Preview of upcoming tutorials

I will be home from my Most Excellent Holiday next week, and back to the grind as they say...... When I am, I have some new tutorials I plan to get ready for you all. Here is the preview:

Ever heard of pillowcase dresses? They are exactly as they sound- made from pillow cases! You may recall that I picked up a bunch of vintage ones this spring for only 29 cents a piece. I will show you how I transformed 2 of them into sweet dressed for my girls, in 2 different styles, for under $2 each!

I have also been on a roll with bags. I will have a cute tote tutorial ready for you as well, using bias tape for the edging.

See you next week!

Next up......

All cut up and ready to start on a Nicey Jane New Wave quilt top! And this one, I think, will be for little old ME :-)

The Twin Quilt Saga, continued

Are you sick of hearing about these yet? Have I mentioned I have OCD?

Well, it was bugging me that the 2 quilt tops were not exactly to my liking. So to spare you the details, I decided to make one more. And here she is:

As you may recall, my original plan was to do a Chain Reaction style one, but the shapes of the cars would not work in the square shape to the measurements I needed. But my brain was kind of stubbornly stuck on this concept. So I decided to modify it to make it more rectangular, and run vertically instead of horizontally.
In the end, I think I am satisfied, and I think these two will hang nicely together on the wall.

But just in case it is actually TRIPLETS, I am ready, right? :-)I promise, this is that last you will hear of these until the babes are born and the quilts are bound and finished!

Pot holders

Made me some of those quilted pot holders I have been seeing everywhere, out of a bunch of my wee scraps and some natural cotton:
Nothing fancy, but I am a sucker for the simple look of a strip of patchwork against linen or cotton, aren't you?

I was thinking that pot holders are the perfect "tutorial" for quilt making- it involves a bit of design, piecing, quilting, binding. I think this would be a quick and cool way to introduce non-quilters to the craft, with a quick outcome. Maybe I should see who else of my friends I can get addicted......

Quick fix- patching up my man's jeans

So, we get to the cottage and my hubby presents me with a big bag FULL of jeans that look like this: Don't ask me what he does to get them like this!! Anyways, he asks if I can do something to fix them. For my kids, I would put some funky fabrics over the holes, but he is looking for something a little less flashy. But my options are few, as I have not been forewarned and don't have much at my disposal. I think of sacrificing one of the many pairs to patch the rest, but they are all different shades and colors so I don't think it will work. So then I come up with the idea of taking jean material from inside the back pockets.

So, I cut it out and then sewed around the pocket to close it off. Sometimes I used contrasting thread to give it a little interest.

The color is slightly darker here than the rest of the jean, but it even looks good flipped backwards:

However, the amount of material is limited. But in the end, the hubby was happy with the results. His comment: "These even look kind of stylish!" I don't know if I would go that far, but they are good enough for slumming it around the cottage :-)

Don't drink and sew

I have been chilling at the cottage, and enjoying my fair share of this:

Late one such night, I had the brilliant idea to piece together one of the twin quilt tops, the interrupted strip quilt (design here). All large pieces, should come together quickly and easily, right? So off I went. And sure enough, it was a quick job. I went to square up the ends and noticed one side was higher by a good inch of more- no troubles, just went to it with my rotary blade and was already toasting my Awesomeness as I lay it on the ground to admire. Well, even in my current state I could see the problem- one side of the strips was way off compared to the other...thus explaining the excess. But I had already sheared it off- sh@*! Anyways, it had finished up large so I trimmed the entire periphery back and inch, but still have this:

I am sure I will come up with a solution with the binding! Overall, it looks nice.

I also pieced together the corresponding quilt top (revised design here)- this time, completely unimpaired, thank you very much!

And here are the set of them:

Not bad, but I am not as sure of the one on the right...... What do you think? It may be a bit too busy in relation to the first, and as they are meant to be hung on the wall side by side, I may want to change it up a bit. Maybe I will make a third and then decide the best 2 together?

Urges

Look what arrived....

I feel a baby boy strip quilt coming on!