Sew Mama Sew! Giveaway Day

 

Another week, another giveaway! It's December after all! I have put together a little package from my own stash for you today and I hope you like it.

To everyone who is visiting for Sew, Mama, Sew! giveaway day - céad míle fáilte (or, to translate, a huge Irish welcome!) to my little corner of blogland. I hope that you stay and have a look around. This has been the year of quilting for me. I finished my very first quilt on 25th January this year and quickly became obsessed with the whole quilting process. So much so that I have made an average of 1 large quilt a month and lots of minis, table runners, mug rugs and other projects along the way, including jointly hosting the Across the Sea quiltalong with my friend Jennifer. Plus, of course, the 3 quilts that are in my sewing basket waiting to be finished by year end! I love to make colourful, modern quilts - big and small - with gorgeous fabrics and simple, clean design. Here are some of my favourite makes this year:

You'll find more about my finished quilts here. Next year, my plan involves lots of tutes and some quilt patterns so I would love if you came back and visited again when all the madness of the giveaways is over!

Later this week I will be posting a tute for these cute phone/gadget cozies - one for smaller gadgets, one for iPhones. They are super fast, and super easy and you can make them with scraps - perfect, last minute Christmas presents! So do pop back and check it out if you need some gift inspiration!

To all my loyal friends, well, you know how much I love you all :-) But I'll say it again, just so you're sure - you're the BEST!! I love how I have become friends with so  many of you though commenting and chatting via email, and I really, really hope I get to meet lots of you in London in June at the Fat Quarterly retreat, funds and flights permitting (lets talk about that more in the New Year, will we?).

So, let's get to the important parts!  Today's giveaway is all of my own fabric, from my (overflowing) stash baskets. In case you are wondering, my home is smoke free and pet free!

First up, I am giving a way a Fairy Tale Friends honeybun.

 

Nice, right? This honeybun consists of 45 1.5" strips, approx 44" wide. Have a look here for more info.


But that's not all, I'm also including 6 stashbuilding fat quarters. The fabrics are perfect mixer fabrics in a nice range of colours. 

They are, from left to right: Freebird by Momo for Moda, Hideaway by Lauren and Jessi Jung for Moda,  Grand Revival by Tanya Whelan for Free Spirit, Pinfeathers by Carina Gardner for Northcott, Midsummer Magic by Laurie Godin for Northcott, and 1001 Peeps by Lizzy House for Andover.

What do you need to do? I'm keeping this simple... you can have 2 entries. Please leave your email address in your comment in the following format: fairyfacedesigns (at) gmail (dot) com so that I can contact you.

1. Leave a comment telling me where in the world you are spending Christmas/your holidays this year. Mine will be here, at home, just outside Cork city in the very south of Ireland.  (Everyone can enter on this comment, follower or not!)
2. For a bonus entry, let me know if you are a follower, new or old.

Important stuff: I will close the giveaway at 9pm Irish time (GMT) on Friday 16th December. The winner will be drawn using Random Number Generator. Giveaway is open internationally. I will delete duplicate entries. If I cannot get in contact with the winner by Sunday 18th December, I will redraw.

**This giveaway is now closed**

Handbag heaven

Here's a little handbag that a friend asked me to make for her. I'm going to find it hard to let this one go!! I really love it I must say. Handbags are my thing, as anyone who knows me will attest and one of my favourite things about sewing and knitting is the ability to make my own for a fraction of the cost. I made one before Christmas last year that I got a tonne of compliments on, including probably my favourite one ever - "Is that an Orla Kiely bag?" (asked by 3 separate people no less!) So when S asked me to make one for her I was thrilled. I'm loving pleats at the moment and decided to try and work some into this bag. I took out my big box of fat quarters and spent a very enjoyable half an hour figuring out which ones to use. I had a lovely bundle of Freebird by Moda fabrics that I bought last month just because they were gorgeous. I adore the brown dotty one which reminds me of a dress worn by Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman and thought it would work great as a contrast lining. I had some difficulty deciding which coordinating one to put with it but finally settled with the floral because it was so fresh and to be honest, it just screamed "make me into a cute bag" to me.





The original fat quarter bag I made last year, I sewed using a great tutorial I found on Sew Mama, Sew. This time, I really wanted it to be my own. So I didn't look at any patterns purposely as I had a clear idea in my head of how I wanted it to look, with the dotty trim at the top, a pleated body and a medium length shoulder strap that would be comfortable to use.
First of all, I cut a long strip off both fat quarters for the handles and another strip for the trim at the top of the bag and then cut each remaining part of the fat quarters in half. I played around for quite a while trying different looks before finally pinning the box pleats on the floral, going for quite wide pleats. I sewed the trim strip to the top of all pieces and then did the side and bottom seams on the lining and the main fabric. I went for quite a wide handle, with the dotty fabric on the outside, and the floral on the inside for contrast.

I used fairly heavy iron-on interfacing on the fabric to give the bag some structure, and used a long strip of very stiff interfacing in the handle. Lastly I put in a magnetic snap button and, with right sides facing and taking care not to twist my handle, sewed the lining, outside and handles together, turned it right side out and finished the last couple of inches by hand. The main body of the bag measures about 9 inches high and 7 inches wide at the top / 9 inches wide at the bottom. Perfect for carrying wallet, keys and a few essentials. Voila!

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!!