So we were sitting around one Sunday evening and got to thinking “hey, I wonder if we can make a tiny mouse with joints like the bears?” (what else would we be thinking about on a Sunday evening? lol)

We did some planning, and some more thinking and a bit more planning, some trials, and little Joshua Robert was born-

Joshua Robert now lives here on the Moor. (Named by our 3 year old daughter-she comes up the the cutest names!) As soon as I made him I loved him so much! He fit right into the palm of my hand. We were so happy with Joshua Robert that we made a few more! Oh, and I made Joshua Robert my new personal assistant.

All calls will be directed to him.

Meet Maxwell, Fiona! Max and Fi found homes yesterday, as the first of our brand new line of 4 inch, 5 way jointed velveteen mousies.

Fiona Meadowmouse

Maxwell Mousington

I’m serious, these little mice are so nice to hold in hand. I’m so happy with the design. The velveteen makes them so soft,(and a bit furry feeling) and the bit of weight their joints give them feels very much like the weight of a real  mouse.

Our mice are normally 8 inches tall, but these new sweethearts are just a bit over 4 inches.

We’ve been working hard on a set of joints small enough to make our small animals poseable like our larger animals are. We finally came up with a nice, reliable design.

We will be adding these little mice into our regular inventory, and custom orders are always welcome. Visit the Moor often, have your proverbial net handy and catch one for yourself! Be quick though, little mice skitter away  fast!

Here’s how my sewing basket looks on a given day. It pretty much follows me around the house wherever I go. My husband bought the beautiful basket while we were on vacation last year. It’s sturdy and beautiful.

 I keep it covered with a small quilt I made about 12 years ago. That little quilt  is full of memories. I was just learning to sew, and decided I wanted to give quilting a try. I gathered up fabrics from different parts of my life to give the quilt meaning. My oldest two children were so small, so I only worked on it a bit each day. It has imperfections, but overall I was very happy with how it turned out for a first try. It hung on our wall for a while in different rooms, then found a resting place on my sewing basket as you see here. I love that it has found a function and I can enjoy it every day.

Here’s a peek at the everyday craziness inside the basket. Each morning I fill it with whatever I’ll need to work on as well as any tools. As you can see today, there is a little bag full of stuffing with some knitting needles I use for stuffing implements. A smaller bag-lined basket catches threads for me (many, many threads!). 

There are glass jars full of  joint parts, and glass eyes. A beautiful piece of cotton crochet lace peeks just over the rim, just because. I just love this length of cotton crochet-my good friend gave it to me last week. It’s a beautiful antique white color, with such a pleasing vintage look. I can’t bear to use it yet. I need to enjoy it a bit more. Sometimes there’s such beauty in the little things.

 Here is the thread wheel. It’s a favorite tool because it solved a rather irritating problem. I was forever losing my spools in the bottom of the basket. If I had too many down there, the threads would tangle together, which was very frustrating. I stumbled upon  this charming wooden disk at the Thrift store one day with little pegs on it. We added some more nails and now my spools are much happier and much more accessible.

I have a hedgehog pin cushion nosing about among my bits and pieces currently. He’s made of wool and bamboo, and stuffed with wool. I have a few pin cushions that I dearly love, and most of them live near my sewing machine. This little darling is a current resident of the sewing basket, and is just the right size to nestle among the day’s to-do’s and offer me a pin whenever I need one.

Last but not least by far is a beautifully crafted sheepie tape measure a good friend gave me, made by Lantern Moon. I took this picture one evening as it sat on my bedside table. This is often where sheepie sits in the evening while I work. Then she too tucks nicely into my basket. I use her so often. I also have to hide her from my little children because they can’t resist pulling on her tail to see the tape, and press her tummy to see it retract quickly back.

And there’s my needle safe (from yesterday’s blog).  It keeps every needle nicely protected and accessible.

Those are the beautiful things that make my crafting even more fun and enjoyable. I really loved sharing them with you this week.

I  really love my hand sewing basket and the little treasures that are inside. I’d like to share a few pics of my fav’s with you this week that make my hand sewing evenings even more enjoyable.

The first I’d like to share with you  is my needle safe. I often use more than one size needle in a sewing session so I came up with this space saving little roll. I love that my hands don’t get pricked looking for a needle I need, AND  no needles are lost to the abysmal (is that a word?) stuffing of my pincusion!

It closes and secures with a leather loop and pretty celtic knot button.

It unrolls jelly roll style. Inside I added some wool strips to hold the needles. Wool wicks away moisture, and keeps the needles rust free.

Our good Craggy Friend Deanna is guest posting on Chic and Green today! Deanna is such a charming person to talk to. She has great ideas on green living, and today she posted some of her favorite links to handmade soaps,a beautiful blanket, and even added some pics of a few Craggy Moor originals that now live in her home. She also gives a short history on how she got started on her journey to live more naturally.

Deanna has her own blog too:

Musings from my greenish life

  

Both blogs are a wonderful expression of some wonderful green ideas and products out there that you might not know about. We have a passion for natural living too, and really enjoy what we’ve read there so far.

 is another super resource for handmade items all over the world.

They asked if they could add our dear Nutmeg Squirrley! We were very honored to send her on over.  We’ve just started looking at all the beautiful handcrafted items on their site. We love it already, and look foward to visiting often! It would be so neat if Nutmeg found a new home through their audience too!

 

 

A great big thank you to you Deanna, Chic and Green, and 360 Handmade! We are so honored to know you, and be featured.

It was very hot and humid here today. It seems like the whole summer has been that way this year. Today we had a very interesting pop up storm happen in the afternoon, bringing with it a momentary rush of fresh, cool air.

Look at the interesting wall cloud over our house!

We have a great love for cooking here  on the Moor. This weekend we tried something we’ve wanted to do for years! We home-smoked a brisket.

Wow.

There really is no comparison to smoking one’s own brisket at home. We began with a dry rub  of our favorite combination of bbq spices: cracked black and white peppers, a pinch of cayenne and 2 dried ancho chiles. We added a pinch or two of cocoa,freshly ground coffee (ground fine),cinnamon,salt,garlic and onion powders. The peppers added a bright spicyness,the coffee,cocoa and cinnamon added a deep note in the background. The garlic, and onion powders kept the savory aspect to the forefront.

We’ve found that charcoal grilling adds a depth to grilling that we really love in general. A superior charcoal to use if you love charcoal grilling is lump hardwood charcoal. The irregular shapes of this charcoal make it pleasingly rustic, and the varied surface area helps the charcoal to burn better we think.

We also smoked with wood chunks. You can get chips or chunks for smoking. We prefer chunks because they burn hotter and longer. And ohhhh the smell they give off is wonderful.

Back to the brisket:

We trimmed the fat, and applied the dry rub, then got it in the smoker.  Halfway through, we began an occasional wet mop of apple juice,water,honey, brown sugar,whiskey,apple cider vinegar(just a touch to balance the sweetness).

7 hours later we had the BEST, and I mean the BEST brisket we’ve ever had. It had so much flavor that complimented the beef flavor so well-you just cannot get anything like home smoked meat anywhere- sweet,peppery,savory, super tender,just right!

Today for lunch we had smoked brisket quesadillas using our smoked meat perfection and a combination of smoked swiss and mozzerella provolone blend. oh ya.

Then for dinner we pulled out all the stops. We made homemade coleslaw, and cut/fried our own french fries. Hey, you do those things when you have such a wonderfully tasty brisket coming to dinner

Add a little Country Bob’s All Purpose Sauce and it was such a treat!

Home smoking was well worth it, and so worth sharing. Would you like a slice?

I finished a custom order milk chocolate boucle bear today with vanilla velvet paws. She turned out so nicely! “Willow” is 14 inches tall, a fill-up-your-arms size, and perfectly huggable.

I’m getting ready to finish her twin sister today or tomorrow, and then they’ll have matching dresses.

Willow has that irresistible forever-friend look already. I hope our customer loves her as much as I do.

Rabbity guest blogging again! How are you?

I’m sure you’re wondering what we’re up to today. Well, I’ll show you!

We are busy creating a set of mouse and bear siblings for a family. Two bears and two mice are halfway done, so I can’t show you any pics yet, but here are some charming color swatches:

The center is the color of the girl white mice we are working on today. The colors on the outside are some of the accents for ears,paws,clothes.

These boucle’s are the beginings of beautiful bears. The milk chocolate boucle on the right has been cut into two girl bears this week, and one is ready to joint! We can’t wait to show you some more pics-hopefully at the end of the week!

In the meantime, I’m just going to sit right here and watch. It’s important to have a good supervisor you know

One of our customers “Debbie” has a beautiful squirrel pet named Abby. She asked if we could create a grey squirrel to comemmorate the special friend she’s come to love very much.

This is our loving interpretation of dear Abby!

Abby Oakleaf is made of a sweet and soft slate grey cotton velveteen. She’s accented with pretty country plaid cotton. Her eyes are shining black glass beads and her sweet nose and smile are hand embroidered.

Abby has a beautiful real mink fur tail that we wired so it can be gently repositioned.

Abby has internal button joints, so her arms and legs are repositionable.  Her stuffing is weighted a bit to make her feel slightly heavy and “real” feeling when held.

Abby is so adorable, she’s sure to have a happy life in her new home.

Alyssa and Albert just crept onto the Moor this afternoon. Come meet them at our Etsy Store!