Weekend Sewing

I woke up on Saturday morning feeling like it was time for a new Spring bag. I haven't made a purse or bag in AGES and I had the itch.

I am so out of practice when it comes to making bags and I know that so I just made a simple bag. I interfaced the outer fabric with fusible fleece and the lining with a heavy interfacing. It also has a magnetic snap closure.

I love it, but it's an odd shape. It's way too tall. (What WAS I thinking?)

It might not be so bad once I cram all my junk into it.



And then I had to finish hemming ANOTHER Simplicity 3835 blouse.



Which of course HAD to have a matching pendant.



And then, this morning, sticking with the "use what I have" theme I decided to make a pair of lounge pants for the summer (if it ever gets here) out of a thrifted sheet. I don't have a large collection of thrifted sheets, but I've decided it's time to use them. Now, I didn't realize until AFTER I cut out the pants and started sewing them together that the sheet was partially faded!!! Consider yourself warned! I carried on because these pants are just for bumming around the house in.



They are slightly cropped and I used bias tape around the hem just for something different. I think I'm going to have to make more of these to replace all my flannel jammie bottoms for when the warmer weather arrives.

Now I'm off to Value Village to look at the sheets. I'm allowed. I really don't have any others to make pants out of! And then I might meet up with Joe and the dogs who are already out geocaching.

I hope you all had a great weekend!

Using what I have

I have decided that I'm going to carry my Canon point and shoot camera around in my purse for photographic emergencies. Of course, this was an occasion for a new zippered pouch! I was up early this morning and decided today was the day I was going to start carrying my camera around with me.

I made a padded pouch for the camera and a smaller pouch to carry spare batteries and memory cards.



The fabric is a cute Japanese fat quarter that my sister gave me for my birthday and I added little vintage button zipper pulls to the zipper.

Unfortunately, today's not the day for me to start taking photos. Joe is using my DSLR today and has BOTH of my camera cards with him.

And...I had barely turned off my sewing machine when I sat down to read some blogs and wouldn't you know it but Felicia of Fluffy Flowers fame posted about the exact same topic today.

Scrabble Tile Magnets

I'm pretty serious about de-stashing! The first thing I found that I had to deal with were a little bag of Scrabble tiles. I had purchased them to make pendants, but I really wasn't happy with the ones I made. What to do with a bag of Scrabble tiles?? Make magnets of course.



Sadly, I have crappy letters. Much like I normally do when playing Scrabble.

Now I want to make more Scrabble tile magnets to give as gifts! I have a bunch of little round tins that I think would probably hold 4 or 6 magnets each. I am NOT buying more Scrabble tiles though. I'm happy to have found a use for these ones.

It's a sickness...

I hope everyone had a Happy Easter! We didn't do too much around here. We met up with some friends and had quite a relaxing weekend.

I did a little bit of sewing and if you read my blog regularly you will not be the least bit surprised to hear that I sewed up another Simplicity 3835 top. I cannot believe how much I completely adore this pattern!!!!!!!!



My sister, who has an awesome Etsy Shop gave me some great big buttons to cover for my birthday. I used one of them to make a pendant to match my new top.



As I was closing the door to my craft room this morning I had a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach. I have WAY TOO MUCH STUFF!!! I've decided (again) that it's time to "use what I have". I am going to seriously go through all the junk I've accumulated (I know I've said this before) and purge. I'm going to approach it differently this time though. Instead of facing the daunting task all at once (making it impossible to do) I'm going to approach it pile by pile, drawer by drawer. Maybe this approach will work. I hope so.

I'm still allowed to shop (my rules) but only for things that will help me use what I have.

Wish me luck! Yikes, I'm scared.

More button bracelets and e-mail woes

I've made more button bracelets. I don't think I can ever have enough of these!



And...I am having Hotmail issues AGAIN. I've created a Gmail account and I'm trying to decide if I like it. It is sooooooooooo different than Hotmail and quite frankly, I don't like change. What I would like to know is do those of you who use Gmail like it? I'm troubled by the fact that you can't make folders and it's a little bit clunky replying to messages.

Any thoughts? Hotmail vs. Gmail?

Wallet (take 1)

I have been on a quest to make the perfect wallet for a VERY long time now! I was very excited to see this amazing wallet pattern for sale as I've been admiring it for AGES!

I was hoping to have the pattern to play with on the March Break, but I was a dummy and had it shipped to my work address instead of my home address so I didn't get it until yesterday. So, last night I ran home from work and made a new wallet.

I made two BIG mistakes. The first one being I used fabric two fat quarters that I've been saving for a while now that I really liked. When will I learn???? When making something for the first time I should NEVER EVER EVER use fabric that I can't replace. Secondly, I didn't have any white velcro! What?!?!?!? I seem to remember thowing out a ball of tangled up velcro not long ago thinking that I had more. I didn't. What I did have was some terrible black VERY sticky velcro. I immediately decided to make the wallet with the sticky black velcro and call this a "prototype".

Well, the velco completely gummed up my machine. I finally cleaned up that mess but by now I knew this wallet would never be usable so I just kind of rushed through it, not being extra careful.



Here's the inside. I really botched that up. There isn't even enough room to put my cards in slots on the right side.



I've already cut out fabric for a second wallet and I plan to go get velcro today at lunch so I can work on it tonight.

I'm still so mad that I used those really pretty fat quarters!!! Live and learn.

March Break - Day 4

I'm cheating today with my post because I have done absolutely nothing crafty today at all. I've been knee-deep in cleaning the house in preparation for my Mother's visit tomorrow.

I had asked Joe to make me a 1 lb soap mold for my birthday. I ended up with three because of a misunderstanding. He knows that I typically make three pound batches, so he assumed that I wanted three molds when I really just wanted one so that I can experiment with smaller batches. I win, I now have three awesome 1 lb soap molds!



I had to test the new molds to make sure they worked (of course!). Last weekend I made two small 1 lb batches of soap, freesia and apple blossom scents. I love them both, but the apple blossom scent is quite faint.



During my cleaning spree today I found two cotton dish cloths that I knit AGES ago. I just had to weave in the ends. So, even though I have NO time for anything today, I sat for 15 minutes, wove in the ends and now I have two pretty dish clothes to show off when my Mom arrives.

March Break - Day 3

Well, I sewed another top from Simplicity 3835. I know it's boring to read about, but I really needed a top to match a pair of black pants that I'm wearing on Friday night to a fancy restaurant.



As I was sewing it I wasn't lovin' it. I kept thinking I'd wear it on Friday and then give it to my Mother (DianNe). But forget that! Once it was done I was diggin' it. I followed Lera's lead and lengthened the pattern by about 2 inches (I had only added about 1 for the previous ones I've made) and I really like the little extra length! (Thanks Lera!).

I'm off to a geocaching event tonight and then I'll be in full cleaning mode tomorrow to prepare for my Mother's arrival on Friday. I'm thinking March Break, days 4 and 5 might not be so crafty. We'll see.

March Break - Day 2

My sewing machine and I have become re-aquainted in the last couple of days and it feels GREAT!!!

I made not one, but two more tops from Simplicity 3835 and I know that before the summer is here there will be MANY more!

The first one is made of one of my favourite fabrics from Joann's. It's an orange print and I love it.



The next one is made from a cheapie fabric I bought at Len's Mill Store. It's strange, each side has a different print! One side is blue paisley and the other is a weird horse shoe print.



I am happier with it than I thought I would be.

Now I'm off to make matching pendants.

March Break - Day 1

I started sewing another Simplicity 3835 top this morning. Even though I KNOW I have some 1/4" elastic around for the neck, I could NOT find it!!!! I dashed out to Fabricland to pick some up and found myself at Value Village (funny how that happens!).

I found this scrappy cabin pillow cover for $1.49. I don't think it was ever used. I happen to have a pillow form for the scrappy cabin pillow I was going to make but never got around to.



I love that it has a prairie point border!



I also scooped some more large buttons to cover which will soon become pendants, I'm sure!



I got home and was all ready to continue sewing when a friend called and wanted to go out and play in the snow with our new cameras, so off I went.

These are a couple of my favourite photos of the day, both taken with my new lens. The rest can be found at my Flickr page.





I wonder what Day 2 will bring?

digging out

Well, the sun is finally shining after 36 hours of constant snow fall. I was out very early this morning shovelling the sidewalk again and I ran into some very nice (and funny) neighbours across the street who probably think I'm nutso for shovelling snow with a camera around my neck.



It might be hard to tell, but there is sooooooooooo much snow on our roof!



There's no place to put the it!



And I don't think I'll be going anywhere for a while. That's my poor little car trapped and Joe's truck is behind it. (We put our windshield wipers up so they didn't freeze to the windshild)



This just in...as I'm typing this post the plow came to do the parking lot across the street. That is so much snow!!



It's a good thing that I have enough soap-making and fabric to keep me occupied until June. I won't be going anywhere for then next day or two!!

More pendants

I had the urge on the weekend to make more button pendants.

As much as I love the pendants, I think I really just like sifting through my disgustingly large button collection. Please don't read that wrong. As far as I'm concerned, you can NEVER have too many buttons!!!!



I'm especially proud of this one:



I have been wanting to make fabric-covered button pendants for a while now, but I couldn't figure out how to attach the bail. The back of a fabric-covered button has a big indent, so the bail won't fit. A light bulb went off and I realized if I glued a flat button to the back of the fabric-covered button, it would create a flat back allowing me to glue on the bail. It worked! So you can expect more fabric-covered button pendants in my future.

I'm actually wearing that pendant today :)

falls

On the weekend, we went out geocaching and for dinner with some friends. We ended up at Bridal Veil Falls (Niagara Falls little sister) to do a geocache.



From the falls we had a great view of Niagara Falls, Ontario.



And Niagara Falls, NY.



The building with the funky coloured lights on it is the casino. That's where we went for dinner. We had a few minutes to kill before our reservation, so Joe and I both stuck $20 into a slot machine. I won $200 and Joe won $25. That sure was fun!!!

Birthday Goodies

Whew. That was certainly an unplanned little blogging break!

Last weekend Joe and I celebrated our birthdays together (they are 2 days apart). We had a super weekend and had lots of laughs with our friends. Once I recovered from the weekend, I was plagued with a migrane for three days. It was all I could do to drag my butt to work each day.

I was also lucky enough to recieve a fantastic birthday package in the mail this week from Lera. She is SO generous. She included gloves and goggles for soapmaking (because apparently she thinks I should wear them!), some geocaching trade items for Joe, socks, soaps, a cute little stuffed bird, mints, chocolates, some funny 40-year old stuff, and some cute little note cards.



I LOVE the little bird!



And such pretty soap!



I always seem to have such a hard time blogging again after a little break. I hope to get back into the swing of things soon!!