Round fabric baskets

Using my fabric scraps, I made these round patchwork fabric baskets.   These baskets are pretty tall, measuring approxoimately 9.5 inches or 24 cm in height.

To give you a better idea of its size, I placed a 500 ml / 1 pt 0.95 fl oz. water bottle in between the baskets.

Back view

The bottom is round... which was a bit tricky to sew.

The lining is pink/white and purple/white poodle fabrics from Japan (although this baskets are reversible).

Inside is quite deep

And what do I plan to do with these round baskets?  I will hung them in the back seats of our car, next to the hanging tissue box cover that I sewed recently.   Yes, I will use these fabric baskets as trash bins in the car, lined with the plastic bags that we get from our local supermarkets.

Hopefully, our kids will keep our car clean and uncluttered with this... at least for a while!

Hanging tissue box covers

Here are my latest sewing projects - hanging tissue box covers.   The fabric used here are pink and white poodle prints from Japan.   The tissue box cover has drawstring opening, which is easy to use as much as easy to make.   These covers  fit the taller tissue boxes that we use in our household  (4 inches or 10 cm tall ).

Side view

I plan to hung these tissue boxes like this in the back seats of our minivan.   I got this idea of hanging the tissue box in the car's back seat from my dear blog friend, cocostitch's etsy shop.   Thank you, cocostitch, for the great idea! 

 And this is how the tissue box normally looks like in the back seats of our car... This poor little thing is stepped on and sat on and even kicked by our girls, especially when it's left on the back seats' floor.  I hope the hanging tissue box cover will stop the tissue box abuse by our kids!

Pink girly pencil case

One of our girls' close friends has been hospitalized for the past week.  We've been hoping that she get well soon.  Along with the get well soon card that my girls and I wrote together, I made this pencil case as a gift to her.  

I used the pink girly Japanese fabric, which I thought would suit her sweet image.   The pencil case will hold many many pens and pencils.  Inside the pencil case, we put some markers, pencils and eraser.

Lining is light blue

Hope she likes the gift, and more than anything else, we hope that she get well soon!

Two drawstring bags

Yay! My sewing machine is finally back from service today, and I quickly made two drawstring bags late this afternoon.  Both bags are based on  Pink Penguin's very helpful drawstring bag tutorial and both will be gifts to our family and friends.

The embroidery work of this drawstring bag is done by my 10 year old daughter Lisa.  After finishing her first embroidery piece, she seems to be hooked on embroidering, although she still has hard time threading embroidery flosses into needles...  The word "Obambi" embroidered here is a nickname of her grandma in Japan.    And yes, this bag will be a gift from Lisa to her grandma.  

Well, besides the embroidery work, I did all the sewing, but it sure was fun selecting fabrics together with my daughter for my mom :)  

Inside is white hearts (the bag is reversible)

I used fun apple fabric for the second drawstring bag.  I plan to put these handmade bibs that I made earlier inside this apple bag and give it to my girlfriend for the upcoming babyshower gifts.

Light blue x brown polka dots lining (reversible bag)

  

Lastly, here is Lisa's latest embroidery work...  I thought it was so sweet for her to embroider something like this...!!!  Which sure made me happy :-)  Now, we're trying to decide what to make from this project... Shall we make another drawstring bag? a pillow? or an apron, maybe??  We'll see.

Bibs for the baby

My girlfriend's baby shower is coming up, and I made two tiny bibs for the new baby to come.   We don't have a baby in our house, so I borrowed my daughter's build-a-bear to be the model to wear these bibs today :)

The light blue x white gingham/polka dot bib is made by my sewing machine previously, and I added a simple hand embroidery work to the pocket part.

Here are the close up

The bib opens by a snap button.

My girlfriend has lived in Hawaii before, so I thought Aloha bib will be another good choice for her baby.  And this one is stitched by hand only.

 Soft and plush minky fabric are used for the back side of both bibs.

For embroidering, I used these embroidery threads called "LETO" that I purchased online recently from Clover-USA. I think in Japan, these LETO threads are sold under the MOCO brand name and are very popular over there. Just FYI, these threads are on close-out sale right now, and it's only USD $5.00 for 20 packs of LETO threads assortments (each thread measures 10 m or 10.9 yards). They come with dark and light color assortments and  I think it's really good value for this price.

Hope the new mom likes these bibs!

Quick gift to my friend

Few weeks ago I made this small pouch to my friend.  She is the mother of my kids' friends, and I had always wanted to make a small  thank you gift to her for being nice to our family. 

It took me about an hour to whip this up, and I was so glad because she seemed to like it.  I somehow managed to take these pictures at our kitchen table that afternoon (sorry for the not so good images).

I think that one of the best things about learning how to sew is that once you've mastered to make a quick project, gift giving becomes so much easier.  Before I knew how to sew (which wasn't so long ago), hitting the local mall was the only way for me to find a gift to someone!  Sewing saves a lot of time... and money, too, I think.

Lining is brown/white polka dots

Love stamps and more

Today was Valentine's day, and I carved some "love" related eraser stamps to express my love to you all...

I personally like the rabbit stamp, which may not have anything to do with Valentine's day... but I guess that's okay, becuase she's lovely :)

It took me about an hour or two to carve these stamps. Hope you had a happy Valnetine's day!

Crochet flower charms and my sewing machine repair update...

I crocheted more flowers and attached lace, fabric covered buttons, and other accessaries to make cell phone charms.  I like the brown crochet flowers, as much as I like the pastel colored ones. 

Attached to the cell phone, the charm will look like this. 

By the way, I haven't used my sewing machine for more than 10 days now, because my baby is still in the shop for service...  Besides the regular clean up, the shop owner had told me that some repairs were necessary to fix the bobbin case and few other parts of my Brother (which I had to agree, because the "automatic threading" function wasn't "automatic" any more lately).  The total repair & cleaning will cost approximately $200 (!!!) and the shop owner had called me up to ask if I still wanted to fix my machine, despite the high price... (Remember, my machine's original cost was a little more than $300). 

It was a difficult decision to make, but I decided to had it fixed.   Not only because I liked my Brother very much but also because even if I decide to purchase a new one,  it won't be after several weeks later (or even months) as I don't think I can make up my mind on which sewing machine to buy.   I tend to get puzzled and confused when it comes to selecting the right sewing machine ... I would rather pick a new car than to pick a new sewing machine (very difficult decision; as sewing machine plays a major role in my life now)!!

Lovely gift

Look what I received in mail yesterday...!! It's a fabric patchwork tray, gorgeously handmade by Sam of Sunnysidey.  She is a blog friend of mine from Aussie who makes fun and colorful projects that make me happy all the time.    Let me show you a little more pics of this pretty tray here...

The tray lays flat like this... And the fabrics used are super cute and cheerful.  Look at all these different kinds of polka dots that she used here! 

The tray has snaps on all four corners...

A snap is fastened here...

It's a perfect size to store my sewing notions at the sewing area, or my jewelry & accessories, or a cell phone and keys, or maybe stationery on my desk... The possiblilties are just endless!

 Thanks, Sunnysidey, for the lovely gift!  I will definitely make use of this for a long long time :)

Matching bird sachet

I made this bird sachet to match with the fabric covered hanger that I created earlier.  The birdie is filled with dried lavender and some poly fills and her eyes are made of wood beads.  The aroma of the lavender is very relaxing.  It was so nice that I placed her by my bedside last night and went to sleep ...zzz

front side

back side

As you may already know, dried lavender acts as a natural moth repellent, so I think it's a good idea to place this sachet on to this hanger and use it altogether when hanging clothes.

Padded Hanger

I made this over the weekend.  Oh, not the dress, but the padded fabric covered hanger.  The floral fabric used to cover the hanger is a flannel from our local Joann store.  And because my sewing machine is still in the shop for service, I whipped up this fabric covered hanger by handstitching only.  It took me about two hours just to stitch together two pieces of floral fabric, front and back, around the padded hanger... Oh, how I miss my sewing machine!!

This is how the original hanger looked like...

 

Then I covered it with scraps of leftover batting by handstitching...

Then I covered it with two pieces of floral flannel fabric...  

Here is the end result :)

I like the girlish look of this hanger.  My 10 year old daughter just requested me to make another hanger like this one for her room, so I will probably end up making more of this... soon.  

Embroidery by a 10 year old

This is my 10 year old daughter's pillow, embroidered by herself.   She embroidered her own name on to a small piece of white linen fabric, and I combined it with her favorite pastel check fabric to make it into a pillow.    It wasn't easy for her to move the needle and thread the way she wanted to (many trial and errors in the beginning), but she really loves the end result.  And I think she did a great job, too, as her first embroidery project.

１０才の長女がはじめて刺繍にチャレンジしました。　あれこれ迷いながら糸の色を選び、自分の名前をリネンに刺繍しました。　その後、私が彼女のお気に入りの布と合わせて枕カバーに仕立てました。　刺繍は最初は大変そうでしたが・・・本人は出来上がった枕にとても満足している様子。　以下は刺繍部分のアップ写真です。

Here is the close up of her work

And while my daughter was embroidering, her mommy was crocheting more flowers.   My sewing machine is still in the shop for service... and I miss her so badly : (

私のミシンは現在メンテナンス中なので、夜はもっぱら編み物しています。　こんな感じでお花がたくさん編めました。　私のミシンちゃん、早く帰ってきて～～（涙）。