Tag Archives: quilting

Current projects

May 24, 2011Bits Of Life, sewingbaby, Baby portraits, Burda, Burda Plus, Burda Plus Spring 2011 Dress 411, clothes, fields, flower print, flowers, gift, Graduation, green, house buying, mojo, pink, purple, quiltingHenrietta

Let me be honest, I’m super unmotivated to create anything lately.

My sewing room is a disaster and I’ve been sewing in the dining room, which is half full of boxes. Blue Hippo Arts is in the process of buying a house, which has been rather arduous for us. Everything feels very up in the air, and that is a difficult place for me to live for very long.

I decided to not take class this summer, so I have a ton of time I could be sewing right now, but I’m not. I feel like its not even worth talking about. So for now, I’m going to give you some pictures and tell you about the stuff that’s on tap to sew soon.

1. Dress for a graduation next weekend

(If you click on the line drawing, it will take you to the downloadable pattern at the Burda website.)

I wish I could find my Burda Plus Spring/Summer 2011 to show you the picture from the magazine. It looks lovely, much lovelier than the line drawing. Alas, I am ALWAYS misplacing my darned Burdas. Oh well. I’m sure it will turn up sooner rather than later.

Its going to be in this lovely fabric:

I’ve also begun a set just for whatever I make out of this issue of Burda. You can see it here.

So far I have altered the pattern, and sewn the muslin for the skirt. The altered muslin for the bodice is cut, partially pinned, and ready to be sewn.

2. Presents for graduation. Ok, I can’t actually talk about these because I hear that at least one of the recipients has read or reads my blog. Sorry. Lame, I know, but here are some of the fabrics I’ll be using.

Hopefully I’ll be back sooner rather than later, with completed projects to show you!

mojo

December 30, 2010Kids, sewingflower print, Fold Over Clutch, Keyka Lou, nephew, quilting, relax, turquoiseHenrietta

I got the Christmas presents done and given. Big successes all around.

I got some bad news about a good friend tonight. I’ve been pretty upset, but my nephew is spending the night and playing video games with my husband, and its very funny. He’s pretty hilarious for a 7 year old.

Rather than sit around bored and sad, I decided to embark on my next sewing project. One of my girlfriends keeps telling me that I need to be sewing over break to be good to myself, and I’m finally doing it.

Its another Keyka Lou pattern, the Fold Over Clutch, sized medium.

Here’s a picture of a sample from her Flickr photostream.

We’ll see how it goes. I’m using a fat quarter I bought from a quilt shop in my hometown, and some fabric I bought last summer to make a sash out of.

Hopefully it will be relaxing.

Goodnight and happy new year.

Little Pretties

November 14, 2010functional sewing, sewingauction, black, bule, cake stand, coffee, green, quilting, white, yellowHenrietta

I talked a couple posts ago about making some coffee cozies as a quick and easy project, and here is my first one!

It was pretty quick considering I didn’t have a pattern and it was the first one I’ve made. I’ve been using it for a week, and have several tweaks for version 2.0 which will then be tested by my coffee guzzling friends.

A note about the cake stand, I got that at an auction for $12! And I love it! Its very pretty and sparkly and old!

Then I made a dish mat to dry our clean dishes on. Basically I pieced fabric together like you would in a quilt, and then sewed it onto an old towel. I made it to fit the countertop on either side of my kitchen sink from a towel that had a giant hole that was burned into it by bleach.

(We walked in and thought it smelled like a pool. Then realized there was a gallon of bleach on its side in the bathroom. Fortunately the towel and a pair of 8 year old pajama pants were the only victims. Yes. I wear a pair of 8 year old pajama pants. Don’t judge.)

It was my first adventure in “quilting” and I gotta say, I have a LOT more respect for quilters now!

This is a small part of it. I’ll take some more pictures on a sunny day. The day I took all these it was rainy and cloudy and gray. Not good for naturally lit photography 🙂

I’ll be doing some mending of a winter coat for a dear friend this week, and putting an edge binding on my dish mat. Lots of heavy duty school work. At the end of every semester I think about how so much work is due in such a small amount of time. I cannot wait for Thanksgiving break!! Have a good week!

Failure!

October 12, 2010functional sewingepic fail, pink, quilting, zippersHenrietta

Well the little ID holder key chain did not turn out as hoped. All was well until it was time to turn it out.

My zipper, a “metal all purpose zipper” that claimed to be “strong, durable, locking slider” was stuck. You assemble the thing with the zipper half open. Apparently with a locking slider zipper, it need to be pretty much open all the way. Even with the slider in the up & able to open position, it wouldn’t budge. And then all of a sudden, it did! And broke 3 or 4 teeth off in the process! Yippeee…

After spending several hours working on this, I was a little bummed. I went ahead and turned it out though, thinking, well there’s probably some way to undo the zipper and swap it out. (I always TRY to be optimistic about my sewing mistakes.)

Then I realized there is just too much bulk in the corners with all that binding. Oh the frustration! Also, I’m not dissing that tutorial at all. This was the first time I’ve done a binding like that and it completely could be my mistake.

After deciding there really isn’t a lot to be salvaged, I decided I would just modify the original design a bit, and make another.
I’m taking some inspiration from Keyka Lou’s pocket clutch pattern.

My first Keyka Lou pocket clutch
(Side note, that is a SUPER fun pattern. I cannot recommend it highly enough. Great directions, complete with pictures, make it a breeze to whip up. I made an enlarged one from the same pattern, and added a wrist strap. Its just a great little clutch to take to a wedding, or graduation, or anything when you don’t need to carry everything but the kitchen sink. The kitchen sink will definitely not fit. )

So I’m off to draw up some pattern pieces for this. The tutorial uses rectangular pieces, so I cut everything with a rotary cutter and straight edge. This is going to be a bit curvier. And without a locking slider zipper. lol. Chalk it up to experience I guess. I learned that I can in fact quilt something, sew in a zipper, and bind something today, so I can’t really complain!