Trash to Treasure Zippy Pouch

It finally happened - this weekend, after an intense February that was determined to remove every last bit of my sanity, my children got sick of me. Saturday morning around 11 am they just looked at me and said with their eyes "we need to be apart from you today," and blessedly found ways to keep themselves amused practically until Monday morning.

It was blissful.

It was also necessary for me to whip up a birthday party gift for one of their friends, which we of course collectively remembered at 6pm on Saturday evening for a Sunday at noon party and after a glass of wine (for me, not all of us. Just to be clear). But one of the joys of living in a quilting home is the ability to shop in one's stash. So down to the studio I went. I may or may not have taken the wine.

I've taken to making little zippy pouches for the preteen set. They are cute, they are quick, and they are getting to the age where they might want to carry makeup and stuff in their backpacks. My dancer daughter Paige likes to fill hers with her hair pins and bun wraps, which let me assure you is MUCH more preferable to her former storage method which involved throwing the wraps (think mini hair net) all over the floor of any room of the house so that from not much of a distance they looked like a dead mouse sprawled on the carpet. Even she freaked when she came upon one once, but did that stop her? No. Not until she had a cute pouch.

Armed with the wine and my sense of color I chose some fabric combos. Decided on the blue. Not that it matttered, in the end. Read on.

I use this tutorial from noodlehead. I have no idea where she got that name for her blog, but I do know that the tutorial is awesome and I've never made one that wasn't cute. Observe.

From a leftover block I couldn't figure out what I had done to make it in the first place.

Look! I can make my photos look just like noodlehead's!

Mouse trap, or Paige's pouch? You decide. Also made from a leftover block.

Front of bag

Back of bag. I mean come on. Cuteness aplenty.

Knowing I could make a cool zippy before my glass was empty, I grabbed the two blue polka dot fabrics I'd selected along with the teal zipper and headed for the sewing machine. But suddenly I was struck immobile right in my tracks. WHAT was that thing lying on the floor over there? Some might think it was yet another of Paige's bun wraps. It was not. It was this amazing cool leftover strip pieced border segment, and I could almost hear it crying "Use me! Use me!" 

So I did. It even went better with the zipper, so I was sold.

The only thing I really do differently than noodlehead (at this point I am wishing I knew her name because I just feel weird referring to her as what seems at least a nicer word for pasta face, but still) is to quilt the fabric I'm using for the outside before I cut the pieces or start sewing. So first I whipped out the 505 and layered it with batting, then headed for my trusty rack of variegated threads to choose the best, most yummy one.

Options one and three are actually NOT the same. The one furthest to the right has green in it. The other has more purple. One must look very closely to see any difference at all, though. Obviously it was imperative that I have both in my collection.

I went with option one, aqua/teal/purple but sans green. I was afraid the green would scream "LOOK AT ME!" but like it mattered, because let's face it:

1. You can't even see the green in the photo.
2. This was for a 12 year old girl. Is she looking at the quilting thread? No.

Once the random garbage I found on the floor strip set I so carefully chose from my vast collection was quilted, I was beside myself with glee to find this cool blue and green floral for the lining.

Perfection is overrated, but sometimes it shows up anyway.

Then came the fun of putting it all together, which honestly isn't all that interesting or any different from how noodlehead does it, so you can just refer to her blog to figure it all out. Then if you have problems you can contact her, not me. See how I passed the buck right back to her there? But I promise you won't have problems. It really is the best tutorial ever.

I didn't take any photos of the process of sewing it together except this one, because it cracked me up how as I was turning it right side out it ended up looking like a mushroom wearing a shower cap for a minute there.

Or not. It might have been the wine.

A few finishing touches like some topstitching and a zipper tag and voila! Is it not the cutest? Even if you don't think so, humor me.

Only drawback was it didn't stand out against my cutting mat, but that's what black fabric is for.

So there you go. The next time your daughters remind you they need a birthday gift in the morning (the preteen social equivalent of "I forgot to tell you I need 3 dozen cupcakes tomorrow" delivered at 9pm), remember me and my trash to treasure zippy. Remember noodlehead. And for heaven's sake, remember the wine.

Hard Hat Area: Hottie At Work

Welcome to the ever-evolving world of Quilting Hottie Haven! No doubt you notice a few changes since your last visit, assuming said last visit was more than 10 minutes ago (I'm not kidding, it's currently ever-evolving, and by ever, I do mean constantly). I'm not totally thrilled with some of the font sizes and colors and need to redo some of the pages to update and perfect them for 2014, but it has more of the clean look I have been craving and I'd love to hear your thoughts on how I can make it even more user-friendly for you! You know I live to do your will. Between you hotties and my children, it's amazing I accomplish anything else.

So what's with all the changes? Did I wake up one morning with a sudden urge to spend most of the day smacking my head against the wall because advanced settings on blogger might as well be written in Chinese? No, although one would wonder. Actually, I'm excited to be entering that exotic world of having a blog sponsored by online shops, and I needed a good place to put them. So just like in life, acquisition of something new forced a renovation. Thankfully this was a little more minor than the time we discovered Baby Oops was on the way and decided to put a 500 square foot addition on the house, but the general concept remains the same.

After declaring Fat Quarter Shop the newest members of Hottieland last week, this week I am welcoming  Lemon Tree Fabrics.

Is their logo not the cutest?

I was first introduced to Julie, owner of Lemon Tree Fabrics, back in October. We share a mutual friend, Larissa, who found out at a playdate that Julie, an unassuming hottie mom much like myself, had an online fabric shop, and told her about me, her unassuming hottie mom quilt designer friend. Julie handed Larissa some business cards to give to me, but not before asking that crucial question all under 55-quilters/fabric lovers ask: "Um....how old is she?"

Apparently Larissa had left off the part where I am an unassuming hottie mom. I mean, it's obvious enough in person, but worth a mention when discussing me with those who haven't met me, right?

In any case, I placed my first order that evening and the rest is history. And now we are partnering in this blog sponsorship, and there are just so many reasons this excites me:

•  I am Lemon Tree Fabrics' first blog sponsorship. Julie was more than happy to have me convince her of the benefits to both of us and signed on immediately. So tempting to insert evil laugh here.
• LTF has a fantastic selection of modern and fresh and awesome prints as well as trims and laminates and all sorts of other stuff. Really. Go look.
• "Choose Your Own Fat Quarter Bundles"  - Want two FQs? Want 10? Whatever! She'll bundle them if you tell her which ones you want! Even if they are on the bolts at the tippy top of the wall.
• LTF is three miles from my house, so even though it's an online shop, I get to pretend it isn't. So I've seen the awesomeness of the basement alcove with fabric bolts stacked to the ceiling and a to-die-for cutting table that ALMOST puts mine to shame. Almost. Note: Three miles from my house places it squarely NOT in citrus growing climes, so at some point I will remember to ask why Lemon Tree, but for now we will just enjoy the cute name.
• I absolutely love supporting a mom-cutting-fabric-in-the-basement-after-the-kids-go-to-bed small business, and hope you'll check her out too!

Welcome Julie and Lemon Tree Fabrics!

With 21 days to go before my children's heads spin around for the last time and explode with excitement, like everyone else I am madly sewing gifts in between baking, wrapping, and finding new hiding places for the damn elf.

This morning I whipped up the cutest little zip pouch out of two UFO blocks using a tutorial at noodlehead, and inspired by this one made by my friend Kelli. I used one for the body of the bag, and the other for the lining.

One side

Other side

Interior. I can see why it was called an "open wide" zip pouch by Noodlehead.

Looks slightly like our betta fish from this angle.

I'd tried to make a zip pouch a couple of weeks ago using the same tutorial, but a much smaller block. Why? Because I did not read the directions and bought a way too short zipper, and had to improvise. It did not turn out quite as well.

Moral: Read directions.

Much happier with the one I made today, and I will be giving it to my niece/hero big girl cousin to the girls and stuff it with a few awesome little gifts. With luck she will use the pouch for her dance hair accessories or something. Paige has commandeered the first attempt for that purpose, and it seems to work. Sort of. At least the pile of bobby pins at the bottom of the dance bag is slightly diminished.

A couple of days ago I went through the NQ fabrics and found several suitable for infinity scarves, and whipped up four of them in an hour using this tutorial from Sweetest Bug Bows.

Three for gifts, one for me. They are lucky it isn't the other way around.

The top one there is the one I kept, because it is very much me. It is also very much made using the back side of the fabric, as the front side was an oriental satin in an almost obnoxious shade of hot pink, which I honestly have no recollection of acquiring and am not sure why I would have as I don't like satin or oriental fabrics, but I LUVed the reverse side, with it's more muted tones and stripey look. Lesson: Always consider the backs of fabrics. You have no idea how often I have done that in quilting and sewing, and I have never regretted it.

I'm also thrilled to have finished the Breakfast with Santa raffle quilt for Baby Oops' school this weekend. I used the same technique as in Greta's Kaleidoscope, and I really like how it came out.

We also really like how the deck, which is FINALLY FINALLY DONE! came out.

Funky star formed by sashing. Love that.

 Not a bad use for a bunch of uglies I got at a block auction, huh? Plus donating it made me have no guilt at all about refusing to work at the event, which always leaves me feeling like I've been run over by a truck full of sugared-up crazy people, because I basically have.

Next up: Attempting to get a quilt done for my husband for Christmas. He's actually never received one from me, and while the one I am working on does not excite me in the least, and you will see why soon enough, he'll be all over it.

Merry merry!