What did I win you may be asking . . . I can barely bring my self to type it I’m so thrilled, an embroidery hoop masterpiece from Lucky Jackson!!!!!

And I get an email saying go to the shop and pick one. Pick one. Seriously, how!?

Lookit these things? They’re fantastic.

People wonder how I have time to create so many things, I’m following patterns, or making 10 at a time, or spending 1 day madly crafting and not touching it again for a week. This lady makes one of these things every single day. I’m amazed. And then she says “how weird is it you won and I’m a fan of your blog?!” I love the handmade community.

You can see the works so far here in this Flickr pool.

Ok I’m not entirely caught on on previous projects. I’ve still got my slippers to crochet and my little sewing thread/scrap catcher thing to make but I did get to this lovely embroidery. And I’m sure glad I did.

I did some things differently, mostly because I was sickly on the couch and didn’t want to get up for anymore colours or to Google a certain stitch . . . I mean I took some artistic license.

I was pumped to try the whipped backstitch but my outer circle ended up a tad wonky so I decided to go around another time in an effort to even it out. Thanks to Nicole for having such an awesomely cute pattern. I proudly showed my hubby “Look!” and he looked and said “What is it?” and even as I started to answer I realized how silly it was sounding in guy speak, “It’s a hedgehog! In a tea cup! Floating . . in the water . . . nevermind.”

So onto this week’s project, the convertable clutch! The PDF pattern is available here on Etsy or here directly from the LBG site. And of course I do have 1 to give away. The lucky winner is . . . .

Ellen!!! (email sent!)

So congrats and I hope you have time this week to get sewing!

Because I need another crafty hobby to like.

Or more craft books . . . this one came just before the holidays so it went to Belize with me.

A sweet little ornament made by Mollie! Such an awesome surprise. I’ll have to get her back at some point. And guess we’ll have to get working on another project for 2012. We’ve done
this, this and this so I wonder what’s next?

It’s one of the many masterpieces created by Nicole of Follow the White Bunny. She writes each week on Feeling Stitchy and she sells her patterns in this shop and on Etsy.

It’s an adorable little hedgehog floating in a tea cup, he’s even paddling his way around. It’s super cute. Buy it here.

Have a safe and happy holiday!!

I cut off all the icky wire bits and filled all the holes that were left behind. There were still some rough parts, thanks to all the holes and the ugly curly design that I tried to fill. I took it to the cottage with me hoping for some quiet time to finish it. And lo and behold!

I hammered some nails into the front, I wanted a rustic sort of look. I used my pinking shears to cut out some triangles from fabric scraps and put some batting on the back for stability. I stitched letters to spell out ‘hello’. I was going to go with ‘welcome’ but ‘hello’ is more me. I folded the top of the triangles over a string of baker’s twine and stitched closed. Then I wrapped the twine around the nails and trimmed the ends. Voila!

I added picture hanger loopy things on the back and used some more twine to hang it on my front door. Like a wreath, but square and waaaay more cute. The weather has been sort of silly here so I’ve given up on a good action shot of that and went ahead and shared.

I can’t remember the first time I stumbled onto Mollie’s site but I’ve been going back ever since. She’s so great with colours, stitches and designs not to mention can throw a cute little face on almost any object. We’ve worked together on a game, a planner and somehow keep wandering back to each other with more ideas.

Here’s the latest idea I’d love to share with you, her Little Snackers designs. These sweet little things are for use one your very own reusable snack bags. With back to school time approaching for most of us I thought reusuable snack bags would be a great tutorial idea and asked Mollie to help out with some of her signature embroidery patterns.

Little Snackers Download

Pattern is for personal use only.

These work perfectly with my snack pouch tutorial from yesterday. If you want a different pouch design, fold over or buttons or something you can find a ton of ideas with a quick Google search. Happy pouch making!

We’ve been making the switch to glass and stainless steel lunch containers. Both my school and my son’s school push for the whole literless/boomerang lunch thing. Bomerang lunch basically means if you send it in packaging or it creates some sort of garbage they’re going to send it back home to you. Strangely we teacher folk are free to load up the garbages at school with our lunch litter but I’m trying desperatly to avoid that. Hence my binge to create some snack pouches!

Now I created a few for my son and I’m going to show you how to make some yourself. I was really hardcore with his and used parts from one of my hubby’s practically new shirts. Somehow he got a weird big circle stain on it right in the front and tossed it into the donate pile. I rescued it.  Oh, lookie a Mabel’s Label.

I also tried to use fabrics I had on hand and chose some of the bright colourful kid prints I have to jazz the pouches up a bit. There some debate online about materials to use for the inside and what is and isn’t food safe. To just avoid having to buy something or find out later what I chose was wrong I’m sticking with cotton fabrics. If you plan on carrying something that could get things wet I suggest adding a layer between the inner and outer cotton pieces to help prevent everything else in your bag getting soaked. Cutting up a freezer bag would work great for this and you could probably get a few out of just one.

You will need:

- lining fabric 4 1/2 x 6ish

- printed fabric for outside about 4 1/2 x 3 1/2

- plain fabric for outside 4 1/2 x 3 1/2

- 4 inch length of velcro, hook & loop piece

- strip of fabric to make tabs

Pin the 2 outside fabric pieces right side together and sew together. I use 1/4 inch seam, or slightly less.

Unfold the pieces and press the seams flat.

Stich on the rightside of the fabric to each side of the seam.  This will help reinforce where the fabrics are joined and adds a nice little decorative stitch.

Because I repurposed an existing garment I didn’t have to make my own little tabs but if you do it’s really simple.  Take 2 pieces of fabric shaped like rectangles and fold it in half so it’s a long piece and then sew down the edge. Turn it right-side out and you should have a nice long thin rectangle.  If you want the little decorative top stitch mine has you can just do a straight stitch down one side.  Trim one tab so it’s slightly shorter than the other.  I’ve found it’s easier to separate them when opening the pouch.

Fold your tab piece in half and sandwich it between your lining and outside piece, placed right sides together.  Sew through all 3 pieces.

You should now have this sort of looking thing, with your tab sticking up.  Now position the velcro about 1/4 – 1/2 inch from what will be the top of your pouch.  Stitch along at least the top and bottom of the velcro, you can do the sides too if you like.  Secure the velcro on the opposite side of the pouch, measuring them against each other to get the positioning correct.

Fold the pouch over completely so the outside is outside and you’re looking at the lining.  Press to get a nice clean edge and then topstitch along near the edge of the pouch.  This will create a nice finish stitch on the inside and outside and reinforce the tab.

Once you’ve completed all these steps for both sides you should be left with something that looks like this.

Place the 2 pieces with the outsides together and stitch all the way around 3 unfinished sides.  This would be a great place to use a serger if you have one.  I don’t so I just went back and did a zig zag stitch just beside the straight stitch and then trimmed the fabric really close to the stitching.

These are really fun and easy to make.  It’s a great way to use up some scraps.  I’m thinking of making them to use as loot bags for my son’s birthday party this year, then the kids leave with some goodies and a fun little reusable snack pouch.  Since things will only be in there a few hours I’m not worried about them getting stale but if you were, or plan to put wet-ish snacks in there, then you can put a water resistant lining between the fabrics.

Also, I’m going to tease you with a little fun embellishment you could add to these.  You’ll have to come back tomorrow for the full explanation.  All I can say now is it involves a guest post and it will kill you with cuteness.

Mostly I make cozies. It wasn’t really what I set out to do when I opened an Etsy shop, but I sort of just fell into it and I’m glad I did. I like it, I get to be goofy and I’ve learned a ton of new things. One thing I haven’t really learned is how to take dozens and dozens of photos of what is essentially the same item and still make it interesting. Which is sort of stinky since I recently created a whole new batch of designs for the shop.

Part of me thinks, “Ok, it’s just a cozy, they get it. Do the plain background thing and be done with it”.

But then if I do have something in the background, like say cookies, I know people see it and look and want cookies so they might want my cozy . . . . Oh I know I’ll hold it in my hand! No one’s ever seen a disposable cup doing that before! *groan*

Today was nice and sunny (after the freak thunderstorm) so I tried to sneak some flowers in. But yeah I don’t know, it’s still a cozy.

What’s a disposable cup doing in my house in the first place let alone on my piano? Who knows, it’s a new place to set up a photoshoot. How about in front of my lappy, you know because it’s a computer joke, get it? Get it?!

Anyone else feel this is a challenge when you’re making similar items and need to photograph for listings?

Maybe I should just start getting really outlandish and putting them on my sleeping cats, or hanging from the ceiling or in the bath . . . .*sigh*

Also, since I’ve organized another scrap swap recently I’ll throw some fun little scraps into the package too.

Simply leave a comment below! Bonus smiles from me if you say something nice.
Giveaway is open to everyone everywhere mail gets delivered until May 25th!

**WOW I have never had this many comments on one post! Does that make me seem lame? Oh well. I usually write out names on paper and choose one when I have a giveaway, don’t think that’s going to work this time.
It’s been so great reading all these comments, thanks for all your kind words. I love all the people noticing it’s a Timmy’s cup!

Some questions have popped up in the comments, here are some answers,
- That is not my sewing machine, sadly, it’s LAs and she took the photo
- You can use your cozy on tea. Coffee is evil (well in my opinion) but my cozies don’t explode when interacting with it or anything
- I’d love to include cookies with your cozy but not sure that’d work in the mail. They are yummy little gems with hidden chick pea goodness from the Deceptively Delicious cookbook. I baked them for the photo shoot and they are sadly, long gone.
- Happy birthday if it was recently/is your birthday *please note that doesn’t mean you automagically win* sorry

I’ve been bouncing around all the other blogs and there’s some great prizes out there, and wonderful blogs. So happy I joined up this year, not sure how I missed it last year. Also really glad today was a holiday for me, it gave me time to click and comment!
Please feel free to add me on Twitter, follow me on Pinterest or come back again. I’d love to keep seeing everyone.