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Pinterest Challenge: Outtakes

May 252012

I went through a couple of other projects for my Pinterest Challenge (which I’ll post about more next) before I landed on my final one. Here are my outtakes!

First, I wanted to make this hilarious mug rug that I pinned; isn’t it awesome? (This picture is of Sew Fantastic‘s one.)

I don’t think mine turned out as giggle-inducing, though, which is why I didn’t want to use it for the challenge.

After that, I thought I’d try making a project knitting bag, which is really just a drawstring bag with pockets.

I combined Jeni’s tutorial with Michelle’s small grocery bag since I was feeling lazy about boxing corners.

There are a couple of slip pockets inside to hold dpns and scissors and things.

This project didn’t feel fancy enough, though. Up next is my actual Pinterest Challenge project!

Buckwheat, hi ho!

May 142012

My mom was feeling junky earlier last week, and in trying to think of something that might help, I remembered that I’d bookmarked a tutorial for a hot or cold rice bag thingy. Since she got better before I got a chance to make one, I gave it to her for one of her Mothers’ Day presents.

The reason it took me so long to make these is that I used buckwheat (which I had to go get) instead of rice (which I have in the house) — when I was pregnant, I hated the smell of cooking rice, so I wanted to avoid that since my mom mentioned that when she feels nauseated she sometimes gets hypersensitive about smells. I bought a whole lot of loose cardamom at the same time as the buckwheat though, so it’s slightly cardamom-scented, whoops! But cardamom smells good!

The bottom one was for my mom, and I used Wild Olive’s super cute baby and mama sloth pattern. The top one was for my sister-in-law; the gnome is from Lark Cottons. (Can I just say? Lark Cottons is awesome! I ordered my fabric in the middle of the night — basically on Friday morning — and then I got my fabric on Saturday! I made my purchase when they were having a free-fat-quarter-with-your-order thingy, and she took the time to choose one that went with the stuff I ordered [I ordered three pezzy prints, and she gave me a fq of that in a different color]. And the fabric cuts were really nice and straight, andand the store’s shopping cart is fantastic. I’m a sucker for good site design.)

I only gave my sister-in-law the buckwheat pillow, so I made a drawstring bag to make it a little fancier. The attached taggy card things have instructions for heating (microwave for 1 to 1 1/2 minutes with a small cup of water alongside), instructions for cooling (stick it in the freezer, heh), and a warning (don’t put it on your eyes if it’s too hot, yo!). When I was reading up on these, I read a surprising number of cautionary comments — people who microwaved their bags for FIVE minutes and were surprised when they got burnt, and someone who enjoyed having the heat pack on her eyes, but then had fuzzy vision for two weeks afterwards. Yeesh!

Edit: I’m linking to Clover and Violet’s Summertime Adventures linky for projects on the go. Embroidery is great to carry around with you! In fact, I almost never embroider at home — I mainly do it at work (during lunch! not when I’m supposed to be working!).

Sewing Kit: Bindtastic Edition

May 072012

I really love sewing down binding by hand, but my current hand-sewing supplies bag is pretty disorganized, and I have to rummage around for things that are floating around separately in there. So instead of working on Mothers’ Day presents (which are obviously due soon) or a baby quilt (that I need to get done by July), I made myself a binding sewing kit.

I made the small size of Michelle’s zip pocket pouch, and it’s just right for holding only the things I need for binding sewing.

There are chairs on the inside because of Daddy bear, Mummy bear, and Baby bear… geddit? har har.

I added a piece of felt for needles and a loop of twill tape on each side of the slip pocket. Then I twisted small rubberbands through the twill loops to hold my new thread snips (I’m so excited about these) and a bobbin of thread.

I was sad when I realized that I should have cut the zipper pocket piece the other way around since the bears are all upside-down, but then I insisted to myself that when I take my binding clips (dollar store hair clips) and thimble out, I’ll have my sewing kit this way so that the bear family will be right-side-up. Retconned!

The adorable grandma lady who taught the sashiko class I attended told us that if you use wool felt for your needles, they won’t rust. Is that really true? Anyhoo, I’m linking to Clover and Violet’s Summertime Adventures Sewing Kit party. I really want to finish a quilt just so I can use my new sewing kit! :>

Justifying my purchases

May 042012

I’m seriously addicted to buying Michelle (née Keyka Lou) patterns. I think I have around ten of them, but I’ve only sewn up half. In an effort to justify the patterns I’ve bought, I have sort of a half-baked intention to go through and sew at least one version of the ones I haven’t yet. (… and then it’ll be okay for me to buy more patterns! Muhahaha!)

Last week I made a zip pocket pouch out of my last little bit of this ladybug fabric (I might have enough left to make something tiny). It makes me happy!

I was such a dork — when I first read people gushing about this pattern, I didn’t totally get it. The whole thing looked adorable, but I didn’t think the flaps served any purpose other than being cute and adding bulk. I didn’t understand that the zip pocket makes a slip pocket behind it! So cool!

Cosmo grabbed it and stuffed cars into the slip pocket part as soon as he saw it.

Edit: I’m linking to Kati’s May Slash the Stash party. Yay, stash!

Quickie baby present

Apr 252012

My auntie asked me to make a little ribbon blankie to help her with a last-minute baby present she was putting together for her friend, so I made this for her using a leftover bit from my mom’s minky blanket. I added the drawstring bag because it felt too dinky handing just a ribbon blankie over. I had wanted to make her a little stuffed bunny too, but ran out of time.

It’s a good thing that I at least made the extra bag — I keep telling my auntie not to pay me for things she asks me to make because she gives me so many things every time she sees me, but she didn’t listen and snuck $15 in the humongous bag of goodies she gave me when my family met up for bai saan this weekend, AND she also gave Cosmo a whole ton of birthday presents! I only spent $2 on ribbons, and everything else was stuff I already had! Ack!

My Preciousssss (bag)

Apr 232012

On Friday night, I suddenly really, really wanted a cross-body bag — the next day, we were going to Chuck E. Cheese for Cosmo’s third (as in the third time we were celebrating) birthday party, and while I like my tote bags, they do drive me nuts when I have to channel Quasimodo in order to keep a bag on my shoulder while bending over to pick up a kiddo. So cross-body bag it would be!

I wanted to make a bag like I Like Orange’s gorgeous one (Istillwant!), but I had no grommets. Curses! So I looked online for other bags to copy, and found this Nino Bossi convertible crossbody backpack. Ooh! I like 2-in-1 things — it makes me feel like I’m getting a deal. Yes, a deal for the free bag I’m making myself.

The exterior is a happy turquoise linen. I have to buy more! I copied the very slight curve at the bottom of the front flap; it’s probably not noticeable to anyone but me, though. I also added a key loop in the front pocket.

On the inside, I finally used my Alexander Henry owls. I bought it a while ago and would take it out occasionally to consider using it for someone else, but I always put it back because I didn’t want waste it on someone who might not think it was funny. Greedy! :> This print makes me laugh — I love how most of the owls look grouchy!

I wanted to be lazy and just box the corners, but it needed the separate bottom bit for the backpack convertibleness. The straps are super narrow because I only had small oval O-rings, but it turned out to be a good thing. I had forgotten to consider that the bag I was copying was made of stiff leather and able to hold its shape; when I originally tried to use my bag in the crossbody style, the whole thing would flop down and basically just hang from the bottom seam. Doh! Fortunately, the regular old split-ring keychain thingies I had were just wide enough to not fit through the O-rings, so I tacked them onto the straps just where they’d keep the bag up. Fixt!

I spent the weekend using my new (preciousss) bag as a backpack — it was great because I didn’t even notice it when I had to herd kiddies! The top flap is about three inches too short, and I really ought to have used stabilizer in the front pocket so that the button wouldn’t make the fabric bunch up, but I still love my happy bag! I’ll improve it if I ever make it for someone else; hopefully I’ll be able to decode my notes.

The Yazoo factory should be paying royalties to Pink Penguin Ltd.

Apr 162012

A couple of weeks ago, my mom asked for another bento bag — this time she wanted a black one to take out to fancy dinners. I asked what kind of fabric she wanted for the top bit, and she said she’d like something white and red. Gah… the color combination that makes the least happy is black, red, and white! But I told myself to suck it up, and a while later I sent my mom a whole bunch of links to red and white fabric and asked if she liked any of them. She poked around the stores whose links I sent, and said she also liked fabrics like these. Hey, those aren’t red and white!

I bought some of the not red and white fabric she said she liked and ended up making her one relatively sober bag (it’s mostly black!):

with mushrooms inside

… and one sillier bag with the not red fabric I was pretty sure she liked the most.

I really love the food fabric I used for the interior, but I don’t think anyone else in my family understand why I think it’s so cute. hehe.

I also made her a quickie grocery bag for the wrapping, but I didn’t get a picture of it because I finished it right before we went over to my parents’ house.

Speaking of which! (…because I used my new machine to make her grocery bag) I finally got my new machine and tried it out this weekend. It sews so fast; it’s crazy! I think it’s super cool, and I think I’m going to try quilting my Made in Cherry quilt this week. I tried it out for the first time at around midnight (since that’s when I sew) in my living room, but my living room table isn’t the most solid, and the machine kind of made our whole place vibrate. I tried putting it on a placemat, and then I tried using it on the floor, but I guess that didn’t help because my downstairs neighbor came up to tell me that she could hear a vibration… how embarrassing!

The next day, I moved it to the dining room table (which is very solid) and put a doubled-over (ugly) foam floor mat from Lowe’s under it, and it was much better. My husband went downstairs so that I could run the machine while he asked the neighbors to listen for it, and our neighbor said that they couldn’t hear it then, so yay! I’m so glad that our neighbor was so forthright to let me know right away when my machine was too loud (she was really nice about it), and also that my husband suggested that we let our neighbor know we were trying to fix the problem and then ask them to listen for it while I ran the machine (I wouldn’t have thought of that on my own). Everything works out so nicely when people just talk to each other! >_<

Edit: Linking to Keyka Lou’s weekly goal giveaway.

In which I am a Cheapie McCheaperson

Apr 092012

It’s another bagstravaganza!

I was taken by surprise last year at kiddie second Christmas Easter when all the grown-ups brought piles of goodies for the kids, and I was determined to be a good adult this year and have treats for my younger cousins. But I was also feeling a little poor, so I made bags that I hoped would be cute enough to distract from the fact that they were also a mite small. I could only fit a box of sidewalk chalk, a large box of Nerds, and a couple of little packets of SweetTarts in each… whoopsie!

These are all based on another wonderful Pink Penguin tutorial, except I made the bags all different heights and the bag handles longer. Cosmo’s was the smallest, and I accidentally only remembered to get him one Easter yummy, so I made him a love bird.

I used satin for the back and put little paper hearts in the pocket that said, “Mommy loves you,” “Daddy loves you,” and “Sunshine loves you.” He carried his chickie throughout the weekend, rubbing it against his cheek and taking the hearts out and “reading” them. It made me happy!

Oh, and here are some gratuitous shots of some bag interiors; since I wasn’t super chintzy and used nice fabric this time (sometimes when I make the kids bags, I just use osnaburg inside since I figure they won’t care), heh.

Oh, but back to the cousins’ Easter stuff — two of my younger cousins are too old to want toys and things, so I folded them little $10 baskets and put two little chocolate eggs in, which I forgot to take a picture of, but were awfully cute, if I do say so myself. And I’m sure they appreciated the money more than they would have little fabric bags, hah!

Edit: I’m linking to Amy’s Creative Side’s One Thing One Week Challenge and Keyka Lou’s weekly goal. This, along with

Zig zag tote

basted Made in Cherry quilt

… completes my challenge. Rawr!

Zakka Style Tote

Apr 062012

Since I’m a leetle bit addicted to making bags, I couldn’t resist making this week’s Zakka Style sewalong tote. I didn’t follow directions very well, though — the zig zags ended up awfully centered-looking, even though I could have sworn I made the panels different sizes. I left my bag a good bit floppier since I like it when my bags can streeetch to fit everything I cram in there.

I also made the handles differently (I can’t stand turning tubes), made the interior pocket a zip pocket, and only lazy-quilted the back.

This time, I took Linda‘s advice and put something in my tote before taking a picture. I think it helped! :}

Bags Less Loved

Mar 292012

I was in a weird shopping+crafting instant gratification mood, so I bought the Jane Market Bag pattern and whipped a couple up to see how they’d look. Everyone else’s are super cute, but mine came out dopey!

I made them both mostly out of fabric I didn’t choose myself; this one’s got a perfectly nice print that I won in the recent fugly fabric giveaway party, and the red painters’ canvas is from a giveaway from quite a while ago.

This yellow one has a piece of Heirloom that I got in a scrap pack. It’s pretty, but something about the way I put it together with the quilters’ linen makes it look kind of Hawaiian-print-ey.

I know these aren’t great, but I offered my mom one anyway because I figure you can never have too many reusable bags in your trunk, and these would be perfect for not caring how dirty they get. But my mom sent them back home without taking one! Wah! I ended up foisting them off on my aunty — she loves giving things away. heh. Someday I’ll try to make cuter Jane Market bags!

Quite a while ago, I made this big market tote to schlep the kids’ things between my house and my parents’. It’s nothing fancy — I used the hedgehogs because I had a huge piece of it and didn’t want to use my cuter fabric on something for the kids. I’m mean!

Here’s my February Sew Bee Joyful block! It’s from Modern Blocks. At first, I was going to make the double circle of flying geese that’s also in this book (I forget what it’s called now), but then I got lazy. :} I still have to make the siggy block, whoops!

Finally, I received this adoooorable Monsterz bundle that I won from Cloud 9 Fabrics. It’s so cute! I don’t want to unwrap it til I use it, but I know I’m going to make a quilt for my nephew Georgie who’s going to be born this year. Yay!

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