Beautiful Dolmades!

I have been making the Greek dish Dolmades for a couple of years now and every time I make them I ponder over the 'art' of wrapping the spicy rice and lamb in a vine leaf. There is definitely a knack to it, like wrapping small gifts. I find it extremely relaxing once I get into it and they taste really good too. I use a recipe from a memoir called 'Apricots on the Nile' by Colette Roassant that uses raw rice and I find it works every time. It's one of those creative dishes that is well worth the effort!

Let Yourself Sew

Gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous! I found this sewing magazine aimed at teenagers for $1 in Vinnies. It doesn't get any better than this for me...utter bliss!

Designer T-Shirt Party

Suitable for boys & girls, ages: 4,5,6,7,8 years

Sewing Level: Adult Beginner. Please note this project does not involve sewing for the children!

Craft Party Preparation: Trip to the shops for t-shirts or singlets and labels, 1 hour cutting and sticking, 30mins for 'test' run, 10 mins label preparation, 10mins applique for each t-shirt/singlet after the party.

It's that party time of year again! This year my daughter decided for her 7th Birthday she would like a Pancakes & Craft party just for girls. I was secretly pleased because for a while now I've been longing to use an image out of one of my childhood favourite Lady Bird books, The Runaway Pancake. In the past I've photo copied pages and framed the gorgeous illustrations and words to put in the children's nursery, and here was another opportunity to use an image but this time as party invites. Once the invites had been scanned and printed (with the help of Photo Shop for the text) it was time to decide on the craft activity. After many consultations we decided to decorate singlets with fabric. The idea was that the girls would pin simple pre-cut fabric shapes onto a plain singlet allowing them to create their own design. Then I would applique the singlets after the party and hand them to the girls at school. After a practice run with my daughter it was obvious that 'pinning' was a bad idea, far too fiddly for a 6 (soon to be 7) year old and actually the pre-cut shapes needed to have a small square of double sided sticky tape on the back to allow the girls to peel and stick the fabric on ready for me sew. The practice run was an invaluable 'test' and it also meant that my daughter had a singlet that she could wear for the party demonstrating how the finished garment should look - perfect!

Materials:
1.T-shirts or singlets (whichever you prefer, no need to spend a lot, look in some of the cheaper high street stores)

2. Scraps of fabric, any remnants will do, the bigger the variety the more fun the designs will be.

3. Bondaweb

4. Double sided sticky tape (no project would be complete without it!)

5. Sewing machine

6. White cotton thread

7. Scissors

Party Preparation: Iron Bondaweb to the back of your fabric scraps. Cut out very basic shapes like squares, triangles or oblongs. A word of warning, if you have shapes like hearts and circles they are extremely fiddly to applique afterwards and you will regret it! Having appliqued hundreds of shapes onto things over the years I felt confident about using heart shapes, however I still limited the girls to two heart shapes each for their designs. Once you've cut out about 6 shapes per child, remove the Bondaweb backing paper and stick on a very small square of double sided sticky tape. Now you have your shapes ready to stick on. Attach a blank label to each t-shirt using ribbon or string ready for the children to write their name on (if they are at the writing stage)

At the party: Adult to child ratio is really age dependant. For 6,7 and 8 yrs it's 1 adult to 5 children max. Otherwise it's maximum 1 adult to 4 children (if you're feeling brave). Prepare enough tables and chairs to seat the children. Place a cupful of pens in the centre of the table, one for each child so they can write their name on the label. Have the t-shirts and pre-cut shapes ready close by for the activity. Start the activity by demonstrating how to write their name on the label, then emphasis that they should carefully choose the pre-cut shapes and experiment with the design layout they want on the t-shirt. Suggest possible layouts to give them some ideas. Explain that once they are happy with their designs, only then do they remove the backing from the double sided sticky tape and stick into place. Explain that the fabric shapes will be sewn after the party and that they will get them back in a couple of days. Start activity. When finished pile one t-shirt on top of the other and put in safe place.

After the party: De-stress and have a cup of tea! The next day iron on the designs with hot steamy iron. Using the satin stitch option on your sewing machine applique each fabric patch to the t-shirt. Clip loose threads inside and out. Pop finished singlet into a small paper bag, I found some gorgeous brightly coloured bags in a local craft shop. Write a thank you label and get party girl or boy to sign (my daughter did hers at the breakfast table before school) stick label to bag, give to child!

Special notes: This activity does not take the children long to do, but works really well and replaces the need for fancy party bags to take home because the t-shirt/singlet is 'the gift'. I stuck a signed 'thank you for my present' label on the bag when I delivered the singlets to my daughters friends in the school play ground a couple of days later and they were all absolutely delighted.