Sunday Fabric Finds

I am always in the market for fabric and here are some I have my eye on

Ruby Star Rising fabric

Glasses in pink

Foxy - 'Anika' collection by Monoluna

sausage dogs say hello to you 

Jumping rabbits

Are these not the cutest pictures ever. Definitely something to make you smile.

Click here to read the full story.

What I got up to this evening

I should have been making bags but instead I was doing this. It was procrastination but at least it was sewing.

I was blog hopping this morning and ended up on doe-c-doe's blog, where I found a site brimming with lovely free embroidery patterns. I have been looking to use my embroidery hoop for ages so I ended up picking mushrooms. Now I have always been up front about the fact that my hand sewing leaves a lot to be desired but I have been making an effort to improve it.

I did sit and ponder how I was going to transfer the images to the fabric. I searched the interweb and read about several different methods. I decided to go back to basics.

My first attempt was rubbish, it took me a while to get my eye in and decide on stitches.

My second attempt was altogether more successful. I decided to to use different colours and my French knots improved considerably.

I feel a few more projects looming, oh yes that's right I'm supposed to be working....

A day trip to dublin

A rare day of for my OH was celebrated by a trip to Dublin, not entirely surprisingly I came home with new fabric. He is a tolerant man. A few pictures of some of my purchases.

The pink wool hasn't photographed well but I am looking forward to working with it. Now I really must get my nose to the grind stone and start my Christmas prep, I'm a week behind already. I love Christmas in July :o(

Card Holder

A handy little card holder which can be made from 2 halves of a layer cake square (5' by 10'). This project is very straight forward. I was a little enthusiastic about the seams but next time I will make them much closer to the edge, to leave a little more space inside

Full instructions can be found on the Moda Bake Shop

Messenger Bag

Sometimes you need to create just for the sake of it. i'm in that space at the minute, I'm looking for challenges and fun things to sew. I look at every project as an opportunity to learn new skills or at the very least to improve some existing ones.

During the week I stumbled across a tutorial for a messenger bag by Diary of a Quilter, I liked the fact that is wasn't going to take ages so I set to work. I picked some bright fabrics from my Ikea stash and I was pretty pleased with the result.

I think I would make the strap a little narrower and shorter if I was making another one. 

I popped a little pocket inside and I think I would make it wider the next time.

The tutorial made me think I could change my methods for making totes, by sewing in the linings in a similar manner. Everyday is a school day.

The folding shopping bag

At the minute I am trying to develop some new lines specifically aimed at craft fairs. Given the current economic climate people are being more careful with their money and are less likely to "treat" them selves to a clutch mid year. With this in mind I have been looking at some ideas to have practical items that are sellable at a competitive price point. I already have a range of totes for shopping but I thought maybe it I could change the bag so that it would fold into a pouch, it may make it more desirable.

I reworked my normal production method for shoppers and after much studying other bags of this nature, decided how I could get it to fold.I, also, decided to not line the bag as this would add extra bulk to the folding and drive the price for the buyer up.

The irony of the design rework is that I actually thing I made it trickier to sew by making the bag simpler, but there is room for changes there.

The results are still open for debate: I thing it looks..... not in keeping with the type of products I produce. Other opinions vary from it's ok to there is nothing wrong with it, and I think there in lies the problem (probably a common one among crafters who sell). Being ok is not good enough, well certainly not for me. I am fussy about what I sell because as a consumer I am fussy about what I buy. I often stand at craft fairs and watch people buy things that haven't always been made with the highest level of care, but at a price they are happy with. Whilst I, like the next person, likes a bargain, I don't like it at the cost of quality.

So this brings me back to the discussion I have with my OH at many of these craft fairs - I am here just to make money or am I here to showcase what I do and hopefully make some money at it. I feel currently I stand at the latter, but realistically I need to be more it the middle. I know I need to make products that have more all year appeal, at a competitive price, but this bag has a way to go before it gets a look I am happy with.

5 things I have learnt about making a quilt

The whole point of this exercise has been to have a look at what may cause problems and have a practice before I start working with loads of expensive fabric.

1. Make sure your squares are cut accurately. Mine were not, I didn't square them off (lazy) and a few were a little out, this actually had an impact on my quilting, making it look out.

2. Don't take your pins out until you have run some quilting stitches over every block, or you will end up with a pucker.

3. Cutting binding stripes is more difficult than it looks, getting them a uniform width is tricky, and really noticeable when you connect the stripes together. It's also a problem when you sew them on as they don't sit well at the back of the quilt.

4. Leave a bigger tail of binding to connect together. It's tricky when there is just enough space to sew and nothing more.

5. I will not be able to produce a big quilt at my usual sewing station. I will need room, lots of room.

My mother was very bemused by this project. She kept asking what was I going to use this tiny quilt for and didn't get that it was just a little test to see where some of the pitfalls lay. I am still a way off piecing my quilt together but I am ready to start something new and see if I can iron some of the problems I encountered out and to see what new ones I can discover.

Test quilt - day 2

So today was binding day. I followed the fantastic binding tutorial on crazy mom quilts. It was well written and the instructions were very clear.

I decided to pick another inexpensive Ikea fabric for the binding. There were a few strips cut before I got some uniform widths.

Understanding how to stitch the bind on was relatively straight forward, actually stitching the binding on for the first time was quite challenging. The corners were really a mental challenge, which took time to get to grips with. I found even more respect for all those ladies who do this all by hand.

The finished product was highly satisfying to look at. This was my first attempt at making a quilt and I really enjoyed the challenge of working on something new.

This project  has been a steep learning curve with regard to making patchwork and turning it into a quilt. It has left me feeling more inspired to create.

A new project - test quilt- day 1

I have been toying with the idea of tackling a little patchwork for a while. So when my search for a new throw for our bed was unsatisfactory I decided, and even said it out loud to my OH, that I was going to make a quilted throw.


Now not for nothing have I admired these fabulous creations from afar, they look hard and I reckon I need a whole new skill set to follow one through to completion. After much procrastination I found myself in front of my sewing machine last night with a little time on my hands. I decided a test run was in order.

I have been accumulating a nice collection of pre-cuts but I didn't want to do my first test run with them, so I hunted around for a some pretty Japanese scraps I had bought ages ago. They were all cut to 5' squares so I pieced them together. I discovered a little too late that they weren't all exactly the same size, but they were quite close. I selected a piece of Ikea material for the backing, that I had picked up free from a resource outlet. It had at one stage been a sofa cover but I hacked it into chunks of material for practice projects and dug around until I found a piece of wadding I had picked up at some time (probably from the reduced bin in Dunelm Mill). So I was ready to go.

I sewed  9 pieces together and pinned the backing & wadding and then ran up some quilting lines.

My finished 9 squares

A close up on my quilting

The backing

To this point I have spent an hour and am pretty pleased with the outcome so far. I am looking at this as a learning experience. Tomorrow the binding.....

Hello......

Hello is there anyone still out there? Probably not, but none the less I will continue. Over on melly and me there was a post about "slack blogger of the year", I'd definitely be in the running. It's been a case of been sick, been busy, been sick again, but I'm off for the summer hols and starting to feel at, least normal for me if not actually, like a normal human.

Part of me blames my ipad, not really designed with blogging in mind, but rarely out of my hand.

I have been reading blogs and generally having a long think about all things creative. I have definite plans for the summer, which I will share with you as they progress. In the mean time I will leave you with this fab set of patchwork cushions from Red Pepper Quilts in Knitknats shop over on etsy, for some eye candy.

 Delightful.

ps I did start this post on the ipad and then discovered I couldn't add links or insert pictures, so I had to go back to keys, how old-fashioned and traditional :o)