Cutest Camera Bag Ever

I was reading blogs this morning and came upon the cutest camera bag evah!!



Wouldn't you just love to make this for yourself or some other budding photographer?

This post was on Fresh Figs by Joanna Figueroa.  You can read the entire blog Here.  I liked this so much that I ordered the book that has the pattern.  Here is the link where you can purchase the book directly from Kay Whitt, designer for Serendipity Studios.  She writes a great blog as well and it is Here.



Here is the Book, "Media Frenzy".



These are some of the uber cute projects featured in "Media Frenzy".

The camera bag has compartments and Kay utilizes hardware and divulges her resources.  I am planning right now what fabrics to use on my bag and the one thing that I know that I am going to add is feet on the bottom so that it doesn't get soiled.

Happy Sewing!!

Kris

A little project for your aching back!

I have a lumbar support pillow that I bought at Aveda years ago.  I like to use it in the small of my back.  It is plain, looks just like unbleached muslin with no embellishments.  My daughter also likes it.  I thought I would improve on it and make one that my daughter would love.  I cut two pieces of fabric 5 1/2" wide x 17 inches long.  I wanted the fabric to be more substantial, so I added some batting and just did parallel rows of stitching in a varigated thread.  Once that was done I just put right sides together and stitched leaving an opening for beans.


Here is my daughter's adorable lumbar pillow!!  She really likes
peace signs.  In the foreground there is also a little coaster that I made for her.
Don't you just love my Ginghers in this picture too?

We used navy beans to fill it because that is what I had in my pantry.  The cool thing about these is that you can microwave them for a minute or two and and then place on your aching neck or whatever area ails you it conforms to your body.  Instant Relief. 

I plan on making another pillow this week with the following changes.  I am going to use piping for a more polished look and round the corners to make it easier to insert the petite piping.  I would also leave the opening off center so I could fill it half way and run a stitch halfway down the piece.  
Hope you all love this little project.  It would make a great gift for a graduating senior or a teacher's gift.  I keep one in my house and another in my car.  You never know when your back or neck will start aching.

Happy Sewing! 
Kris

Spring Napkins with Mitered Corners

I saw this fabric on-line recently and it was speaking to me!!  Hmmmmmm....  Hello, we are your new spring napkins!!  The fabric is Oval Elements by Pat Bravo for Art Gallery Fabrics.  I bought the fabric at this Etsy shop!  Nicole and Sue were super nice and from the time I purchased until I received, was only 3 days.



Here are all fourteen colors of the Oval Elements by Pat Bravo for
Art Gallery Fabrics.  Yummy!!  I have photographed it here on my mantel
with some Bunnies and Sheep!



I love these dots and think that they are just scrumptious. Of course, I am having a love affair with dots and believe that they are the perfect neutral.

I bought a yard of each of the 14 colors.  I just love these colors and they just remind me so much of Spring, jelly beans and Easter candy, spring flowers and little girls in their smocked dresses.  I actually wish I had more than a yard each.




These are the colors that I am going to use to make the napkins.  Look
for the post tomorrow with the completed napkins.

I like my napkins big.  If the fabric is 45" wide then I can get two from wof.  Each square will be 22". I found an excellent tutorial about mitered corners here.  This tutorial teaches you the concepts and you just have to determine how big you want your turn under or hem to be.  I like mine about 3/4 - 1". 

The other super important thing is to stitch really close to the edge.  Nothing says homemade like stitching 1/8 of an inch or more from the edge.  This is a skill worth practicing. 

The only other thing left to talk about is if you are going to pull a thread to cut these or will you use your rotary cutter and cut a 22" square?  I am divided on this.  I worked in a drapery workroom in high school and we pulled threads on everthing except prints.  I sometimes do when making napkins because if the print is too far off grain they are hard to iron into submission. 

On these napkins I am just going to cut them with my rotary cutter.  I am making 8 for me and 8 for my sister and I want to pop them in the mail tomorrow.

Happy Sewing!!

Kris

Block of the Month - Hidden Stars

I wanted to share something that I am working on that I think that you are going to like.  My LQS has a BOM from Marti Michell.  At first I had a little trepidation on working on this as it is a little too traditional of a quilt for me.  But........I did want to work with templates.  Plus, I would be picking out my own fabric.  Hmmmmmmm..........

I happen to be in love with Amy Butler Fabrics and thought that this would be a great time to bring them out.

Aren't these just the yummiest group of fabrics.  They span several of Amy's collections but the colors are all meant to work together.  They would be challenging fabrics to work with because of the size of the pieces in the block, but, oh so very cute!!

The pattern that we are piecing cannot be purchased from Marti Michell's website.  It is meant to be made as a BOM.  It requires two sets of templates, which are made with exceptional eye to detail.  All of the corners have been cut so that you will not have any cat ears after piecing.  I also chose to buy the Half Square Triangle Ruler to make the triangles easier to cut.

I have finished the first block for class 2, which is next week.  Two things that I learned after  making this block.

• My background fabric is really light and very hard to distinguish the right from the wrong side.  In couturier sewing the tailor always makes marks on the wrong side of the fabric.  This is not a bad idea.  One that I will be using from now on as I sewed one piece in upside down.
• My aching arm after the first class from toting in all of my yardage to pick just a teeny tiny bit for my block was plain crazy.  I cut fat quarters from all of my yardage and steamed it all here at home so that I don't have to spend my class time doing that.  Now I only have to take a little bit of fabric to class.

This is all of the fabric that I will not be carrying to class!!

Now.............Drum roll please!!!

Here is my completed first block!!



I have a Flickr group for all of the ladies that are participating in this BOM.  It is called Quilter's Workshop Sampler Studio. The link is here.  Please feel free to share your blocks, fabrics, comments or whatever.

If you are interested in being able to participate in this BOM, please contact either Sam or Diana at The Quilter's Workshop, here.  Patterns are provided and are made to be kept in a binder.

More to come about what else I am working on.  Since I am unemployed, most of my days are about sewing (after looking for a JOB).

Happy sewing!  Peace

Kris



Shopping Locally

I have been in Oklahoma this past week with my daughter.  We were looking at University of Oklahoma and Oklahoma State University.  On the say to OSU, we made a detour in Oklahoma City to visit Oklahoma Quilt Works.  WOW!!  What a cute shop.  It was in a strip center that had unique stores all around and no visible chains except for perhaps the Jimmy's Egg next door (A local breakfast chain I am thinking).  OQW had lots of fabric and everything that I wanted to see; Anna Marie Horner, Amy Butler, Brights, & solids.  (I am planning a houndstooth quilt and want to use solids.)  My daughter and I liked that they had lots of samples made out of the collections and I was really mesmerized by a quilt that had a circle theme and was made our of primarily polka-dot fabric.  I love polka dots.  They seem very happy to me!  They just add a lot of zip to your quilt projects. 

Well the employees at Oklahoma Quilt Works were like bright yellow polka dots ----- very helpful!!  They sent us to a restaurant to eat at which coincidentally,  was a one of a kind, jewel of a restaurant.  Here   is the link for Nicolette's Raspberries 'n' Creme. It was a chic little bistro with delicious food.  I had the fish tacos and my daughter had a chicken sandwich on fresh foccacia.  Yummy!!

This is the funky ORIGINAL chandelier that was hanging over our table.  I thought that the brush fringe made it tooooooooo cute! 

Some more originality that made me happy!!  Iron napkin rings that were the same vintage of the chandelier.  Fresh Flowers!  Each napkin a different color and colorful dishes with the same vibe of Fiesta Ware.

I cannot say enough about how important it is to visit and shop at brick and mortar stores.  It means a lot to me that I can go to these stores and actually touch the fabric.  Even though ------ in my last post I referred my readers to an on-line shop that sells Guterman thread inexpensively, I support my local shops.  The Quilt shop that I frequent;  The Quilter's Workshop, is a great place to go.  Their site is Here.   Sam and Diana of TQW a Mother/Daughter team have made this a creative place to learn and tweak your skills. I will be sharing lots of the quilts that I have made with Sam's patterns and you can look for them on their web-site. 

Bottom line ------  I value being able to shop local.  Keep your local stores in business because these are what make up the flavor of your town.

On the topic of thread

Sew - I was reading some blogs today and I read one that seemed to have good information.  She suggested buying "cone" thread because it has more thread rather than buying thread for quilting and fashion sewing.  It was cute because she called the cone thread "Biggie Size"  like we were watching Sex and the City.  Well the Biggie Size or Maxi-Lock thread like they sell at the big box sewing stores is quite a deal compared to Gutermann.  The problem is that it is meant for a serger, and not a sewing machine. The serger uses three or four threads at a time and it has to be a finer thread.  This is simply not meant for quality construction and if you are going to invest in fine fabrics for your sewing you need to buy "good" thread too. 

I can hear you now!  Why oh why are all of the good deals not really good deals?

I have a source - Sew True!!

http://sewtrue.com/

They have Guterman at a steal of a price and you can buy theirs in a 5500 yard cone for $16.50.  They also have the 1100 yards for only $3.50.  They are never out of the basic colors like some other shops and they are quick to ship.  Hopefully you will take advantage of this wonderful opportunity to purchase your thread on-line.

Have a fantastic sewing weekend!!  What are you doing?  I have the Dallas Quilt Show sponsored by the Dallas Quilt Guild.  I am looking forward to photographing some really yummy quilts with my new Canon Rebel.

Resolutions for the New Year

I am not a fan of making New Year's Resolutions. I always think of the standards such as losing weight. I need to be realistic after all, so this year I am going to focus on my fabric addiction and my need to purchase too much fabric.

I guess that the real reason that this is a focus for me this year is that I sold my house in June where I had a dedicated sewing room and am now living in an apartment. Now, I rented a two bedroom apartment and the second bedroom was going to be a sewing room, but then my daughter decided that she wanted to go to Junior College instead of going away to college.

What's a mother to do? I, of course said she could move in. I ended up putting my fabric into storage boxes and there are a lot. I started off buying a rather large box. It is the size I put all my Christmas Ornaments in, from the container store. Well, after I loaded my fabric into these I could not lift them. It took me and Ganzy (my daughter) to carry them to the closet and once we got them on the shelf it made the shelf bow.

I went and bought 12 under the bed storage size. Of course 12 will not fit under my bed. I did manage to get most of my fabric into these and they are stacked on the floor of the walk-in closet and take up half of the space. But now I can't see my fabric. Being able to see my fabric makes my heart happy. If I am going to get anywhere this year I have to shop first in the closet.

The good thing about this resolution is I do think I will be able to keep it. On January 3, on my first day back to work, my boss told me that my job was ending so with no income I really won't have anything to use to purchase fabric. So, my first resolution is at least for the time being is to not purchase any more fabric. I am wondering though can I still purchase patterns and notions? Let me know what you think?