Happy Halloween!

Our girls are all excited for the upcoming Halloween this weekend.  Tomorrow at school, there will be parties in their classrooms, followed by the costume parade.  I'm glad that this year's Halloween will be on Saturday, instead of on a weekday, so that the kids could stay up a little late after going trick-or-treating.

I made this Halloween garland by felt.  After cutting up the felts  into ghost, pumpkin, and bat shapes, I combined two felt shapes (wrong sides together) and machined sewed all around, leaving a small opening.  Then, I filled it with the fiber fill, and machined sewed the opening.  Their eyes, nose and mouths are glued on to the felt with the fiber glue, so the entire job was pretty quick and easy. 

Recently, when I found this orange trimming with pumpkin faces on at our local Joann's, I knew what I wanted to make with it... a Halloween garland!  This pumpkin garland was 60% off, and with that kind of a deep discount, I just couldn't resist but to buy and make something...!! 

Hope you all have a safe and fun Halloween! 

Lavender hearts

lavender sachets, originally uploaded by chick chick sewing.

I made these hearts filled with dried lavender. The scent of lavender is soooo soothing and relaxing and I just love them (although my kids dislike the smell... hmmm. I guess it's one of those things in which you need to be old enough to appreciate the beauty of it.)

These were fairly easy to make, except when sewing the inner curves of the hearts... But I guess I shouldn't worry about it so much because the ribbons and buttons attached will hide the messy seam... I plan to hang these in the entrance area of our house. And I plan to make more for my clothing drawers.

I ended up making another pencil case (total of three) this week for... yes, another birthday girl. Altogether, I think I've made more than ten of these in the past few months (all of them for birthday gifts.)

Hope you have a good week!

Applique bag

I received this vibrantly purple cotton shopping bag for free at a local fabric shop.  It's a very nice bag, especially the color of the bag (purple is one of my favorite colors).  But it seemed like something was missing, so I appliqued a flower print onto the bag, with a little help from the iron-on adhesive...

Here it is!  I love the bold roses in the center of the bag.   How do you like my new bag?

Pastel check pencil case

After finishing the pink poodle pencil case early this week for the friend of my 2nd grade daughter, our 4th grade daughter was invited to her friend's birthday party.   Just like me, my 4th grade girl is really picky with fabric choices, and after searching through my fabric stashes, she selected these pastel color check and pink heart fabrics  for her friend's pencil case.   The birthday party will be a sleepover party, and my daughter is really looking forward to the sleepover. 

The pencil case measures approx 5" tall x 7.5" long x 1.25" wide.  We will put some mechanical pencils and an eraser inside as well.   

Hope you have a good day!

Pink poodle pencil case

pink poodle pencil case, originally uploaded by chick chick sewing.

My seven year old daugher is invited to her friend's birthday party this weekend and I just whipped together a handmade gift for the birthday girl. The birthday girl can use this little bag for any occasion, however, my daughter uses her bag as a pencil case. It's pretty roomy inside; it can hold more than 30 pencils and pens. The handles are fully lined so it's sturdy, too.

I also made these pony tail holders using the matching fabric in covered buttons.  By the way, this pink poodle fabric is a Japanese fabric of linen and cotton.   I hope the girl likes the gift!

terrier

terrier, originally uploaded by chick chick sewing.

I embroidered this cute terrier using an embroidery pattern from this embroidery pattern  in this blog.  In this blog, there are many other lovely and vintage looking embroidery patterns available, and they're even free! I'm thinking, what project shall I make this cute terrier into, with a little bit of fabric... ? A pouch? A drawstring bag? Or a pillow?  We'll see.

Besides this terrier, I also made this deer pillow using another pattern from this blog.  I added cherries around the deer. 

I just love these embroidery patterns!

Both of these embroideries are done on ivory linen, using two strands of DMC floss.   Happy embroidery!

New apple tote

This is a new tote bag for my daughter who carries a lot of stuff to her school... lunch, bottled water, snacks, textbooks, notebooks, pencil case, chapstick, hand sanitizer...and what else?

The apple fabrics (light blue and red) are used on both sides of the tote, front and back, as big pockets for her to stash things in. There are also two small pockets inside. The apple fabrics used for the outside pockets are the Metro Market line from Monaluna, which I purchased from Sew Mama Sew shop some time ago. I also used cotton batting throughout to make the bag sturdy.

Hope you have a good weekend and happy sewing!

New Crafting Blog

Hi all. I am so excited to start my own blog after enjoying all the wonderful crafty inspirational blogs out there.

I just love to make everything handmade, especially by sewing, embroidering, and crocheting. I've been posting my finished projects on my flickr page for a while but starting my crafting blog was on my mind for quite sometime. And I'm so happy to tell you that today is the day of the new beginning!

This is a place for me to showcase my finished projects as well as the work in progress projects and hopefully to inspire myself and others to be more crafty.

This is my latest project. It's a drawstring bag and it will be a gift to my girlfriend who lives in Japan. I embroidered her initial "T" using my sewing machine. Outer fabric is linen, and the lining fabric is flower cotton lawn fabric (although this is a reversible bag). I like the way this bag turned out and I hope my friend likes it, too.