Wednesday 8 October 2014

Swaps and Pouches

This is a bit of a catch up post to share pictures of some gifted items and showcase my new obsession - zip pouches!

Since learning how to insert a zip I have gone a little zippy bag crazy, which is no bad thing as they are varied, versatile, generally well received as gifts and are a great way to play with different fabric combinations and ideas instead of committing to a large quilt.  Cushions are now a bit of a favourite too for the same reasons but more of those another time. :)

This first one is a quickie  - a little Hello Kitty themed pouch for Mr 4's little friend, Miss 6.  It was for her birthday and whipped up quickly when we received the Hello Kitty invitation to the Hello Kitty themed birthday a few weeks ago.  She apparently loves it and is using it for her pencils.

I used Noodlehead's "open wide zip pouch" tutorial for this pouch.  I would link but it seems the site is down, hopefully only temporarily as it is a great tutorial.

Also using this tutorial I made this pouch for my very first swap gift:

 The theme was "Fairy Tale" and we were matched with a partner that would (hopefully) align with out sewing tastes and style.  My partner was the lovely Heidi from the USA, which was very exciting.  One of her likes was Red Riding Hood and she liked a bit of Heather Ross fabric amongst other things...
I made this pouch by improvisationally piecing the outer using low volume, woodland themed fabrics to try and capture the idea of a snowy woodland walk....
...and lined it with this fantastic Japanese Red Riding Hood fabric for a pop of colour and unexpected surprise inside!
 Because it was a swap, and you can never have enough little treats in a swap, I also made this little hexagonal coin purse/ear phone holder and allowed the Red Riding Hood fabric to take center stage.
I was a bit limited in how much I could send before postage would require a second mortgage but managed to squeeze in a few Australian themed goodies with these two items - some Aussie fabric fat quarters and some sweet treats...as well as a cute Red Riding Hood themed applique.

I can't wait for mine to arrive now!

Charming!

Been absent a bit longer than anticipated and therefore have a couple of posts to do.  You know how it is, working on secret and not so secret squirrel projects that you *can't* post about (or forget to post about, ahem) and then they all creep up on you!

So this first post is dedicated to a quilt top I whipped up in a frenzy of inspiration (and as I admitted on facebook, procrastination), and I am rather glad I did.

A few months back I joined my very first charm swap run by the super organised and lovely MsMidge.  Why did I join?  Because it was for fabric by possibly my most favouritest designer Bonnie and Camille!  (And not just because the current line is called Miss Kate, I'm not that shallow, honest...)

So for the uninitiated, a charm swap is a bunch of fabric enthusiasts tracking down fabrics (and sometimes trying to outdo each other), sometimes hard to find ones, cutting them up into little pieces (charm squares which are 5") and then sending them to the organiser who then drives herself crazy ensuring everyone in the swap gets one of each 112 charms...and then most people make something with them.

I am not a huge charm square fiend.  I have always found them a bit limiting but loved the idea of having 112 pieces of Bonnie and Camille fabric.  And of course once you have it, you get the urge to do something with it.  My urge just happened to hit late at night when I was trying to force myself to finish another project I wasn't so inspired about.  Hence it becoming a procrastination quilt.

I had found a few charm quilt designs on the web, which I liked as they kept the integrity of the charms (ie they were squares :) ) and this appealed (read, I didn't have to do much more cutting).  I decided to challenge myself to use as many of the 112 charms as I could and to use a solid other than white/off white or grey...given I wasn't challenging my cutting abilities.

I sorted the charms into colour families - yellow/orange, green, neutrals, reds, blues and pinks and set to work... 

Border after border like a square medallion quilt I suppose!
And this was the result - All except 4 of the charms were used, so I was pretty pleased about that.
The turquoise? aqua? or as I like to call it "Bonnie and Camille blue" was just what I wanted.  I can't remember what it is call exactly but it is in fact a linen and the pattern, I suppose, although inspired by things I have seen, is my own design and measurement.

The combination of florals, checks and pretty designs which Bonnie and Camille fabrics are known for plus the addition of the solid gives this quilt top a really retro 50s feel, which I love.  I can't wait for the opportunity to quilt it and finish it off!

The link up for the Bonnie and Camille Charm Along with Ms Midge runs until October 27.  Looking forward to seeing inspiring charm quilt ideas!