More Fabulous Fabric!!

Another package arrived today, this one from Texas, USA with more beautiful fabric for me to drool over. http://www.etsy.com/shop/cherrylanetextiles All Riley Blake, it's a combination from different ranges and I just love them all. Can't wait to use them for something, I have some already earmarked for a patchwork buggy blanket.

Funky boys' bunting: the finished item!

The bunting is finished, hooray! I'm glad I left it till tonight to do, as soon as I looked at it with fresh eyes I realised it needed another solid, dark coloured triangle to balance it and the spacing was a little too wide. I was able to remedy that pretty quickly and a little careful sewing later, it was done. I love the combination of colours and patterns so much I'm tempted to do one for D's room; he would love the Wheels fabric and the hedgehogs too. So here's hoping the recipient loves it as much as I do!

Funky boys bunting

Tonight I got started on some bunting which my sister asked me to make for a friend's little boy. I have been planning the combination of fabric with great anticipation for days but when it was time to start actually cutting it I almost didn't want to, it's so lovely!!! But I did and soon ended up with a lovely pile of triangles:






I got the machine out but quickly ran into problems which resulted in a frustrating half hour sorting out a problem with the tension :-( But happily I eventually got going and it was all plain sailing from there.






I had it all pinned to the tape ready to sew up but decided at the last minute to wait until I have a fresh pair of eyes tomorrow before deciding finally on the spacing and combination! Can't wait till tomorrow evening :-)

Happy fabric day :-)

Most of my fabric arrived today from the wonderful FabricShoppe on Etsy: www.etsy.com/shop/fabricshoppe . Less than a week to come from America, I was delighted! I got a combination of fabrics: fat quarter bundles from some ranges - Wheels by Riley Blake, Hedgehog by Michael Miller and Freebird by MoMo for Moda plus a few individual fat quaters. Lots in boys colours and patterns which I was running low on. They are even more gorgeous than they looked on screen. I already have the fabrics picked for the bunting I need to make!!

Loveys all around

I couldn't wait any longer to make something with the gorgeous minky so I got out my things last night and put together a brand new fish comforter yesterday evening. It is bright blue fleece, backed with baby blue minky, and has a fish applique in a contrasting fleece. I used some heavy cotton spotty fabric to applique the fins, tail and eye, and some thin blue ric rac for a wavy affect. Some soft blue fleece bubbles and lots of ribbon around the edges finished it off. There are lots of interesting contrasting textures for a baby's little fingers, not to mention bright colours.





It joins the 2 star loveys I made as baby presents, entirely of fleece and embroidered on the back with baby's name. I love making these, they are so soft and tactile and it's fun picking ribbon and deciding where to place it. Every single ribbon is different with a mixture of colours, widths, lengths and textures for greater exploration by little fingers!

Getting Knitty

Today was a wall-papering day! Myself and T blithely sailed into uncharted territories when we broke open the pack of wallpaper paste and the (still hideously expensive even though they were in the sale) Laura Ashley Kimono wallpaper in a beautiful duck egg blue. It all looked so simple in the YouTube videos. 5 hours later it wasn't so pretty in our house! But it is done and it looks gorgeous.

So, taking all that into account I didn't get any sewing done today. I did wash fabric to prep it and I wound up my busy day with a little knitting. I'm doing a cardi for myself to a lovely pattern I got in a magazine last month. I'm using my bamboo needles for the first time and loving them. Plus the yarn is gorgeous - it's a King Cole bamboo cotton mix and is soooooo soft. I'm knitting it in a grape purple and am very excited to see how it will turn out!



Nearly finished F's tunic too, juast need to hem and put on trimmings. Fingers crossed by tomorrow I will be done with tunics. I promised D I would sew him a new fleece monster tomorrow so that will have to take 1st priority :-)

Sew Cute!

Despite the fact that a distracted driver ran into the back of my car this morning, I managed to soldier on with a little tlc from my lovely hubbie and lots of sympathy at work. The fact that no major damage was done to me or the car helped too :-) I was afraid to sit over the machine for too long this evening though, as my back was quite stiff from the jolt, so limited myself to finishing off E's tunic. I love the finished result. The fabric is really fresh and clean looking and the blue and green combination is a nice change for my little pink girlie! This tunic was inspired by an Emma Hardy pattern in her book "Making Children's Clothes". But I had to take her basic idea and adjust it quite a bit to size it up, and I changed the trimmings too. I found fab trimming in Vibes & Scribes on Sunday in teal and I think it works really well. I gathered up the trimming to make a little rosette, and found a button in exactly the right green in my button box to finish it off. The button was one I cut off a little cardi E wore last year. In fact, my best source of cute kids buttons is old, worn out clothes - I cut all the buttons off and then recycle them!

This tunic is great for a pre-schooler. It fulfills my daughter's absolute need to wear something pretty and girlie (read: wear dresses at all costs!) and my need to dress her in jeans, long sleeve t-shirts and other dark, practical clothing as opposed to light coloured, impossible to keep clean and quick-to-bobble tights. I usually slip these tunics over jeans and a top and it is both funky and pretty.

I didn't manage to get F and N's tunics started though. Eeek! I'll have to figure something out!

Supersoft me!

So, the Minky fabric arrived today and it is gorgeous. So, so soft, it would be perfect for baby blankets or one side of a lovey. I got 4 gorgeous soft colours, baby blue & pink, and sage green & lavender. My friend at work said that she would love a pillow made from it! If I had one, I don't think I'd ever get out of bed again.

The thinking hat is well and truly on now and I'm planning my buggy blanket. The real question is whether to use fat quarters I already have for the buggy blanket, or wait till some of my new fabric comes from America. I'm really excited about some of the Riley Blake Summer Song prints that are winging their way over but I also have lots of Amy Butler, Joel Dewberry and Tanya Whelan prints which would be fab for it. Decisions decisions!

Cutting Edges

Its been a very productive evening in my kitchen! With my lovely hubbie occupied watching Man Utd's first game in the new Premiership season, and the kiddies in bed early, I was able to tackle into cutting my fabric for 4 projects I'm working on. I'm waiting (very impatiently) for some fabulous fabric to arrive from America for baby gifts and in the meantime I'm making tunic dresses - 1 for my little girl E (the blue flowery fabric), and one each for my friend's two girls F and N for their birthdays. Plus a tote bag for myself as a little treat in beautiful Cath Kidston striped fabric with baby pink and white bubble cotton to line it. I changed my mind at the last minute about which fabric to use for N's dress and decided to use a cute red cotton instead of the blue-based ladybird print I have. This meant I ended up struggling a bit to make the pink lining go far enough for 2 dresses but with a bit of creative laying out of the patterns I just about managed to do it. So I'm all ready to get sewing. The tunics are super easy to sew up and I will hopefully get some of them done tomorrow evening, considering we are going to visit my friend for N's birthday party at the weekend! I usually make the drawstring ties for the neckline from the dress fabric, but found some lovely ribbon in Vibes & Scribes on Sunday so I'm looking forward to see how that looks instead.

Meanwhile I'll keep a watchful eye out the window at work for the postman in the morning and hope that my minky arrives! I have 3 baby presents to make in the next week - I want to try the minky in the ribbon lovey blankets and see how that works compared to fleece which I usually use. As soon as the rest of the cotton comes I'll be starting some bunting for a boy's room, and I am trying to pick fabrics to do a buggy blanket - patchwork squares on one side and minky on the other. But now its time for bed considering that its a work night!