More Sewing

What does a girl do while listening to the new Madonna CD-Hard Candy? Well she sews up some funky pillows for the front porch.


I just played around with the cutting strips and sewing them together, my first attempt can be seen below. The fabric was in the stash.



The fabric is the same fabric used for the lining in Neighbor girl's bag:




No you aren't having an acid trip! This is my second pillow and aren't those fabrics just wild?

The rainbow fabric makes me smile. I want to cover everything I own with it.

These pillows will be on the porch. I don't expect them to last very long but they are good practice and I enjoyed making them. I never thought I'd say I enjoyed anything about sewing.

This and That

Here, finally, is the Neighbor Girl Bag. The picture as is expected is not a good one. It is a clickable image but beware, my photo editing software is misbehaving so it will be huge! The bag is sewn with the seams to the outside and are supposed to unravel and fuzz out. I ran it through the wash twice, and hope it continues to unravel so it looks more like it's pricey counterparts.


When I call my friend Andrea, her ringtone for me is the theme to Sanford & Son. The reason for that is the spousal unit. At the time we married I had no idea he would be a primo dumpster diver, but over the last couple of years he has wandered home with some amazing "trash". A perfectly good patio table, four patio chairs, wicker and wicker and more wicker that we have often gotten two year's more use out of, but was deemed old and unworthy by it's previous owner. We use them til our butts fall through the seats. So Friday night I get this email from Andrea and it's about a major yard sale, guy bought out a sewing store. Saturday morning the Spousal Unit and I wander over, I find a few small cuts of fabric and buy those and we move on. The guy just had too much stuff and I wasn't looking for anything other than fabrics that have a vintagey feel to them and I was hoping to score some of that great 70s acrylic yarn. Anyway on the way home we see a yard sale sign off the highway. We decide to check it out, what a great decision. We scored the couch seen below, also in a blur but it's possible that blur is caused by haze of dog hair floating around my house not my lack of photography skilz:




They had it priced at $100. We debated, we sat on it, Andrea showed up, said "You guys should make an offer." I had $50 so the Spousal Unit asks, "Will you take $50 for the couch?" The seller says "YES!" Sold. Our problem, our truck is broken and it wouldn't fit in the back of Andrea's car, oh yes, we tried. Andrea offered up the use of her truck so we paid for the couch and told them we'd be back in a hour with a truck. Our dog chewed sectional is now biding it's time in the garage waiting for a trip to waste management. This morning the pillows you see along the back were strategically stacked, I called the Spousal Unit and asked, "Do we have poltergeists or did you put those pillows on the couch that way?" He answered that yes he did it and it was to keep the dogs out of his spot.

The wall behind the couch, along with the rest of the living room, will be yellow in the not to distant future. I've lived with all the tropical colors I can bear(bare?) for a while.

The Spousal Unit called me Monday morning from Destin, said he saw our couch in a shop there for $850. I think we totally rocked the garage sale for once.

A Tale of Two Bags

The little girl next door wanted a bag like her friend's. They are sold at this ridiculously expensive boutique in my little hick town. I see her friend's bag and say, "Oh I bet I can make you one of those!" I open my mouth and these lies just start spewing out. What is up with that?

Anyway, I ponder the bag for over three weeks hoping neighbor girl will forget or her mom will give in and buy her one(like that's going to happen). Anyway, I finally let neighbor girl go through my fabric stash and choose what she likes. I take another day or two searching for the rotary cutter and looking for anything that might resemble instructions online. It's a simple patchwork bag, seams sewn to the outside, if anyone can sew something "wrong" it should be me.

One night I suck it up, I start cutting six inch squares, I apparently don't have a five inch square and since precision is not my strong point, I opt to make the squares a little larger than necessary, because I'm like, totally lazy. Anyway, I cut, I lay them out, I rearrange, I find my sewing machine guide, I fill a bobbin, I thread the machine. I rethread the machine four times before I get it right. I attach my patchwork foot. I start to sew. In less than an hour I have the bag put together. I hand it off to my friend Pam who is going to do the lining and the handles because that is beyond my level of skill. I started to right "skilty". Isn't that what Aragon says when he tries to heal Frodo from the Ring Wraith's blade? I'm still not sure it's a real word.

Anyway, Pam came through big time for me and neighbor girl. Here's a close up the button, Pam had it in her stash. Friends with eclectic stash collections are just the best aren't they?


Here's the lining--Pam you totally rock:

Whoops! I'm missing a pic of the finished bag! Blogger is not cooperating when I try to add it, I'll keep you guessing and you can see it tomorrow!

But I did make another bag because I'm like this master sewer now. I had some five inch charm squares in the stash. These are from the Nell's Flower Shop collection by Blackbird Designs for Moda. I love these fabrics. This bag is for my friend Pam because she deserves it, not that anyone should necessarily be deserving of my sewing skills, but I did my best, pressed my work. I found the iron, under a pile of Rolling Stone and Martha Stewart magazines, isn't that where everyone keeps their iron?

After spending a good bit of time checking out the instructions for lining a bag in my Sew Easy, Sew Fast book, and looking for more directions online, and getting really frustrated last night, this morning I called Pam and asked if she could walk me through that whole lining a bag thing. She said "Sure bring it over, I'll help." I said, "I can't really do that, this is something for you! Surprise!" She said, "Bring it over, I'LL HELP!" I did and she made the lining for her own gift. I know I totally suck, but on the positive side, she loves the fabrics and they were a surprise to her, I never showed her my little collection of charm squares so it was a surprise.

Tune in tomorrow for a picture of neighbor girl's bag!

Thanks Y'all!

Thank you for all the notes and emails about my dad. They were all appreciated more than you know.



If you read my friend Sharon's Blog this little biscornu will look familiar. I went to my mailbox one day last week and found the frogs. I am deeply in love with these guys. They have beads on their toes. Frogs with bling. Sharon ROCKS! I am so honored to be the recipient of these guys. Thanks Sharon--for so many things but most of all for being my friend.



Here's the back:

It's overcast here, of course I post no pictures for ages and the first day we get rain I decide it's the perfect time for a photo shoot. The spousal unit is probably correct that I really don't need a Hasselblad camera. I'm kind of obsessing over one right now. Ashton Kutchner humping Nikon has really put me off wanting a D80 Nikon now. I know I'm weird.

Some stitching has been going on:

Above you see part of page 10 and part of page 11 of HAED Dark Waters based on the artwork of Selena Fenech. And below you see how the table looked right behind the stitching. Crystal will not move and she hisses when you try to move her yourself. I left her alone and just propped the Q-snaps on the cat. Whatever works right?

Chick With No Skilz

That would be me. I thought zigzaging around some wave borders for my Just Beachy quilt would be easy. Wrong. Even going S-L-O-W I messed it up in some spots. I need a little bit more control and some practice.

My library has started getting in books on Playaway. They are so freakin' cool. It's the convenience of an iPod without spending time loading the material on the computer and then loading it up on the iPod. I price checked these on Amazon and they are only a little more than a book on CD.

Haven't had a picture of my guys on here lately. Here they are at the hotel where my SILS were staying a few weeks ago. The youngest is refusing to cut his hair. I'm letting it go. Picking my battles. He keeps it clean so we'll see how long he can suffer with the Fabio look.

BTW-I conducted a taste test, McD's iced coffees vs. Burger King. If a Starbucks Frappe is no longer in the budget go with the Mocha Joe at Burger King. The McD's are awful. JMHO of course. But the Mocha Joe has a really rich taste and I've tried several at McD's different times of the day, different McD's and they all taste watery and why don't they have a mocha flavor? Vanilla, Hazelnut and Coffee are the choices around here. Don't they know people love mocha?

Time Flies

It's been a while since my last post. On the date of my last entry my dad passed away. I really don't know what to say or write about it at this time. I kept thinking there were things to say but for time being, I'll just keep the thoughts as my own.

Other things have been going on these past few weeks. The boys last day of school was yesterday and so begins the long summer of "I'm bored, why don't we ever do anything, can't we go somewhere" blah, blah, blah. If they don't watch out I'll send them to my mother for a few weeks and they'll be very happy to come home and sit around our boring house.

I finished my part of a sewing project and when my friend finishes her part I'll post a picture. It's one of those things where I said, "Oh I can make on of those" forgetting that I have no skilz to speak of. This is a thing for the little girl next door. I wasn't sure she'd be happy with it until I showed her the inprogress item and she was thrilled. So pictures to come in the not too distant future. My success with that item has me finally getting up the courage to sew the flipping skirts I've been wanting to make. So maybe this afternoon I'll suck it up and get those done. The patterns are fairly straightforward. I also need some new "lounge pants" in summer fabric instead of my winter flannel so maybe I'll make a pair or two of those, need to get some fabric.

So life goes on, crafting continues, the sun still shines, and the children still whine........