ready to travel!

I just completed a tutorial for this cute passport/travel purse and put it in my sidebar for downloading. A friend of mine is getting ready to go on a cruise, and I thought it would be perfect for stashing her passport, itinerary and her small point-and-shoot camera.



It didn't take long at all to figure out, and because I had bought 3 fat quarters, I had plenty of scraps left over to make these sweet luggage tags. That tutorial is also in the sidebar, and includes a sheet of labels you can print out on cardstock to put in your luggage tags. Now, you will never miss your luggage again!

lauren's quilt :: one of eight

I just finished my first real quilt from start to finish! I have made table runners, placemats and a lap quilt for my mother-in-law, but nothing as big as this! This quilt is for my oldest daughter, who turns 22 in May! I had hoped to make it and give it to her earlier, but, I just got a sewing machine that could handle the machine quilting.



It is the "Turning 20" pattern and was super easy to piece. I free motion quilted each separate piece differently. It was my first quilt to free motion quilt, and I definitely learned a lot. If you are wanting to become more comfortable with free motion quilting, I would suggest doing the same. It is much more satisfying than using a practice piece and then throwing it away! Your kids are pretty forgiving with your mistakes. My daughter said she would "love it forever"! That made it so worth it! After gifting her with it, she went and bought new sheets for her bed and took this photo.



I love the color and design of all the gorgeous fabrics, and the crinkly quilted texture adds that something extra to it. The only regret I have is that I forgot to make a quilt label for it because I was too excited to give it to her! I will have to make one and add it later. I plan on making quilts for each of our eight children, and look forward to choosing fabrics and quilt patterns to suit each of their personalities.

Next up, I am making my 19-year-old son's quilt, a Bento Box, from 48 different batiks!

mountain baby blankets

I was so excited yesterday to "happen" upon Rachel's blog, rachelcoxdesigns. Rachel is a single mom who watched Diane Sawyer's "A Hidden America" a couple of weeks ago and felt the calling to do something to help teenage moms in rural Appalachian Kentucky who don't have enough money to even buy blankets for their babies. She is organizing a handmade blanket drive, Mountain Baby Blankets, so these precious children will have a cozy blanket to cuddle under. Of course, their needs go much deeper than a warm blanket, but this is something that many go without after food, and some bills get paid. And, this is something that I can do!

I have joined many others who also want to bless these children and show the love of Christ through a blanket! I, too, saw the special that night before Valentine's and was touched by the extreme poverty and hopelessness so many of the people lived with. I am thankful that Rachel had the vision for her project and would like to invite as many as are willing to join her in this adventure. You can visit her blog here to read about the project and to sign up to help.

And, if you missed the special, click the photo below to go to abc to view it in its entirety. I promise, it will touch your heart and make you so grateful for what you have!

coming soon to the shop...

These camera straps were all lined up in a row on my work table so I took a quick picture of them to give you a preview. They will all be listed in my shop as soon as I have the time to take decent photos of them.



I just listed 6 of my new patchwork pocket aprons in the shop last night and today. And, I already sold one of them! Yay! I plan on doing more of these. They were so much fun, especially picking out the scraps for the patchwork pockets.



And, last up tonight, is a preview of my new wristlet point and shoot camera straps. They are awesome and come in all the cool fabrics my other straps do. I will also get some of these in the shop this week.



I am also working on a tutorial and a freebie for the printed tags for these sweet fabric luggage tags. I plan on doing these on my next show, along with a sunglasses case and a travel pouch to hold your passport, boarding passes, airline tickets, etc. Be watching for all the project sheets in a couple of weeks.

new tutorials!

I just posted two new tutorials in my sidebar for a bath mat and fabric-embellished towels to coordinate with my shower curtain. This was such an easy makeover I did for my kids' bathroom! Just a few hours, a few towels, and a little bit of beautiful fabric, and you can have the same results!

The awesome thing about the bath mat is that it's soft and easy to throw in the wash with your other towels. I was beginning to despise the rubber-backed things we had been using! And, it has an added bonus of being really pretty!



They were so easy, I am making another set for my bathroom!

patchwork and linen :: a lovely combination

I put together this apron in just about an hour the other night! It was so easy and so much fun to do! I made it based on the apron in Denyse Schmidt's Quilts and love the simple style of the apron combined with the "log cabiney" pocket on the front.



The best part is that it cost next-to-nothing! I bought a linen skirt from the thrift store for a dollar, the pom-pom fringe was in my stash, and the pocket was made from leftover scraps from the shower curtain project I just finished! I totally recommend this book because it has so many cute and fun projects in it. It was the perfect kind of sewing because it gave almost-instant gratification.

I am thinking of making some of these for my etsy shop because I am sure others would want their own cute patchwork-pocket apron to bake chicken pot pie in, don't you?

patchwork shower curtain tutorial

I just finished this lovely shower curtain today, and as I made it, I wrote a project sheet for it. You can find it in my sidebar in the tutorial section. It is made along the same lines as the one I made for my kids bathroom and posted here.

I will be demonstrating how to make it tomorrow for my sewing show, Sew Simple. It really is simple to make and there are so many possibilities. You are limited only by your imagination! I love all these beautiful fabrics, and you can find them at my favorite quilt shop, Sew Bee It!

Let me know if you make anything from my tutorials -- I would love to see photos, too!

and we have a winner!

our giveaway winner is...

Random Integer Generator

Here are your random numbers:

38

Timestamp: 2008-12-04 18:50:01 UTC


Lisa at I Get the Green Swing!

Lisa said...

What a wonderful giveaway! My favorite one is the black toile stocking!!!



Lisa, it's yours! I will try to contact you, but please get hold of me with your mailing address so I can pop it in the mail to you this week so you can put it to use! Much love and warm holiday wishes to everyone who entered my giveaway! And don't forget the true meaning of why we celebrate Christmas, our Savior, Jesus Christ's birth!

another day :: another giveaway

Sew, Mama, Sew Blog is having a Give-Away Day today, and I decided to participate to kick off the month of December.



As a child, my favorite part of Christmas morning was always the anticipation of waking early and looking through my stocking with my brother and sister and seeing all the little treats tucked in, right down to the ones in the toe. There was always an apple, an orange and a few nuts and even a peppermint stick lovingly placed inside with the other special treasures. I was always reminded of Laura and Mary and my beloved Little House on the Prairie Books as I gleefully pulled each item from my handmade stocking each year and how they had celebrated Christmas by hanging their stockings for Santa to fill and how excited they were to find a shiny penny in the toe!

As an adult, I have passed that tradition on to my own children by making each of them a stocking that I felt symbolized their personality and filling it each year with small inexpensive gifts to show our love for them. I hope they will one day find their own ways to pass down traditions within their families with their children and maybe I will have the opportunity to make a few more stockings. Time will tell...



But for you...I have two stockings up for grabs! I have made two beautiful stockings, one in a black and white toile print with a polka dot cuff and trimmed in black and white gingham and the other in a black and white houndstooth with a polka dot cuff and trimmed with black pom-pom fringe. There will be one winner, so just let me know in your comments which is your favorite and tomorrow morning, I will use a random number generator to choose the winner!

another winner!

Charlotte at Owl Love to Stamp said...

That is the cutest tea cozy I've ever seen! I'd love to have it.

Well, Charlotte, you are the winner!

Number 75, was the winning number this time after using the cool random number generator once again. So, I'll be contacting Charlotte to get her cute tea cozy out to her right away!



I hope each and every one of you are having a glorious Monday morning! And for those of you who entered my giveaway, thank you so much! I loved reading each of your comments! I truly wish I could give each one of you something! I may have to make this a monthly habit!

camera strap giveaway winner!

Well, I was out late last night and didn't have time to choose my winner for the camera strap, so early this morning, all entries were thrown into the random number generator, and the winner is.....



I have an international winner! Half-pint pixie from Ireland! I will be contacting you to claim your prize! How exciting! And she chose the kaffe fassett pumpkin paperweight! It's one of my favorites, too!




I want to thank everyone who entered the drawing by offering each of you a 20% discount on your own custom camera strap from my shop. All you have to do to receive the discount is to purchase a strap from my etsy shop and let me know before you pay that you entered my giveaway and I will send you a discounted invoice through paypal. The discount will be good for one week, through November 5.

fall bloggy giveaway carnival :: you're my cup of tea

It is once again time for the quarterly bloggy giveaways carnival and I am once again participating. Yes, I am doing another giveaway while one is still going on, and no, I won't forget about those of you who have entered my other one, and yes, you can enter this one as well! Whew, I hope I answered all of your questions!



Since I am giving away one of my cute camera straps in the giveaway a couple of posts back, (which by the way, if you haven't entered, you still have time until Wednesday)I have decided to give away this adorable quilted tea cozy for those of you who drink tea. I made this a while back for one of my sewing shows, and since it doesn't match my kitchen, I have never used it. So, it will go to someone who will love it and care for it and cozy up her tea pot with it!



Now if tea is not your "cup of tea", I will happily substitute one of my equally as adorable and "green" coffee sleeves, made to slide over your coffee cup to keep your coffee hot and your hand not, and all those cardboard sleeves out of the garbage. Now you can tell your favorite barista, "Thanks, but I have my own!" You just let me know in your comments which you would prefer, and on Sunday, November 2, I will use a random number generator to decide who wins. I will then notify the winner by email and here on my blog!

And since I work from home to help support my lovely family, please take a look at my shop to see if anything there is "your cup of tea" for your holiday gift giving this year! Give the gift of handmade this season! You won't regret it!

Check out the other great giveaways as well!

a glimpse of my kitchen table

This is just a glimpse--we have been eating outside on the back porch a lot lately, however, it is getting colder here, and I guess that means I am going to have to clean my kitchen table off so we can eat inside!



This is a table runner I am working on for my show, Sew Simple, and I have to say, it turned out exactly as I was hoping! I used all Kaffe Fassett fabrics in beautiful rich fall colors and I love it! I can't wait to finish it up and use it on my Thanksgiving table.

handmade holidays aka I'm having a giveaway party!

The Nester is hosting a handmade holiday party and I decided to join in! Buy handmade this holiday season and support your local crafters!

To make it even more exciting, I am offering a free camera strap from my etsy shop! All you have to do to enter to win is to take a look in my shop and leave a comment telling me which strap is your favorite!



When the contest ends next Wednesday, October 29, I will use a random number generator to choose the winning entry and notify the winner by email and here on my blog. Your custom camera strap will be on its way to you within a week of the end of the giveaway!



Take a look at all the other terrific shops for some more handmade love, too! You won't be disappointed!

my beach vacation :: show and tell

Our family just returned from a week's vacation to Jekyll Island on the Georgia coast and if anyone knows me, they will know just how much I love the beach! We had the most amazing weather while there (aside from a few rain showers) and the last evening I had planned for a family photo shoot on the beach.



I am not a professional photographer, but I knew that I wanted photos of my family as our children are getting older and we might not have many opportunities like this to have most of them together again. My oldest daughter unfortunately was unable to make it because she is in college and couldn't miss a week of classes to go with us. The rest of our children were on fall break from school. I searched on flickr for family beach photos and I loosely interpreted some of the ideas I got from there. I loved the way all of them turned out!



Get suggestions from your kids, too. My girls had the idea for the jumping photo. I think it turned out really cute. Most of all, have fun!

We were able to get some great shots on the beach as the sun was setting and although they are not professional, they are perfect to me! As I downloaded them and began reminiscing and laughing, remembering the wonderful times we had while there, I was inspired to make myself some new jewelry. Initially, I had thought I would just make one new pendant to wear on my white/clear glass beaded necklace. But the more I looked at the photos, I couldn't choose just one. In the end, I made five, yes I said FIVE, new charms. I found some quotes that I fell in love with and put those on the back and now I can change them out as my mood changes.



If you have any of your beach photos lying around from your vacations, now is a perfect time to get them out and turn them into a treasured heirloom!

My friend Sherry and I have a business called S & S Heirloom Art and we make these beautiful pieces of jewelry and we are now having a sale where you may purchase 3 of any item and receive the 4th item free! Check out our blog and see all the details. And check back tomorrow morning bright and early when you will find more about an awesome give-away on our blog as well!

quilt giveaway

Elizabeth Cranmer over at Pigtails and Snails is giving away this beautiful quilt!

It is absolutely gorgeous, and all you have to do to enter to win is to leave a comment on her blog. How easy is that!?! You have until 7pm MST on Friday Oct 17th, so go enter!

bathroom makeover

I have been wanting to re-do the kids' bathroom for so long and finally got around to it a couple of weeks ago. I absolutely love it! This is a picture of what it looked like with just the walls painted:

And this is a picture of the shower curtain I made.

The only fabric I had to buy was the red Heather Bailey fabric. All the rest was from my stash! Woo Hoo! It always helps to buy great fabric when it is on sale at your local quilt shop. You never know when you might need it!
This is the artwork I made using some 10"x10" artist canvases, acrylic paints, and scraps of fabrics:

And last, but, not least, these are the towels which I dressed up with the leftover scraps of fabric and put loops on to hang on a new peg rack so my kids will maybe hang their towels up and not throw them on the floor on a heap. You can see from the first photo that they never used the lovely brass-finish towel bar!

I hope to put a tutorial together soon for the towels and put it here in my sidebar along with my other tutorials. I also plan on making a floor mat with another towel I purchased and trimming it with the rest of the leftover fabric scraps so it can be thrown in the wash with the rest of the towels when it is dirty.

I don't know why I waited so long to do this makeover, but I sure know it was worth it and I plan on doing many more rooms in my house this fall! I can't wait to get started!

more tutorials added!

I have added three more tutorials to my sidebar for your downloading pleasure! I have to run now and teach a class, but I will add photos to this post to show you the goodies when I return!

*****Okay, I'm back! Here are the photos of the tutorials I just added!

The first is this snap wallet:

Next up is a checkbook cover:

And lastly, is a zippered pouch:

Hope you enjoy them!
Love ya!

and the winner is...

Well, the time has come for choosing a winner and after putting the numbers through the random number generator, Tiffany, from Pate Family Fun is the winner of a new custom camera strap! This is the one she chose! I think she has great taste, as it is a cute vintage fabric, and there is only one left after this one.



Thanks to all who entered, and I sure wish I could give each of you a strap! If any of you who entered the contest and didn't win, I am going to offer to you a 20% discount for the rest of this week on any camera strap listed in my etsy shop! Oh, I might as well offer the same discount on custom orders, as well, since I have a bunch of new fabrics and haven't had time to make up new straps in those fabrics. Just let me know you entered my giveaway before you pay and I'll send you an adjusted invoice to reflect the discount! Remember, this offer is only good through next Saturday, May 3!

Thanks again! This was a lot of fun and I plan on doing it again in July for the next Bloggy Giveaways Carnival!

bloggy giveaways carnival

It is time for the bloggy giveaways carnival and I am so excited! I have entered several giveaways, and most of them have a coffee theme. I'm all for some free Starbucks!

I am also hosting my own giveaway and have decided to offer a free custom camera strap!



Just take a look at my shop and see the straps, and then at my fabric swatches to decide just which fabric you'd like. Then, leave a comment telling me what you would like to win. The contest will be open until Saturday, April 26, 12 midnight EST. I will use the random number generator to choose the winning entry on Sunday, April 27, and notify the winner by email and here at my blog. Your custom camera strap will be on its way to you within a week of the giveaway's closing.

Take a look at the other terrific giveaways, too! You won't be disappointed!