I made up this set of potholders for my sister for Christmas. Her kitchen had navy and yellow as a theme so I found these precuts in my stash and they made the perfect size nine patch for the fronts of these potholders. The blue is a Christmas patterned fabric but I thought they went so well together I just decided they could live all year round in her kitchen. The backs were pieced from wide strips of this fan patterned navy and gray fabric. Therese
I made up this pennant for my youngest grand daughter for Christmas. She will be receiving OWL magazine (once postal workers are back to work) but I always have a small gift under the tree to open. I started with triangles (6" wide - 7" tall) of the pink/green fabric and cut coordinating green ones and made up the pennants. I cut the green strip and captured the tops of the pennants in the seam. I hand stitched paper clips (airplanes and hearts) to each side so art work can be displayed on either side of depending on which side she prefers. She loves to draw - lots of mushrooms lately - and so there is always art to put up. It was a fun project sewn up from my stash fabric. Therese
I have been contemplating how to best store my pins so they can be available and easily accessible when I need them. I have purchased a new set - the glass headed ones on the left. The ones on the right I have had a few years and I have had quite a few lose their plastic flower "heads" and I have found no real good way of getting the heads back on once they have fallen off. They are also susceptible to heat though I have only two who have been deformed because of running them over with the iron. I am now storing them in little shot glasses. There is enough weight in the glass that they should stay upright and I like that the heads are all at the top and easily accessible. Because they are not too full there is room to reach in with a finger and pull out one or a few depending on what I need. My sister has suggested using silicone wine bottle caps to keep them contained when I am not using them. I had planned to make them little caps so that should work well.
My sister gifted me some clips last year for Christmas and they store very nicely in their little bin!! I have a few more glass headed pins that I have collected along the way in the first blue bottle and little short applique pins in the second blue bottle.
These two boxes hold my straight pins. The long ones fit perfectly in this little box in which a little craft punch was purchased. I created a little pin cushion in the lid which keeps them all arranged when the box is closed and a place to keep them available when I am using them. The shorter ones fit in a small plastic box so I created a small pin cushion for that box as well to keep them easily available when I am using them. I have cut a little piece of mat board to keep the pins arranged once I close the lid. I have used clear cellophane tape to create a hinge on the back side of these boxes which keeps all "the things" together so they can be found and stored away properly. Below is how they look closed.
Below, I have sorted my pins on my sewing machine pin cushion as well. I have a few needles, some long pins and two sewing machine needles which keeps them all handy!!
This pincushion sits on the extra thread pin I have on my sewing machine which is really handy. It is a wooden spool with a cushioned wrap all the way around. I had planned to make a more beautiful one if this concept worked well. So far, I have not made a new one.
I found a variety of pieces of coordinating fabrics in my stash that were easily stitched up into some squares with a few additions where needed. I started with the large square and added the little square and the two rectangles on the sides. Wanting the squares to be larger I added another set of pieces - one small square and two larger rectangles. I dug through my stash to find all I needed to finish off 16 squares. I laid them out and then stitched them together. I added a light yellow border all the way around to frame it which worked very well. Not something I have done before!!
For the back I went looking in my backer stash to see if I could find something big enough. I found a piece that was perfect in colour but too small in one direction so I added a piece that I had worked on earlier from scraps from the same stash I used for the front. Beautiful fall coloured fabric!! This is from a bag of quilter scraps I bought from my sister which she purchased from a quilter who was liquidating scraps from her quilting room. Win - Win!! Needing just a bit more width I kept looking through my boxes until I found this red piece that was just the width and length I needed. I trimmed the yellow piece into three uneven pieces and stitched in the other two pieces to make the backer. I added a piece of corduroy as a batting. I laid them in order and stitched all the way around leaving a gap to turn it inside out. I stitched all the way around to seal the opening and established a stable edge. Wanting to experiment with more quilting lines I decided to add diagonal lines of stitching starting from one corner to the other adding guidelines where the distance was longer to try to keep my lines as straight as possible. Not too bad for my first try!! I can see the advantage of using a technique (pen, marker, chalk, etc) to draw a line where you need it then cover it with stitching.
It was a fun project and could be used as a playmat, small quilt or even a table topper!! I will add it to the finished items bucket for now.
Therese
