Reversible sling bag... with tutorial link!

I have been looking for a quick, easy and super cute bag to make for Christmas presents this year but have been a little daunted by tutorials with loads of steps and processes so I was delighted to find THIS tutorial over at Crap I've Made.

This bag took me around two hours however I think I could probably halve the time next attempt now that I understand the processes. I am a VERY beginner sewer so I imagine most serious sewers could knock one of these up in well under an hour.

I made a rookie mistake when cutting my black & white fabric and ended up with four panels instead of two however I was able to sew them back together and carry on as planned.

The tutorial warned that you will wonder how on earth you will be able to manage turning the whole thing right way round via the small hole in the strap but to persevere gently as it will happen... This prediction was exactly right for me as I thought I had stuffed the whole thing up during this process but like predicted, it did happen eventually! What a relief!

Next time I will give the strap a little more length but all-in-all I am very happy with this bag! 

Now I need to go op shopping again for more lovely vintage sheets so I can make some more!

Thanks to Cintia at My Poppet for being a constant source of sewing and general creative inspiration!

Apologies for the crappy photos. It was very bad light. iPhone no likey bad lightey!

Advent activities- toenail painting and frozen beach walk

The message in today's advent pocket read "paint each other's toenails... even dads!"

I think Molly was more excited about this activity than any other we have done so far. 

John's a good sport.. he now has sparkly pink toenails to match ours.

Another advent activity was "eat fish and chips on the beach".. We pushed this one to tonight as there has not been a good time to do it however due to the freezing gale force winds coming off the water, we ate in the car and John and Molly ventured out for a quick walk (in completely inappropriate clothing!) before quickly retreating to the warm car!

Advent-ure and Christmas rituals we love..

I am unashamedly a lover of Christmas.. Of course, there are many many aspects of Christmas that I detest (mostly around materialism, wastefulness and greed), but the season itself, and how we choose to celebrate it brings me joy nonetheless.

Over the last few years we have been practicing being more frugal, wasting less, making more and giving truly meaningful gifts. We have also focused on creating family rituals that revolve around togetherness and fun. These are aside from the community and churchy stuff that we also do.

A few of these rituals include;
- Decorating the house with a Christmas tree and adding several home made additions each year. This year we have made paper chains, painted Christmas paintings and have hung the new (old) Advent calendar that was recently bought by my sister in law from the op-shop.

- Christmas cooking. This starts some time in early December (fruit "super" balls, gingerbread angels/stars/house, shortbread, fruit cakes etc) and finishes Christmas day with the baking of Christmas morning cinnamon scrolls and any lunch/dinner fare that we may be serving up. Oh, and a pav... can't forget the pav! Molly has requested a peppermint crisp topping this year after eating some at a friend's party yesterday. I am a traditionalist and like strawberries, kiwifruit and passionfruit but I am willing to be flexible so I may come up with a way to combine both! Fun!

- Women's Christmas brunch... now this sounds very "hoity-toity" however, it is really just an excuse for the women in my family to stop, eat, drink tea and gass-bag. Not sure when this is happening this year but I hosted it last year and I think the torch was passed on to the mother-in-law. Better confirm this soon!!

- Going to Nana and Pa's to put up their tree and decorate it. This is done at the beginning of December and the kids (although it was just Molly this year) receive a special Christmas-themed gift from Nana and Pa to use in the lead up to Christmas. Molly was given a cool sticker book this year.

- The advent calendar. This is a new one this year! It involves getting a lolly (yes, we do lollies.. it's Christmas after all!) and a written message with an activity to be completed during the day. Eg. Yesterday was "make icecream sundaes" and the day before was "go op-shopping with Dad". There are lots of funny and some more meaningful ideas, some of which I copied from one of my favourite bloggers Owlet. I will come back with some advent calendar activity updates as they happen!

So Christmas is a special time for us in our family.

What do you do for Christmas?? Why not write a post about it? I'd love to read it! Go on, go write one and let me know (in the comments) when it's done so I can steal some of your ideas share in the joy!