A Parade of Elephants - my Stamp It Up Swap pouch finish!!

A few weeks ago I signed up for Nicky's Stamp It Up swap. I was, to be honest, pretty apprehensive about my stamp-carving abilities and how it was all going to work out, but willing to give it a try. In the back of my mind, my plan was if the stamp carving all went terribly wrong was to buy a stamp, rather than disappoint my partner.

I ordered my supplies, raided the local pound shop for rubbers (at 27c each, they were not a huge investment of money!) The supplies duly arrived and I looked at them fearfully for a few days until I finally worked up the courage to give it a shot.

Luckily though, the stamp carving turned out to be a LOT more fun that I imagined it would be. I had a look at some of the tutorials recommended and gave it a whirl. I played around with lots of different ideas - some turned out terribly, some worked ok and could be developed a bit more. It became pretty addictive actually. (Despite stabbing my finger pretty badly with the scalpel in the process.)

But I was still looking for an idea, and rummaging around in my fabric stash I came across an elephant print and decided to try it.  I managed to replicate the shape reasonably well on the rubber. My first effort was too small, and didn't have the sort of clarity I wanted.

So I tried out a bigger carving, which I was much happier with. And then I realised my big and small elephants could work as a parade of mum and baby elephants for real cuteness factor.

I was pretty sure my partner would be happy with that, but I tried another idea, just in case. The elephants won out in the end though. I was really happy with these leaves though and think I might try and work them into a design of some type when I only have myself to please.

The process of carving stamps is definitely fun and worth a shot. Fabric stamping is something I'm new to but I will be continuing and I think I'll buy a little set of letters as they would be so useful to have.

Once I had my idea in place, I stamped it on some Essex linen, and used some of my new Koi fabric to set off the purple and pinks. I back it with fusible fleece and added some hand quilting and beading for the eyes. Then all I needed to do was add the lining and zip and sew it up into a zip pouch.

And its all ready to send off to my partner, in perfect time for the mailing window. I hope she likes it because I certainly had fun making it!

Linking up to Finish it Up Friday over at Crazy Mom Quilts.

Back in Swapping mode!

It seems to be absolutely ages since I took part in a swap....it is ages. I think its well over a year - maybe the Mouthy Stitches swap last year was the last one I did? Anyway, I've been thinking recently that it was time to pull myself together from an organisation point of view and brave up to working to deadlines again. I still get weeks where I get no sewing done, but most of the swaps have good lead time, so if I amend my normal habit of leaving things to the very last minute taking a relaxed approach to timelines to making early in the swap, I should manage.

So, of course, being me, I couldn't just do what normal people do and take part in one at a time. No, I've jumped, feet first, into 2 swaps, one of which involves a technique I have no idea how to do and have no experience with. And the other where I am the swap mama. Sensible, no? But, sure, that's the fun, right?

The first swap is a Scrappy Pincushion swap. I am Swap Mama for this one (nothing like a bit of extra pressure, right? lol) I am running it on behalf of the Modern Quilt Guild of Ireland, and it is an Irish swap. We are making cute little pincushions. I've made/received pincushions in quite a few swaps and they make a great swap item, so small that you can experiment and try something new and if it doesn't work, you can abandon it and start over without having wasted a lot of time or fabric. And pincushions can be so cute - have a look at my inspiration mosaic - I would just love to own any of these!

If you're living in Ireland and want to participate in the Swap, there's still time to sign up. Pop over to this post on the MQG Ireland page, and join the Flickr group and you'll be in! If you're not a member of the MQG Ireland, please do consider joining. It is a fun group of peeps who connect and support each other, mostly online, and we have a lot of plans for the remainder of the year.

After I had set all that up, I was admiring Nicky's fabric stamping posts over on her blog and noticed she had set up a little swap for that too. Somehow, over the course of an email conversation with her, she cast some sort of a spell on me and I signed up for that too!

We have to make a stamp ourselves (eeek!!!), stamp some fabric, and make something small for our partner. She assures me it is easy enough. I'm not totally convinced but willing to give it a try. Must go source some supplies. So I spent a pleasant few hours browsing around Flickr looking for ideas for an inspiration mosaic, and at the end of it, I am quite excited about giving this stamping lark a go - loads of possibilities! Here's my mosaic. I think there's lots of cuteness in there - in fact, I struggled to whittle down my choices!

So wish me luck :-)

Ps - my mega giveaway for my 3 year blogiversary is here - open till Monday evening, be sure to enter to win lots of goodies!