Some fun little finishes

It may not seem like it, as my blogging is a little bit slow at the moment, but I'm actually getting quite a bit of sewing done lately. We're full swing in the summer holidays and the whole family is at home all day every day. Finding time in between the constant demands for food (seriously, how often do children need to eat, because it feels like my older 2 are hungry every hour!) and baby care can be a bit challenging at times, but short bursts of sewing are perfect when you're working on small projects.

(Don't forget that my giveaway for a $25 gift certificate for Fat Quarter Shop closes tomorrow, so if you haven't entered already, make sure to do it here)

My friend asked me a while ago if I would make a few things for her, and of course I was happy to oblige.
 

First up, she wanted some placemats for her kitchen table. She had seen the ones I made for my brother, but wanted a more regular shape than triangles. I settled on rectangular mats measuring approx 12" x 10", and made 2 contrasting patterns, 3 of each. I loved her colour palette of pink against a neutral and really enjoyed making these. The neutral is Kona Champagne, which I've had in my stash forever, and is such a lovely warm colour. These are a very easy make, and would be a perfect project for those new little mini charm packs so I'll post a quick tute later in the week with the measurements.

 I straight line quilted these using Aurifil 50wt thread, they are quilted approx 1/4" apart in dense lines which I hope will help them to stand up to frequent washing. I really love the stitch definition I got with it.

I found the perfect pink binding for them, with tiny stars, and they are backed with a Tanya Whelan Grand Revival print which I can't remember the name of. I machine bound these (again, to help them withstand frequent washing) after reading a few different tutorials for the technique, I like how they turned out on the front  but could probably make the back a little neater with more practice.

My friend also wanted some bunting for her little nephew. I forgot how fun it is to make bunting and how pretty it looks! Must make some for baby R's room too.

Lastly, after seeing my friend Fiona's piano cover over on her Facebook page, my friend asked me to make something similar for her daughter (my goddaughter) for her keyboard.

 

We decided a rainbow of colour would work nicely for this one, and once I had pulled out some prints, I put this together very quickly. I think this is one of my favourite things I've made this year - so simple, but I just love how it works.

 

I used a candy stripe pink for the backing and a black poplin to bind it. I quilted the white space similarly to how I did the placemats, leaving the coloured "keys" unquilted so they popped that bit more. This measures about 32.5" x 6"

I'm heading off to visit my friend next week, so I have lots of goodness to bring with me and I know she's dying to get her hands on it, which is great.

Kona Tumbler baby quilt finish

Some time ago the lovely Cindy asked me to make a baby quilt for her shop and promised me the opportunity to pick some lovely fabric to work with. Of course I jumped at it and here it is :-)

This is a very simple quilt made with a couple of charm packs of Kona brights, and 1 fat quarter of the Sweetest Thing. I used this tutorial from Moda Bake Shop.

 It's backed with some lovely bright Kona Peacock.

And I used an orange binding to really make it pop:

 I stippled it using a 50wt Aurifil thread, colour 2600 which is a light silvery grey. I love this thread, it is brilliant for using on quilts with multiple colours as it works with them all and the quilt design sinks in nicely from it once its washed and dried. I also changed up the quilting from my normal by adding in very frequent loops, and I really love them - I'll be doing more loopy quilting in the future.

The front and the back work really nicely together. I have to say that I really love the simplicity of the quilt design with the tumblers and the solids, and I think the pops of the print work well. At 30" x 43" its a lovely baby size too.  I'll feel a little pang posting this one off on Tuesday morning to Cindy as I really fell in love with it while making it. But hopefully someone will fall in love with it as much as I did!

I hope that your weekends are going well. We have a bank holiday weekend here in Ireland and are enjoying some good weather - probably our 1 week of summer before the rain sets in!!

This is one of my finishes for Q2 of Leanne's Finish-a-Long - so good to tick another one off my list.

Kona Tumbler Quilt top

A while back, the lovely Cindy asked me would I be interested in making up a quilt for her shop and of course, I jumped at the chance! She had quite a few ideas for fabrics I could use, but I immediately knew I wanted the Kona Brights solids charm packs.

When I started quilting first, I only saw solids as background fabrics, and it took me a while before I realised the possibilities with them. Then I took part in a couple of rounds of the For the Love of Solids swap and became really inspired by solids only projects! I love how they put the emphasis back on colour use and design.

So I jumped at the chance to make a baby quilt with these beauties. I wanted to do another tumbler quilt, having had so much fun making my Posy tumbler quilt for baby R earlier in the year. I used a quick and easy pattern from Moda Bake Shop and decided to add a few tumblers in a single coordinating print from The Sweetest Thing just to add some contrast and interest to it. I like you you can really see the print tumblers popping in this picture:

 

A few hours sewing (in my new sewing space...I promise I will have pics this week) and it was done and ready to flap around in the wind this afternoon:

I just need to quilt and bind this baby now and she will be winging her way back to Cindy. The backing will be Kona Peacock (you can see in the top photo) and I just have to decide on a binding colour. Hot Pink? Orange? Yellow? I'm still mulling that one over.

For the Love of Solids Swap Package done!

Woohoo! Another swap package finished and ready for posting :-)
This is for Round 2 of the For the Love of Solids swap, and I am totally thrilled with how it turned out. I hope my partner will love it and use it.

I managed to catch 10 minutes of sunshine this morning to take some pictures before the rain started. Wow, I'd forgotten how nice photos taken in sunshine look! It's been so grey here all winter, but I love how vibrant the colours are looking. I will be sad packing this one up, I would use this myself in a heartbeat.

First up - the big item which is the finished messenger bag. It's looking good, isn't it? I adore this bag, and I am definitely going to make one for myself. Even Himself, who normally runs a mile when I suggest making something for him, wants one. As in, I didn't suggest it to him, he actually asked me to make him one. In plain manly colours. (Obviously.) But still, you could have knocked me over with a feather! High compliments indeed.

As I posted before, I made the messenger bag following loosely the pattern in Lisa Lam's Bag Making Bible. The lining is strengthened with fusible fleece, which gives the bag loads of structure, and the exterior fabric (Kona quilting weight cotton) is interfaced with woven fusible interfacing. The flap of the bag is quilted, and has some heavy weight interfacing to make it hang nicely. I bound it in the lining fabric for a touch of extra detail.

The construction of this bag was relatively straightforward and the hardest bit was just getting the small details right - like making the pieced panels to work out the same size as the pattern pieces and get the proportions right. I used incomplete strips on the back of the bag, and I think this is my favourite bit!

I followed the pattern to make an adjustable strap complete with slider and it looks really good. Plus, I've learned a new skill and they are very easy to make, so I can use them on other bags in the future too. Yay!

I used some sew in magnetic buttons as closures.

I added some pockets to the lining, in 2 different shades of blue. The back lining wall has a long divided pocket in aqua blue with space for pens, cards etc.

 The front lining wall has a pocket for a mobile phone.

The finished bag measures approx 14.5" x 11.5" and is 4" deep. It would be perfect as a general bag for carrying your stuff around in, would fit an A4 notebook or 3 easily, or some books. It would easily carry fabric etc for going to classes or guild meet ups, or it could also be used as a baby bag to carry nappies/diapers, change of clothes etc (although it doesn't have a waterproof pocket). It's very practical and lots of fun, in the bright colours. I also think the Kona Ash background colour will not show up marks and dirt as easily as a darker colour would, which is important in a bag (well, in my world it is anyway!)


For the small item, I decided to make a matching zippy pouch. I had a bright purple zip which I was sure would work great against the green lining, so I made purple the central colour in the star and used some purple perle cotton to hand quilt around the star. I really like how bright and fresh this one looks.

For the back, I used a strip of pieced colours, similar to the bag, and handquilted on either side of the line.

The pouch turned out very nicely, and at 10" x 10" it is a great size. It could be used for hand sewing supplies, including an embroidery hoop, or could hold make up, or could even be used as a pencil case. It fits perfectly inside the bag.

So there it is, another swap package done. This one is all ready to be wrapped up and posted on Monday morning and I really hope my partner will like it as I had lots of fun making it for her.

More goodie swap sewing!

This week has not been good for sewing. I feel like I managed to get hardly anything done, a combination of work, kids and still feeling under the weather. Plus feeling quite lethargic about it all! But yesterday evening I decided I had had enough of feeling uninspired, sewing-wise, and knew that the only way to "cure" myself was to go and do a small, fun project. I've been mulling over my mug rug for Partner no 1 in the Goodie Swap for a few weeks now and after seeing Judith and Fi both turn Lee's great block tute into a mug rug, I decided that was the way to go. I really really love Lee's tute and this block is a strong contender for my month in Sew Bee Blissful. My partner's colour are a little different from the sort of palette I normally like but I just love how they go together.  I mixed in some solids as I had them in the right shades, and I used lots of fabrics in this one - Kate Spain (Fandango and Central Park) more Aviary II, Loulouthi and more! I felt it needed a neutral border so added on a strip of Kona Ash and think it finishes it off nicely although this is measuring up as a very,very big mug rug!! Oh well, I don't think my partner will mind.

After finishing binding it, I decided to break out my new Perle Cotton which I had in an Iris/purple variegated colourway and did a little hand quilting in the Ash border - a line of small stitches on the inside and longer stitches on the outside. I like the effect although I wish my stitches were more even!

So, partner no 1 is now done. I think and hope she will be pleased with her package when it arrives!

I moved on then to Partner No 2. Now, I feel I know partner no 2's taste reasonably well and she has been very active commenting in the Flickr group which is always a help. I I know exactly what I am doing for her mug rug although I won't get to it till later in the week. I've been mulling over her goodies and I know that she would probably like the needle case I made for partner no 1 too. But one of the things I love about this swap is the opportunity to do different things for different people and work with separate colour schemes. So I have been looking for an opportunity to use Ayumi's patchwork wristlet tutorial for a while and decided Partner 2 would like this.

I used Kona Ash to make my feature fabrics stand out more and I think it has a fresh clean look that I love! This is the back - don't you love those seahorses?

And this is part of the front - I'm afraid that one of the feature fabrics will just make it too obvious to my partner so I'm not showing the whole thing!

This is a really practical little pouch. It has a wrist strap (matching the interior lining) and would be perfect to hold a few small things if you don't want or need to bring your handbag out with you. Its lined with some Modern Meadow fabric, with a pocket made from Kona Ochre. The pocket is divided and easily holds some cards, notes and a lipstick. Plus your phone and keys would fit easily in there too.

So partner no 2 - I hope you like it! More on the way for you - I have another (little) goodie in mind for you as well as your mug rug. Keep watching :-)

PS. If you're looking for my Kona solid giveaway for 5 half metres of Kona cottons, pop over here to enter! It closes tomorrow evening so don't miss out!

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