Category Archives: Sewing Crafts Posts

Princess Pillowcase

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While I was in Arizona a couple weeks back, I managed to visit a couple of quilt shops.  One of the places that I visited was Bernina Connection in Phoenix.  This store is a very small store for what they have to offer.  I could have spent a long time in there, but my daughter always has other plans.

While there, looking for new inspiration and fun colored thread, my daughter found the Disney Character section.  Between, her, my mom and some of the store staff, I could not leave with out getting something Disney related.  Besides, my two year old asked me to “cut it mommy!”  How could I say no to that?

I quickly decided that I would make her a pillow case.  I managed to find a fun pink and purple fabric to match for the cuff of the pillow case.  I used my mom’s serger to stitch it together, 30 minutes later…. here is what I created…

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I would say that she likes her Pillowcase a lot!

Embroidery Spree

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I had the opportunity to attend an “Embroidery Spree” at my local Quilt shop and Bernina Store, Quilting Delights, this past weekend.  Since purchasing my new Bernina B770-QE machine, I have not had to opportunity to work on anything embroidery related.  This is in part due to the fact that I have no idea how the embroidery attachment that came with my machine works.  It was a great experience to meet new people and get an idea of what I can do with the embroidery attachment.

Here is a picture of of the projects that we completed over the two day event.

As you can see we completed two mug rugs.  These were especially fun!  I loved how you could just have the machine do everything for you.  I liked embellishing the bag with my initials and adding a few flowers underneath.  The scissors case was really cool, as we used the embroidery module to actually punch out the design of the case.  We also got to use RFID fabric to complete a small wallet, very cool!

Thank you again to Quilting Delights for this opportunity and giving me ideas on how I can use embroidery with more of my quilting projects.

I think that I am going to try and design my own embroidered label for all of my quilts.  I am very excited learn more about embroidering!

Finishing Old Projects- Square Quilt

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New Year…. Time to clean up, organize and make room for new projects.

While organizing my craft cabinet, I found a quilt top that I absolutely forgot about.  It was a square block quilt that I had begun, so, so many years ago.  I am not sure if this was before or after my Texas Star quilt.

From what I can tell it began as a 9 patch quilt block.  Then several years ago I had sewn the squares together to make a quilt top.  I think I was going to make this as a doll quilt, as it has turned out quite small.  The quilt block colors decently match as well.  I do not remember where this fabric came from.  It is probably just as old as I am.  I know it was fabric that was handed down to me from either my mom or grandmother.  I know I did not pick it out myself.

As I was trying to iron this quilt top, I discovered that I had hand sewn some pieces together and machine sewn others.  Seam allowances are not a consistent quarter inch.  Some are larger and some are quite a bit smaller which is why they blocks do not match up.  This was definitely a quilt that I started long before I acquired a Bernina Sewing machine.  I vaguely remember trying to sew the blocks together on an older second hand sewing machine.  I always had issues with tension and thread breaking, which I always attributed to the fact that it was a crappy machine.  However, I am now learning that it might have been the cheap fabric and cheap thread that had caused all of my frustration, not the sewing machine.

After I completed ironing the quilt top, I decided that instead of trying to fix all the imperfections, I was going to keep everything the way it was.  I like seeing the old vintage style fabric with the squares not lining up.  It serves as inspiration;  Where I have come from, and how much I have learned through out the years.   There was enough fabric to create a pillow as well.  I quilted the pillow before stuffing it and have machine quilted the quilt top.  It is not perfect, but that is just what I wanted.  I am going to keep this quilt and pillow in my sewing area.  It will help me slow down on future projects so that I can complete them correctly and it will serve as a reminder of what not to do.  I learn a lot from mistakes and just trying new things.