selvage cuff

I could have sworn I posted this project over the summer when I made it. When I put up the Waste Not, Want Not quilt I was going to reference this as my "starter project". A quick look at my archives and then my picassa account proved it didn't exist in blogland.

So here you are, the project I used to get my feet wet before starting the selvage quilt.

Like a lot of you who have accumulated a decent amount of selvages, but are afraid to just begin, I decided I should do something with less of a commitment.

A simple rectangle of muslin is the base (just as with the quilt blocks). This is where I played with how closely I could edgestitch my strips and how I wanted to balance plain and printed pieces. You can see on this project I chose to elimate any of the actual fabric print.

After the selvage piece was put together, it was sewn right sides together with another piece of muslin with an opening on one long side for turning. Do the usual thing - clip corners, turn the cuff right sides to, and press that baby flat. I closed the opening with two rows of edgestitching, added some vintage mother of pearl buttons and snaps for the closure.

My cuff measures 3" by 7 1/2" when laying flat. I'd suggest a narrower width for anyone wanting to make their own - 3" is too large not to take the widening of the forearm into account, so my cuff is tight on one edge. I also have a small wrist, so you'll probably want to add some length the other way.

A dear friend arrives tomorrow from Dallas. I'll be taking a little break to have some girl time with her.

a bunch of barrettes

I made these a few weeks ago and never got around to posting them:

They're a great way to use up ribbon scraps - each barrette only uses about 3" at most. The barette bases were bought at Hobby Lobby. The first picture has the kind with the spring hinge, the ones below are are the clip kind (you can see them better in the third picture). A little bit of adhesive like E6000 or Amazing Craft Goop on each end holds the ribbon in place. The ribbon is folded around to the back of the barrette about 1/4" on each end. To keep the glue from sealing the barrette shut, I clipped them onto wax paper while they dried.

Instructions for these can be found in Button It Up:

I think some of those liberty scraps on a covered button would be great for my hair.

trixie's party - more games

After some running around outside, the party moved indoors.

Tom Kitten's Button Hunt was next. This game was also adapted from the Peter Rabbit Party Book. I hid enough buttons in the living room for each child to find 2 or 3. Once found, they came to me for a ribbon to make a necklace. I used shank buttons for this because they were easiest to string on the ribbon quickly. Buttons with very large holes would also work.

Next up was a version of "Who Am I?" using the masks from the book instead of a card with a name held to your forehead. I put a mask on a guest while their eyes were closed. The other girls then gave clues as to what kind of animal she was. (Not even my kids would have known the actual names of each character. Peter Rabbit - yes. Johnny Town Mouse - doubtful.)

We had two other games ready to go, but ran out of time. Animal Noises would have the guests start by making the sound or using a word associated with their animal. The first child would say their sound, the next child says their sound and repeats the one before them, etc.

The other was a version of musical chairs. Instead of chairs, I had planned to put the play veggies on the ground (one less veggie than number of guests) and have the kids pick one up when the music stopped. (I'm a little relieved we didn't need this one. This game always seems to turn into a free-for-all or someone ends up crying.)

A little peek at the memory match game the girls played before everyone had arrived.

Tomorrow - goodie bags. And then I swear I'm done.

thrifty thursday

Had some luck earlier this week:

I grabbed this because I loved the pink plastic case. It was labeled as being filled with crochet cotton. When I got home and unpacked it, I was delighted to find about 20 balls of perle cotton - something I'll actually use. There was another unpleasant surprise as well. At the bottom was a melty chocolate caramel. Very little thread was damaged and it washed off the case easily. Such are the perils of thrifting.

They must have just received a donation of buttons because I can't imagine that these had been there very long(AND they were half price the day I was there!):

A few other goodies to round out the day's finds:

I need to drag out my vintage hankies and see if I have enough for a quilt at this point.

ready for blogher

I'm headed into the city today to see some of my favorite people and perhaps meet a few new favorites.

The last time I attended Blogher(okay, so I only attended the cocktail parties), I was woefully unprepared without business cards.

Not this time:

HUGE thanks to Kim for doing all the computer work for me AND printing them out on my cardstock. I didn't think it fair to ask her to sew all the buttons on and pink the edges as well.

like sorting buttons

There's a down side to having a great year of thrifting. Somehow it all needs to find a place to live once you get it home.

I returned home from vacation two weeks ago to piles and piles of things I've acquired over the past few months. Most had no place to go. Even with all the studio moves and reconfigurations I've gone through this year (which is why I've yet to post pictures), there just wasn't much room or a good system in place for new things. It seems I'd carve out enough space for what I had in the stash and then when I brought home new fabric I was back in the same boat.

Two things have happened over the past month. First, the kids have lost more space in the basement to my crafting. I really did feel some guilt over it at first. When they saw the pile of toys I was thinking of selling or donating though, not one of them flinched. Ellie and Glenn flat out told me to get rid of them. I then discovered that when I moved things out to make more room for crafting, they actually wanted to be down there with me a lot more. Amazing what a little room to breathe will do for a space.

Second, I purged my own toys, I mean fabric. Ruthlessly. Two large laundry baskets of fabric and a few other odds and ends have made their way to my quilting group for others to use. (One quilter's trash...) It seemed only fair to bring what I didn't need to the place where I've gotten so much.

That's left a lot of room for what I'll really use and some room to grow. Now that I think about it, that's where last week went - my basement - weeding, sorting, putting away.

That part of the process took a lot longer than I anticipated. How do you sort your stash? By fabric type, color, potential uses, amount of yardage? It starts out innocently enough, but there's always a pile that doesn't seem to fit into any particular category nicely. I've gone mostly with color, but even that threw me when I got to the odd greens - or are they more blue - or aqua? And what about this lavendar/periwinkle one? Do I put the solids in their own pile away from the prints? I think I've got something that will work for me in the end. More importantly, there's room at the top of each pile so I can get fabric out and put the pile back neatly. The key to keeping it organized isn't about shoving it away, it's about ease of retrieval.

The buttons are from the garage sale. Luckily, I already have a pretty good system in place for storing those. They're where they belong now.

thrifty, but not thursday

I have a backlog of things for Thrifty Thursday at this point. If one of the treasures involves sewing, I'm just going to start posting them when I finish the project.

Like this little doll bed-

The bed was found at the Salvation Army thrift store ages ago. I thought I'd give it to one of the girls for a birthday or Christmas, so I had it stored in the crawlspace. Then it seemed like a great thing for displaying my doll quilts at the art show, so I pulled it out. That got me thinking, if it's good for the show, I should just keep it out with my quilts on it to enjoy all the time. And hey, the girls won't appreciate it the way I will, so I'll just put it down in my studio. I'm sure a stuffed animal or two will soon find their way into it in the coming days.

Back to what I worked on - It needed a mattress for the show. The fabric and buttons are from my stash. It's not visible from the picture, but the mattress is about 2 inches deep. I did the corners the same way you'd box corners for a tote bag. It's stuffed with a thick poly batting leftover from another project. I think there are 4 layers of the batting stuffed in there. The buttons tie the mattress through the back and hold the batting in place.

This little guy doesn't even creep me out. His(her?) blue ears and legs match the polka dots perfectly.

Ellie has noticed that it matches her room. Nice try, kid. It's staying in the studio for now.

ellie's bulletin board

I hope I'm not the only mother who's kid has to hound her for 2 months to follow through on a promise. Ellie saved up her allowance and gift money to buy her own bulletin board. I got her all excited with the idea of gluing buttons out of her collection onto tacks like I did for her brother's bulletin board a few years ago. We picked out the buttons, discussed how to hang the board and then... nothing. Everytime she asked to move on the project I was in the middle of something. The answer was always "later".

Later finally got here. I can check this one off the to do list of house projects.

This picture was taken right after I put it up and arranged it all so she'd be surprised when she got home from school. She has since "fixed" the display. Tomorrow - pictures of her new obsession that this board now houses - door signage.