Ruffle Curtains

This cold has really been getting to me lately, and so I have spent more time sewing than on the computer, but today I have something super cute and girly to share with you! Pink ruffle curtains!!

My sweet neighbor is having a baby girl in a couple of months and is going all out on making the perfect nursery. I get to help her out. I made the curtains, some sheets, and changing table cover and a few other little things. But today I am sharing the curtains with you. Those of you on instagram have seen these already, but now I will tell you a little bit more about them!

I did a simple pocket rod top because then she could stick a curtain rod through it or use curtain clips to hang them. (and sorry for the bloated curtain look, it was so cold the day I took pictures and it seemed like my heater did not turn off!!)

For the bottom I did two larger ruffles and then one that was slightly smaller. They were super simple and easy! And then just folded over my hem and sewed them onto the curtain.

The hardest part was sewing the blackout liner into them! But I got it and they are done. But because she used regular fabric and not drapery fabric they are smaller than she wanted. So now she is trying to figure out how to have me make them bigger! We tried a ruffle on the side, but it just looks like an after thought! (which is what it was!) I am trying to convince her that a seam off to the side will not be that bad and will give the curtains the width that they need. We will see what I end up doing!

And here is the crib with the bedding that she got off Etsy, before she knew I could sew! Which is probably a good thing, because I do not like sewing bumper pads! I did them once for one of my kids and used those until my last one because I never wanted to do them again!! Ha!

I just love how girly and fun this room is! She has some turquoise accents throughout as well. As she finishes it up I will post the 'done' pictures!

On another note, I got my ombre quilt all cut out and most of it sewn together. I am starting to sew the rows together now! And I hope to start cutting for another quilt this weekend! I'll be sure to share pictures!

Enjoy and stay warm everyone!!

Teacher Gifts

Merry 'almost' Christmas! Today I am sharing with you my super cute zippered pouches that my kids gave their teachers. I have to say I am hooked on making these. They are so quick and easy and turn out great!!

This cute polka dot one I was a little bit frustrated with. I accidentally sewed the fabric I wanted to use on the outside as the lining. But it is still cute and gives the lining a nice surprise. I think because I was using an invisible zipper it threw me off.

Next is my Freshly Squeezed bag. I loved this fabric from the day it came out, and when I was going through my scraps I thought it would be perfect. And I even had a green zipper that went so well with it!

And for the inside I have this fun dot print.

And lastly is this super cute red and turquoise pouch. I really wanted to keep this one, but I told myself no. I might be making one for me in the near future. There is just something about those two colors that I love. Well really I just love anything turquoise!

I used a simple turquoise for the lining. And I used some of the labels I made on the inside!

I even got a little bit fancy on the wrapping. I shared this picture on Instagram. I used simple gold tissue paper and some ribbon and then a monogram letter I cut with the cricut. It added just the perfect touch!

And the pouches were a hit! My kids teachers could not believe that I made these. One of my boys even told his teacher that he thought I bought it! hahaha!

Now we are on the countdown, my kids are going through the house singing "there is only 2 days till Christmas" I think they might get sent outside here soon.

Enjoy!

DIY Fabric Labels

This past week things were crazy at my house. But Friday we found a new car, so hopefully things can be a little bit less crazy here. But with it being so close to Christmas, I am not sure! The other day while I was making up my zippered pouches for my kids teachers I had a great idea that I should put some labels in them! I even had this idea while there was still time to put them in without unpicking anything! That is pretty good right there!

But I browsed Pinterest looking for some good tutorials. I read a bunch, but just ended up kind of making up my own!

I took some freezer paper and ironed it to my fabric. Then I trimmed it down to 8.5x11, so that I could fit it in the printer. I wasn't terribly worried about how fancy it looked because I knew that I could iron it out later.

Then I designed my labels in photoshop and ran it through the printer. One worked beautifully and I was so excited that I ran another one through.

It was not as good - the wrinkles did prove to give me a little bit extra ink and I had to kind of feed it through the printer. But it still worked, I think that I will worry about the wrinkles next time and try to get a nice smooth one.

Then I ironed over the printing to help set the ink. I have not washed any of this yet so I do not know if they are washable or not.

I then cut apart the ones that I needed and sewed them with a zig zag stitch to the inside of my pouches and voila! They look great! And so much more professional now!

I've got these all finished up now, I shared a picture on Instagram the other day. Maybe I'll get a post written about them before I wrap them up!

One more thing I was able to cross off my list! I hope that you are all enjoying this wonderful time of year!

Enjoy!

Pokemon Quilt

I got my Pokemon Quilt all finished this week! And I got it washed and wrapped up and now it is sitting under the tree waiting until Christmas!

I love how this turned out. There is just enough Pokemon characters to make it a Pokemon quilt, but not too many that it can grow with my boy. Pokemon is not my favorite thing, so this gift is a huge deal - I think he has been asking for it for a couple of years now!

I stuck with bright colors to go with all the bright characters in Pokemon. I backed it with minky fabric because that seems to be the favorite of all my kids right now - and who doesn't love a nice soft warm quilt backing!? I used the same red and white stripe for the binding that I used on my super hero quilt.

I quilted it with straight lines, and I like how simple and nice it looks. It ended up being just larger than twin size.

My Pokemon fabric only gave me a couple of different characters to use, so we used all of them twice!

Now I am off to finished up some other Christmas presents and house cleaning because today our temperatures are supposed to make it to 3!! Too cold to go outside!

Enjoy!

Sharing over at Quilt story, Freshly Pieced, Crazy Mom Quilts, Confessions of a fabric addict, and I have to say.

Easy Zippered Pouch

I am in love with this pouch!! This has literally been sitting on my counter since this past weekend so that I could look at it! For those of you who follow me on Instagram, you saw my picture of it this weekend. Today I have some more pictures for you.

First off I have to say how easy this was! I got the tutorial from V&CO she is so talented and I love her simplistic style.

I picked up a fat quarter of this awesome keep calm fabric a month or so ago from my local quilt shop, and I pulled the turquoise out of my stash. I went and bought a specific zipper for this! I just love the way that the turquoise just pops off the black and white fabric!

Here is the inside - nothing fancy. I sewed the bottom seam with my machine because I am not a huge fan of hand sewing!

I have already cut out three more of these in various colors for my kids to give their teachers for Christmas this year! They are just a perfect size for almost anything. I am thinking I should make a bunch and clean off my sewing table!

I am hoping to get some more sewn on the other ones today, but I have cleaning to do and unfortunately car shopping!

Enjoy!

Patriotic Table Runner - Done!

This year I am trying to give the gift of handmade for Christmas. I already posted about the Happy Birthday banners that I gave most of my siblings. (I already gave it to them and some of their kids opened it - so it will not be a surprise!) Today I have a table runner that I am giving to my military neighbors. I have shared the top before, but now it is all done and fabulous!!

I have been practicing my free motion quilting - in hopes that someday I will have saved enough to buy a long arm! Here is is:

I made up the pattern off of something I saw on Pinterest. I didn't get my measurements quite right, but it still looks great I think! Here is a close of up one of the smaller stars. I did kind of a echoing star pattern on them.

I did the figure 8 motion on the stripes and kind of a wave pattern on the cream border.

On the back it looks a little crazy! But when will you see the back!?

Here is one of the two big navy squares. This is where the echoing star pattern looks really good. I started this and had to unpick half of it before I figured it out - not the funnest thing I did!

And then the pinwheel. I did a zig-zag kind of thing in the navy and then pebbles in the white and red parts. I really like the pebbles. They look great, but take a little while!!

And then one last view of this beautiful quilt before I wrap it all up to give to my neighbors!

Off to do some more sewing and crafting before the kids are on their Thanksgiving break!

Enjoy!

Patriotic Table Runner

I have been thinking about what to give to people this Christmas (I know it is only the end of August, but I need to get a head start, it makes me feel good.) and I just adore my neighbors here, they are so nice and kind and I know that they would help me with anything. This runner is for them, and I know it is a 4th of July kind of thing, but we are military and so 'Americana' is more of a household staple. I hope that they love this!

I saw a similar table runner on Pinterest, and made my own pattern based off of it and went digging through my scraps to see if I had enough to make one of my own. And I did and so we started!

This is what I have done so far:

And another view:

And yet one more, because why not?!

Here is a close up of my center star, I really kind of like how this turned out.

And then my flag blocks. These turned out to be a little bit harder then I thought, my math was not spot on, which is not good with quilting. But it still looks nice.

I have it all sewn together and the backing spray glued on, but I do not have any fabric for backing . . . I guess I will just have to go to the fabric store! and then decide how to quilt it!

Enjoy!

Boy Baby Blanket

If you have been following me for a while you know about my sister who I help out in finishing her quilts. She pieces the tops and then sends them to me for quilting. We really have quite the system!

Earlier this summer she whipped out quite a few baby blankets, some for friends and one for her. This one was for one of her friends. It is super cute and easy.

I did a simple all over pattern on it because she wanted a quick turn around - I should just live closer to her because then we would all be happy!!

I am sure that the new mom loved this blanket!

I am off to sew a little!

Enjoy!

Bias Tape Bag

As some of you know I live in the middle of nowhere. So middle of no where that the closest Walmart is around 100 miles away. This assignment is called 'remote', and boy is it ever! Which is why I have this project to share with you today.

About a month ago my daughter got invited to a birthday party. She was super excited because this does not happen all the time out here. I was too, until I realized that the party was next week, and we had already made our monthly trip to the big city! What were we going to do for a present?!

Sure there was a small little shop, but I have been in there and my budget does not always agree with them. It was then that I decided that I would have my daughter give a 'homemade' gift.

We picked a bag, because was pre-teen girl does not want a bag? After browsing through Pinterest I decided on the classic bias tape bag. I followed the instructions here, but I made it bigger because I did not like how long and narrow it looked.

It was so easy and I loved that!! I think it took me about an hour from start to finish! I just went through my stash of fabric and picked fabrics that I liked and would work well. The pink is a heavier fabric, so that worked out great, and you cannot see it, but I lined it with yellow satin. That just adds to the greatness of this bag!

This is the bag before we added a little 'more'. It just was kind of boring as my daughter said.

What better then some classic rosettes to make this a little nicer and more girly?! Add a few buttons and they are beautiful!

And doesn't that just do the trick nicely? I loved how it turned out!

My daughter loved it so much she requested one for herself!

The best part of this story is that my daughters friend just about died when she got it. Her mom later came over and told me that she loved the bag so much, and her older sister was jealous! Win for mom!

Enjoy!

linking up to the parties listed in my tab at the top.

Baby Life Quilt

My dear sweet SIL is having a baby this fall and I wanted to make her a quilt - because I never got to it for her first one! When we were last visiting with them I asked her what kind of quilt she wanted.

Because she is a fellow pinterest lover it did not take her too long to figure out what she wanted: the baby life quilt that has been all over pinterest.

I was excited to make this because I loved it and have wanted to make one for a while now and she gave me the opportunity!

She picked all of the colors and I used my cricut to cut out the words. I ironed them on with heat'n'bond, but I also sewed around them because some of my other projects that I used heat'n'bond did not really stand up well in multiple washes. And with this being a baby blanket I knew that it would get washed and washed and washed some more!

The yellow does not show up really well in pictures, but it looks great in person!

And here you can see my stellar sewing around the letters -

And here it is all wrapped up and ready to go. I have actually mailed this already and she got it and loved it! Which is super important!

Now I just hope that we get to make it out there in a couple of months and get to see her and her new little boy!

Enjoy!