The one where I go all squeaky about being in Issue 8 of Fat Quarterly …

So yes … I have a tutorial

for a lipsmackineasypeasyrawedgeappliquespoolblock sewing machine cover 

in the latest issue of Fat Quarterly … <-- it's out on Tuesday 31st if you're not already a subscriber.
 



I have to say, Issue 8 is truly fabtastic - the theme for the rest of the issue is foundation paper piecing. 

I mean.  Could I ask for more?  It's the one thing I really want to master or at least give a good try this year.  So many great ideas …This is a totally indispensable reference of foundation paper piecing inspiration; demystified just enough to make me feel I could attempt any of the projects.

WooHoo!

Honestly, if you don't subscribe, do yourself a favour and just go for it!   I have made projects from every single issue I've had so far ..

... And if you do subscribe and you've already licked the screen several times since downloading, what do you think about foundation paper piecing now?  Inspired?

BeanBag Reader/iPad/Tablet rest - Tutorial

I needed a super quick project for something to make my 8" tablet a little more upright on

(a) my work table for reading blogs/tutorials/Fat Quarterly and 

(b) my knees when reading in bed.

I have always had a problem reading in bed - I fall asleep pretty quickly.  Even when I've just woken up and try to have a little quiet time before getting up for work!

So, I made myself a little pyramid bean bag and filled it with some out-of-date couscous I had knocking about at the back of the cupboard.


I added a few drops of lavender and rosemary essential oils to the (dry!) couscous - they are both relaxing smells for me, but the rosemary is to aid concentration, in the hope that I can stay awake that little bit longer!

I used to thin my oil paints with oil of spike lavender - I could work for hours with really good focus and concentration and my flat wasn't overcome by turpentine vapours. 

No wonder all those Victorian lady painters used it! I have to say that my sitting room smelled delicious all day and I managed to maintain focus long enough to re-organise my sewing space (again!) and do a lot of cleaning and tidying.  Win Win.



Anyway … if you'd like to make one it's easy peasy …



I just used a scrap of Echino I had left over from my upside downside journal/tablet cover  … (still going strong since April - I think I'll do a tute!)

My scrap was 12" by 12" which was perfect, as my tablet is 8" x 6".





Please note - these measurements will NOT be big enough for an iPad rest … you need to have at least the width and height of what you want to prop up!

If you want to make one for your iPad I suggest you start off with a 14" or 15" square.



It's very easy … fold your square in half and sew up 1 long & 1 short side …   Fill  with rice or beans or sand or diamonds (about 2/3 - you can pin it and play a bit to get the right degree of squidge … fold top edge in by 1/4" and THEN squeeze the opening to bring your side seam to the middle, pin and stitch across the top.

Voila! 

If you have a microwave (and were to use wheat or rice not stale couscous!) I guess this would double as a heat relief pack too!  It was wonderful next to my pillow -  the lavender was oh so calming, and YES I did manage to read for a whole hour before crashing out!

To get the best angle of 'prop' pick the bag up by two corners and shake contents down … then place on table, lap etc. with emptyish portion closest to you and nestle tablet into place … woot!!

This project took about 20 mins start to finish (including pics) so why not have a go?...  if you make one, do post your finished attempts in the Pings Flickr tutorials group!

P.A.N.T.S for Santa

Christmas is so very close and I am so very unprepared.  who knew?

I've been trying to keep the twigging about on the interwebs to a minimum and the actual marking of work & making of stuff to the max ... (the latter pretty unsuccessfully, I must admit) … 

But I have been trying to organise my P.A.N.T.S.



In case you missed me rambling about it before, it's a flickr group I've set up to link to tutorials you've created using your own genius crafting brains or to show stuff you've made from others' tutes that you really like. 

Discussion threads are open to the usual mixture of smut, wisdom and community spirit …

This weekend, May the Crafting Force Be With You and your P.A.N.T.S. ever inspirational ...

Tutorial: {Caffeine} Molecule Mug Rug!

The most important thing I have learned about the Accuquilt Go! Baby is that it isn’t just designed for cutting a whole quilt or larger project … oh no!

My initial fear about using any kind of cutting machine was that anything I made would look just too anodyne and perfect (fat chance!)  When I twigged that it's the sewing and embroidery that defines my stitching, not what I use to cut the fabric, it all fell into place.

Once the novelty of cutting bulk circles & hexies
& squares out of scraps (for the sheer joy of it) had worn off, I realised I had a tool that affords me the time to actually try new things out - because I know that I’m approaching the task from a starting point of accuracy. 

People talk about the fabric wastage, but really for me, my usual process involves having to agonise over cutting templates and several botched cutting attempts, so there is very little fabric wastage with a machine if you use your noodle a bit and precut the fabric.

<-- For this tutorial I was inspired by this brill nerdy mug rug from Lillian’sStitches over on Flickr.

Even though there’s only one hexagon to cut, I wanted to make a few of these for nerdy sciencey mates & colleagues, so it was a great Go! Baby project. 

I also had to cut pentagons, which I did using my lazy laptop-screen lightbox method:

1. find an image on the interweb
2. resize it in the browser using Ctrl + or - (the keyboard shortcut makes your whole browser magnify or diminish incrementally - blurry handy!)
3. using tracing paper or template plastic and sticky tape if you feel you need it (get rid of some of the sticky on some batting first to keep your screen clean) trace image off laptop screen with a fine marker.
4. cut with old fashioned scissors.  carefully.

I was a bad girl (I’m sure it’s not recommended) and also cut a piece of template plastic using the Go! Baby for the 1” hexagons. I really wanted to fussy cut neatly as they’re so small. 

Here’s what you need for the molecule mug rug (click on image to enlarge on flickr)

in case you can’t read the measurements, the front and wadding pieces are 9” x 7” and the backing (and self-binding) is 10.5” x 8”.

I found some mug clipart (for the other side) and traced that off the screen too, straight onto bondaweb. 

I also traced it onto paper using a marker, so that I could flip it for the reverse image, and add to my other applique templates.  I used red and green fabric for the mugs to make it a little more Christmassy.

Quick scrawl of caffeine molecule (also traced off screen) ...

Next, iron the applique pieces onto front and back pieces.

Either machine or hand applique (I forgot to photograph that bit!)

Embroider your molecular connecty bits …

Lay backing wrong side up, batting and front right side up and baste. 

Pic taken before the embroidery and applique, sorry … don’t be confused! … I was taking advantage of the 10 mins of daylight I had!



 To self-bind, fold backing over twice, as for hemming, and press with an iron.

Pin and sew as you would for binding - I didn’t mitre my corners here, I wanted them square and blocky:

Ta Da! One Caffeine Molecule Mug Rug!

I hope you feel inspired to run up a few of your own … if you do, please add them to my squeaky new and very empty Pings And Needles Tutorial Stuff Flickr group  
(Bwahaha .. PANTS for short!)  I’d love to see what you make!

I'd really really love it if you used it like a kind of permanent linky group for any quick and easy tutorials that you do ... We can get organised in the Discussions, but just adding pictures to the Pool that link to tutes would be fantastic ... 

Feast your Mince Pies on this {Accuquilt Go! Baby} Wrist Pincushion Tutorial

So, following on from yesterday’s post, may I present the mince pie wrist pincushion!


This one came about when I was sewing the perle thread edging on my wristwatch pincushion - it reminded me of the crimping round a mince pie!  (It was teatime too, and I was feeling a tad peckish) so I just made one to see if it worked!  I really like it … a bit of festive silliness!

This one is even easier and faster to make than the last … no transfer printing, just plain felt, a bit of ribbon, a brown marker and a tea bag!



You will need:

2 x 3” circles of white felt

2 holly leaves and 3 berries cut from felt

neutral sewing thread (I used my Aurifil)

some caramel coloured Perle thread

A brown permanent marker pen (I used a Sharpie)

some rice for the filling

2 scraps of velcro

10” piece of twill or ribbon - edited to add ..
 the ribbon is from Clothkits here ... 

First cut your circles … 
If you have an Accuquilt Go! Baby then you know how easy this is!

Equally - if, unlike me, you are good with scissors - it shouldn’t be too taxing!

Next, you need to just go round the edges of your holly shapes very gently with a brown marker (I cut mine freehand, but you can find clipart here) and then make some little crimping marks round the top circle.






Then sew your holly shapes onto your top piece with the caramel Perle thread …








Now sew your ribbon/twill down the middle of the back piece (that middle section will be covered by the top piece.





You can sew your velcro on now,
or wait until it’s stuffed (don’t trim the length until it’s finished as you could end up with a tight fit!)













Then pin and sew the two pieces together, along the line of your ‘crimping’ marks.

Again, I used backstitch.

Leave a gap for the stuffing!

Fill with rice (quite puffy this time, as it’s a pie!) and sew up the gap.






It should look like this:











Now you need to go round again, this time with the Perle thread in a kind of reverse blanket stitch.






You can leave it like that -




But if you like your mince pies with a bit of a higher bake, then just get a cold tea bag and daub it gently over the surface of your pie … build up the colour slowly … less is more.

I actually used a bit of felt dipped in my cup of coffee because I was lazy!

Ta-Da!

I think these would make really sweet stocking fillers for stitchy friends ... Do let me know if you make one!

Next up is a nerdy mug rug ... here's a sneaky peek ...

Wrist Watch Pincushion Tutorial {Accuquilt Go! Baby}

So, here we are with the first of two wrist pincushion tutorials -  a watch AND a mince pie!



Let’s start with the watch today …



I made one of these back in March to go with a little giveaway and I can’t tell you how impossible I found it to cut two circles out of fabric.  Pathetic.  Really!  I must have cut about 8 circles before I got a pair I liked.

Not now.

Oh no. 

This time I’m using the Accuquilt Go! Baby for these little cuties … And boy oh boy is it easier!  Now, if you don’t have one, it’s still easy enough, I’m sure, for you to cut two 3” circles.  It’s just me who finds it impossible!

First off you will need a good clock image to print onto T-shirt transfer paper … (remember to reverse the image when you print or it will come out backwards!)  You should find it in your printer settings …
You can use this picture by right clicking and saving it to disk:





I printed 8 onto a sheet of A4 paper (if you’re using something like Word, insert a table and then paste the image into each cell - that way you get really good spacing)






Then cut round your transfer leaving a little white space around the edge (it makes it easier to peel the paper off after you’ve ironed it on)




Then you will need:

1 x transfer print of watch face

2 x 3” felt or fabric circles

1 x 10” piece of ribbon or twill

2 x scraps of velcro

rice for the filling

standard sewing thread (I used my Aurifil)

red & green embroidery thread/perle for edging (optional)


I used a heavy off white felt that I got from my linen man (He’s not made of linen, he just sells it)  … It’s 100% wool, ex-Ministry of Defence stuff (used for lining uniform collars apparently!!)


I put two scraps of felt onto the middle (3”) die and then rolled it through … sooooo easy!

Iron your transfer onto one of the circles.

You should now have one front (watch face) and one back piece …

Take your back piece and sew your twill/bias/ribbon down the middle …

… This will be the inside back.

You can sew your velcro on now (one on each end, opposite sides of tape … or you can wait until you have stuffed it to get a better idea of the length needed!

Then place your watch front piece on top (right side up) and sew the two pieces together, leaving a gap of about 2 inches for stuffing … I used a back stitch about 1/8” in from the edge …

Now fill your watch!  It doesn’t have to be very full (as it’s a watch and all).

Then sew up your gap and you're ready to rock and roll!

Once I’d sewn it up I decided to make it a bit more festive with some red and green perle (threaded together in same needle).

… and that, as they say, is that!  It honestly took twice as long to write the tutorial as it did to make the pincushion!

… Don’t forget to come back tomorrow for the mince pie!  It was inspired by that crimping look made by the embroidery thread!

Feeling festive yet?