Stitch

Stitch (not a Disney character) is the name of my block submission for the Sew Out Loud quilt-along block contest. 

After sewing along with this QAL for the last couple of months, I’ve learned a lot about paper piecing. Of course I’m like 4 blocks behind at this point, but the blocks have all been stellar and just awe-inspiring in their ingenuity and uniqueness not to mention humor! All sew-alongs should be this fun.  The sew-along includes a final 12^th block designed by one of the members picked from this contest.  So this is my submission.  

 Let me just tell you that if you think foundation piecing is hard, wait until you try to design a foundation pieced block.  It’s a lot trickier than it looks.  This final block is actually my 3^rd try. My first try was not working out at all, so I redesigned and came up with this block which then needed to be further refined and voila you have the final block. 

Go check out the other submissions if you like – they are all stunning.  The winner will have their block made available as part of the sew-along.  I plan to publish this foundation block pattern myself on the blog  in the next few weeks if not sooner.  I am working on the e-version of the drawing right now, so stay tuned.

Idol Time

Well now, here's a little bit of fun:

Brilliant idea SMS - the American Idol of the sewing/crafting world and a contest after my own heart! I love it!

A marriage of Pinterest and Sew Mama Sew.  Get all the deets here and see how you can enter.

Along this weeks theme of Sweet Child of Mine ~ Here's my little collage of goodies - keep your fingers crossed that I make it into the finals, a stack of fat quarters and endless fame and a record contract is at stake. Ok maybe I'm exaggerating that last part a bit.



I had so much fun making this collection, I decided to try another one - strictly for fun ~


 

I think I might turn this into a weekly habit - such a blast!

Happy Sewing! 

Pouches galore

ETD ~ The cell phone wristlet pattern is now available. Just click through the link on the top right-hand side of this page to purchase it. Thanks so much for your interest.

Where does the time go? March is always a crazy month for our family with spring break, birthdays and ski season. Here it's come and gone and I haven't even had a chance to tell you about the latest SWAPeroos I'm sewing for.

First up is the Pretty {little} Pouch swap (P{l}PS)which I have joined before. My pouches are all done and off in the mail to my partner. Hopefully they will arrive soon. Since my partner likes scrappy designs and pastel-ish colors I decided on this pink-inspired color palette. I just love this Domestic Bliss line from Liz Scott which is saying something because sewing is about as close to Domestic Bliss as i'll ever get. Other aspects of domesticity not withstanding.

This fabric is so vibrant and girly and seemed appropriate for my partner. I knew I wanted to do a scrappy star, so I made an 8-pointed paper pieced star out of selvages and then appliqued that to the linen pouch. The pouch needed some more interest so I added the wavy curve along the front, also scrappy-pieced. Add in some hand stitching and you have a finished pouch!

Well, hmmm, it seems to be missing something. Somehow that didn’t really seem like enough, so I added a little cell phone pouch to coordinate. I must confess I needed to make a cell phone pouch as a gift for a friend, so I used my P{l}PS partner’s extra as a prototype.

Needs some tweeking to get it just right for my friend, but it turned out pretty well for a first pass. The patterns are self-drafted and I do plan to make them available soon so stay tuned. I know I always say that and don't always deliver, so keep me honest peeps! Swap project A completed. Now onto the next one…

Happy Sewing!