Berry cute quilt

On April 15th, we got a new addition to our group of friends. Kenley Katherine was born! She is beautiful and has a full head of auburn hair! Her parents decided to go the surprise route, so we didn't know if she was a boy or a girl until she was born. The result was me cranking out this quilt, start to finish in under 3 weeks!

I decided to go more "little girl" rather than baby, because I figured she'll be a little girl much longer than a baby, so hopefully she'll like this quilt for years to come.

The quilt features strawberry, cherry and polka dot fabrics from Robert Kaufman. I very loosely followed the free Foliage Paisley pattern from Andover Fabrics. This is the first quilt I have sewn where the block corners needed to match perfectly. I was very nervous, but it turned out great! I feel a lot more confident making more complicated blocks now.

I forgot to take a close up of this, so this picture isn't great, but I wrote her name on the border while quilting. It's not super noticeable, but a cute little surprise!

The backing and binding is made from a vintage sheet, which worked great. However, I cut it on the bias to make the stripes diagonal, which made quilting and binding a challenge. I won't be doing that again!

Leafy, scrappy pillows

My best friend and her husband recently bought a very nice new couch. Once they got it in the living room, it quickly became apparent that she was in desperate need of new pillows to put on her new couch. Much discussion and google image searching later, we decided to make these leafy pillows out of scraps, since she'd already spent a good chunk of cash on the couch. I, of course, decided I wanted some too!

The only fabric we bought is the unbleached cotton for the front. Everything else is scraps. Even the back fabric was free!

She is making hers closed all the way around since she didn't using pillow forms, but I did so I made the backs of mine overlapping flaps for easy removal and washing. (Last fall I lost my favorite throw pillows to a washing machine accident that I do not want to repeat!)

For just a bit of added whimsey and fun, we put a owl in each tree. Almost unnoticeable, but a great detail. Did you notice the owls before I mentioned them?

These were fun to make. You should make some too! If you do, I have one tip to offer. Use Heat'n Bond to make the leaves into iron-on appliques. You can buy it by the yard for super cheap at most fabric stores. This helped a lot for two reasons. First, it made tracing and cutting out the leaves super fast. Second, it perfectly held them nicely in place, without having to mess with pinning, while stitching the tight zig zag around the edges.

We had a few leftover leaves, so I sewed them onto a onesie for my nephew.

Batik Ombre Quilt

A while back a good friend of mine gave me a HUGE box of batik fabrics, in every color of the rainbow, cut into 10x3 inches rectangles. The fabric is all beautiful and the thing that struck me the most was how the colors changed so gradually from light to dark. I wanted to play off that quality to make almost an ombre effect for a quilt. I needed to crank out a top pretty quickly before my next opportunity at the long arm and my least favorite part of quilting is cutting pieces, so I didn't for this quilt! Just lined them up in a pleasing gradient and stitched away. I really love how this turned out and it makes me want to do several more similar ones. I think the same effect in blue and green would be very pretty.

For the back, I found a very pretty fabric with tiny, batik-looking green flowers. I think it complements the front nicely.

The quilt is about 70 inches by 80 inches. Not big enough for a bed, but just about perfect for snuggling up in a comfy chair with a good book and a hot cup of coffee. That sounds so good, I think I'm going to do that now. 

Spice girl

I'm not sure I'm think it's a problem, but we might have a spice addiction in our household.

I think I have spring fever, or at least the itch for spring cleaning. Maybe it's the weather. It's fairly rare that central Iowa hits the 60s in the middle of February. It's extremely rare that we hit the 50s and 60s for almost 10 days in a row and I think it's made my body convinced that it is actually spring. Tomorrow's high of 32 degrees should remind me otherwise.

Whatever the reason, I felt compelled to clean and organize all weekend. Even more surprising - I actually followed through on that impulse. Besides the closet and refrigerator, the spice cupboard was in desperate need of cleaning out.

I pulled everything out and set them on the counter. There were over 70 containers and took up several feet of counter space. Plus I have a spice rack with 12 more jars. Why does one household need 4 different kinds of cinnamon, 3 different cajun blends, 5 kinds of garlic and about a dozen spice blends containing garlic. We are apparently taking Hollywood's fascination with vampires to heart.

Do normal people have this many spices and seasonings in their house?

So what do all these spices and seasonings say about me? I like cooking. Baking slightly less. Also, I like spicy and international cuisine. And, apparently, have an affinity for spices beginning with the letter C. Maybe it's just that there are so many more spices that begin with the letter C? Think about it. Cinnamon, cardamom, cilantro, curry, cumin, caraway, chili powers, cloves, coriander, cayenne, celery seed, chipotle and chives. I am sure there are more, but those are the ones we have on hand. Seems like a lot. (Before you ask, I WAS NOT alphabetizing them, just noticed a pattern.)

It's been a while

It's been a while. A very long while. But there are finally new totes in my shop!

I have been loving this Patricia fabric from Ikea for about 2 years now, but every single time we go, they are out. I was finally able to pick up a few yards last month and am so happy with how the totes turned out!

I have two of these for sale now and three more in progress.

Back by popular demand: Why the Caged Bird Sings totes. Same as the Patricia totes, 2 in the shop now, 3 more to come.

It feels good to get back in the sewing room. I am hoping life calms down even a little more so I can sew even more.

Sticky Style

I have been loving vinyl wall decals now for a while. I have had great luck (as have a couple of friends and my mom) with Byrdie Graphics on Etsy. That's where I bought my winter tree branch. They are SUPER fast with responding to convos (Etsy emails) and very quick shipping. The instructions and tools they provide are great too!

I'm also still obsessing with the colors gray and yellow together. Marry those two loves and I have new vinyl decals in my kitchen! (My TINY kitchen is very hard to photograph!)

I really like them with my gray and yellow curtains made with Mood fabric!

The 18 gray scroll damask graphics are sold in a set.

Photo from Byrdie Graphics

The two yellows were purchased individually. Minus my being too impatient to wait for a level, application went smoothly.

Vinyl decals are a great idea for rental places. I wish they were popular a few years ago. I would have had much cooler apartment walls in college! My roommate and I did starch fabric polka dots onto a wall once. It was cute, but the red fabric ended up leaving pink circles that we had to paint over anyway.

Ruffled Reticule

A few years ago, I found a purse on Etsy that I loved. I didn't buy it and have had reverse buyers remorse (should have bought that!) ever since. Of course, the seller doesn't make them any more, but that hasn't stopped me from longing for one anyway.

After my most recent trip to NYC lead me once again to the fabric oasis that is Mood, I found the perfect lining fabric to go with some tweed I already had in my stash. After many measurements, sketches and a couple of trial pieces, I decided to go for it. I wouldn't say I made a pattern, more like a list of measurements and a single pattern piece for the front ruffle.

The end result is beautiful and I LOVE it.

My only regret is that I wish it was wider. I carry a lot of stuff around and, while I've crammed it all in, I could definitely use a little more wiggle room.

I put in lots of pockets in the interior and one on the back as well.

The process went smoothly and I only had to rip out one seem! (Sewed the back pocket on upside down. Duh.)