Elise

This baby girl set is quite the same I made for my ex's newborn, the only thing that changes is the bias binding on the hooded towel. The adressee of this new baby set is Elise, a half French baby I am looking forward to meeting, hopefully before the year ends.

A few weeks ago I came across this lovely tutorial and could not resist to give it a try. Is not the cutest hen?

Elephant

In between of a crazy period of work and family issues, I have finally found a little time to take some pics of the four piece baby girl set I made  for my cousin's baby in born. These are two towelling bibs with a heart applique, a changing mat and a hooded towel with an elephant applique. 
You know how much I like grey, and think the combination with baby pink and white is kind of relaxing, do not think?
The elephant applique was meant to be for a bag, it ended up on the hood of the towel though. The ear relief makes the set funnier. 
The lovely tags I have been using lately are about to finish (only four left). I would like to get some more but it is getting hard to be able to go to craft fairs, where I know I can get them for a nice price. Last weekend a great craft fair took place in Madrid and had the best of companion (the sweetest friend willing to dive herself in the sewing world) however I could not make it in the end...
Work, family, more work, tiredness,... my issues and feelings lately. Fortunately, Christmas break is just around the corner!

Change of mind

I got this flowery fabric because it reminded me a cheap version of the liverty fabrics of London. As I mentioned in my last post I got it to make another lunch bag... Nevertheless I thought it would be nice to use it to make a baby set of hooded towel and bibs for a newborn baby girl. I am happy with the result and hope the new parents also like the fact I avoided the typical pale pink for baby, which I also love it, by the way. Yet it is good to do something different for such special little people. 

The bad thing comes when I got to the shop this morning to get some more of this fabric and it was all sold out :-(  I still got a piece of it, but not enough for the lunch bag I had in mind. 

Fabric Stash

The polka dot maroon colour fabric has become a protagonist in both my lastest posts and my hearder. I got this (expensive) fabric in this shop and I have already run out of it. Neither to say I really have made use of it. To take the most of the last pieces of this fabric I had of it I made another piramic pouch (this time for my aunt).

The flowery fabric is from the same shop and made a heart-shaped lavender bag with the left-overs. The inspiration for lavender bags comes from Yummy Lavender, who makes them in dozens for events such as weddings or Christmas.

Finally I want to share this new (and unexpensive) fabric I purchased with the aim to make another lunch bag, yet do not really know when, since my wish-to-make list increases as much as my working time. Anyway, where there is a will there is a way, do not think?

Lunch Bag

Working life is not leaving me much time to enjoy doing things that make me disconnect, such as sewing. I finished my first lunch bag a while ago, but as I was not happy with the cord I had I did not post the pics before. Yesterday, I got up early and went to the centre to my favourite supplier shop and got a nice cord for it.  I also got some towelling to make some hooded towels and bibs for 3 three newborn girls, who are welcoming the world next month.
It is a pleasure to follow Pink Penguin's tutorials: the outcome is always gratifying.

Working on a new bag

I have already used Pink Penguin fabric bag tutorial a few times (click here, here, here or here), but it is the first time I am using the lunch bag tutorial. If you have not used any of her tutorials yet, I do recomend you to do it, including those amateur seamstress around the blogosphere, like me. They have plenty of great pictures that guide you gently through the process. The problem I found was that I am not familiar with inches (and my tape measure either), but I use an on-line inch-cm converter and piece of cake!
Ayumi also uses a lovely rich range of fabrics. My fabric stash is quite limited, so I am just going to use a three fabric convination.

The outcome in the next few days.

New Header

Yes, I have changed my header... but do not really know if I am keeping this design... 

Anyway, the "back to school" is just here, and getting ready for it is what I have been into for the last few days.  I have a new school year resolution, or I should call it challenge... whatever I call it I just want to improve my I.T. skills and be able to use them both professionally and my leisure time.

I have attended to a few teaching seminars in which you could see how motivating and useful I.T. is for teaching and have had in mind to create a teaching blog for my students, in which they could participate posting the great projects they make for the class. However, it is taking me a long long time, especially because I am just useless at I.T. and do not want my students know it!

As I have been on holiday I have had the blog and my sewing projects a bit apart, but on my aim of becoming "fluent" in I.T. I designed this new header for my blog yesterday, just to practice editing with "picmonkey". The most difficult part comes when my aim is to create buttons to external links of pdf documents... I have come across some useful blogs with lots of blogger tutorials, but when they start talking about html codes I cannot help but start yawning... but I will not give up!

The header is not the only thing I should change on my blog but it is the first thing I have got rid of, even though I must confess I was fond of it since it was with me since I started my blog, in December 2009.

r.i.p.

Pyramid Pouch

Just a quick post to show you this little pouch I made for my sister: it is a pyramid pouch made with a Michelle patern (before known as a Keyka Lou). Initially I wanted it to be a flowery pouch and use the spotted fabric for the linning. However, I find the spotted one so nice that I thought it deserved to be seen, so I used for the flap. I was not sure it I did right, but it could be unsewn and re-sew the flap the other way in case my sister did not like this way. 

Project Done!

You might remember this post about paper piecing technique I posted last year. I have had this unfinished project on my working chair for months without knowing what to make with it very well. I used to take it away everytime I sat down; so, eventually I thought the perfect place for this project was where it usually was.
So, I took this obsolete (and ugly) cushion cover off...

I recycled the zip and added a back...

and here is my new cushion cover!

I have already mentioned about the dark nook where my sewing machine is and how much I wish to have a bright and handier place to keep all my crafty stuff. For the time being, nothing has changed, except my new cushion cover, of course!

Findings

When I was a child my dad used to tell me I was found in a rubbish bin because I was just curious about what people threw away; in case there was any kind of "treasure" for me. I have not lost that curiosity, and I still enjoy finding things that are useless for others and convenient for me.

Otherwise, look at these little baskets I found yesterday on a rubbish bin. Please, do not misunderstand me; I am not saying that I enjoy looking in the bins (that is a bit disgusting). People like me have a method: every time we throw something away and think it could be useful for somebody else, we do not put it just in the bin, but on it or in a strategic place near the bins, that people could easily see it and take it if they want to. Obviously I gave them a deep wash before putting my fabric in. For the littlest white one I also want to make a kind of inner fabric bag.

I follow some American and Canadian bloggers and I really enjoy those posts in which they find lovely pieces of furniture, clothes, haberdashery items, etc. for ridiculous prices.In my city there are not many second hand shops, and I do not think the prices of the few of them we have, are real bargains. That is why I love those charity shops in England and needless to say the yard sales in the States and Canada...

By the way, if you think your children may have this kind of "curiosity" do not tell them what my dad used to tell me: I had a kind of trauma suspecting they really found me in a rubbish bin and was adopted.

Fabric Bundle

On my last trip to London my host had put this fabric bundle on my guest pillow, isn't it nice?. These eight fat quarters are adodable and I think Michelle or Ayumill's patterns are perfect for them. Suggestions are admitted anyway. For the time being, I have just hand-washed them and are being dried by the bursting sun of Madrid, so by the time I finish this post they will be completely dried.

Travelling Pouches

Last May we went for a stroll and came across a lovely craft market: there weren't many stands but enough to brighten my day up.
I said to myself not to get more fabrics, but how could I resist to this pretty world-map fabric? I had seen similar fabrics in other blogs and websites and always loved all the projects made with it.

I could not resist to these super cute labels either...

For the inner and the pockets I also used some ikea fabric I had spare from these cushions I made last year.

I almost forgot to mention about the pattern: I did not use any. I made my own measures and watched this tutorial from PeSeta (an atelier-shop in Madrid I discovered a few months ago). Hope you find it useful!