Swan Kitchen Towels

 

 

I'm a little ahead of the game on these.  They are kitchen towels that I plan to give to my mother for Mother's Day.  I noticed that my mother has started collecting swan-themed items, so I decided to make her some swan themed kitchen towels.  The quilted part that wraps around the oven door handle is made with swan fabric.

The quilted part was done using my long-arm quilter in a swirl pattern.  I quilted a piece of fabric that was about 7 inches by the width of the fabric then cut it down into 6-1/2 inch squares.  I rounded off the corners of the squares and then attached bias binding to make the equivalent of a potholder.  I then sewed the "potholder"  to the center of the kitchen towel, gathering in the towel to make it match the width of the potholder.  I then attached a button to the side opposite the loop and use the loop as a button hole.

The bias binding was cut at 1-1/4 inches wide, but I think I will try 1-1/2 inches next time.  I think that would be a little easier to work with.

Floral Twist bag

 

 

Yesterday and today I worked on making this little twist bag.  I made a similar bag for my granddaughter last year and I decided to make one for myself.  I don't often carry a purse, but when I do, I usually just want something to put my keys, wallet, and phone in.  I think this will be a nice size for that. 

I quilted the outer part of the bag on my regular domestic sewing machine in parallel lines.  The thread is Aurifil Bright Pink (#2425).

Since this one is for me and not intended to be inventory for my shop, I'm not going to count it toward my yearly goals.

Wizard Tote Bag

 

 

I made this bag today, from start to finish.  The wizard fabric is the same as the fabric in the bag I made for Ruthie, but the purple accent fabric is different.  This bag is also smaller than the one I made for Ruthie.  This one is my normal tote bag size, roughly 5 x 9-1/2 inches at the base and 14 inches tall.

I quilted the outer shell on my longarm in a spiral meander pattern, using Isacord thread in Sugar Plum (color #2912).  The batting was leftover 50/50 Bamboo Blend Happy Cloud batting from Fat Quarter Shop.

I made this just to be inventory for my imagined craft fair booth, that may or may not ever happen.  But it also fulfills one of my creativity goals for this year.

Running total of goals accomplished: 

1. Finish UFOs = 2 of 4
   
2. Use pre-cuts = 1 of 3
   
3. Do window paintings = 0 of 2
   
4. Do non-window painting = 1 of 1 (completed)
   
5. Sew sets of coasters = 5 of 5 (completed)
   
6. Sew small bags = 0 of 2
   
7. Sew tote bags= 1 of 2

Kitchen Towels

 

 

Earlier this year when my younger daughter was visiting, she saw a kitchen towel that I have which buttons onto the handle of the oven door.  She commented that she needed towels like that for her kitchen, because her toddler is always pulling the towels off, and they end up on the floor.  The one that I have was made with a hot pad and a towel sewn together.  When we were out in Washington, where she lives, I was going to make her some, but I couldn't find any towels and hot pads that I liked and thought would actually work in this application.  So I decided to use some left over quilting fabric and make little quilted hot pads (with regular batting, not heat resistant).  I think they turned out really cute. The way the towel is gathered where it is sewn to the hot pad, they almost look like little dresses.  Here are a couple of them hanging on my oven door.

 

I hope she likes them.  I hope that having them attached to the oven door doesn't upset my grandson too much either.  I'm sure he'll learn how to unbutton them pretty quickly if he really wants them down.  He's a real problem solver in situations like that.

Throwing Stars

 

Quite a while back my middle son, who will turn 33 on Friday, mentioned that he had would like some fabric (or yarn) Ninja throwing stars for him and his daughter to play with.  I hadn't thought about it since shortly after he mentioned it, but making the coasters reminded me.  So, for his birthday I decided to surprise him with some fabric throwing stars.

They are made from some scraps of fabric that were left over from making a quilt.  I used fabric that was quilted to batting (cut aways from having the quilt long-armed) and matching non-quilted fabric, using the same technique I used for making the coasters yesterday.  This time I cut them into little equilateral triangles using my triangle ruler (3 inches) and then sewed two completed triangles on top of each other.  

I think they make nice little throwing stars, and the process was much easier for me than the crocheted one that I've seen online.  I crochet a little, but not much and nothing fancy.

Fabric Coasters

 

Last night when we were Facetiming, my step-daughter mentioned that her one year old can't be allowed to get hold of their cork coasters because he bites them and takes chunks out of them.  (And he had done the same thing with a cork trivet from the table.)  So this morning I decided to use some of the fabric that was left over from making her wedding quilt to make some fabric coasters.  I made a set of 4.  They are quilted to the batting and then sewn to another square fabric and turned right-side out.  Then I sewed around the outside to close up the hole and stabilize them.

 

I'm not sure which side should be the "right" side of these.  On the set I made before the quilted side was definitely intended to be the right side.  But on these I think I might like the plain side better than the quilted side. The good thing is that they are completely reversible, so she can use them however she wants to.

Black & Gray Pot Holder

This is one of my UFO for this year.  The pieces are pretty small and I originally intended it to be more of an artsy piece, but then I really wasn't feeling it as art, so I made it into a pot holder.  It has both regular batting and insulated batting.  It is machine quilted in-the-ditch-ish around each of the little hourglass blocks.

Lots of little pieces, carefully sewn together to form a light to dark fade, now something to set hot dishes on.  Oh well, at least it is finished!

A New Purse for Camryn

My youngest son (who is 20 years old, btw) told my that his girlfriend said that she needed a new a purse.  I was wanting to make something for her, so I volunteered to make one for her. As far as I know it will be a surprise for her.  Her favorite color is green and she wears a lot of dark colors.  My son says that she will love it.  I hope so. 

New Cat toy

I made this cat toy a few months ago out of some scraps of left over quilted material.  You know, the edge that gets quilted by the long-armer that is just backing and batting.  I sewed it into a tube and stuffed it with plastic Walmart bags.  It took Cleopatra a while to warm up to it (as is the case with a lot of cat toys), but now she pounces on it, grabs it, and kicks it like crazy, which is exactly what I intended her do with it.

Scrappy pot holder

I needed something to work on today, so I made this scrappy little pot holder.  It is made from cut-away corners on my Moda quilt from last year.

I saved a lot of cut off corners from that quilt.  I'm not sure what all I will end up doing with the rest of them.

New quilted bag

I made this bag from fabric that I had in my stash.  It uses the same pattern as my Not Quite Giant Jellyroll Bag, except this time it is not giant and it doesn't even use 2-1/2 inch strips.  I also added a flap and button closure to make it more like a purse, which is my intended use for it.  I have to stop making bags with this pattern.  It really isn't fun.  I'm not sure why I decided to do it again.  Oh well, at least I have a new purse!

Pot holder swap

For our May meeting, my quilt quilt is having a pot holder swap.  Everyone is supposed to bring a homemade pot holder, and we are going to have some sort of creative way to swap them, not sure what that is going to entail.  I made mine out of an orphan block I had laying around.  It has a layer of regular quilt batting and a layer or Insul-bright inside to make it heat proof.

One of my quilting friends found a cute little picture on pinterest that says that there are no mistakes in quilting - only pot holders.  I think that is good idea!

Not Quite Giant Jellyroll Bag

Our project for this month's quilt guild meeting was the Giant Jellyroll bag from Shabby Fabrics.  We were told to go to the Shabby Fabrics website and print off the free pattern.  I did, but apparently, I didn't do it the correct way.  I clicked on "download free pattern" and it opened in the browser window.  From that window, I clicked "print."  It would seem that if you want the pattern to print at the correct size, you have to actually download the pattern and open it in Adobe.  Make sure it is set to 100% scale and then print.  So mine ended up a little less than "giant".  Not that it was really that big to begin with.  It would have been nice if it had been a bit bigger, like the original pattern, because I was making it for my daughter-in-law to use as a diaper bag, but I'm sure it will be fine.  Here is a picture of the inside with two nice, big pockets.

I think I might try again to make it with the right size pattern.  Not sure what fabrics I would use.  I think it would also be nice if you put pockets on the outside as well as the inside.  You wouldn't bother with jellyroll strips for the outside if you were doing it that way, though.  Unless you were going to cut the exterior pockets out of jellyroll strips.  That might work.  I would have to measure.

Valentine Place Mats

This month for our quilt guild project, we were supposed to make a heart table runner.  I didn't really want to make the table runner, because it was too big for the table that I use a table runner on.  So, instead of making a table runner I wouldn't actually use, I decided to use the elements of the table runner to make a couple of place mats.  I had to do a little figuring to translate it into place mats, but for me that is half (or maybe more than half) the fun.  The finished place mats are 13 inches by 16 inches.

I also did something new, for me, when it came to quilting them.  I free-motion quilted them using my regular home sewing machine.  I had never actually done that on a project before.  Anytime in the past, when I had tried it on a scrap, I always ended up with a snarled mess on the back of the fabric.  It has been a long time since I tried before, so I'm not sure what all I did differently this time.  But I didn't adjust the tension at all and I didn't drop the feed dogs.  I just put on the darning foot and quilted it.  I think it turned out looking really nice.  It isn't perfect or anything, but I like the way it looks.  You can see the quilting a little better in the picture below.

Christmas Stocking

Today I made a Christmas stocking for my new daughter-in-law.  I wanted her to have a stocking here at my house so that hopefully she will feel like part of the family.  Her's will be a little different from the guy's stockings, because theirs have white fleece at the top, but I don't think she will mind.  I don't know what happened to my white fleece. . .

Anyway, the stocking is made from poinsettia fabric with a solid green lining.  The top fabric is quilted to the batting.  Then the lining and outside fabrics were sewn together wrong-side out.  Then the whole thing was turned pillowcase style.