Sewing...

I've been really trying to get into sewing, and actually thinking of starting a business out of it, but who knows what will happen. I just wanted to share a couple of examples of what I have been doing lately, and hopefully I will get some tutorials up soon!

Pin Cushion

I don't know if I've already said this before, but we are horrible bloggers; literally awful. I've been pretty busy sewing and doing all these side little projects, that I would completely forget to take pictures as I was doing a piece...woops.

But, I did get some of this one! First off, here's what you'll need:

• Scissors

• Fabric

• Picture Frame

• Packaging Tape

• Spray Paint(optional)

• Poly-fil Batting

First, I bought this frame from D.I. for $.50, didn't like the colors of it, so I spray painted. You can choose whatever color you like, but I decided to go with aqua because I had multiple fabrics that it would look cute with, plus, it's one of my favorite colors. :)

Next, I put my fabric and batting together! The amount of fabric you will need is just determined by how big the opening of your frame is, but I decided to add an inch and a half to all sides for wrapping. This was the most challenging part. I could not find staples for our staple gun, so packaging tape it was...I taped down two of the sides first and then started to fill it with my batting. I had to have Kendra help me during this part because there was no way I was going to be able to rip off pieces of tape at the same time that I was pulling and trying to tighten all the sides so it would look good and even. It definitely did not turn out perfectly, but I think it looks pretty good considering the circumstances.

Next, I needed to put it all back together.  The frame I chose had two different pieces of cardboard on the back, so I stuck the one that I hadn't used to the back of the fabric, and used the nails that were already used, to put it all back in to place.

Ain't she just fabulous? I love Pinterest. Especially when there are so many easy, cute, and useful projects like this!

Not another quilt!

Yes... I decided to make another quilt, this time I kind of knew what I was doing. ;) I stuck to an easy pattern I made up, and I ran into very little problems this time. It also took me like 1/6th of the amount of time it did with my t-shirt quilt.
At first, I was going to do this quilt in only yellow, grey, and white, but as time went on and I bought more scraps of fabric, I thought some black and turquoise would be cute too. :)

 Keep adding more patterns and squares!

 Here's me just showing you that I actually did sew this. :) I bought all my supplies and fabric from Hobby Lobby (of course) and Joann's. I sewed the set of four squares together first, and then sewed those to the bigger squares.

 She's almost done! Just need to finish the last couple of rows, do the back, and stuff it with batting!

 Voila! This quilt only took me about 3 weeks to finish since I was so excited about it, and I love it! I did the back in just a queen sized sheet cut down to fit, and then tied yarn knots in it every couple of squares to make sure that the batting stays in place.

Revamping my Memo Board

SO...probably around five years ago, Kendra got herself and I these memo boards with the intentions of revamping them anyways; we didn't care for the pink and brown with little bows(not pictured here, I took them off like two years ago). Since then, it's been sitting in my closet just DYING to be redone, and finally I got around to do it! The wet spots were scratches on the fabric that I thought I would be able to get out with some water, but it didn't work.
Heres a list of items you will need:

• Ribbon; grossgrain is the best kind to use because it is more sturdy
• Staple Gun and staples for it
• Sewing Machine, thread
• Scissors
• Brads/Jewels/Buttons (your preference)
• E6000

  The first thing I decided to do was pick out different ribbon that I wanted to use. At first, I was going to use ribbon that were all the same size, but decided that using different colors and also different sizes would make it more unique and cuter. I chose colors that my mom already had, and that would match my room scheme.

Next, I cut all the sides where the ribbon was stapled in the back of the board. I then pulled out the staples holding it in place, and threw it all away except the strand of ribbon used to hang it up on the wall, I will need that for later.

For this next step, I needed Kendra's help holding down the ribbon to make sure that it stayed tight and straight so all the lines would end up perfectly(or close to it) aligned. I wanted to cover up the lines from the ribbon before, so I lined up and stapled them all in the same places as they were before. I first stapled the ribbon in the top back, and moved across the board stapling at each place needed, and then ending in the back for a final staple.

 

Here is a close up.

Here is a picture of it half way done.

And here is a picture with all the ribbon finally stapled on! I decided to have the different colors of ribbon all cross each other, making an 'X' pattern.

Next, I decided it needed some BLING. So I went to Hobby Lobby and bought a pack of 12 scrapbook jewels. They were the perfect size and ended up only costing me about $1.80 because they were on sale! Woohoo! I used some E6000 to glue them down in the center of each crossing, and let it dry for 24 hours. I also sewed together the ribbon that would hold the memo board onto the wall during this step. I kept the old pink ribbon so I could measure how long I would need it to be, and went off of that.

And that's it! Super easy, and a great craft to do if you are sick of the way something looks in your home. Here is how it looks up on my wall plain, and also with pictures and other things in it!

Thank you for reading!