Tuesday, November 20, 2007

cute buttons and things

I went to spotlight last week and couldn't resist these cat themed buttons. They would look great on a bag - not all on the same bag though :)

This first button says 'Queen of the Jungle' underneath the kitty. It's a bit blurry because my camera wouldn't zoom in properly on the small button.

I love the colours and designs of these buttons:

I saw this felt for 50c and thought that it would be great for applique.
The hanger is for a christmas card holder I'm making. I just noticed that the wire hanger cat shape looks a bit weird. I wonder what the bump under the cat's face is supposed to be? It's chin? Stump from a missing leg?

Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Ooooh, Pleated Beauty is complete!

I finished sewing the bag together last night. I was like a kid at Christmas when I finally got to turn the bag inside out to see what it finally looked like. I'm really happy with the way it turned out. The pattern & instructions for the Pleated bag were from Amy Karol's Bend-The-Rules Sewing book.

No show without punch of course. Milly had to climb in and investigate.

Sunday, November 11, 2007

What is it going to be??

I started making this yesterday. I'm really happy with the way the cat stitching turned out. The butterflies were raw edge appliqued from some pretty material I had in my stash. I roughly cut around the butterfly and then ironed some double-sided interfacing onto the back. Then I carefully cut around the butterfly, peeled off the interface backing paper and ironed it onto my material. I then used a beige metrosene thread and made made tiny stitches all the way around so that it doesn't fray too much. I used a gold metallic thread and backstitched the butterfly antennas. I'm still halfway through making this project so I will keep you posted - literally!

I made this xmas tree skirt on Saturday. It was really easy. I didn't have any major problems at all. When I was trying to sew a decorative stitch on the fleece, my needle kept jamming. I just left it as straight stitch. I need to get a 'blue tip' needle - so my sewing machine manual says.
Anyway, other than that it was super easy. The snowmen and holly were mostly glued together which was really quick. My tips: Don't put too much glue on the back of the fabric as it can seep through to the front. The glue says it dries clear but you can still see it on felt.
The fabrics I used are really nice and soft. The cats thought that it was awesome and everytime I turned around one (or both!) would sneak in and curl up on it.

Monday, November 5, 2007

Felt Bunnies

I got the pattern for these bunnies from 'The Cute Book'. They are really easy to make. The instructions say to hand sew it all together but I machine stitched mine. The larger one was going to be for a toddler so I wanted it to be strong.

I photocopied the patterns from the book and then enlarged it by 200% for the small bunnies. For the larger bunny I just free-handed it bigger when I cut the pieces out. I stuck the pattern pieces onto cardboard and then cut them all out. That way I can re-use them.
Tip: I save bits of cardboard from packaging, boxes etc and put them in my sewing room to re-use for making templates.

I traced the pattern pieces on to felt and cut them out. The instructions say to glue the legs, arms and ears to the dress & head but I just pinned them. I used the small buttonhole stitch on my machine to stitch around the dress and head leaving an opening for stuffing. Then I stuffed the two pieces and buttonhole stitched the openings closed. The stuffing makes it a little difficult on the machine but if you stretch the opening out, pin it and hold it stretched while you sew the ends meet up. For the small bunnies I just sewed the head to the front of the dress. But I didn't like the look from the back.

For the larger bunny I cut the dress slightly longer at the top and slipped it into the head opening. Then I sewed it together. The head is a little floppy though so I sewed a couple of hearts onto the neck and that stabilised it a little better.

The felt I used was just cheap craft felt. I think proper felted wool would be a lot nicer, fluffier and softer if you are making them as toys. I'm going to get some real wool felt and see how that turns out. I'll have to enlarge the pattern again though as they are still too small.

Here they are ...

Tuesday, October 30, 2007

Ready for my new home

Here is the completed Lil Lucky Duck quilt ready to go to its new home.

And here's what the back looks like:

Ta-Da! Finished

It took me a couple of hours or more to snip all of the raw seams at 1/4" intervals. It was worth it though because the seams came out nice and fluffy after being washed & dried.

Label Binding

To make up for my short binding I created extra binding out of some leftover white flannel from the side of the duck panel. I attached the binding so that it was the length & width of the corner square. I then made up some labels and reverse printed them onto transfer paper. I ironed them onto the binding and viola, disaster averted. The side label says "Lil Lucky Duck" with pictures of ducks in the background.

I was a bit worried that the labels would come off in the washing machine but you can see below that they survived the washer & dryer!

Ran out of binding!

I was sewing my binding on and realised I was short about 2-3 inches! I went to my local sewing shops but no-one had any flannel that matched. Arrrrgh!!

Sewing the strips to the panel

The strips were sewn together in pairs, with the raw seams to the front, and then the shorter strips were pinned and sewn to the top of the duck panel. To reduce bulky seams I pinned the seams, of each square, in opposite directions. This also makes it easier to align the rows. When I sewed the side strips on I found that they were too long. If I sewed them on as they were then the squares wouldn't line up with the top rows of squares. So, I pinned the squares to match the top strip's squares and then along the sides of the panel I pinned the extra material over at the seams as I sewed. It was a little bit puckered along the seams but I just eased them along so they were less noticeable.

Silly Kitty

The cats quite like trying to sleep on the quilt. Even trying to sleep on the unsewn squares. Here's Milly being busted and shooed away from the strips.

Starting to get it together

I sewed all of the squares in strips. There are two strips of 7 squares for the top of the duck panel and 2 strips of 8 squares for the sides of the panel.

Monday, October 29, 2007

Lucky Duck Panel

This is the lucky duck panel being prepared for quilting.

Each layer (backing fabric, wadding and then front panel) was masking taped down to my sewing table to hold it tight while I basted the layers together. I also put in some safety pins in the middle of each square to hold them still while I machine quilted the panel. I was quite happy with the quilting. I went around the duck and made a template of the star shape and quilted that on the opposite side and also on the duck's tummy. I quilted crosses in each square and traced around the borders and the 'BABY' wording.

Take a cutting ...

Here's the stack of materials cut meticulously into 120 x 6 1/4" squares of flannel material and 60 x 5 3/4" squares of batting.

Lil Lucky Duck

A friend asked if I would make a baby quilt to give to one of their friends who is due in Nov (07). It took me ages to decide on what to make. There are just too many options out there. I ended up finding an adorable quilt kit called Lil Lucky Duck. I found it when JenaVeve & I went to a craft show in Melbourne, VIC. It is a raggy, flannel quilt. The next few posts will be the making of the duck quilt. I used to go to patchwork group every Saturday morning. My teacher is an awesome quilter and has won many awards. Anyway, she said that I should always name my quilts. So I took her advice, literally, and this quilt is called "Hector".

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