Sewing – Page 12 – The Craft Room

Kids Clothes Week June 2015

Last week was Kid’s Clothes Week, and I managed to keep up with sewing an hour a day to make a t-shirt for both boys.

I used two Fishsticks Designs patterns. For the small one, the 18-24 month size lap tee from the Wee Tot Collection. I was expecting the envelope neck to be much trickier than it actually was – I thought it was actually much simpler than an ordinary round neck as you sew onto two straight edges instead of a round one.

I used a pale blue jersey with a giraffe print with white ribbing round the neck.

For the big one I made the size 6 from the Charlie Tee and Hoodie Pattern. I used a red and blue stripes jersey with black ribbing for the neck.

They both turned out pretty well and have already been worn a couple of times.

The sizes seem a good fit, so I think I’ll be making some more for both of them 🙂

I’m linking up with And Sew We Craft Together

Personalised Notebook Covers

Next week is the last week of the school year here, before the long summer holidays. So I have been making presents for W’s teachers.

I decided upon notebook covers, thinking that they seemed like nice, quick and simple things to make. Nice – yes, they do look nice. Quick – no, they took me about a week. Simple – not at all, the first one was unpicked and redone three times!

Luckily you can’t tell that it was unpicked so many times now it’s finished.

I was following a pattern. The pattern and I did not get on. I stamped my feet and complained a lot that the pattern did not work, and then went back to the beginning and reread to make sure I wasn’t being stupid and missing something obvious. But no, it wasn’t me, and I was never going to end up with the finished cover I wanted by sticking to it, so I ended up abandoning it and trawling the internet looking for different techniques that other people had used.

Finally I same across a tutorial on a blog called Stitch by Stitch, which reading through I could see exactly how it would work, and from then on the job got a whole lot easier!

I pieced the outer cover fabric together to give them the solid red spine. This allowed me to embroider the names onto them where they could be easily read.

They do look very pretty now they are finished, and they’re even finished with a week to spare! W has given his approval, so hopefully his teachers will like them too 🙂

Cuddly Baby Quilt

I completed my June goal! (I was #17 on the link up). And even better, it’s only the 9th – it didn’t take me as long as I was expecting.

It is a simple patchwork square design, and came together quickly as the squares are six inches once sewn together.

They are a mixture of materials – some of the prints are cotton, the green squares are minky and the dot fabric is flannel.

I did simple straight line quilting equal distance from each side of the seams.

It is backed in the dotty flannel, and is turned and topstitched rather than being bound.

I think it looks pretty, and will make a great new baby present 🙂

I’m linking up with Sew Cute Tuesday over on Blossom Heart Quilts.

Doctor Who Backpack

What young Dr Who fan wouldn’t want their own Dr Who backpack? Certainly not this one!

When I saw this Dr Who fabric it was crying out to be made into a backpack, and it came together quite quickly. It is a pattern that I have used before, when I made the blue monkey backpack, using the preschool backpack pattern by Pattern Play.

The main outer of the backpack is a TARDIS print, with a Dalek print for the bag and pocket flaps. The lower pocket, lining and straps are all a plain black cotton.

It’s a good pattern for using novelty prints, as you don’t need huge amounts of them to make a reasonable sized bag. As a children’s bag it’s not huge, it’ll just about fit an A4 sized book in the interior and has four small car/crayon slots under the outside pocket flap and two slip pockets behind the outer pocket. I started with a half metre of the TARDIS print and a fat quarter of the Daleks, and have a small amount of each left over.

The straps are adjusted with two D-rings on either side, and both the main bag and front pocket are fastened using velcro.

I particularly like the piping around the bag flap which I did in black.

I really like this bag. It’s certainly very cool!!

I’m linking up with And Sew We Craft Together

A Lovely Year of Finishes 2015 – June Plans

The idea is that during the first week of the month we make our plans for what we intend to finish, and during the last week of the month we show off our finished items.

This month I want to finish a quilt kit that I got for Christmas about 3 years ago! I never got very far with it and it’s been on my ‘to finish’ pile ever since.

I’m looking forward to it being finished by the end of the month!

Patchwork Minky Playmat

This playmat has been a long time in the making! I started it last year, and every time I thought “I’ll finish it this month,” it never seemed to happen. But finally it’s done, and I’m so pleased with how it turned out!

It is made from 62 minky squares in seven different colours/prints, and one rectangle with an embroidered name.

I’m no good with random, so I organised the different colours and prints so that mostly there was the same one at either end of a row and all the rest in that row were different, and so that there was none of the same colour touching.

Cutting the squares took up quite a bit of time. Sewing the rows was fairly quick. When the top was done I thought “it’s nearly finished!” but that was in about February, so completing the top was clearly not as near the finish as I thought!

I had a large piece of minky dimple dot that I wanted to use for the back, but when I came to use it I found that it was not big enough. All of the rest of the minky pieces I had were shorter than the width of the blanket, so strips of those wasn’t an option either. I solved the dilemma by creating stripes diagonally. It makes for an interesting back panel:

Quilting two layers of minky is not at all fun! It has a mind of its own and doesn’t want to play along, but after a lot of unpicking I finally showed it who was boss! I used straight lines either sides of all the seams.

It seemed obvious to bind the blanket with minky since that’s what all the rest was made with. I can safely say that I won’t be doing that again anytime soon! Trying to sew it down by hand is very much like crocheting with furry or eyelash yarn – you can’t see what you’re doing. It took me a whole week to finish the binding.

Somebody tried to grab a hold of it before the binding was all finished because it’s all soft and snuggly:

But finally it’s finished – hooray!

And the mini one is getting lots of use out of it. He likes to sit and play on it 🙂

I’m linking up with And Sew We Craft Together

Bag of the Month 2015 – January

This year I signed up to the Bag of the Month Club, where you receive a new bag sewing pattern every month from January to June. The bags from last years club looked really good and I thought it would be a way to try out patterns that I possibly wouldn’t have chosen had I seen them beforehand.

January’s bag was called the Companion Carpet Bag, designed by Sewing Patterns by Mrs H. I did actually start it in January, but saved it for my sister’s birthday in March, and then we went away for a month, and somehow the photos have only just made their way from the camera and onto the laptop ready to be uploaded!

I chose an upholstery weight spotty fabric to make it in that has been in the cupboard for several years waiting to be made into something. There is a layer of fleece inside to give it shape which I quilted in place first. It is lined with cotton and contains a layer of plastic canvas at the bottom to make a rigid base.

The handles are leather and were bought ready made. I sewed them on by hand with extra strong black thread.

I like the frame that is the main feature of this bag. It opens so you can see everything inside. It stays open when you open it, and stays closed when it’s shut! It was actually a lot easier to install than I was expecting, although it did take two of us to hold it and screw the little screws back in once we’d slotted it into the channel!

On the bottom are 4 bag feet. I’m not convinced that they do a lot, but they do make it look quite nice.

I think it turned out well and my sister was pleased with it 🙂

Now just to finish the rest of the bags!

I’m linking up with And Sew We Craft Together

Hedgehog Cushion

Following the success of my Dalek cushion, I decided to also make a cushion for my brother’s birthday.

When I read about the Hazel hedgehog quilt along on gnomeangel.com is sounded like the perfect idea to use for a cushion, especially since my brother has spiky hair like a hedgehog!

I didn’t finish my cushion in time to link up with the QAL, but did finish it in time for his birthday.

The cushion inner is an ikea one, which is larger than a standard cushion, and just the right side to fit two hedgehogs side by side.

The pattern is the Hazel Hedgehog pattern by Elizabeth Hartman. I used shades of blue and teal with a cream background to match the sofa in my brother’s living room.

To quilt it I outlined each hedgehog, and then continued outlining at regular intervals until I reached the edge.

The cushion was a hit, and is now living on my brother’s sofa 🙂

I really enjoyed making the hedgehogs. They are easy to make and look really effective in three colours, so I may have to try making some more in the future. Maybe enough to make a hedgehog quilt!

I’m linking up with And Sew We Craft Together

A Lovely Year of Finishes 2015 – March Plans

So the idea is that during the first week of the month we make our plans for what we intend to finish, and during the last week of the month we show off our finished items.

However, February’s plans didn’t go so well. I think I was perhaps a bit overambitious!

I started the month with this:

And planned to finish it by the end of the month.

I got a lot further than I probably would have if I hadn’t been working towards this as a goal, but it wasn’t finished in the month. The top is completed, but the back needs piecing, it needs quilting and it needs binding.

At the moment it looks like this:

I am pleased with how it’s looking and think it will look great when it is finished. So I am carrying over the same plan to this month. To complete my baby blanket. Hopefully this is the month it will be finished!

Dr Who Dalek Cushion

About 18 months ago I bought a selection of blue and grey fabrics to make a Christmas present for my husband:

I ran out of time to make it then, and then we moved and had a baby …

But it finally got made and he got it for his birthday last month!

We are big Dr Who fans in our house, and when I saw the Dr Who patterns by Whims and Fancies I knew that that was what I wanted to make.

I chose the Dalek pattern. It was more complicated than any of the paper piecing patterns I’d followed before, with 19 sections to make and then join together. But I did it, and a Dalek was made:

The final step was to turn it into a cushion.

The cushion insert is one from ikea, which is a nice big 50cm square – much smaller and the picture would start to get lost in the curves to the edges.

I had some Dr Who print fabric that I had left from making shorts a while ago, and that was perfect to border the Dalek picture:

The back is a simple envelope opening, also in the Dr Who print:

He’s very pleased with his cushion and it’s now sitting on our sofa 🙂

I’m linking up with And Sew We Craft Together