Christmas In July

I love Christmas tree quilt blocks.  I found this tutorial on a blog, The Spruce Crafts,  Christmas Tree Block  and I had to make one.  I thought the original size was a little too small so I increased the size of the strips to 3.5" and I increased the length of the tree pieces about 2 to 4 inches each so they would be substantial.  The final size is about 15.5" x 17.5 inches.  Perfect for a pillow cover.

Wild Christmas Pillow Cover

    I made myself a bright and wild red and green Christmas pillow cover.  I love it.  I found the fabrics on Etsy and I used the quilted pillow cover tutorial here. 

Secret Sewing Is Done, On To Selfish Sewing And Making

     I can't believe it's August already.  This year is flying by.  I've only made one trip to the beach this summer so my summer season has not been filled with fun and excitement, just working and doing regular household and life maintenance.   I am trying to schedule more beach day trips before the end of September.

    I'm so glad that I I finished five secret sewing projects last week for dear daughter's birthday in November.  It's hard for me to do secret sewing because I can't share it on social media until after it is gifted.

     My selfish sewing projects start with this adorable snow family fabric.  I found this at JoAnn's a couple of years ago and I made some hanging dishtowels with it to give away to my Christmas day hostess.  I have been wanting more of this fabric ever since.

    I found the snow family fabric again last weekend and had to buy it.   I made this quilted pillow with a whole cloth piece of the cute snow family fabric so I could see all the little family members.  I especially love the kitty and doggy in this print.  I cut the fabric a little bigger than my sixteen inch pillow form to allow for the quilting and I cross hatch quilted the top piece with a scrap of 80/20 Heirloom batting and a white muslin backing.  Then I joined this quilted top to an envelope backing.  It was really simple and I love it.

   The front of the pillow.

   The back of the pillow.

   Close up of snow kitty with a redbird on its head.

    I found another YouTube pieced pillow cover tutorial that I just love.  I have purchased red and green Christmas fabric to make one for me.  Here is a link to the tutorial:   quilted pillow cover tutorial.  This tutorial is really well done and I used the dimensions to make the whole cloth pillow cover that I made above.

    I still have to make the tote bags from my Hawaii souvenir fabric and that fabric is sitting on my ironing board waiting patiently.

    There is one more Christmas decoration that I want to make.  I have a crochet angel dishcloth pattern that I want to experiment with by making the pattern with worsted white cotton yarn combined with silver crochet size 10 thread.  I want to make a couple for me and a couple for dear daughter for Christmas decorations.  I'll have to see how the first one turns out before I commit to making four.  LOL.

    I have knit 24 dishcloths since the beginning of the year.  I am finished with knitting dishcloths for awhile.  I have plenty to give to dear daughter and keep for me.  I still have to get back to my hexagon quilt top and my crochet blankets that I started.

I Just Could Not Resist . . .

Making one more neck pillow for myself.  I love this fabric.  A link to the .pdf pattern and the sewing tutorial is on my August 11th post.

Neck Pillow For Long Distance Drives

  When I'm not driving, of course.

   I'll be using this around the house as well.  I may even make another for a back up.  I have quite a bit of neck pain and I usually deal with it, but I think this will help me a lot.

    I used this tutorial here.  The link has the .pdf pattern and the sewing instructions.  This project took me about 2 hours from cutting the fabric to the last stitch.  It was fun to make, it fits well, and is super comfortable.  I used cotton fabric from my stash and an almost 12 oz. bag of fiberfill which I bought yesterday.

   Using stash fabric and a $4.00 bag of fiberfill, this would make a nice gift for someone.

The Christmas Quilt Is Finished.

   Here it is.  It's kind of ugly but it will give me a a pop of red and green color in the living room during the holidays and it's something that the most destructive kitties in Christendom cannot tear up.  You can see the black/red/green poinsettia flowers on the binding material.  It kind of blends in with the top, but it shows up nicely on the back.

      I'm making fun granny squares to cover a pillow for my pink and green bedroom.  I'm using a 16" pillow form, pink yarn leftover from my afghan project, and the pink rose fabric leftover from my pillowcase project.

   I'll be working on vinyl pouches after I finish covering my pillow.

   I still have to varnish my barn quilt.  I want to do that job outside and I'm waiting for drier weather.

Time To Buy A Bathmat

     I'm going to buy a bathmat from Walmart today.  I will not be finishing the crochet bathmat I planned to make with the the 1" strips of fabric I sewed together to make fabric yarn.  I did a test crochet last night with the ball of yarn I made the other night and I hate it.  I just wanted to let you know that I will not be working on this project anymore and you won't see a picture of the little bit I crocheted last night.  It is completely U G L Y.   I wasted about a week on this sewing/crochet fail and I'm moving on to the items listed below.


1.  Recover the cardinal pillow I made last year with red plaid fabric I bought a couple of weeks ago.

2.  Cut the squares for my Civil War Buckshot pincushion  and order the emery sand.

3.  Make the 4 pillow cases with the yardage of Tanya Whelan fabric I purchased last year.

4.  Iron the muslin and trace the pattern for the hand embroidery, Never Underestimate A Woman
     With A Sewing Machine.   Then pick the colors of floss for the embroidery.

5.  Organize the box holding more projects, fabrics and supplies.

6.  Start the pink fluffy granny square afghan for my bedroom.


 
 

Cat Pillow Done and Another Project Started

I finished the cat pillow today.  I had to dog sit my granddog at my home this weekend.  He is an American Bulldog and he always scares my kitties, so I have to stay with him the entire time he is in my home.  Yesterday I spent my day  setting up my new computer and today I finished one sewing project and started a new one.

This is the fabric before I turned it into a pillow cover.

And this is the front of the finished pillow.  I made the pillow envelope style.  It was really easy once I got the fabric made.  I put a muslin back on the fabric and I sewed the fabric to the muslin for stability.  The muslin also gave the fabric a lot of body.

I started my patriotic door decoration for next summer.  It's a simple star, 10" squares made into half square triangles that is super easy to make.

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I have the rows put together now and the backing is sewn to it.  I didn't put any batting in it, but I am going to bind it with top with the back and I'm using the blue fabric to bind it.

I should have the binding done in a couple of days and I'll share the finish with you.

Making a Pillow Cover with Laurel Burch Kitty Fabrics

I love, love, love Laurel Burch Cats.  I have a few bags, earrings, and socks with her colorful cats on them.

I also collected a few different Laurel Burch fabrics over the last few months that I have been wanting to use to cover an 18" pillow form.

Here is one strip of the fabric I'm creating to cover my pillow.  I have to make one more strip like this, then I can sew the two together to have enough fabric to cover my pillow.