Monthly Journal of What I've Been Working On:
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I didn't realize how sadly I have been neglecting my site until now. Nothing has been posted in the month of December. I have been diligently keeping up with my blogspot - FabricFascination, and have started adding items to my new online fabric shop with the same name.
And of course this is the time of year when I am very busy with the holidays.
One thing I want to tackle soon, is revamping the front page of this site, and researching how to get it noticed more by the internet search engines. I would like to start offering more items for sale directly on this site, as well as in my icraft, etsy, and (oh yes, another thing I did in December) new Artfire shop.
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| The fabrics from Laura Gunn (her Lantern Bloom collection) that went into these placemats is just scrumptious! I kept the design simple and let the fabric do the work. The purple piping is a satiny hand-dyed cotton from another Etsy seller which I have been doling out sparingly for my sewing projects . I think it adds a touch of elegance to these table linens.
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This custom order was for a bag with dark blue green fabrics in a pattern that blended. The customer does not like the charm square look, so I decided to use an apple core die cut instead. I love the curvy effect , and the deep underwater look of these batik fabrics. The photo is actually of the back of the bag. It shows the blending of the fabrics better than the front which has a pocket running the full length.
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| Another set of placemats. I am calling this one Spicy Salsa. It is made up of a collection from Kaffe Fassett, Brian Mably, and Philip Jacobs. Red, set off with canary yellow Kona cotton piping. My daughter and I are headed off to a weekend quilt retreat, and I wanted to get one more new item in my shop before we left.
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| I'm on a placemat kick. The one on the left is Kaffe Fassett fabrics and kona cotton, quilted in the ditch. The cheery one on the right is made from the Erin McMorris Wildwood collection. I really like both these fabric collections. The Kaffe so warm, the Wildwood so cheery, perfect for a sunny Sunday breakfast.
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I call this wall quilt "October Skies. " Alternately it could be named "Crimson Sky, " or "Cinnamon Sky. " The pieces are cut with my new accuquilt cutter. I am amazed at how smoothly the quilt goes together using these die cut shapes. It makes piecing fun instead of a struggle.
I really like the pattern for this quilt. It has the illusion of movement because of the shapes of the blocks, much like another favorite pattern of mine - "Storm at Sea." The more you look at it, the more designs you see. Can you see the slightly curved diamond shapes? How about the circles? Or the stars?
There are two things I am disappointed with regarding this quilt:
#1 - It is too small. I wish it were at least a twin size. Maybe next time I will enlarge this pattern to cover a bed.
#2 - There is a small glitch in the quilting on the underside of the quilt. I did not have it basted close enough apparently, and by the time I noticed, it was too late to take out all the stitches. The front quilting is fine, but it is annoying just the same.
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| Jason Yenter Fabrics |
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| The pictures do not do this fabric justice. These are from the Jason Yenters Floragraphix line, loooooove them!
I made this bag for one of my wonderful repeat customers. It is a new style for me, rather structured, and quite big. She wanted a market tote, so I hope this shape will work for her. It certainly has plenty of room for to hold lots of shopping finds!
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October has been a fun crafting month. Only one of the pictured items are for my shop. The quilt to the right was a collaborative effort with two friends. I was asked to make a lap sized quilt for a guest teacher in the church. I took the opportunity to try out a pattern on my "must do someday" list. My friend Tina chose the fabric. I never would have chosen these fabrics, but I love the way the quilt turned out . And the quilt top goes perfectly with the special backing I had previously chosen. Sandi did all the piecing, which she said was a challenge. And then I finished it up with quilting and binding. Sure was a quick and easy way to make a quilt!
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| The pillow sham was a new pattern for me too. I wanted to make a gift for a special customer to match a quilt I had already made for her. I found free online instruction on how to make a flanged pillow sham, added my own quilted touch, and voila! I really like the way it turned out, and hope she will too.
The quilt in progress is a 1000 Pyramid, or Triangle Quilt. I am making it out of scraps from my sewing room, and using my new Accuquilt to quickly and accurately die cut the isoceles triangles. I used the Accuquilt Go for the sham blocks too, and they went together like butter!
Finally, the Wonderland bag is for sale in my Etsy shop. Sadly, this fabric line has been discontinued, so this bag will be one of the last in the collection.
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I took an evening to make four travel size tissue cozies for my shop. I wanted to list something since I've been working on custom orders for months and haven't had time to replenish inventory. These are made out of batik fabrics.
The quilt is one of two lap sized African quilts I made this month. I love this pattern, and apparently my customers do too. It really shows off the fabrics.
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| Travel Size Tissue Cozies |
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| African Lap Size Quilts |
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| African Queen II |
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| I've spent most of my summer working on custom orders. This is the second queen sized custom quilt I made for someone who had also been a missionary in Africa. So far I've made four of these quilts for friends and family of my original customer. Word of mouth is definitely the best advertisement.
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I've also started offering homegrown, organic lavender in my paperparaphernalia shop. Lavender is my signature flower, and I have it growing all over my yard. The scent is wonderful of course, and I love the look of it as well. These bundles were tied with cotton twine and air dryed.
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| Homegrown Organic Lavender |
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| Jamaican Beach Quilt |
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| A completely new idea for me, born (as these ideas usually are)out of spontaneous creative thought processes inspired by the materials I am working with. I purchased these fabrics from an Etsy seller KarolsVintageArt. When I pulled the fabric out to work on, I found that the large beautiful prints just screamed "don't cut me up!" So the idea of the beach quilt was born.This sunbathing quilt is very practical, comfortable, and makes a statement on the beach or poolside. My daughter said the fabrics looked Jamaican, hence the title. She has dibs on this one if it doesn't sell by our beach vacation in August. Maybe I'll have to make some for us to take with us.The collage picture was another new thing for me. So much fun to learn new things and put them into application.
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This was a fun one to make. I tried a new technique. First I layer the fabrics, then sliced an undulating curve through both layers, matched them up like puzzle pieces and sewed them together with bias binding covering the seam. I think it turned out really pretty. This fabric is from Sue Beevis, beautiful watercolor flowers. I really enjoyed working with it.
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| Joanne Watercolor Bag |
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| Just made it in under the wire with this custom journal order. Deadline is today. I've emailed my buyer and am just waiting for payment before shipping these off. I enjoyed making them assembly line style, and think they turned out rather attractively. Hope she likes them even more than I do!
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This bag is made from fabric scraps leftover from making the African Queen. I love the way it turned out. It was lots of fun to piece together, and even more fun to try out my newest free motion quilting design, the feather stitch. I've wanted to use this beautiful long beading for awhile now, and this was the perfect bag to show it off.
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I put a few extra details in this bag, a contrasting seam binding on the edge of the pockets, and a key loop. My goal is to continue to improve on my designs, make them even more appealing, more durable (although I've had some of my personal bags in this style for years even after daily use), and more fun. I really like the contrasting sunny mustard lining in this one. It's the reason I named it after one of my granddaughters who is into yellow.
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I've had an interesting challenge during the month of June and have successfully completed the project. A wonderful customer ordered a custom queen sized quilt using scraps of fabrics from her missionary trip to Africa. I felt honored to be entrusted with such gorgeous fabrics, which obviously held special memories for her.
Many of the fabrics were loosely woven and had to be stabelized. Then there was the issue of getting such a large quilt under my standard sized sewing machine to do the stipple quilting I had decided would look best for the design. But all was figured out eventually, and I am very pleased with the results. Hope she is too!
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| African Queen |
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I have been very thankful to have had a steady inflow of custom orders of late. One lovely customer has ordered five bags, of which two are pictured at left. Another has commissioned me to make a quilt of fabrics collected from a missionary work in Africa. And most recently a repeat customer has asked that I make four journals for her to give as gifts because she liked the last ones so much.
The African quilt is a big project, can't wait to share pictures of the completed quilt. It has been fun to work with the brightly colored designs, but challenging too. I've had to stabelize some of the fabrics to keep them from stretching out of shape, and cut many of the blocks out of existing clothing items.
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| Custom Orders |
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| Mary Lynn Batik Quilted and Beaded Bag |
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| This bag is named for a childhood friend who recently passed away. She and I had a lot of adventures together. Her father was a Doctor, so they owned a cabin at a ski resort, another at a lake, and all kinds of toys like snowmobiles, sunfish, etc. She was a very sweet girl. I haven't seen her for many years, but still, it was sad to hear of her death.
Recently, I've learned a new photo technique. I used the portrait mode on my camera for this picture. I like the way it sharpens the foreground image, and blurs the background, perfect for what I am trying to do.
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Another promotional item for my paper shop. These were fun to make with the 3D butterflies and tabs on top. I made the sleeves big enough to hold a standard size business card too. I think these would be great to include as a gift with a sold item.
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| Thank You Tags and Sleeves |
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I also added this mini thank you cards with envelopes to my paperparaphernalia shop. The cards and envelopes are purchased, but I embellished and stamped them. They are perfect to enclose with items sold as a little gift if you leave them blank. Or, of course, you could write a thank you note inside if you prefer.
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| Mini Thank You Cards with Envelopes |
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| Batik Stix & Stones Custom Bag |
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| We had an absolutely beautiful weekend here. Record breaking temperatures for April, and sunshine! I put in some strawberry plants (hope it wasn't too early), and finished this custom bag. I love working with batiks. The colors are beautiful, the fabric is meaty in my hand, and I can feel the wax used in the batiking process as I iron (or at least I imagine I do). Either side of the fabric is lovely, so there is no problem with using the "wrong" side. A zippered pocket is included in this bag. It was fun figuring out how to make it look great and be practical too. I also added a key loop, and my usual three open pockets for cell phone, keys, glasses, etc.
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| I have been blessed with several custom orders of late. This one is from my paper shop paraphernalia. A returning customer wanted 100 stitched and notched paper sleeves for promotional purposes in her shop. I still had paper samples from the last time she ordered, so it was easy to obtain the supplies this time. The work went smoothly, I got into a pleasant rhythm of cutting, scoring, folding, notching, and finally stitching. I am pleased with the results, and hope she is also.
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As you can see by these jumpers, I am experimenting. Same pattern but trying different fabric combinations. A jumper needs to have a bit of body to hang correctly. So when using lighter weight cotton, I need to quilt, or line it, with another fabric. The blue and lavender dress is quilted to a white kona cotton. The color blocked dress that I call "little house on the prairie," has a cotton lining, hemmed separately.
I have several more jumpers in progress. Have to get them out of my system, so to speak. So far, they are all in size 12 months, or 18 months, but I plan to offer them in sizes from 6 months to 3 years old. I've been looking at some great fabrics from Westminster and Free Spirit. I'd like to make some of these dresses reversible. How fun is that!
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| I am making little jumpers for my almost two year old granddaughter, and will probably sell some in my shop as well. This is the first one. I love the fabric. My daughter and I found it in the clearance section of Joann Fabrics. It is a mid weight cotton with just a touch of lycra, which makes it a dream to work with, perfect for a jumper.
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I made this little evening bag out of leftover fabric from the Kaffe Bag. A lot of thread painting went into it, some beading, a beautiful lining, magnetic snap, and a first for me, the beaded handle. But it isn't quite right. It is disappointing when I spend a lot of time on something, and it is still not good enough to sell in my shop. But such is the process. In order to grow, expand, there has to be experimentation. Next time, I will do a different kind of closure, and I will probably leave off the beaded strap. It is a workable idea, that just didn't work this time.
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| Kaffe Fassett with Thread Painting & Beads |
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| It is so nice when a customer has very similar taste to me. Kaffe Fassett is one of my favorite fabric designers, and this custom bag is for someone who also enjoys his work. I made this bag with a longer handle than the original. Thread painting is very relaxing, and I love working with these colors.
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Just finished a custom bag for a wonderful buyer in Arizona. I love Kaffe Fassett, and happily, she does too. So I got to play with this gorgeous rich blue fabric, did a bunch of thread painting to bring out the design, and added a few beads just for sparkle.
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| Kaffe Fassett Thread Painted & Beaded Bag |
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| Nemo Quilt |
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My quilting buddy Tina and I, along with a few other ladies, make quilts for the new babies in our church. We had a quilt all ready for the next baby to arrive, until we changed our minds last Saturday and decided to make this Nemo quilt to match the babies nursery theme. Tina got a piece of the wallpaper from the nursery, scanned it into her embroidery machine, and stitched these adorable fish. Then we pieced it, I did the quilting, and we presented it to the mom-to-be at her shower today.
At noon, I was still quilting as the baby shower began, and still had to shower and get dressed. But although a bit late, I was able to slip in while everyone was still eating lunch and not cause a disturbance.
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We always include a scripture on the quilt. This time it was from Psalms 96:11:
Let the heavens be glad,
and let the earth rejoice;
Let the sea roar,
and all it contains!
The shower was fun, we had a teaching from the Bible, played bingo as the gifts were opened (I didn't win), and ate lots of food, including my favorite - chocolate covered strawberries, yum!
Everyone ooohed and aaaahed the quilt, which made the last minute change of plans all worthwhile.
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| Keep your eyes on this little bag. It might become a giveaway on my new blog which I'm hoping to have up by the second week of March. I had fun quilting around the flowers and leaves in this design before stitching it all together and adding a vintage button I found in my button can.
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| 5 New Bags! |
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My husband suggested that I make five bags at once, so I tried it this week. I am very happy with the results. The bags turned out well and went together smoothly. By cutting, sewing, and assembling each stage for all five at once, I was able to streamline my production process and, I think, do a better job because I was performing the same task five times in a row. Each session felt like an accomplishment, and I was thrilled to finish them up today and get them listed.
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| Check Out the Web Exclusive Sale on This Bag |
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| I Finished my Swap Blocks |
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| I finished my strippy swap blocks for the Quiltsy Team and mailed them off to the coordinator, who will redistribute the blocks and mail twelve back to me. Can't wait to get my strippy package!
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Basic Grey had long been a favorite designer paper company for my scrapbooking. Now they make gorgeous fabrics as well. The bag on the right is from their Urban Couture Line, their first line of fabric as far as I know. I LOVE it! This is one of the bags I will have to make for myself as well. The next line coming out in the spring is called Sultry, and I already have my order placed.
The green Marie bag has been a favorite seller in my Etsy store. I love the garden earthy feel of the fabrics. Color makes me happy!
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| Marie Bag |
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| Kym Bag |
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| Recycled Blue Jean Hipster |
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| This little bag is an obvious off-shoot from the scrappy strip blocks I've been experimenting with for the Quiltsy Team Block Swap. I had fun with this pattern and will probably make a few more. It is a perfect size bag for when you need to carry a little, but don't want to drag around a suitcase.
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I like to make my bags in pairs. I call them sister bags. These two are Marie and Karen. Marie is a custom order after an earlier Marie bag I made. My daughter-in-law gave me the brown and blue fabrics for Christmas, so I named the Karen bag after her.
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| Quiltsy Team Block Swap |
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| The Quiltsy Team on Etsy is having another block swap, this time a scrappy string block. Hopefully this will use up some of the scrap fabric we all have in our stashes. I love using pieces of cloth that would otherwise be wasted. The marvelous part is that no matter how mismatched the fabric strips are, the block turns out beautifully. I am having lots of fun with this project.
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