Rambling Roses Design

I’m sure all of us remembers the story of The Princess and the Pea from when we were growing up. I have to confess that I sulk when it comes to sleeping on a lumpy mattress, hotel mattresses that are too soft can feel lumpy sometimes! Vineet always laughs and says that I’m being such a diva, I just chalk it up to old age 😉

On our recent mama-son expedition to Granville Island, I came across a lovely little fabric store called The Cloth Shop. The store is tucked into a corner of the island and filled to the brim with bolts of bright, fun prints and colors – totally my kinda scene! Sometimes this sort of thing can be so difficult because making a choice becomes impossible. That’s when I saw this panel, it was the princess and the pea printed onto fabric*.

The print had colorful mattresses piled high and a bright green pea at the bottom! Of course, there was the princess and her impressive collection of crowns 🙂 The store had a sample of a little girl’s pillowcase using this fabric, cute! I had other plans though.

My 6-year-old, Kiki, loves to read and so we’re at the library a couple times a week. I knew that this panel would be perfect if I used it to make her a book bag.

I used fusible interfacing to give the bag some structure which was a good thing especially for the front pocket. However, that meant that the pocket kept flopping open. Out came the hammer. With a few good whacks to fix a pearl snap fastener into place, the bag was good to go.

Oh yeah, I ran out of fabric for the handles. I remember seeing a different type of handle somewhere on Pinterest (or Flickr?) long loop – short loop – loop them together and voila!

We haven’t filled it here, but this bag is roomy enough to carry an armload of books!

When she took her book bag to the library for the first time, even though she’s read the book before, she insisted on checking out The Princess and the Pea. Quite appropriate!

My favorite fairytale that I loved reading over and over was, Goldilocks and the Three Bears. Do you have a favorite?

* This print is from the Quiet Time collection by Tamara Kate for Michael Miller fabrics.

Posted by Preeti & filed under Bags, Fabric, Kids, Sewing, Sewn Finishes. This post has 6 comments.

We’ve just had the hottest day of the year (so far) pass us by. However, today is murky and wet… April showers bring spring flowers and all that jazz, so I’m okay! That hot day just screamed road trip so we decided that it would be the best day to make the short drive south into Washington state and visit the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival. Only thing is that every Pacific Northwesterner had the same idea as us, hah! We realized this when we got off the interstate and onto the Tulip Route, too late to turn around! Anyways… the miles and miles of tulips we saw that day made up for all of the traffic woes and then some!!

Jaw dropping gorgeousness!

The kids didn’t whine once when I asked them repeatedly to say cheese, I’ll take that as a bonus!

They actually had a good time 🙂

About the hat… I took my Wellington hat along knowing that there would be fantastic photo ops. I didn’t account for the heatwave though 😉

This hat uses organically grown cotton yarn dyed by my friend Heidi. She creates magic dyeing a range of vegan yarns in gorgeous colors! The pattern is by the talented Jane Richmond. I bought this pattern and the yarn at Knit City and immediately knew that this would be a perfect marriage.

Of course, I finished knitting this hat when the cold weather had long passed, isn’t that always the case?

The stitch pattern is a lovely, textured honeycomb but there’s no need to use a cable needle… win!

I love the crown on this hat, lots of drama happening there.

For a bit of slouch on this hat, I knit the body longer than the beanie style original.

Wellington (Ravelry)
Pattern: Wellington by Jane Richmond
Yarn: Vegan Yarn Alnilam Worsted in colorway Thrift Shop
Needles: Sizes US 7 / 4.5 mm

Posted by Preeti & filed under Family, Finished Knits, Hats. This post has 8 comments.

When a collection of things are strung together and hung up, it always creates a festive mood. After bunny one and bunny two, I decided that we needed some more festivity and this time I was going for quick.

So, I sewed some buntings! Bunting… such a funny word 🙂

For this bunting (hehe!), I used scrap bits of patterned fabric for the fronts and backed them with a large red and white dot.

Sewn onto a length of ribbon and up this went in Kiki’s room.

For the larger, even quicker version, I used a bigger template and a few charm squares. I left the edges raw on these and didn’t back them with a contrasting fabric either.

I think I’ll hang this above the fireplace in our family room… after she’s done twirling with it, of course!

I have to add that I finished both of these in under an hour with the help of my triangle-sorting assistant who is home from school today. The plumbing at her elementary school is shot and so while they get that fixed, 500 kids are home today with moms scrambling to shuffle schedules!!

Now that we’re set with festive decorations, all we need are some good tunes and maybe some confetti 😉

Posted by Preeti & filed under Sewing, Sewn Finishes. This post has 7 comments.

Time to put away the warm woolies and dig out the gardening tools, spring is here! I’ve made several trips to the garden center this past week. It’s time to brighten things up and usher in some color!

Spring is indoors too with this cute knitted bunny that I recently finished.

It took me a whole day of seaming and stuffing all of the little bunny pieces. I should have followed the instructions and stuffed and seamed as I went along with the knitting. Lesson learned!

Like my first knitted bunny, this one too is knit entirely out of stash bits and pieces.

I used leftover Tosh Pashmina from my Soay cardigan to knit the face, ears and limbs and it does make her look quite different from her BFF. Less fuzzy but just as adorable!

I knit the little dress in the round and so I have a “jog” up the back where the stripes meet. Thankfully, she’s not a vain bunny and so she’s cool with it 😉

That cute little button was just asking to be a part of this dress! It’s an old one from my button stash. Button stashbusting too? Whoa!

Pattern details…

Spring Bunny (Ravelry)
Pattern: Bunny girl in a dotty dress by Julie Williams
Yarn: Stash
Needles: Sizes US 2.5 / 3 mm

Have a lovely, springy weekend all 🙂

Posted by Preeti & filed under Finished Knits, Rambling, Stashbusting, Toys. This post has 8 comments.

This post brought to you via iPhoneography 🙂

The kids have been on spring break the past two weeks, so it’s been a wonderful time of relaxing and sleeping in 🙂 Monday, is back to school for one last term which is always the busiest one. This lull before the storm was nice! We went on a mini vacation over the weekend, back to the Okanagan Valley.

The landscape was such a contrast to how we remember it from the summer. Don’t be fooled by that drab exterior, there’s plenty happening below the surface with the orchards and vineyards getting ready to burst into bloom.

Out here by the coast, the early plum blossoms are already displaying their splendor.

Prithvi and I decided that we would be tourists for a day in our city, well not exactly in suburbia where we live, but right downtown. It was so much fun!

First, we took the cute little Aquabus across False Creek to Granville Island.

We walked around the Public Market and worked up quite an appetite for a huge plate of fish and chips.

With happy bellies we visited the various little artisan stores around the island.

One of our favorite stores was Make with its quirky items made using recycled materials. Another one we liked was Ten Thousand Villages. All that walking and browsing made us peckish for some sweet treats so back into the market we went.

So many delicious choices!

It was time to take the Aquabus back and wander down to the Vancouver Art Gallery with a quick detour to the MAC store 😉 Art expedition done, we each grabbed a cup of brew and headed down Robson Street for people-watching, selfie-clicking and window shopping. The light was beginning to fade with the setting sun and of course, we were hungry again, hah! We decided to end the day with dinner at one of our favorite Malaysian restaurants, Banana Leaf.

It was so lovely to spend the day with my son, creating great memories that we will always remember!

#touristinmytown, you’ve got to try it!

Posted by Preeti & filed under Canada, Family, Food, Rambling, Travel, Vacation. This post has 5 comments.

I’ve heard it said that when you don’t know what to blog about, blog anyway. So, here I am blogging anyway 🙂

I’m so thrilled with this kitchen adventure. I found a recipe in an old magazine for lemon curd cheesecake. Just reading the recipe made me drool and so I just had to make it. I went on the hunt for lemon curd and didn’t find any at the store. I did find Ina Garten’s recipe for homemade lemon curd, yummy! The only hard part about making this is the whisking. I convinced Vineet to help me whisk and so we took turns, him whisking and me dunk tasting and then switching roles 🙂

This recipe is a keeper. Even for eating straight out of the dish while it’s cooling (guilty as charged!) or smeared onto warm scones, mmm. Getting back to my cheesecake, I’ve baked it and left it to set in the fridge. I can’t tell you how tempted I’ve been to attack this deliciousness with a spoon. If I give in to temptation, I think the family will notice a big gaping hole in the middle. So, I must resist!

Oh, oh I have to show you what I made a few days ago. But you know me, there’s always a back story…

I have this little pouch with needles, tiny scissors, a tape measure and other bits and bobs. As much as I tried to contain the needles within the plastic-disc-holder-thingy, I would always have a few strays drop out. Every time I reached into the bag I would get stabbed by one of those errant needles. I got to thinking that there must be a better way to contain these without having to use strong language before I used them each time.

What do you know… needlebooks are meant for this very purpose! I looked for a tutorial and found tons, each needlebook was cuter than the next.

I had a hard time deciding but I picked this one because the instructions were very clear and Amy’s stuff is always so charming and adorable.

Here’s my Inspired by Nanacompany Needlebook.

Now all of my needles have a place and there are no more nasty surprises lurking in my pouch. I love my little needlebook, everything that’s scaled down in size is always so much cuter 🙂

Posted by Preeti & filed under Food, Rambling, Sewing, Sewn Finishes. This post has 6 comments.

My dear friend, Kim, who was battling cancer, passed away on Saturday. We will all miss her terribly. However, she said so many times that we weren’t to dwell on that. She wanted us to remember only the fun, good times. To honor her wishes, we are celebrating her life.

She loved people, she was passionate about everything ocean, she made amazing quilt after quilt and was always upto some crazy adventure. Her zest for life was just so contagious. Knowing her has made my life so very blessed!

Cheers, Kim!

Posted by Preeti & filed under Rambling. This post has 9 comments.

I should be getting my hat done. Actually, I should be finishing our taxes (ugh!) instead, here I am knitting something absolutely frivolous and so much fun!

Every year once we get our taxes filed just before D-Day, I vow that I will be better at being organized with next year’s paperwork. And every year I fail miserably! So as a picker-upper, I pulled out Julie’s bunny pattern and some stash yarn and got knitting. Grin 😀

I think Dottie needs a playmate.

I accomplished so much last week with life stuff and crafting stuff. This week, I’ve got zip-nada-zilch!

Last week I finished and handed off these coasters. They were well received and I’m so grateful for that order.

I finished these placemats for two little girls too 🙂

One of them loves pink and the other loves red.

They also each got their initial monogrammed with some handstitching. Dots make everything extra cute, in my opinion and so I used them quite liberally. I think I need more dot fabric in every color in my stash!

I’ve got a large-ish order going for various items but with a relaxed deadline so I haven’t had much time to actually list stuff for my empty-looking etsy shop right now. I will in time, I promise.

Off to knit another bunny ear before I get back to wading through paperwork. Talk soon 🙂

Posted by Preeti & filed under Etsy, Rambling, Sewing, Sewn Finishes. This post has 6 comments.

Today is Pink Shirt Day. Click here to read how this tremendous movement came to be.

I’m sure most of us have experienced bullying to varying degrees. Bullies aren’t just limited to the school playground. Adults can be bullies too. My first recollection of being targeted was when I was in kindergarten and not by my peers but by my teacher. You see, she was reading us this story about a rag doll and his friend and one of the kids piped up and asked, “What do you mean by gollywog, Miss? What does he look like?”. She was quiet for a moment and then I distinctly remember her saying, “A gollywog’s hair is like Preeti’s”. Hence came to be my nickname through most of elementary school, “Gollywog”.

This story has a happy ending because I now have come to accept and embrace my messy, tangly, unruly mane of hair but through most of my childhood, I wished I was bald!

I hope you’ll wear pink today to take a stand against bullying.

In other generalness (yes, that’s totally a word), the earth went bwahahaha because after I posted the picture of our crocuses from last week, we got hit by a freak snow storm. Say wha’?

No white-out conditions or anything dramatic like that, not even that cold really. Just pretty white flakes that fell softly, magically for three days. It was like winter’s last hurrah.

As I type this, most of the white fluff has melted away. It was so lovely while it lasted and we didn’t even have to shovel 😀

Then, this bunch of loveliness arrived in the mail! I am undecided about what I want to make with these.

More floral loveliness. I’ve got spring fever, maybe?

For now, I’m just happy to pet them and smile 🙂

Posted by Preeti & filed under Fabric, Rambling. This post has 7 comments.

I could be knitting my fingers to the bone to get my Ravellenics project finished before the Olympic flame is extinguished on Sunday. However, it looks like I’m going to have to bow out gracefully before the finish line.

First, I’ve got to get all of the straggly threads knotted and buried into these coasters before tonight so that they can be shipped out pronto.

Sewing these together was quick, it’s the finishing that’s going to take longer. That said, it’s all about the finishing and we crafters know how important those details are.

I’ve also got to finish up another project that has a fast approaching deadline. Since I took this picture last week, I’ve worked exactly zero minutes on it, ack!

February is moving swiftly to usher March in. While I was determined to try snowshoeing or at least take the kids tobogganing again this year, that will have to wait because just like that, the seasons are rolling over too!

I know that there’s plenty of snow on the mountains still, but spring is almost here and I’m feeling all giddy just like these pretties that obviously love coloring outside the lines 🙂

I want a spring sweater to be on the needles asap. Also, I’ve got a bunch of happy fabric all cut out, waiting to be pieced together. I’m even thinking paint, staple gun, upholstery fabric to makeover a couple boring chairs we’ve got. I’ll let you know if I’m brave enough to try since I don’t know the first thing about furniture redo!

Busy as a bee it seems and I’m not complaining because that’s just how I like it 😉

I’m ready to play with some spring projects. Do you feel the same?

Posted by Preeti & filed under Hats, KAL, Sewing. This post has 5 comments.

The Princess And The Pea

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