Flannel and Minkee Fleece

Happy Hallowe'en!
No, I am not dishing out candy to cute little costumed trick-or-treaters. We actually don't get any coming here at Buffalo Lake. I guess that's more of a town thing.

Right now I have all my flannel fabric stretched out on my ironing board in my computer/ craft room trying to decide what to do with it.  I want to make some simple receiving blankets and a couple of diaper change pads. The receiving blankets are easy, just turn over all the edges a scant 1/4 inch, press it, then turn it another 1/4 inch and pin. Then simply sew around all 4 sides.

The tricky part was not knowing how big to make a receiving blanket. I went on line and there are various opinions out there. I decided to go with 34" by 36" finished, which means cutting the flannel an inch longer and wider than that for the seam allowance. I have one ready to be sewn in the morning from a cute blue flannel with yellow ducks, bears and rattles...

Also destined to become a receiving blanket

Now, about the Minkee fleece:  Wow, this is luxurious fabric, to say the least! It is like fleece on steroids, LOL! Talk about soft.  Minkee is fleece with little raised bumps on it.

I was in Fabricland yesterday, they had a big sale on and most of their fleece was 40% off.  I always just walked right passed the big bolts of fleece before and went right to the cotton fabric to use for quilting.  A quilter friend of mine suggested using Minkee Fleece on the back of a cotton fabric to make a cosy play mat for babies. (Thanks for the idea, Connie. :)

I'm eager to start one!  I bought a yard each of a medium pink and a bright yellow Minkee.  I also bought a yard of blue cabbage rose fleece. It has small raised swirls on it that look like tiny roses. :)
Then I saw the 'piece de resistance'!  It is a cute, thick, soft fleece with little colored hand prints and foot prints all over it. It was regularly $24 a yard so even at 40 % off it's expensive, but I decided right away I was getting enough to make 2 little blankets out of the fleece alone. Even the back of it is soft. I just have to decide if I'm going to turn the edges and sew them like that or buy some satin and sew a strip of satin on each end to finish it...

Nursery Window valance

Because I am making this valance from scratch, I took a piece of paper and make myself a plan, like I usually do.

My daughter and I first measured the nursery window, which is 63 inches from the outsides of the window casings. I figured that a person probably wanted the valance at least 50% bigger than that, if not more...

 We thought we would like a valance about 12 inches wide.  We had planned to use a 9 inch wide strip of the yellow Newton's fabric, with a 3 inch bottom border out of the turquoise star fabric.  The tabs to hang the valance on the curtain rod was going to be the turquoise print fabric. (All 3 of these fabrics are in the twin babies' new crib quilts. :)

 I cut the yellow Newton's fabric 9 1/2 inches wide. Each strip was only 41 inches long so I figured I would sew 3 strips together end to end for approximately 120" valance.   Then I cut 3 1/4 inch strips of the star fabric and sewed 3 of those strips together next. Then I sewed that on the bottom of the yellow fabric. 

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After that I had to make a seam all the way around the outside. I ironed a scant 1/4  seam  and then folded it again about another 1/4 inch, then ironed and pinned that. Next I started sewing it on the machine. At some point, I realized that because of losing so much fabric to the seam allowance, it was going to be a lot narrower than we had planned.  I decided to put a 3 inch strip of fabric at the top as well and then sew the curtain rod tabs onto that. 

Now the tabs:  I wasn't sure how many I would need and how best to make them. I decided that 3 inch tabs would be too big; 2 inches wide was probably better. I cut fabric pieces  4 1/2 inches by 7 inches from the turquoise print.  Then I folded them in half with wrong sides together and sewed a scant 1/4 seam around them, leaving one end open to turn them right side out.   

My math geneous husband helped me to calculate how much distance to leave between the tabs so that they would fit well in the window space, but not be too crowded, and not be took far apart that the valance would bag either... We figured 16 tabs would work with a 120" valance for 63" window. 

Sewing and turning these piddely little tabs right side out is not much fun... :(    Now I  also have to figure out how far down from the top to sew them on. Should I finish the bottom seam on each one, or just hide it behind the good seam when I fold them over and sew them on?....

Hmmmm......

  

Cloth Books

Right now I am working on sewing together some little cloth books for my twin grand babies. :)

My daughter and I found panels for cloth books at the Sewing Room in Calgary. They have quite a good selection.  We chose a Beatrix Potter panel called the Three Little Kittens,  a panel to make a cloth counting book called The Tiny Tailor, as well as a third one, Alphabet Soup, with very bright colorful animals on them.

Alphabet Soup panel for cloth book

Cloth books are quite simple to make, just follow the easy directions printed on each panel, (and skip the part about adding optional piping around the front and back cover! I went through that headache with my first attempt at a cloth book, the Winnie the Pooh one. It was hard to sew the piping so that it lined up properly on both sides.)  

The three parts of the cloth book

Just cut the page sets out together and make sure each page is numbered properly so you don't sew the wrong ones together. (Yikes!) 

Place the front cover/back cover piece on top of the page 1/page 10 piece, right sides together.  Cut a piece of  batting (I used leftover batting) the same size as the pages. Place the batting on either back side, then sew a 1/4 inch seam around the outside of all three, leaving a 4 inch opening so that you an turn the pages/ batting right side out.  Then press it and slip stitch the opening shut.  

Do the same for the other pages.  Place batting on the wrong side of the page2/page9 piece and place it right sides together on top of the page3/page8 piece. Sew around the edges, turn right side out, etc. 

Do the same with the last 2 pieces (page 4/7 piece, on top of the page 5/6 piece.)  You will have 3 separate parts when you are done.  

Now put the 3 parts on top of each other in the right order so that page 1/10 is face up, with page 3/8 on top of it, and then page 5/6 on the very top. If you fold it in half now, you will see the book the way it will look after you have fasten it together. (Flip the pages and make sure the story pages are in the right order. ) Now just sew right down the centre of all 3 pieces altogether and your book is done! 

How cute is that!?!

Newton's Lullaby Dreams Baby Girl Quilt Top- Completed

My baby granddaughter's Newton's Lullaby Dreams  quilt top

As the title suggests, I have now completed the little quilt top for my soon-to-arrive baby granddaughter's quilt top. :)
My daughter and I brought the defective Newton's Lullaby Dream mauve fabric back to the Sewing Room, the quilt store in Calgary where we had purchased it. The store manager there was very understanding and very willing to make restitution.  We looked at the original bolt of fabric, which my daughter had her heart set on using for the quilt back, and much of it had the same fade mark along the fold. We did manage to get a piece that looked better than most of it, with only a little fading. It should be just enough for me to use for the back but there will be very little to spare. It will be 'touch and go', I think, to quilt this little quilt, but I did manage with the yellow Newton's Dream quilt that I had made recently for my soon-to-arrive grandson, so I guess it's doable.

The manger gave us a refund on the faded piece of Newton's fabric and she also gave us 50% off on the new piece that we took home! We thought that that was very generous and we will definitely continue shopping there.

Here's their website if you are interested in checking it out:
www.mysewingroom.ca

I enjoyed the Adult Literacy Symposium and drove home from Calgary on late Saturday afternoon.  I had won a door prize at one of my sessions, "Tongue FU", which was 2 CDs by Lisa Chell. One was the same Tongue Fu session that I had attended and the other was an interesting CD on concentration and memory, with some good tips on it. I played them in the car and they kept me company on the 3 hour drive home. :)

That evening I cut and sewed the outer border on the little quilt top. I think it looks quite nice with the pink stars and the pink border.  (In the photo the border looks paler and more washed out than in the actual quilt top.)

Now it's time to wash the kitchen floor again so that I can pin the little quilt top to the batting and backing, and start on the quilting process.  :)

Finding something that you love to do and can be passionate about is the secret to a happy retirement! ♡
Happy quilting to you all!

Baby Girl's Quilt Top/ Fabric Problem

Have got the majority of my little baby granddaughter-to-be's quilt top made aside from the outer border.

Baby Girl's quilt top with inner border only

There's a bit of a problem with the fabric, the pink 'large Newton's Lullaby Dream' has an L-shaped tear in it about an inch long. I noticed it when I was ironing it after I had washed it on Sunday. Could I have done that in the wash, I wondered? My washer is front load (no agitator to catch on), and the only thing in the load was the back fabric and the border fabric. In the drier there were some socks and t-shirts with it, nothing sharp.  Could we have damaged it in the transport from The Sewing Room in Calgary? 

I can work around it as I need to cut 5 inch strips anyway.

What is more disturbing is the back fabric!  It's 1 1/2 meters of the mauve 'small Newton's' fabric and it has fade marks on it. There's a fade stripe right down the middle of it where the fabric was folded on the bolt and also 2 fade marks where you can see it had been wrapped on the bolt! Can't use it in that condition for the back of a tiny baby's new quilt!  So it's coming back to Calgary with me tomorrow when I go for the Adult Literacy Symposium there and we'll be returning it to the Sewing Room, the store where it was purchased to see if they will give us a replacement in better shape.

Right now I am busy sewing around the pink applique star on the quilt top. It looks cute and I hope that it can be completed in a satisfactory manner....

Only the Edging Left/ And Cushion Covers

I have spent the last 2 days working on quilting my little Newton's Lullaby Dreams quilt. I sewed mostly 'in the ditch' along the strips of turquoise sashing on the front with turquoise thread and I echo quilted a 1/4 inch out around all the stars with yellow. I also quilted vertically along some of the 'patchwork' panels. Then I sewed a shell/ ocean wave pattern on the narrow border using free motion quilting and a 'meander' pattern on the wide yellow outer border. It turned out really well with very few places needing rework.

After that I trimmed off the excess batting and the fraction of the excess back fabric that was left. I was very lucky that I had enough. I kept unpinning and smoothing out the quilt top and pulling the back fabric taut as I quilted and it worked out
. I see now though, why most directions call for 2 to 3 inches of extra back fabric around all the edges when quilting. I think it's mainly to preserve your sanity!

Now I just need to cut the 2 1/4 inch fabric strips which will make up the edging. I can't believe I'm almost done! :D





I have also been working on another project....

I had decided that the cushion covers on the throw cushions need washing, but they didn't look so good  after I dried them. I decided I didn't want to put them back on, I would design a couple of new ones. I have been working on making blocks out of scrap fabrics over the last few months which I am eventually planning on sewing together into a throw quilt for the couch.

I decided that I would use some of those blocks and make cushion covers out of them.  The cushions are approx. 19" by 21" and I made the covers slightly bigger , about 21 3/4 inches square. The back is made out of the same fabric as the sashing around the blocks.  I had to use the invisible green zipper from the old cover as I could not find the right size of zipper ( 20 ") anywhere. Strangely enough, the 2 zippers from the old cushion covers aren't even the same size! One of them is 2 " shorter. 

Now I have to hunt for a second zipper before I can finish the second cover....

Photos of Finished Heart Quilt

Here are the photos of the completed white, yellow and pink "A Star is Born" scrap baby quilt with the heart appliques.   This quilt is an adaptation of a pattern in the book called "Keepsake Baby Quilts" designed by Julie Higgins, published by House of White Birches. 

The original pattern has stars appliqued on it, but I decided to go with hearts instead for my very first little darling granddaughter.

I do love how it turned out!  And what a great way to use up scraps of fabric to boot! :)

A Connundrum Solved

Yesterday I sandwiched together my latest little baby quilt, the turquoise and yellow Newton's Lullaby Dreams. First I washed the kitchen floor  and then taped the backing fabric (a green small Newton's Lullaby Dreams) face down with pieces of masking tape. The batting I'm using is made of beautiful, soft bamboo and silk. I smoothed the batting over top of the back fabric and then place the quilt top over that. Yikes! It didn't fit!  The quilt top was wider than the backing fabric!

I had made the outer border of the quilt top 6 inches wide ( 5 3/4 after seam was sewn) for a total of 42 inch wide quilt top. My tape measure verified that the back fabric was only 40 1/4 inches wide! I had just assumed that it would be 42 inches wide as most fabrics are... What an amateur mistake!

Now what? I tried to figure out a way to cut the back fabric and sew it together in a manner to accommodate the 42 by 46" quilt top, but the fabric isn't big enough and it has a directional print on it besides....

Next option, I could trim the back fabric and add some of the turquoise fabric to the sides and top of it  like sashing....  The hard part then is placing the quilt top exactly squared over the back, not easy to do with the batting in between hiding it.

So I decided the baby quilt did not have to be 42" by 46" anyway and I cut 1 1/4 inches off the outer borders (on all sides). That only gives me 1 inch and a smidge of extra back fabric, which usually gets pulled in by the quilting process. Most patterns want you to have 3 inches extra on all sides.

After that I repeated the process of sandwiching the quilt back together and pinning it carefully so that the back fabric and quilt top didn't overlap anywhere. It's going to be tight, but as long as I don't overdo it with quilting, and keep smoothing out and stretching the back fabric, I think it will work.

next I showed my daughter the sandwiched quilt on the weekend and she noticed that the top of the quilt top and the top of the back fabric were flipped around! (What the...!?)

So we pulled all the pins out and started all over with taping the back to the floor again and repinning the top on the other way this time...

Now I have to remember to change the pattern directions for the outer border for my next Newton's Lullaby Dreams quilt top, the pink version.

Did I mention that we are having twin grandchildren in January? A little boy AND a little girl! ♥♥
Are we thrilled or what!!!  ☺☺