bend the Rules Sewing. I decided to order it from Amazon to save money. Well you know I HAD to take advantage of the free shipping so I ordered Sew What! Skirts too. At the time, I was pretty excited because I was eager to sew some skirts for myself. Well it’s been over five weeks and the books FINALLY arrived today.

I didn’t notice when I was ordering but the skirt book wasn’t in stock for 4-6 weeks. And when I got the email saying when it was going to arrive I didn’t want to cancel it because I was saving money. So every time I thought about the books I’d kick myself thinking about how I could drive 10 minutes away to buy them. Now so much time has gone by that I have other projects that need fixing first before I start something new.


Not as if I could get much sewing done anyways. Drawing, yes. On the computer, yes. Reading, yes. But sewing. No. Too much concentration required. I don’t want to stop every few minutes. And why would I be stopping so frequently? Why Isabelle of course. She is being a regular little monkey. She’s getting into everything. She figured out how to get into the playpen by herself. One day she was playing near it and I had my back turned. When I turned back around she was inside. I was so surprised. But I figured she was nice and safe once inside so no worries. I turned away and next thing you know she got out by herself!

Ok she’s not a magic flying baby. It was by the couch and she was lowering herself in and pulling herself out by grabbing onto the arm of the couch. She’s gotten quite adept at using things to help her get up higher. I think the scariest was when she climbed on top of the ottoman that was sitting on top of her toybox. I worry she might fall on her head. And of course I can’t be sewing if I need to make sure she doesn’t break her little head open.

Here are some more pictures from our busy weekend. We went to the Kidfest in Concord. I would say it’s for kids a little older. Isabelle is too young to jump around in bouncy houses with older kids. Or I should say we are too overprotective. But she still had fun. We walked around, listened to music, had festival food, and watched Isabelle enjoy herself. I could share a bunch of pictures but I’ll restrain myself and only show one…ok two. I’ll spare you the ones of her eating, us trying to give her cotton candy for the first time (aren’t we great parents? she didn’t want any), and her fascination with the Chinese lion dancers.

And after the Kidfest we stopped by the used book store right there and I found some old books. I love old books. Have I ever mentioned that? I found a sewing book from 1945 called Sewing for Everyone for $1.98. The other book, which I could not find a published date for, was in the children’s section. I have no clue what it’s about. I just liked the cover. And I figured I could read it to Isabelle when she’s older.

And since I’m talking about books, here are the books I bought when we went to Japantown.

Isbn 4309280463, on the left, is for me!! Finally a book for me! I love this apron skirt, this dress, and this top is so sweet.

I actually saw the other book, isbn 4418051244, the last time we were in Japantown for the Cherry Blossom festival. I kept thinking about party dresses for Isabelle and how they make the inside, under the dress. So since I couldn’t get it out of my head I knew I had to get it this time. Ooooh and it has some boy clothes as well!

We had a very nice weekend. It was the Cherry Blossom Festival in Japantown so we met Olinda there for lunch. We thought Isabelle would enjoy it but I mostly wanted to go here, where I got to hurriedly flip through books (hurriedly because of little tugging hands of course). I wasn’t planning on getting more children clothing books but I did. I actually wanted to get a book to make clothes for me but I ended up getting these two.

My favorite dresses from the book on the left, are this and this. And my favorites from the other book are this and this. Maybe we’ll go back next week for the parade and then I’ll get a book for me…maybe…

Anyhoo back to what I was saying. We had yummy food and walked around and then later that evening we had dinner with my father, sister, and nephew. And when we got back to my parent’s house Isabelle played with her cousin Ebow in his little car. And that’s the video I have to show. I missed it all. I was downstairs helping my dad but Alan got it on video using his camera phone! Yay!! So here it is,. I love the part where Isabelle pushes the button and claps her hands and shakes her head to the music.

I’m thinking about making this Mom’s Bag for the Sew I Knit along. It’s from For Sweet Baby. This will be challenging for me seeing as I don’t read Japanese. But I hope I’ll be able to figure it out by looking at the pictures. It seems to be just rectangular shapes. Seems easy enough. I can do that. And I think I’ll add pockets inside.

Here are the other pictures of the bag from the book.