A little reprieve

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I've been going, going, going with all the crafting lately, and I had to take a break. So I put away the sewing machine to make room for a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle. I haven't done a puzzle in forever because I had a cat for a very long time. You just can't have something like that laying around with a cat. This puzzle was harder than I thought it would be, but I finally finished it the other day.

I have been doing a little crafting since my last post, which I'll show off shortly. I'm sporadic about posting mostly because I don't download the pictures from my camera often enough! But I've got a cute watermelon table runner to show off, and I'm working on refashioning a t-shirt of mine into a dress for Paige. Not sure if that will turn out or not. And after that? Believe it or not, I've got plans to make a couple more of the Sophia Carry All bags! My very good friend wants one just like the one I've already made, and I picked up some cute fabric the other day to make another as a gift.

Sorry for a picture-less post!

Craft carnival going on now!

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Craft Critique is a blog I just discovered recently, and I already have it in my feed reader! They have a spring craft carnival going on now, and I was included in the blog roll for the top I made my daughter. How cool is that? Head on over to check it out!

Button, button, who's got the button?

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I've got the button! I saw a rainbow colored cha-cha bracelet in a j. crew catalog and I was inspired to make a piece of rainbow jewelry. I used a chain, jump rings and toggle clasp, all from Michaels. The buttons are mine. I have a little hand-crank drill that I used to make holes in the larger buttons. Open up the jump rings, add a button and hook it onto the chain. For the clasp, all you need to do is open up your end links and attach the clasp to the end.

Remember that sneak peek I gave you?

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Ta da! I think it turned out really cute!
The pattern doesn't call for the lining fabric to be used for the handle or the piping on the outside, but I think it looks better this way. Striped fabric on the bias (for the piping) is adorable! I kind of wish I'd done the handles on the bias, too. I think this fabric pattern fits the style of the bag really well.


The bag is a great size... big, but not TOO big. There were definitely things I would do differently next time. Check out my review on patternreview.com for the minutia.

So, do you want one? They still have a ton of this fabric available on clearance!

My cute kid

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I made a top for Paige from Butterick pattern #5020. I put up a review of it on Patternreview.com. I had a lot to say, so rather than repeat it here, please just check out the review. Regardless of how the project went, it turned out pretty cute, no?

The bodice is a bit too big, but I made it in size 3 since she's already 2 1/2 years old. Hopefully she'll grow into it before the cold weather returns in the fall!

Where did I get the fabric, you ask? My fairy godmother, of course!

A piece of my heart

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The very first thing I made with the fabric my friend's mom gave me? A gift for her, of course!This is called the "schlep bag", based on a pattern from my local quilt shop. Normally the four patch you see is just one piece of fabric, but I used some of those precious scraps that had been given to me. They were already cut into 5" squares, but the bag calls for 8" squares, so I had to sew them together first. There are still enough left over to make another bag if I wanted! I hope she likes it!

How much is too much?

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My best friend's mom is a quilter. She's in the process of getting her home ready to sell, and decided to destash. I was the very fortunate recipient of 10 GARBAGE BAGS FULL of fabric!! Here's what it looked like after I had gone through every bag and folded everything neatly:
You can't tell from this picture, but there is a little more fabric behind the stacks you see here. The plastic grocery bag on top of the stack is full of precut bundles. There are TWO jelly rolls, at least one charm pack and a bundle of fat quarters in there! The paper grocery bag over there to the side? That contains fabric that she had already cut for a project, and in some cases had begun to piece together. I did cull quite a bit of that kind of thing out, but these were gems that I wanted to find a way to use.

Here's what it looks like laid out on my kitchen table, all coordinated by color:
I'm still pinching myself! I did thin out a little bit of the stash she gave me. It ended up filling two garbage bags. That stuff was mostly very small scraps. As you can see from the pictures, there was a LOT of decent yardage in this, in some cases more than enough to make a quilt back for a lap to queen sized quilt. Don't worry, I'm not going to throw away what I didn't keep. Some of it will go to a friend whose son loves tractors (John Deere fabric just isn't my thing), and the rest will go to Project Linus.

My cup runneth over!

A sneak peek!!

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Here's what I'm up to next:

This is the Sophia Carry All bag from Amy Butler. However, those are NOT Amy Butler fabrics this time! Hancock fabric was having a great sale on decorator remnants, with 50% off the already discounted price. I got these two coordinating prints for $6 a yard, and since they're decorator fabrics, they're 54" instead of 44", which means you buy less. Score!

It's coming together very fast, much faster than the Field Bag I made earlier. Using a decorator fabric means there's less interfacing to work with. I'm at a little bit of an impasse right now. I followed the instructions, but there's part of the bag that didn't come together as well as I would have liked, so I'm going to hand sew a little bit to correct the issue before going on to the next step. I should have a finished bag to share with you soon!

Grab Bag

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I've gone and made another handbag. Check it out:
This one is also from a free pattern, available here. Be careful, because part of the pattern instructions is dependent on viewing it in color. I ended up ripping out a bunch of unnecessary stitches because I printed the instructions in black and white. The stitches on the diagram are actually both black and RED, and I was only supposed to sew the red stitches indicated. Because all of the stitches on my print out were black, I sewed all of them. Oops!

It's a very cute bag, though not very secure. You close it like this:

Fun for a casual evening out, but probably not very good for an every day bag. If you want it, it's for sale in my Etsy shop!

D is for Dear Friend

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I made this recently:


It's the smaller version of the portfolio I made earlier. Both patterns are available in the same download. I made this one to give to a friend whose last name begins with D. Not sure what she'll use it for, maybe grocery coupons or something like that. It has two small pockets on the inside. Guess who designed the fabric?

I didn't use the Cricut to make the applique this time. I've come to the conclusion that it's too much of a pain to put the actual fabric through the machine. Instead, I cut out whatever shape I want out of nice, thick card stock and use it as a template. Old school (sort of), but much easier in the end. Plus, it means I can use whatever shapes I want since it will work with both cartridges AND Sure Cuts a Lot, the software that I bought to use with the Cricut. I found that I couldn't cut fabric using Sure Cuts a Lot, since the software specifies the speed setting on the Cricut for cutting, and it wasn't slow enough. I'll write more about Sure Cuts a Lot someday.