sewing...

Sorry for disappearing!  As you probably know from reading my blog... I have a love/hate relationship with my computer.  With all of my photos and videos on here, I have about maxed the poor thing out.  I had the last of our Labor Day weekend trip photos up in photoshop for about two weeks.  It had gotten to the point that each and every step of editing took about 5 minutes to process.  I finally ran out of patience and shut my computer off to reboot.  Things are a little smoother now, but I'm over those photos, so I'm moving on :-)
 
In a future post, I'll have to go deeper into this, but this school year has brought on a bunch of change.  The kids have really rethought their activities and what they're into and made some changes.  One major change that Clara made, was to open up her weekend schedule.  She decided this year, to not sign up for any ongoing class on the weekends.  She wanted the time to relax, go to parties, hang out with friends and take sewing classes again.

I know... I just said that she didn't want to sign up for any classes on the weekends, right?  Well... that just applied to ongoing, every week classes.  She loves taking the classes at the craft/fabric store.  They're typically one day classes or at the most, two days.  A couple of weekends ago, while the boys were at the Michigan State game, the girl took two sewing classes.

First up, she took a hand sewing class to make a fleece blanket...

I thought her owl turned out really cute!

The next day, she took an applique class...

Yes... owls are their theme this session.  This was supposed to be machine sewn, but the instructor said that it was just too difficult to do with an already assembled tote bag.  They tried hand stitching it, but the canvas was too thick.  So, in the end, they finished the edges with puffy paint.  Clara picked out all of the fabrics for both projects all on her own.

She was the only one in the tote bag class, so with the extra time, they worked on making her a pillow to go with her blanket she had made the day before!  There is still some assembly to be done...

It doesn't match exactly since they let her use felt from their stash instead of purchasing more.

Since Mango was peeking out in the last photo, I thought I would include a quick snap of her...

Clara has really gotten into sewing again and I love it!  She and Alex took a sewing class this past weekend and made themselves new pillowcases.  They turned out really cute... I need to get a photo of them!

Clara is also taking a fashion design/sewing class at her school.  She's totally loving having the free time to pursue some of her other interests!