Fabric Friday Week 30: June 9

Summer is in full swing around here and my days are simultaneously so fast and also glacially slow. Why is that? I've never quite understood how that aspect of the time continuum works. My kids are keeping mostly busy, and mostly not fighting, which is always nice. And we're eating plenty of creamies and snow cones. 

Today's fabric bundle came from these nice blues. Two of them are from Jill Howarth's Little Women line, and of course I added in the green that matches perfectly, but then added in some other fabrics to round it out and make it mine. Because that's what I always do. I rarely use strictly one line, I find it too matchy, and not individual enough. I mean, the lines are great, and quilts made from single lines are beautiful, but they're not really me. And I like to express my creativity through quilts. Or at least, that's what I tell myself...

I find it interesting that it looks much different than I remember my economy block quilt looking. It's off being quilted right now, but it had lots of Little Women fabric in it, but lots of others as well. I don't think I pulled teal for that one, and it had some awesome butter yellows, but this one just feels different. Maybe I'm remembering wrong, who knows? 

I hope you're enjoying the summer! 

Sewing lanyards

Later this summer, we're heading to Europe with the girls. I'm really excited, we have some really fun things planned! We will be spending a few days in both London and Paris, though, and I know they are going to be PACKED. Europe is packed right now, and it's only going to get worse as the summer goes on. We've got reservations made for dinners in London and we've already purchased tickets and a few other reservations, so I'm not too worried about getting into what we're interested in doing, but I am a tad worried about walking around in busy crowds with our four kids. 

SO, we decided to use airtags to keep track of them. I was looking around for necklace holders, and couldn't find any that were simple but secure (some look awfully breakable...) and then it occurred to me: simple lanyards. We could attach the airtags to keychain holders, and then use keyrings on the lanyards. I let my girls each pick pretty much any fabric from my stash, since it would require so little fabric, and I whipped them up a few days ago.

I did some googling for basic measurements, but didn't end up using them. I cut strips 2-1/2" wide by WOF, and then I pressed them in half lengthwise and then pressed the ends into the middle. I stitched down both long sides and then kinda held it up and measured around my own neck, figuring if I could get over my head it would be more than plenty for the girls. I settled on cutting the strips 30-1/2". 

Once I cut them, I serged the two ends together so they wouldn't fray, fed the keyring on, and then did two lines of stitches across the ends, one close to the edge and one 1/4" closer to the keyring, with a short stitch length. And that's it! Super fast.

All the Good quilt

I'm finally posting this quilt because I finally bound it! I got it back from the quilter over a month ago, but I've been busy sewing t-shirts, and this just wasn't a priority. Also, I needed matching thread for my binding.

I bought this pattern at Quiltcon in Phoenix and loved the improv style. It took a while to piece because of trimming all those flying geese and half square triangles, and then layout took a while (and two go's if you read that blog post) and then I had to pick a binding...this just took a lot longer than a standard quilt, and that's okay. It's finished now.

I love it. I wish it were a bit bigger, and I'm sad that I've got another wavy binding, but I really like it. I love a lot of the prints I used, and the colors, and the radiating center, and the navy binding...I think it turned out great. The pattern is by Jittery Wings. I didn't love the format of her pattern, but I love how it turned out so I don't not recommend it. And I didn't make any mistakes, so it was not a bad pattern by any means. 

Fabric Friday Week 29: May 26

May is almost over and I don't know where the time has gone. Right now, time is absolutely flying. Schools are starting to let out for the year in our area, and we've had an amazing spring. It started late, but this year here in Utah has been a blessed one. We've had record breaking snow, and still continue to get some rain, and the summer is easing in slowly. It hasn't gotten above 80 yet, maybe even 75, which is pretty uncharacteristic in my memory, at least. Usually we're pushing 90s by this time of year. It's been beautiful, and green, and cool, and I hope it continues to ramp up slowly (which we desperately need so all the snow doesn't melt extraordinarily fast and flood our communities). My peonies and irises have started blooming and I have several vases on my kitchen counter. We've had just lovely rainbows. 

Anyway, enough about the weather...that's a rather boring topic, isn't it? Today I have a bundle I pulled quickly, and I like it. I don't always pull red, if I need something like red, I usually end up in the magenta range. But I really like the red in this group. I think it works surprisingly well with the deep purple, and I've always loved red and pale blue. 

I hope you have a great weekend, I'm going to spend my sewing time this weekend sewing rash guard sets for my girls! Wish me luck!

Summer Sewing

I've been busy sewing for summer for my girls, and I'm not done yet! First up, I made a couple of t-shirts, one each for my older two girls, from leftover performance fabric I had bought for myself. One was an athletic material and the other was a merino wool. The performance fabric is a tad heavier than I'd like, and may be better suited to leggings, but I like the top, just not sure it's as perfect for the hot weather as the lightweight merino one is. 

Next, I made 3 pairs of Sunny Day shorts by Oliver and S for pajama bottoms for my girls. I let them pick quilting cotton from my stash I was okay with letting go of, and one of their choices surprised me, but they all turned out great. I wanted to make them pajama shorts because for our upcoming trip, we're aiming to pack super light because there won't be a lot of room in our rental car for a lot of luggage. So, shorts are preferable to traditional pj pants. 

Most recently, I finished a stack of 15 t-shirts. My oldest got two made from the Isidro pattern by Itch to Stitch with just a couple of modifications, the rest of the t-shirts are School Bus T-shirts by Oliver and S, and my second daughter got 4, one twin got 4, and the other got 5. I assembly line sewed them to an extent, doing them in groupings based on size and thread color. It took almost 3 weeks and I'm so glad to be done. It was a lot of serging! They seem mostly happy with them...hopefully they'll wear them! I like to sew them t-shirts because they're all so tall that it's hard to find them shirts that are long enough. And, bonus, most of the fabric I used for this stack was purchased at Black Friday from Girl Charlee and so they averaged $3-4/yard. Super cheap! 

I had to measure...6-1/2 inches tall! That's a lot of t-shirts!

Next, I need to pick up my fabric from Raspberry Creek and make some rash guard sets. Wish me luck...

Fabric Friday Week 28: May 19

The past few weeks have been packed! I have been sewing, which I'll share in another post another day...but it's also the end of the school year. My kids are getting out REALLY soon, which means we've had end of year concerts and parties and all sorts of things. You know. Plus spring sports...one of my twins did a short after school soccer camp for 4 weeks and the other twin is trying out coach pitch rec baseball...my kids haven't been hugely involved in extra curriculars in the past, so getting kids all the places has been an adjustment, lol.

This weeks fabric is a color palate I think I've landed on for a Hexibore quilt by Papper Saxsten. It's gone through a few iterations, but I'm pretty happy with where it stands now. I signed up for her June workshop and I'm pretty excited. It's a lovely modern quilt and I'm excited to learn her tricks. And I've got to get the fabric ordered soon so I can get started on cutting! 

Fabric Friday Week 27: May 5

I cannot believe it's May! We are in the final countdown for school and it's coming up unbelievably fast. We've got a trip this summer that I'm trying to sew for...pajama shorts for the girls, lots of t-shirts for them (my girls are tall and long t-shirts can be hard to find!), AND, I'm trying to get the courage to pull the trigger on ordering some sport lycra from Spoonflower to make them rash guard swim sets. I recently learned how dangerous light blue or aqua swimsuits can be (basically invisible in the water, which makes sense but I had never thought about it...) and I love rash guard sets because then it's less sunscreen to apply, more sun protection, and it's far easier for changing or using the bathroom. I've been all in on rash guard sets for a few years now. But, finding some that fit, that aren't pale blue, is hard. And I figured, they're basically just t-shirts made from swim material, how hard could it be?? Well, we'll see, huh?

In the meantime, I've got a bundle of fabric. I based it off the strawberry print on the end, and I really like it. I would not tend to add red and pink to the same bundle but I like it here a lot. 

Have a great weekend!