Crafts

You might remember my vent a little while ago about how the timing on my sewing machine made a turn for the worse. $99 repair..more than half of the cost of another machine. I thought my machine would be all better, but I was terribly wrong.

Last week, I started noticing that it would hesitate when I tried to turn the hand wheel. Then, when making holiday Nifty Woofs, the machine stopped reverse stitching altogether. I need reverse stitching for the bandannas to keep the seams secure, but now I have to do that manually. Pain in the you know what.

I can’t believe my machine broke so quickly again. Let’s just say that this crafter will never buy a Singer again. EVER. This is my machine.

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I’ve been sewing on it for about a year now, and it’s already having major problems. Boo on you Singer. Never again.

Maybe in a couple of months, I’ll splurge on a new machine. I’m totally NOT paying another $99 to get this machine fixed, only to have it break on me again. No way.

I have a problem. My personal craft to-do list. Can I admit to you that I have a cross-stitch sampler that I owe to a good friend for her baby. I’ve been working on it since she got pregnant….and uh, the baby is now 1. (Worst crafter EVER, right? I’m working on finishing this one though, I swear.) I also sort of wanted to make a college scrapbook for myself. Well, I graduated college over 3 years ago…fantastic.

At random times, though, I’ll finish a project I’ve had my sights set on.

Well, now I have ANOTHER project I want to do, because I’m so competitive. This contest. Chances are solid that I won’t win, unless no one enters or anything. The prizes are drool-worthy though, and maybe no one will enter? Heh.. Also, I think I’m going to attempt free motion quilting with this one. Eep!

I bought my fabrics at Jo-Ann Fabrics yesterday, which are LSU colors. I tend to lean towards the blues/greens with my quilts, so I wanted to do something different color-wise.

I chose to do this pattern from Oh, Fransson!. It’s a wonky quilt…another first for me, but the tutorial looks simple enough. I just hope I don’t end up with a heap of fabric on the cutting board, and me drowning my sorrows in a pint of ice cream. Ha!

I can do this in a month, right? LOL…not like I have other quilts to do. (sarcasm)

So…here goes. I might be attached to my sewing machine by the time this is over…Christmas Quilt Block Swap Quilt, this quilt, my Etsy projects and my handmade Christmas gifts to family/friends. Oy..I’m a little cah-ray-zee.

I really do enjoy sewing. I usually go in our guest room, where my craft room is as well, plug in the iron, sit down and just sort of ease into crafting.

I’m still pretty new to sewing, however, and occassionally, a project will make me more stressed than happy. This project was seriously the devil. I am probably never making this again, unless I have my own kid to make this for (not anytime soon).

Here’s the project: McCalls M5721. Do not ever buy this pattern…ever.

What was the big issue? Well, McCalls instructions made little to no sense for a good portion of the project, especially when it came to sewing the pockets on. Also, the pattern asks you to make your own bias tape. Uh, no. I hate that…ended up buying my own. Saved me an ironing headache.

Also, this project ended up really messing up the timing on my machine, due to sewing the nylon webbing. My machine was not a fan. A $99 repair. Not happy.

In the end, though, I finished this cover. The friend I made this for took pictures of her little girl in the cover. I think she likes it.

I am usually not a watermarker for my photos, but my friend requested that I mark these pictures to avoid this picture of her daughter getting stolen and posted without permission.

A nifty thing about this ? The cover is reversible and folds into its own tote bag. That’s the only saving grace that this pattern has.

Rating out of 10: 2. If a pattern causes me to break my machine and sort of make up instructions for a good part of it, I’m bitter and it won’t get a high rating. 2 points for the reversible coolness and the fact that it goes into it’s own tote bag. I do NOT recommend this pattern for a beginner if they want to refrain from cussing and pulling their hair out.

A couple of weeks ago, my dear sewing machine broke. I was working on a shopping cart cover (avoid this pattern for dear life…it’s written TERRIBLY and the steps just made no sense), and in the finishing steps, the nylon webbing decided that it didn’t like my needle and took it out on my beloved machine. According to the repair guy, the timing was off and some needle hook thing broke. Erg…never working with nylon webbing on a machine again….

This lovely repair costs $99. $99?! Totally not cool, but since I’ve been trying to open my Etsy shop a while, I really had no choice but to get this taken care of ASAP. 🙁 Good news: My machine will be back on the table tonight, sewing Etsy things like it’s nobody’s business.

Anyway, the past couple of weeks involved no sewing. It kind of blows, but stupid me realized that while my machine is out, I can still cut fabric, which is SO not fun, but needs to get done. 🙂

So, I cut patterns and fabrics for Christmas gifts.

Don’t you just LOVE this? It’s going to be made into a laptop bag (this pattern/this fabric). Delightful.

I also decided that my dog should dress up for Halloween. I’m that puppy mom, and I think she’d have a blast at the costume contest that Petsmart is hosting. She loves that store! So, she’s going to be a sea monster…check out the fabric to the left. It’s a shimmery looking fabric with fish scale print. 🙂 I’m sort of winging it with a simple dog jacket pattern, because they don’t make costume patterns for 40 lbs. dogs. Go figure.

To the right is a handbag that will be made with this fabric. The pattern looks simple enough, but we’ll see how this one goes. 🙂 My first lined handbag…whoa!

Oh, and packages have started to come in for the quilt block swap! From what I’ve looked at so far, the fabrics are awesome, but I’ve only received 2 packages. I’m hoping the other 3 come in soon! ::hint hint to the participants:: I can’t wait to bundle these up and send them out. Since my sewing machine broke, I didn’t get to finish all of my blocks, but I’m pretty sure I can hammer those out this weekend too. 🙂

And, new project, of course. Instead of trashing the pillows we have in the house, I’m pretty sure Millie is getting a new dog bed and our sofas will be adequately decorated as well. I want to reuse this crazy amount of pillow fluff…I’d feel terrible trashing it all now, and the gears in my head would never forgive me :). I think I have about 10 pillows total to tear into….whoa.

I’m sure most of you are thinking that I’m just plainly wacky for all of these projects looming around, but I told myself that I really need to use up some fabric. I really have too much in my basket, and don’t really have room to sprawl out with a huge stash, sadly.

I can’t believe I’m typing this less than a year after forking out a sewing machine for the first time ever. I completely made a quilt. Yes, I made a quilt before, but that was yarn-tied and not properly binded (after doing some research), so I will call this one my first quilt also. 🙂

The idea sparked after my local quilt shop had a 50% off sale. I raided the store for Amy Butler fabrics, as well as the charm pack and backing for this quilt.

Fabric is: Lily and Will charm pack, backing fabric is Plume by Tula Pink

The quilt pattern is from Oh, Fransson’s blog. It’s fabulous for a first quilt, because charm packs are pre-cut, and all you need to do is cut some of these in half for the colored strips. Then, cut a few strips of Kona cotton and you’re good to go. Easy and quick!

Of course, I laid out all of the squares and arranged them around. I think this was the most fun of the project. 🙂 I love the pastels and designs.

I used Kona Cotton in Snow to put between the colored strips of fabric, and I think it just ended up looking fantastic!

I used a walking foot to quilt this in (not so) straight lines. That foot is my new BFF. It looks so puffy and cute!

Gosh, I hope the Mom and baby LOVE this quilt. This quilt was definitely a learning experience for me. My binding is not perfect in the least, but I will agree with the majority in saying that it’s fairly therapeutic to sit down and just finish off the binding by hand. 🙂

Next up? Time to work on my Christmas quilt block squares. There’s still time for you to join in the fun! We’re working on group 2. 🙂

This morning I was greeted with beautiful Fall-like weather. I was wondering if I was dreaming for a second, because I’m just so used to going outside at 6am to hot, sticky nastiness. Yep, even at 6am. Man, I hope that weather comes back soon. I don’t know how much of the hot, sticky mess I can take anymore!

With that glimpse of the Fall, it reminded me that Fall always makes me think of a change, and well, some things are about to change around here. 🙂

Any guess as to what those fabric cuts will be used for? Nothing to do with quilts, that’s for sure. These fabric cuts are going to be made into dog bandanas. Ever since I brought my dog to the groomer and got her a bandana, I got inspired. I think she looks adorable in one, but paying almost $10 for one bandana was really crazy to pay. So, I figured there had to be a better, CHEAPER way to make this work!

These bandanas aren’t all for Millie, though. They are going to be in an ETSY SHOP! That’s right…The Nifty Foodie is opening an Etsy shop. 🙂 I’m really excited about this, and I hope this little idea brings on at least one sale! 🙂

While I’m working on my little ol’ future shop, here’s the status of a couple of quilts I’ve been working on, which are actually both almost done!

This is the charm pack quilt that I mentioned a while back. It’s all sandwiched up and ready to be quilted. Wahoo! The quilt was done in this charm pack and has Kona cotton (in Snow) in between the rows.

This is an Amy Butler quilt (fabrics are here) that I made in a class. OMGosh…I absolutely LOVE this quilt. I quilted it by doing the “stitch in the ditch” technique, and can’t wait to bind it.

I can’t wait to see all of these projects finished, and start working on some new ones too. Gosh, I love sewing!