Zippy highs and lows

I've been beavering away this week on craft fair and shop stock.  There's lots of cushions but I'll save those for a future post and today will concentrate on a bit of zippyness! 

I thought zippy pouches would be a good craft fair make because they shouldn't take too long and could be reasonably cheap.  However, I needed to conquer my zip phobia first...cue googling "Easy zippy/zip/zipper/zippered pouch tutorials" - try saying that after a glass of wine!.  Having read a few I sat down to give it a go.

This first one uses a 5" zip and scraps from a cushion I was making.  It's not bad, but just ...O....K.  I used a furnishing fabric for the body, which was fine, but the same fabric was too unwieldy for the zip ends which I couldn't get through the machine properly...lesson learnt.


So then I tried a second larger version, using linen and a few scraps, with a PVC inside and a favourite hot pink zip.

First mistake on this one was forgetting to undo the zip before sewing all the pieces together....and then realising that there was NO way I was going to be able to either undo the zip from the reverse, or turn the purse the right way round..."darn it...unpicker, where are you?"

After that little hiccup, it went quite smoothly.  I added boxed corners to make the perfect (ahem) little make-up bag.  Yeay!  I proudly show it to friend Sarah.

She liked it too, I don't know whether she was just being polite or whether she didn't spot it either...but it was only later that I noticed the daft mistake, did you?!


Yep, my flowers are upside down. 

Doh.

Third attempt, zippy make-up bag for mum-in-law's birthday.  The zip ends aren't so neat on this one (I left them too long I think) but at least the butterfly is the right way up!

I'll persevere...at least my zip phobia is almost cured!

x

I am in love with this...!

Check out this fantastic machine raw-edged appliqued work by Aneela Hoey of Comfort Stitching ...  I found it blog-surfing whilst eating my cereal this morning via Quilt Story.    LOVE LOVE LOVE this style!   It's going to get added to my ever growing list of things to do, which I have now decided to publish on the sidebar on my blog...just to keep the impetus going  :)

Ceri x

Shamed into action!

I've been following a few sewing blogs and recently a number of sewing goddesses have been revamping their sewing spaces. Tilly and the buttons, Handmade Jane and Hayley goes handmade have all shown their lovely, organised spaces and really put me to shame!  I'm lucky enough to have a devoted sewing room in the basement (one of the benefits of living in Hastings is that the property is cheapish!) however, I've let it get so messy that I've moved my machine to the kitchen and my stash is also gradually migrating up the stairs! See below for evidence! (the kettle belongs to our builder who has taken to using the room as his tea room!)

To be fair one reason for doing this was so that I could still sew whilst hanging out with James in the evenings, but the kitchen table take-over is not ideal! Having being shamed by all the lovely spaces, I resolve to get organised in the basement, give me one month and I shall report back!

The gorgeous Felix has been poorly, her first real cold I think :( so I have been a bit slow in production this week.  My latest project is a table runner for a small cottage.  The brief is modern, blues, lime greens and grey, and it needs to be about 1.2m long.  So far I have a front (see below) which uses that lovely IKEA fabric from Nikki I mentioned in an earlier post as well as some Amy Butler and some Moda plus various other fabrics from the stash.

I have also completed a reverse in plain colour blocks with the odd piece of patterned fabric which all needs to come together with appropriate binding.  Still haven't decided whether to quilt it or not...will come back to you with the finished product shortly (I hope!)

x