The coolest thing ever is showing your daughters the page in a “real live” book with your tutorial in it. They are so proud. I wish I had filmed their reactions – makes a mamma feel great!
Lucky Spool’s new book “50 Little Gifts” is a compilation of 50 simple sewable projects, perfect for gifting or swapping. And, to be honest, I’ve got a list of things to sew right away for me!
My contribution is the Cat-Eye Zipper Pouch tutorial. I love having it close by, now I won’t have to go back to my post for the instructions!
I was thrilled when Susanne Woods asked to include my tutorial. And doubly-thrilled to be in the company of contributors I’ve silently stalked followed around for forever – Anna from Noodlehead, Deborah from Whipstitch, Abby Glassenberg and Denyse Schmidt to name a few.
As I was flipping through it again this morning. I commented to my husband that I want to make so many of the projects in it – some books have a few great tutorials – this one is chock full of greatness. #notjustsayin
Wanna win a copy? Lucky Spool gave me an extra, just for me to give to you!
This giveaway is open to everyone worldwide, from today (August 17) until midnight August 24, 2018 (EST). Use the Rafflecopter widget below to enter – and if you don’t have Facebook to sign in with, use your name and email address. There’s a “click to enter”, no social media login entry too!
BONUS: Find my giveaway post on Instagram and comment to get an extra entry!
** Edited to add the WINNER! **
From a total of 344 Rafflecopter entries and 65 Instagram entries,
and as per Random.org – the winner is entry number 29:
Last fall my husband and I went away on a week-long vacation. We’d been planning for forever because it was for our 10th wedding anniversary. As I was packing, last minute of course, I realized it might be nice to have a large beach bag to use while we were there. Quite a few of the bags I’ve made so far would do nicely – but of course I needed to make something new! #sewallthebags
Enter the book Handmade Style from my favorite bag blogger, Noodlehead. I treated myself to a copy last year and it’s gorgeous. So many great project, clear illustrations and pattern pieces. Anna’s bags are simple, and perfect for showcasing your favorite fabrics. I’ve made so many of her projects I can’t list them all, but I think my favorite is my first Cargo Duffle.
Of course it was last-minute (as usual) and I auditioned fabrics from my stash. Heading to the fabric store afterwards to buy vinyl and a metal zipper. The fabric came from Warp and Weft a few years ago. I had grand plans of turning it into a quilt, but the bright colours looked perfect for the beach! The prints makes me think of elaborate tiles, which lead to piecing them as simple patchwork with some straight line quilting. I maybe should have quilted it 1/4″ on either side of the seams to add to the tile look. What do you think?
I added a fancy turn-closure to one of the open outside pockets, so it was a bit more secure to use on the plane. It’s a little nerve-wracking to cut a hole in the side of a finished piece. Yikes! #holdyourbreath Thankfully it came out straight. In fact, I’m pretty happy with the whole bag! Only thing I don’t like is the zipper tape width. The handles are added in directly beside the tape at the top of the bag, which makes for very little room and sometimes the zipper catches on the handles. Next time I would use a wider zipper, or add some width with fabric before sewing it in.
As far as the instructions, they were great too. And the bag is a good size. Over-sized for sure, but not too big to carry. Great for holding road-trip snacks or even to use as an overnight bag for the kids. It’s so big that I really didn’t need that much room for our plane trip, with just my husband and I. Of course, it would be a different story if the kids had come with us. Maybe I would have needed two of them!
In the end, I didn’t use it on the beach. The bag turned out fancier than I imagined, kind of by accident. The vinyl, fussy closure and pieced quilted body really dressed it up. Who would want to get that sandy? No problem – I filled in the gap with a souvenir bag from the gift shop – because I also needed to remember where we went, right?!
Have you made anything from the Handmade Style book?
Today I’m posting over on Sew Can She as part of the Sewlebrity Sewalong for Caroline’s book “Just for You”, written with Sarah Markos. I get to be the first Sewlebrity, eek! (Check out the giveaway later in the post!)
As part of the sewalong I made the Sweetly Gathered Round Handbag by Delia from Delia Creates. It’s a great bag – really big and super cute. Use your stashed favorites to make it and you can take them everywhere with you – or at least wherever your purse goes! The inside of the bag has a welt hidden zipper pocket and a divided pocket – great for organizing. And did I mention it’s large?! Not too large to carry around – but large enough to stash quite a bit of fabric on a fabric shop run, if that’s what you have in mind!
Check out my post on Sew Can She for more about the bag, the book, and a mini tutorial about how you can add a vinyl base to it (and why you might need to!) And people… I MADE THE HANDLES, and it wasn’t that hard! Not sure if it sounds that exciting to you? But it will change how I look at sewing vinyl and handbags. I think we’ll be seeing a lot more vinyl on the blog in the future!
The Sewlebrity Sewalong is happening all year over at Sew Can She. The book “Just for You” has two projects for each month – 24 patterns in all! Grab a copy of the book and sewalong with each project’s Sewlebrity. Enter a photo of your project before the end of the month and get a Sewlebrity button in the mail – you can collect one button each month you participate. Really and truly – Caroline will send you a button – Happy mail fun!
Caroline is giving away one copy of the book “Just for You”!
This giveaway is open to everyone, internationally from today (Jan 14th) until midnight on Monday evening, January 19, 2015. Use the Rafflecopter widget below to enter – and if you don’t have Facebook to sign in with, just use your name and email address. There’s a “click to enter” no social media login entry too! (US winners will receive a hard copy of the book and Canadian/International winners will receive the e-book.)
Disclosure and Privacy Policy: I received an e-copy of “Just for You” as part of this sewalong. I will never recommend or highlight a product that I do not love, and my opinions will and have always been my own. Thanks for reading!
Dana’s book is an amazing resource that most definitely NEEDS to be on your Sew Essential list! I won’t say too much today, because I did a review of it in May of this year. Suffice to say, there is an amazing amount of information in this book. It even includes how to do a “burn test” so you can find out what the fibre content of your fabric is!
Also, if you have never read Dana Willard’s blog, MADE, you should really check it out. She covers everything from sewing to baking to crafting – all with bits of life in between. Her photos are refreshing, bright and colourful – something for bloggers (especially me!) to aspire to and use for inspiration!
Of course, you can get her book from Amazon, or a myriad of other places I’m sure. Check out your local book store (if you still have one, sadly) or quilt shop and you may find it there as well.
Do you have a favorite sewing book that you reference on a regular basis?
Continuing on… Come back tomorrow for Sew Essential #6! And – as usual this week – enter the contest to win a fat quarter bundle – can’t hurt. You might just win!
Before you go any further… sign up for the Fabric Spot giveaway if you haven’t already. It’s the LAST DAY to enter! The giveaway ends at 10pm tonight (May 24th). Don’t miss out on your chance to win. (It’s worth signing up, check out the yardage I won last weekend (Hooray!), it’s posted on the Thread Riding Hood Facebook page.)
Aside from stitching up a tutorial (for this coming Monday!), I’ve been reading a really great book that I bought last week. It’s not a book you would generally sit down and read cover to cover… but I am a person that generally reads manuals for everything, cover to cover – so I suppose this works!
When I first read about Dana’s book “Fabrics A to Z” on her blog, MADE, I figured I would eventually have to buy it. She’s an amazing blogger and sewer and her photographs are really well put together. She’s a big inspiration for me when I sit down to write a post for y’all! (I’m allowed to say “y’all” by the way, my parents are currently living in the Southern US!) Anyhow – her book is really great and I would recommend that you buy it. I found mine on Amazon, and for a fraction of the cost on the back, which is always nice.
So… confession… I wasn’t really sure that I really needed this book, I just wanted it because it seemed cool to own Dana’s book. And everyone knows, you have to be cool to be a blogger (ha!) so I decided to buy it. Motivation aside, it turns out I really did need this book, and still do, and will for (maybe) always? It’s an amazing compilation of information about every fabric known to man and includes really great and super helpful information for each one.
And… this leads to why it is unlikely that you might sit down and read this cover to cover… it’s a reference book. But, like I said, I like to devour information (mostly to my detriment, because I really can’t remember everything I read) so I started on page 4 and went on from there. In the first few pages I learned:
What Bedford Cord is. And its properties, how to work with it and it’s care. Oh, and its most useful needle size, stitch length and sewing machine foot and whether to use the “with” or “without nap” layout when cutting patterns. (And there’s more info than that on every one of 150 fabrics types!)
Canvas and Duck cloth are the same thing. (and I always thought they were different… silly me!)
Chambray is made by weaving a coloured “warp” thread through a white “weft”. (She also explains warp and weft on page 10). And, the most common colour of Chambray is blue – just in case you were wondering!
And we’re only on page 18 (of 224). Okay, I admit it (Ack – 2 confessions in one post?!), I’m a sewing geek! I am imagining that you are reading this and wondering why I think this information is so amazing! But maybe, there are a few of you who understand?!
Anyhow, if nothing else, buy it for the information you will invariably need it for as you sew along. She’s included a notions and tools section at the end of the book – more great information on zippers, machine presser feet and elastic (oh my!). And… exciting news from Dana – she’s got a 2nd book coming out this August. This new book is “project based” so I’m excited to see what she’s put into it. I’ll have to get it…. all the cool kids will have it! (Have a great weekend, see you on Monday!)
