String-Pieced Crib Quilt Tutorial

I hope you all are okay today. I'm feeling blue, to be honest, so I thought I'd show off this blue quilt today. I posted the full step-by-step tutorial on how to make it over at Sewing Machines Plus, check it out: Blue Baby Crib Quilt Tutorial.  This quilt was a lot of fun to make while I waited for a special little boy to be born.  It doesn't have to be blue, of course; make it in whatever colors you like best.

Grandmother's Quilts

For Mother's Day, today, I gave my mother and Mr. Green's mother baby quilts that I made from blocks left by their mamas.  Both of these dear grandmothers left a small stack of pieced blocks, and last year they were given to me.  So I arranged and sewed together the blocks, and because in both cases there were less than enough blocks for a whole quilt, I added borders. 

My husband's grandmother hand sewed the blocks in the quilt pictured above.  I used the machine to sew them together and quilt it.  I just love the pink, blue, and red color scheme, which is one I never would have thought to use.  I didn't have enough of one binding for the whole quilt, and so I improvised using two blues! 

The blue striped border continues around all four sides on this quilt.  The blocks in the middle of this one were made by my great great grandmother, who was also my mama's "mother," through adoption.  She passed away many years ago.  When my mother gave me her quilting things recently and I saw these blocks, memories came flooding back.  The fabric and color choices in this quilt could have only been chosen by her!  I can remember seeing her hanging out laundry wearing a dress made from one of these fabrics.

I keep calling these grandmother quilts because they were started by grandmothers and I gave them to grandmothers, for holding new grandchildren.  I made a bit of a mess in the quilting of these, as I always do- I love making patchwork, but not quilting as much.  They turned out just fine, though, really.  Both our mothers seemed pleased, and I feel pleased as punch to have finished these projects which were started by others so many years ago.

I hope all of you who are mothers have had an amazing mother's day this year!

Sew Soft Toy Blocks and Upcycle Baby Clothes

Please visit Associated Content to read my tutorial for keepsake baby blocks.  I make my soft baby blocks differently by repurposing pieces of sweet baby clothes.  Cute appliques make cute blocks, but using premade appliques from baby's clothes helps this project to make up super quick.

These are great for stacking and safe throwing.  I think this is a cute way to upcycle and repurpose baby clothes that have been outgrown, stained, or ruined.  They make great nursery decorations, too.  These blocks are also a little addictive to make; my baby has a huge set of these because I am always coming across cute appliques and wanting to make just one or two more.  Please read my tutorial and make some for a child you love!  There are instructions included on how to get the jingle bell inside to jingle properly and not be muffled by the stuffing, as well as how to successfully make these using knit fabrics from baby onesies.

Thank you for reading my work at AC!  I hope you enjoy this project as much as I do, and I hope the toys you make are played with and loved as well as our set!  Happy Sewing!

Ideas for Easy Gifts to Sew for Everyone on your list

If you are looking for ideas for gifts to sew, you will find lots of ideas in my sidebar here.

Please also read my article at Yahoo, Easy Gifts to Sew for Everyone.  There are more ideas there, as well as a very important link...if you do not yet know about the handmade holidays series that has been running all November for the past four years at SewMamaSew, then you will absolutely want to visit the link at the bottom of that article for scores of amazing gift ideas.

I am excited that yahoo just sent me an email to let me know that I have been accepted as a featured crafting contributor at Associated Content, so there will soon be many more crafting articles written by me on that site. I will still be sharing lots of ideas here, too, of course.  Here is the link to my contributor page  at Associated Content.  You can subscribe and be emailed whenever my new articles are published, and I would very much appreciate your readership there as well as here!

I am uber busy preparing for my first ever arts and craft booth at a local country Christmas fair this weekend, but I have a new tutorial for a sweet upcycled kid gift that should be posted here very soon, as well as other ideas to share.

In the meantime, Happy Sewing!

Easy Baby Jacket to Sew: Another One-Yard Wonders Project

The Baby Fly Away Jacket in the One Yard Wonders book caught my attention when I first looked through this book.  I knew I would be making at least one of these cute jackets, and now that I have, I predict I will make more.

This is a super easy project that makes up in just minutes.  The directions in the book call for one layer of flannel, and then using bias tape to bind all the raw edges.  Which will work beautifully, I am sure.

But I decided to skip the bias tape and make this little jacket lined and reversible instead:

To make this jacket this way, all you have to do is cut and sew 2, instead of one.  Then place them right sides together and sew a narrow seam allowance all around the sides, neck, and bottom, leaving an opening for turning.  Clip your seams, notching around the curves, turn, press, and then close the opening and top stitch all around.  Then you just fold under the raw sleeve edges on both sides (together) and top stitch these down.  and Voila! This works out even easier than the original instructions of using bias tape, in my opinion.  Next I want to try to enlarge this and make one for my toddler, and add a hood.

I must have made more than a dozen projects from this awesome book by now, and I will make many more.  Here are some I have shown on this blog already:
casserole cozies
the Folklore Bag
Ladies Jammies

I thought I had posted the bias skirt as well; I have made half a dozen or more of these skirts and this is my favorite pattern in this book so far.  I will go and photograph my most favorite one and post that next.

If you don't have it yet, you really should buy this book now!
Happy Sewing!

Gift Idea: Soft Balls for Baby

I am working on a tutorial for ya'll; I plan for it to be up later today.  But it has been too long since my last post, so I thought I would share some links for this gift idea.

Here is the first soft ball I made:

I made this by cutting 12 pentagon shapes with 2 inch sides.  You just choose one to use as the middle and sew 5 other pieces to that, one along each side.  Then repeat, and sew these two halves together, turn, and stuff.  I like to add a jingle bell, encased inside a small plastic container (like the capsules that hold vending machine toys, or a small plastic easter egg, taped closed).

After I made this "soccer ball" type soft toy, I found a different pattern at  Grand Revival.  This page includes patterns for making three different sized balls.  The first ones I made were from felt, which I do not recommend.  These balls will be played with a lot, and the felt gets pilly and kindof yucky.  You can see that in this picture of the balls I made last year:

So, now I make these balls from regular cotton fabrics, and they turn out much nicer.  Like I said, I like to add a jingle bell inside and also ribbon tags for grabbing:

Another thing I have done with these balls is add an applique.  This is a photo taken before I had a digital camera, and I hesitate to post it because it is so bad, but it might inspire you to add something cute to the balls you will make:

So that should give you some ideas for cute baby or toddler gifts.  I also found another cute way to make a soft ball that might be even better for a younger baby; this one has lots of places for a little baby to grab.  I haven't made one like this yet, so I don't have pictures to show you.  But there are pictures along with the tutorial for sewing this kind of soft ball at the Daily Skein.

Like I said, this is just a bonus post of sorts, while we wait on the next tutorial from me.  I hope it will be up in a few hours.  Until then, happy sewing!

Favorite Scrap Sewing Project: Baby's Soft Book of Colors

I want to feature this soft book of colors to kick off the month.  This was my favorite gift I made last year, and I loved making it so much that I had to make more.  This is really a fun gift to make!

This is perfect for any baby on your list, from the not yet born to the toddler set.  I promise you will love making this and the book will be well loved.

 This tutorial is well done and made by a brilliantly talented mama named Jazmin.  Here is her tutorial at Homegrown Happy.

 Here is the first one I made:

I made the back cover brown for my son.  I have made a pink back page when giving this to a girl.

Like I said, this was definitely the best gift I had yet made and I know you will be glad if you make one too.
I promise you will enjoy it!