Placemats and Napkins

I have wanted to do something for the special people in my life so I'm slowly making my way through a list in no particular order. Currently I've been working on some placemats and napkins for my one of my best friends. It's a surprise so don't tell her! :) I finished up a 4 placemat set and decided to use the extra left over fabric to make some napkins of various sizes. Here are a few pics:


Front


Back


Placemats wrapped up with the various napkin sizes.

Updated Craft/Sewing Room Storage and Table

Hand stitched Stuffed Animal

I took 3 hours with a group of 6 women on August 17th and began working on a hand sewn stuffed dinosaur. I really love the way he turned out and the pics are below. So, looks like 6 days for me to finish this one. It was super cute and quite is quite challenging yet amazing.

Table Runner Project

So I finally finished my table runner project and it's fabulous! It looks so wonderful on my kitchen table. I'm very excited now too because I plan to make some matching placemats as well as some matching quilted coasters. I'm in love with sewing and quilting. :)

Finished the Ladybug Crib Quilt!

I'm so very excited about having this one finished. I absolutely love it!! I know it is so far from perfect, but to me, it is so amazing. I am going to start on my next project soon and know it will be even better with everything I've learned and am finding.

Working on binding

Ladybug Crib Quilt (quilting process)

Finally picked up a walking foot over Memorial Day weekend and put it on Saturday night. It worked like a charm for the 20 minutes that I sewed on the ladybug quilt. I left the machine for the evening and picked it back up Sunday afternoon. I had such a hard time getting the machine to work. Every time I had the walking foot (or even feed foot) on, the machine would lock up. If I removed it and put on the regular sewing foot, it worked just great. Finally figured it out and went about sewing.

During the day, I broke 2 needles because the foot became detached, but in the end, I finished quilting the sandwich together. Now all that remains is the binding...I think I'm falling in love with this one more and more. I am hoping that I don't ruin it with the binding.. that part is terrifying me. Not only the process, but the actual fabric... I guess that'll be a post for another day.

Ladybug Crib Quilt top

A lesson in Appliqué

I can honestly say that I have no idea how to do or know what to do with Applique. I did a little bit of research and then a little practice and then set loose on the ladybugs. It was really interesting, hard and boy do I still need to work more at it. Even though they are not perfect, I'm very happy with how the finished product turned out. I still need to add the antennae - which I haven't decided what colors those will be yet. So any ideas??

New little person quilt

I decided on the pattern for the new little person quilt. It's based on a pattern found in a Fons and Porter Summer 2010 Magazine & am using the Kitty Komono Pattern. I'm removing the Pinwheels & going to appliqué Lady Bugs instead on all the big pink squares in the center. I have more fabric triangles to add to the center and rectangles around the edges in addition to the Lady Bugs. I'm super excited about this one. :)

This is the blanket I'm making with fabric found from the New creations post a few days ago. Additionally, I purchased 2 more fabrics from the Nursery Fabric Ladybugs theme for the backing and binding. I'm super dooper excited about this one. I will add pics of the fabric I have cut and laid out as of now when my camera battery is charged.




Here is a black and white of the original from the magazine.

A little birdy reminded me..

that I have a blog here and that I haven't posted in a while. I have been super busy the last 15 months with a new job and many other things that have been happening.

One of the many things that have kept me busy is that I have been trying to keep up with learning my sewing machine and making things, so I have set up a craft style room in one of our available bedrooms. I have been recently making baby burp cloths and trying to create my first quilt. I have pieced together the top and it's around the size of a queen sized bed, but I'm terrified of ruining it during the quilting process. I recently decided that I will create a miniature quilt like the one that I will be working with so that I can practice on it before I make it to the main first one. :) It's been wonderfully exciting and very fulfilling since I've begun doing this.

I'm going to try to keep this one updated with my crafty projects because I'm very happy with all the hard work that I've put into them.

Pattern Creation

Ok, so what I did for this project is design "the look" of the bag on paper first. Now, this can change through the process of pattern creation.. but next I went on to creating and then cutting out the pattern. The first attempt at creating the pattern that I wanted yielded a minor error.. it was WAY too small! So, I went back and started over. I used printer paper and drew the pattern that I wanted and then cut it out. Where the one piece of paper was too small, I used scotch tape and put two sheets of paper together to get the size pattern that I wanted to create.. the following pictures will show the pattern that I cut out and used to cut the fabric.

Haha ok the following photos will show the fabric, design and the look of the tote/purse.




I absolutely love this photo because well, the bag body kind of reminds me of women's granny panties. :giggle: But don't despair, the bag body is much better than this..









Here's the rest of the outside of the bag body.
What I am doing with the inside liner is making a somewhat opposite version of this one. The curved edges will be brown, the V section will be the white with the stars and the middle edge (not yet shown) will be the striped pattern.







The handles will be brown on the outside with the stripes on the inside.













This last photo shows the pieces that will go on the outside/inside sides of the purse to make it a little more broad.








Well, so far this is as far as I have gotten. I need to go to the craft score and pick up some D rings and figure out how they will fit into it all since they'll be part of the handles as well as pick up some fusible heavy interfacing to make the bag a little more heavy duty. Additionally, will I make this bag a zippered bag or create a flap to "close" the bag from outsiders.. decisions decisions.

Sewing

I am so lucky to have a neighbor who can sew. She came over on Friday to look at my ancient sewing machine and showed me several things I had no idea about. It really does help to have a manual, but unfortunate for me --that the manual was lost and not included with the machines gifting to me.

However, I finished my first tote bag/purse and have used it since Nov 1. I am planning out my second as we speak because I really REALLY want this one to be more along the lines of a different image I have in my head. I am currently avoiding this bag that I love

and would love to have the pattern for and a similar material, but instead, I'm going to be trying my hand at creating my own pattern. While this is going to be much harder on me, I think I'll be able to achieve as long as I take my time and plan everything IN WRITING! LOL Wish me luck!