Meg's Secret Santa Bag

So I put my santa hat on my head and searched the internet for a bag pattern that I liked and thought would be handy for Meg. After much searching I came across a blog that had this shopping bag tutorial. For the life of me I can't find the blog now. This is a bit frustrating because I wanted to pop the link up for you all to see.

The basic steps for this bag are:

1.) Choose two fabrics. One for the lining and one for the exterior. Wash and iron fabrics.
2.) Work out how big you would like the bag to be and cut the fabric up so that you have two pieces the same size in each print (ending up with 4 rectangles in total). Pin all four pieces of fabric together then fold it in half.
3.) Now for the handles, you want to make them double the width that you would like them to be at the end. Get your scissors and cut your handle shape out.
4.) Get one of the lining pieces and one of the exterior pieces. Pin the exterior fabric piece and the lining piece right sides together. Then sew the "U" shape together. Make sure you don't sew all the way to the top. I left about an inch. Then sew the outside parts together making sure to leave about an inch from the top. Turn right side out and iron pieces flat.
5.) Repeat step 4 with the two remaining pieces. You should end up with two pieces.
6.) Place both exterior pieces right side together. Move the lining pieces out of the way so all you can see is the wrong side of the exterior fabric. Pin these together and then sew them.
7.) Push the exterior pieces out of the way and sew the lining together. When you fold both pieces outwards you shouldn't see any visible edges. They should be all hidden on the inside.
8.) Next I had to pull the lining out flat so both the Exterior and the lining make one big rectangle (right sides facing each other for both fabrics). Sew along the side edges of both the lining and the fabric. Now all you have to do is turn the entire bag right side out. The lining will end up on the inside and you will see no seams.
9.) This is where you make the gusset by folding the handles in half. Far outside bits fold in and under. Then like a shopping bag poke the sides inwards until you get a nice straight, flat side on your bag. Pin the handle in place and the bottom to hold it all together.
10.) You now need to sew a french seam to close the bag. To do this sew across the bottom of your bag making sure you catch the gussets in your seam. I then had to trim my seam allowance as close as possible. Turn the bag inside out and sew across the bottom encasing the seam allowance.
11.) After turning the bag the right way out I sewed 2 buttons onto the handles to fix the handles. You could just sew them together though.

So that's how I made Meg's SS present and this is how it turned out.

Plastic Bag Holder

Project 3 was a plastic bag holder. For this project I didn't use google or a pattern, just my memory.

When I came across the funky army style flannelette at Big W I also found another cool blue and fancy black check patterned fabric. After a particularly stressful shopping trip I opened the cupboard where I normally stored my plastic bags and they all fell out onto the floor. I decided enough is enough!
Surely there is a better way I could store my plastic bags, right?

Luckily some other plastic bag frustrated person had already invented the good old plastic bag holder. I just remembered what my mum's plastic bag holder looked like and improvised.

This is how my plastic bag holder was born. I just trimmed the edges of the fabric down a little and sewed them together. Next step was to hem both ends of the bag holder with a hem wide enough to fit some elastic inside. I then guestimated how much elastic I would need for each end. Then once again using my trusty safety pin I threaded the elastic through and sewed it together.

The next step had me stumped for a little while. It took me a little while to decide on how I would make the handle. I decided to make a matching handle out of the fabric bits I had trimmed off. I worked out how wide and long I wanted the handle to be. I folded the fabric in half to get the right sized strip and cut it to size. After a quick sew and turning it the right way out I joined it to my bag holder and put it to use.

Mini Munchkin PJ Pants

So project number 2 (July 2010) was a pair of PJ paints for my little munchkin man. While I was checking out the sewing aisle in Big W, after I got over the shock that Big W had a sewing aisle, I found some lovely flannelette in an army style print. There was just enough to make a pair of pants.

So after searching the wonderful world of google I found a few different ways to make a pair of pants. I settled on tracing a pair of pants, making sure to add a little more fabric for a seam allowance.

Attempt one of sewing I some how manage to make a strange flannelette army skirt. After lots of giggles, a cup of tea, a little bit more thought and some time consuming unpicking (lucky I bought a quick unpick doobalacky) I tried again and succeeded.

To make the elastic at the top I cut a small slit in the waist band, got a piece of elastic and just stretched it around little munchkin man and took a guess at how much I would need. Then I just threaded it through with the use of 2 safety pins and sewed the ends together.

Here are the finished PJ pants modelled by my cheeky munchkin.

Norma's Quilt

So I'm not one to take baby steps when I can dream BIG!
This project was an example of this. I have always wanted to make a quilt so I thought why not? How hard could making a quilt be? ;)

The first step I took was to design what I wanted the quilt to look like and how big I would make it. I'm not so much into randomness, I like things to follow patterns and to be balanced so I was careful to work out how many different fabrics I would need.

My next step was to drag my little family along with me to spotlight to pick out some fabric and buy basic sewing supplies. I found spotlight completely overwhelming! Lucky Mr M was there with me to help me navigate through all the fabric. After picking my sashing and 6 coordinating fabrics, lots of thread, some scissors we left. On the way home we popped by ALDI for food supplies and I found a fancy cool cutting device (mat and circular cutter). Don't ask me what they are called but they are handy and super cool.

Here is an example of what all the fabric will look like together as a quilt. Pretty cool me thinks :)

After deciding that I was happy with my fabric choices I set to work cutting my quilt out.
Like any proud, blogging, snap happy sewer I took pictures of each step I took. Here is my first quilt square :)

After an afternoon of chopping and sewing this happy Mumma had to have a well deserve hot chocolate while admiring her handy work.

Next came the fun task of joining the entire patchwork quilt front together. For my first sewing project I surprised myself by actually being happy with what I had created. Please excuse the not so awesome photography. So here is the front all joined together, before I trimmed it down and added the edges.

And then I added all the edges. At this point I learnt not to trim fabric until after all the pieces join together just incase you end up with your fabric being a little too short on one end. Too lazy to unpick my mistake and because it was a little bit too late I had to patch my mistake up.

After I finished the front panel I realised that I hadn't bought anything to back, fill and bind my quilt. So off to spotlight we go again where I found a thick, soft chocolate brown fabric and some bamboo lining. I couldn't find any bias tape so we checked out a little quilting shop nearby and found some chocolate bias tape. Below is the edged quilt laying on the backing.

The next step I made was to sew the bamboo filling to the backing. I didn't want to sew it to the front in fear I would damage the front. After that I joined it all together and my little Munchkin man decided to test it out for me. It seems it passes the test.

So up until now the quilt didn't really take that long to make. However after 4 attempts at binding my quilt I took a break... There is only so much unpicking one can do before they become completely over it. So months and months after, when the weather was cold again I pulled the quilt back out determined to win. There was no way I would be beaten by a quilt.

It took an entire afternoon and night and only 10cm of unpicking but my quilt was finished! My join binding join could have worked out neater but that was nothing 2 strategically placed buttons couldn't fix ;)

Here is the finished product. Once again I apologise for the shocking photo.

The proud new owner Mr M's Aunty Norma just loves her quilt, so I am stoked!!