Patchwork Sew Together Bag

Today I have my very first Sew Together Bag that I shared at Ellison Lane as part of Jennifer's Patchwork Summer Series back in the beginning of July. I'm sure you've seen these all over the blogosphere and on Instagram, I know I sure had, and finally bit the bullet to make one of my own, and I'm very glad I did!



    I am completely smitten with this bag, I had planned on keeping it all for myself, but ultimately decided to gift it to my sister in law for her birthday and make myself a second one.  This bag has more pockets, and zipper pockets than anyone could ever completely fill, but I'm sure Amanda will find plenty of goodies to stash!  While I love the one I made for myself,  this one holds a special place in my heart.



My absolute favorite part of this bag of course is the outside.  What's great about this pattern is the outside can be a solid fabric, or quilted like this patchwork version.  I chose to use left over scraps from the pockets on the inside and added in extra scraps from my stash in pinks, yellows and greys.



I used 2" unfinished squares that finished at 1.5" and quilted 1/4" on the outside of each seam.  While I will never pass up an opportunity for some free motion quilting, there is something to be said for simple straight line quilting.  It always looks so clean, fresh and polished.



If you haven't tackled a Sew Together bag yet, I highly highly recommend it.  Don't let the zippers intimidate you, just think you'll be a pro at installing them by the end of this bag!  I will say the pattern itself left me a little puzzled at a few of the steps, but I followed along with The Quilt Barn's Sew Together Bag Sew Along and easily finished the pattern.  Heather's step by step instructions and pictures made easy work of a few parts that likely would have left me quite frustrated had I only the pattern to follow along with.

Mixed Tape Side B

Making quilt backs is usually my least favorite part of the quilting process.  I take that back.  It might sit just behind basting as my least favorite part.  I think its because once I have the top pieced, I just want to get quilting!  Quilting, particularly free motion quilting, is hands down my favorite favorite part of seeing a quilt through from fabric selection to stitching down that last inch of binding, and any step in between (I'm looking at you quilt-back making and basting) is just standing in my way.



This quilt back is different.  Possibly because I'm looking at is more of an alternate quilt front.  When I opened Pandora's box of quilt bee blocks I have stashed away to work on Side A, I knew I wanted to incorporate as many blocks as possible into one quilt.  Consider it an epic bee quilt of sorts.  When I planned this quilt, and found these 12 blocks, I instantly knew I wanted those to be the back.  And I wanted them to have a border of white, with a small color border, and then lots of white negative space.  And offset to the bottom left.  Yes this quilt back vision was quite specific.



Now that this quilt back is pieced I am itching to get this basted and get quilting!  Unfortunately it will probably have to sit for a little while, but hopefully soon it will see its turn at my machine!

Rose Room Quilts giveaway winner

I owe you a winner this evening!  The winner of the $25 gift certificate to Rose Room Quilts is entry #46, Amy!  Congrats Amy!  Look for an email from me later today to get your shipping information.  Thanks everyone for entering, and thanks Rose Room Quilts for a great giveaway!

Sew Together Bag

This is my second Sew Together Bag I've made, and this one is all mine!  After picking up a few tips and tricks the first time around, I think this one came together much quicker than the first.  

I probably spent as much time  deciding what I wanted as the outer main fabric as  I did putting the whole thing together!  I ultimately decided on a little piecing, and then quilted a whole lot of loose organic lines using some variegated thread and my walking foot, and I am in love!  I love the texture this type of quilting added to the linen and the pretty soft pinks, peaches and purples in the thread are just the added pop of interest this bag needed.  I cannot wait for another small project to use this sort of quilting on.



Currently I am using this bag to house all of my cross stitch supplies.  I skipped adding the optional felt needle holders, and I'm sort of regretting it, as I am just pinning my needles with leftover thread through the inside lining, and the lining will likely soon be paying the price.



There is more than enough room to house the two current projects I'm working on worth of thread (the Frosted Pumpkin Stitchery's Once Upon a Time Sampler, and 12 Days of Christmas Sampler) along with scissors, extra thread bobbins, a sharpie to mark my bobbins and pattern and a whole host of other odds and ends, with room to spare.



I am certain this will not be my last Sew Together Bag, they make amazing gifts (so says my sister in law who received the first bag).  Kati had an genius idea, she cut the necessary fabric and interfacing ahead of time and stored it in baggies with the appropriate zippers, so when it was time to sew, she could get right to it!  What about you?  Do you have a go-to stitchy gift you're always ready to make??

iPad sleeve

So we're getting ready to leave for the beach in a few days, and while I should be pondering how to fit half of my house in a Nissan Rogue with a rooftop carrier, I instead headed down to my sewing  room, because my iPad needed a new travel case.  That's rational, right?  But seriously.  Anyone with the tips on how to fit my house in my car to take to the beach, would be much appreciated.  

While of course there are more pressing things I should be tackling right now, in my defense I did need a more protective carrying case for my iPad than the magnetic case that I use for every day use.  I knew I wanted something with a small pocket to store my charging cord, and something not super bulky, but padded enough that a little jostling wouldn't hurt anything.



I sketched up the design for this envelope style, and sort of blindly started cutting fabric, and by some stroke of luck, both the sewing gods and the two hour nap gods were smiling down on me at the same time, because just as I heard Nora waking up from her nap, my machine was taking its last few stitches to finish this guy up!



I'm happy my quick quilty math worked out, because this sleeve fits great even with my every day cover on my iPad, and I can store my charging cord, or a pen/pad of paper in the little envelop pocket and the top flap closes with no problems.



I'm planning on writing up a quick tutorial once we are back from vacation and time is a little more free, so be on the look out!  And if you want to say a quick prayer that the car ride and a week of pack n play sleeping go well,  that would be swell also!

Welcome Rose Room Quilts and a Giveaway!

******This giveaway is now closed******

Happy Monday everyone!  I'd like to give a big welcome to my newest sponsor, Rose Room Quilts!  Cindy, the quilty gal behind Rose Room Quilts is actually a friend of mine I met through our local Modern Quilt Guild a few years ago.  We instantly bonded on a guild sponsored Shop Hop, what better way to become friends than over a day of fabric shopping??

Needless to say Cindy has impeccable taste in fabric, and it's no surprise she's opened up her own online quilt shop.  I have already been drooling over Rose Room Quilts' fabric selection, and couldn't decide what to purchase first!  Cindy just received and has listed Heather Ross' Far Far Away, and its available in yardage and bundles.



This was the first bundle I grabbed, I think Nora definitely needs a Far Far Away quilt in her life!

  I am also loving this Wee Wander bundle, I can't get over those little lightening bugs, how sweet!  We find out if my sister in law is having a boy or a girl this week, and if its a girl, you can bet this bundle will be in my cart.  And lets be serious, I'm likely getting this regardless!



Cindy also has tons of basics and blenders yardage, like this Michael Miller Random Pencil Check in Linen:



or Ta Dot in Sea (among other colors)!



I can't sing enough praises for Cindy and Rose Room Quilts!  And now for the best part, Cindy has generously allowed me to give away a $25 gift certificate to use in her shop, Rose Room Quilts!  To enter to win, head over to Rose Room Quilts, and tell me what you would use the gift certificate to purchase in the comments section.  For an extra chance to win, share this giveaway on your favorite form of social media (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram).  Be sure to log in to RaffleCopter below.  This giveaway will be open until Monday, August 18, 2014 at 12:00 AM EST.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Quilty Flashback Friday

When I saw that Elizabeth was doing a little flashback Friday- quilt edition, I couldn't help but join in the fun!  When I sorted back through my pictures on Flickr, all the way back to the spring of 2010, it was certainly a walk down memory lane!  Those first few projects made me chuckle, and remember how I knew absolutely nothing and was completely flying by the seat of my pants!



This was my very first quilt I ever finished, and from the looks of it, it actually doesn't look all that bad, but boy did it have its issues!  I remember sewing the blocks together with a "1/4" seam allowance, or more like a 1/4ish seam allowance, because I can distinctly remember going to piece the rows together and nothing matched up!  My blocks were off by a good half of an inch. I'm pretty sure I just hacked away and had a total Tim Gunn make it work moment.



This must have been post block hacking because things seem to align pretty well!  I also remember having absolutely no idea about fabric quality.  I can remember purchasing what I now know are Jelly Rolls of fabric off of Ebay in these 3 colors along with some calico prints I picked up at Joann's.

I wish I would have taken a picture of this, but I learned a quick lesson about fabric quality, when after finishing the quilt and then washing it, after I took it out of the dryer, there was a GIANT hole in one of the fabrics!  My husband can confirm that I definitely cried.  It was the strangest thing, it was almost like I dropped bleach on it and the fabric just shredded!  Still to this day I have never had anything like that happen, and cannot figure out what went wrong, but from then on my eyes were then opened to the world of quilt shop quality fabric.



Needless to say, this quilt never saw its intended recipient, and I'm not even sure what happened to it, but it was sure fun visiting my first quilt ever in photos!