Sewing roll

On Wednesday we had our Christmas buffet in our patchwork group, Golden Lion Quilters.

The "festivities" are kept simple and include a raffle, where we all get a piece of fabric, and we exchange a secret present. They are all put in a bag and we pick one.

This is what I made, and Yvonne picked it up, as well as a tin box for buttons.

 I made a sewing roll and you can find the patttern here, on All People Quilt's website. The paper is on the left side of the photo.

 I didn't have time to add the embroidery or the flowers in fabric. I kept the design simple.
I was hoping to add some ribbon but found nothing suitable in my little stock.

 There are 4 pockets, 3 small and one bigger, and I added a needle holder piece.
You can see that the bigger pocket could easily be embellished.

And as its name indicates, you can roll it up to carry your sewing necessities.
The pattern was so easy that I am considering making another one for myself, using different fabrics. We'll see.

Enjoy your sewing, maybe you are finishing some Christmas present.

Pascale.

Christmas sewing present

I know I am late, but I would still like to wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
We spent 10 days in France after a long journey in the snow, we just had to take our time to drive slowly to Paris.
Now we are back and the house is starting to look tidier, I can show you some presents I made and received. First today will be the little sewing kit I made for my nearly God Daughter ( she is my husband's but on my side, just a question of how many sisters the parents have ). She is 8 years old and lives in France, and her mum told me that they had done some knitting together.
In the process I made a needle holder for DD3, she loves it and I have more photos of that one than the other, pink one.

This needle holder is a model from Tilda

This is the pink needle holder

Here you have the kit for my niece with a zip closing case, the needle holder and a pin cushion.

 I forgot to take a photo of all the things we put inside like scissors, pins, needles and a thimble.

I also made this pincushion in the shape of a strawberry. At least it is supposed to be a strawberry, but one of my girls thinks it looks like a radish !
Next time I'll show you the little bag kits we prepared.

Old sewing notions

My grandfather worked in the textile industry. See it's not my fault if I love everything related to fabric, it must be in the blood. And I found these in my grandmother's sewing supplies.

I loved them both dearly but sadly they left us a few years ago.

Under the brown paper from Coats, are reels of thread. I didn't open them to check the state of the cotton, because I think they look so much better like this, with the tie around.

And then there were these books of buttons. Some were used by Bonne Maman, probably on some clothes for my Mum and Aunt.

Sorry it's all in french, but I am sure that you can catch the spirit of the time, just looking at these.

Sunbonnet Sue needle holder

I found this tutorial in french on the Frimousse's blog here, and as it doesn't take long to make, I had a go one afternoon.

So it was one quick project but I am not sure it looks finished enough. Maybe I could try again with some thicker cardboard, and with sewing the edges instead of applying glue. But then of course it wouldn't be a quick project any more.

I drew the pattern freehand, as I couldn't find one on the tutorial.

There are 3 pieces of cardboard, cut twice. Two the whole size, two of the head alone, and two of the dress, without the feet. Each is in a thicker cardboard, and one thinner.

Tell me what you think, especially if you try this project.

Secret Santa

This year for the first year, I am taking part in the Secret Santa swap with BQL. I have received my parcel, and it is waiting neatly, still in the envelope.

On Friday I sent my own parcel and am allowed to show its content, without revealing who will receive it.

I embroidered the front of the needle holder with a design found on Cynderberry Stitches by Natalie Lymer called "Sweet and spotty Needle Wallet". If you look on the website there is a free download of this project in the column on the right.

The pin cushion is made with 2 squares sewn in a strange way.

You start with one corner sewn on the middle of the side of the other square. You keep going like this all the way around. I then added a button in the middle.

The 6 fabric coasters you have seen before in a post.

Little hens

I have seen this design many times on the net, even a video on Quilters TV.com, and I wanted to try it.

Our quilting group theme was log cabin, and I knew what to do with my little blocks.

There are 2 log cabin blocks, the center of the block is 1"square finished and the logs are 1/2" wide around it. The finished block measures 4" plus the seam allowance.

Then you need to prepare:

- the beak of the hen (I used a 2"square of fabric folded on the diagonals),

- the comb (draw the shape on paper, put it over the fabric doubled and sew around. Cut around with 1/8" seam allowance and dent the round parts, turn around),

-and the tail (same technique as for the comb).

Place the beak and the comb on the right side of a block, seam allowances aligned, on the light part of the log cabin for me. I did a quick seam to maintain them in place, hidden in the seam allowance.

Put the other log cabin block right sides together against the first one, pin and sew around 3 sides that will be the back, the front and the belly of the hen. Leave a gap on the belly to turn your hen out.

Then pin the tail inside the hen, centered on the seam, you are giving your hen its shape. You open the hen bit that is not sewn, and move the seams you have just made so that they are opposite each other. Sew across as on the photo.

Now you just need to turn you hen the right way out, and sew some eyes if you want to make it safe to be used by children, or sew some buttons if you want a bigger effect.

This hen can be used as a toy or as a pincushion.

It was so easy and nice, I made another one straight away.

My sister's sewing purse

Now that she has received it I can show you my sister's present. I made her a little purse for all her sewing things. The fabric is from Kaffe Fassett, and I quilted around each little circle, the design of the zippered purse is from this book from Tilda.

Then I made her a little pincushion, 2 circles sewn together and some embroidery thread to perfect the shape.

The needle holder comes from another book from Tilda, and in fact I have made 2 now

One is closed with one of the fimo buttons I made a little while ago, the other is closed with a popper, and is for my niece.

I must explain here that after I prepared all this for Marianne, she rang me to say her daughter, my god-daughter would like to receive a sewing kit, and she thought it would be a good idea if I made her one as she had seen us sewing together. I was just stopping myself from laughing on the phone. So I kept my secret and made another pouch, but it was way too big (I'll keep it for another post or this will be too long).

So there are 2 needle holders, and then I bought some ribbon and with my sewing machine I embroidered their names on it and attached them to the scissors.

You can see the name Aurore on the red scissors. I also bought some very cute felt for her to play with, she is only 7.

They both received some needles, pins and a measuring tape, plus some pink thread, fabric and ribbon for my niece. I think they both loved it, and I had great fun making all this.