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Monday, April 18, 2011

A-bunting we will go ...

I have been meaning to make this for a while, but finally got around to doing it yesterday.  A friend had a little baby girl a couple of months ago and I thought I would make some personalised bunting flags to decorate the room.  Making the bunting flags was super easy but everything associated with appliquing the letters was time-consuming.  Not particularly difficult, but just took a bit of time.


I practised on the letters with the straight edges first before tacking the 'e' and the 's'.  Those two letters took a bit more concentration.



In total, eight flags (six with letters, two that were blank)


The technical stuff  - for the lettering, I used Cooper Black font 350pt in Word.  The flags themselves were cut with a 9.5" base edge and 10.5" length from the base edge.  I used 1/4" seams and the binding was simply some ready made binding I picked up at Spotlight ages ago.

I hope the little girl likes it (or at least her Mum and Dad do!)  :)  I now have 2 orders for similar bunting flags from my own little girls ...

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

EB Potholder Surprise!

Yesterday I received a lovely package in the mail - it was my EB potholder swap!  Five colourful potholders made by some talented ladies - thank you!! 

There is divided opinion in the house as to which one is the best - we all have different favourites.  Both Samantha and Asha love the crazy house potholder (they each think it's a picture of themselves in the house).  But Samantha also loves the purple heart potholder, while Asha is a firm fan of the chocolate and pink bird potholder.  Pete likes the colourful scrappy potholder (I think it's the bold colours) but he is also impressed with crazy house.  And I have to admit, I can't pick a winner.  I keep changing my mind!

I won't delay, I will post up the pics straight away for everyone to see.


Crazy House potholder - a family favourite (made by Rebecca)


some free-motion quilting detail & the peek-a-boo girl in the window

Chocolate and pink bird potholder

Colourful scrappy potholder (made by KraftyKira )

Purple heart potholder (by Narelle)

Samantha keeps tracing the heart with her finger

Lavender paths potholder (again by Narelle)
The family voted and the crazy house potholder will hang as a feature in the kitchen in our new home (if/when it gets built) so I'll be putting it away for a little while so it doesn't get dirty.  Asha has already managed to get one of the potholders a little grubby, so I can see they will be well loved.  Thanks again ladies.

And many thanks to Rebecca for organising the swap, for being so patient and for including a treat in our packages!  You're awesome.  :)

Monday, April 11, 2011

One ruffle skirt completed ...

Finally I finished the ruffle skirt for Samantha.  It took a few late nights and loads of fabric. :)



Nie Nie skirt from Pink Fig Designs
  I changed the pattern slightly as I wanted a flat front, not the full elastised waistband.  (The back is elastised, so that gives a bit of growing room).  This took a bit of fudging from one of Samantha's old skirts and then took one ruffle before I was able to match up the fabric directions with the pattern.  But I think it works quite well.  Now that I have thought about it, I have also figured out how I would make it if I want the back section to easily allow elastic replacement.  Maybe I will try that next time.

Also, I used my ruffling foot, rather than manually gathering the ruffles.  That saved on a lot of time but I wasn't quite sure how much material it would use compared to gathering.  Turns out it used less fabric - I'd hate to think how full this skirt would be if I had manually gathered the full required amount of fabric.

The last two ruffles are 80 inches (2m) in length, so very long.  It adds up!  :)

Things I learnt - don't use a stretch denim.  It adds a lot of weight to the skirt.  Unfortunately, that's all I could get at the time when I bought the fabric and it does look good, but it makes it a heavy skirt. If using denim, go for lightweight denim.  Samantha does like the skirt, but she says it is heavy, so I'm not sure if she's going to wear it as much as she would if it was lighter.



Modelling her new skirt!


Time for a twirl!  It's a skirt made for twirling. :)
I'll make one for Asha, but will use lightweight denim.  That's next on the list ... 

Saturday, April 2, 2011

Next project - a ruffle ra-ra skirt

Okay, so I'm on to my next sewing project.  Samantha has her birthday party coming up soon and if I can pull it off, I plan to make her a ruffle skirt for her party.  (As an aside, I can't believe my baby is turning 4!!)

I am going to make a modified version of the Nie Nie Skirt (by Pink Fig Designs).

Pic from Pink Fig website here
Instead of a full elastised waistband, I am making it flat at the front (like a yoke panel) with an elastised back.  The rest I will adapt as necessary - it's just strips of gathered/ruffled material.  This looks like a pattern that would suit an overlocker perfectly.  But it's all good.  It'll just take a bit more time to hem and finish off the seams with a sewing machine, that's all.

Anyway, the fabrics I am going to use for Samantha are

denim and two quilting cottons from Spotlight
And once I make this skirt for Samantha, I'll also make one for Asha.  The fabrics for her skirt are ...
denim and 2 cottons again
I have cut out all the ruffle strips for Samantha's skirt.  Will start hemming them tonight ... this is going to take some time ... wish me luck!