a little journal of simple living: family, food, sewing, gardening and quilting.
To this:
I spent the morning listing them on Etsy. I think these would make great end of year teacher gifts, don't you? (Go ahead, tell your friends and neighbors, I don't mind.)
I have my first item for the give away finished. I am hoping to get the give away started within the week, so stay posted!
After my frustration with the mini duffel, I took a look at my sewing room and realized how much of a disaster it was. I took everything out of the cabinets and reorganized. I went through my patterns and weeded out the ones I know I will never use. Finally I refolded and organized my fabric. I realized that I have quite enough to work with for a while. I took out all the small odds and ends and am currently working on lots and lots of coasters. When I get finished I'll post them all and then I'll do a give away.
I finally found the blog that inspired me to 'use what I have.' It is called simplesparrow and the reason I couldn't find the post right away is because it was from about a month ago. Anyway, tonight I was looking at some of the sites I like to visit and I discovered that she just finished organizing her fabric. Great minds think alike, I guess.
I want to personally thank Xia (see her blog here) for encouraging me to dig the mini duffel out of the trash. It isn't often that a three month old tells you to do something so I figured I'd better do it! I dug it out of the trash, ripped about 1/2 of the seams and resewed. I'll get a picture up soon. I still don't love it but hope that someone may. Thanks Xia!
Here are two things that I made properly. The first is a pair of oven mitts. If you remember this quilt you may notice some similarities in the fabric design. The second is this little halter for my next door neighbor, Tess. It is terrifically fun to sew for girls. 
One of the many reasons I love homeschooling my sons is the opportunities for spur of the moment field trips. Another homeschooling mom from our group mentioned she was taking her sons to a wild flower preserve "walk." I had always wanted to see this preserve in the southern part of our county and we have been so excited that the weather has turned somewhat warm and sunny that I wanted every opportunity to enjoy nature. 
We truncated school ("you mean we don't have to do MATH today???") and drove the 30 minutes through some of the most lovely land in Lancaster County. It almost made me want to move out of the city. The "official" hike was way too boring for our tastes (my boys like to experience nature at their own pace, they don't much care about the names of the wild flowers, they just like to look at what is interesting and run and jump and climb and throw rocks into streams as much as possible). We can't wait to go back, picnic lunch in hand next time.
Here's a new pincushion I whipped up the other evening. I remember when I learned how to cut hearts out of paper by folding the paper in half. I thought it was the most fantastic thing and proceeded to cut heart after heart after heart. It still sort of amazes me.
Thank you for all the lovely comments. I have discovered that there is no way to directly answer your comments (unless I happen to know your email, which I do for most of you). I don't like that aspect of blogger. But, it is free so I shouldn't complain. I want to thank you all for commenting. I'm thinking of having a give-away in the near future just to see how many people are out there reading. What do you think? I have coasters and pin-cushions and maybe even some oven mitts! What to give away....(thoughts, suggestions?)
Heather asked about making these coasters. Truly they are simple. I just pick the front fabric and the backing fabric, line them up right sides together and sew around leaving an inch or an inch and a half open. Clip the corners, turn (I use a chop stick to help) and then slip stitch the opening. Press and over stitch if you desire. I cut these out 5 inches square and sew with a 1/4 inch seam. The finished product is about 4 1/2 inches square.
I don't know how much sewing I'll be doing. School will consist of read-alouds today. We are reading Heidi by Johanna Spyri to finish out the school year. We have this abridged tape that we have played in the car for a long time but it leaves out much about Heidi's faith in God and how she shares that faith and her simplicity with those she encounters. I wanted the kids to hear the whole story. We especially enjoy the parts where Heidi brings kittens into the Sesemann household. As you know, my kids love anything cat.
We have a very busy weekend ahead of us. I'm glad I was able to spend quite a bit of time sewing yesterday. Here are some of the other projects I completed. The flower pin cushion is for my friend Amy. I had to wrack my brain to remember how to make those embroidered flower petals. It came to me but I definitely could use some practice. The photo below is of some coasters I made using small bits of fabric that I just can never throw away. I have a large pile of fabric pieces on my blanket chest just waiting to be put into a project. I doubt I'll get to them until Monday and maybe not even then. Let me know if anyone out there is trying to "use what you have".
We bought a couch and love seat with this pattern (blah) about 12 years ago. The couch isn't in our house any longer and the love seat has a hole in it so large that sometimes we lose the kids inside. It works for the school room. I have hated these pillows for eons but never got around to making them look nice. 
So, today, I made them look nice. In the spirit of 'use what I have', I took the zipper off the old pillows and used them on the new. I must say I am darn pleased with myself. Aren't I just simple!
I found this pattern for a groovy bag. I printed it off, found some fabric that I thought might look ok together (from the stash, of course) and cut everything out. I then read through the directions. I already knew I wasn't going to make the weaved fabric before I started so I didn't really bother to read the rest of the instructions. I sewed the lining to the outer pieces of fabric and then went on to read how to attach the panels together. To my great dismay, I discovered that it was all hand sewing. Sew the inside lining of piece A and B, then sew the outer edges of pieces A and B. That is a lot more time than I wanted to spend on this bag. However, I don't actually mind hand sewing and I do spend a lot of time sitting at the school table (where I can't machine sew). So, I spent the next two days hand sewing.
I know when I've been looking at too many blogs when I want to find something I saw and just can't do it. Someone out there in blog-land posted that she was not going to buy anything new in April. She would just use what she had. What a grand idea.
I finished my quilt and will take a picture of it as soon as the sun shines enough to get a good shot. I am in the mood to sew things that aren't quilts for some reason. I also want to try to use fabric that has been sitting in my house (and the last house) for years and years. My style has changed over the years and so has my sewing. I have fabric that I don't love anymore but I want to use it anyway. I may try to make some bags to sell with it. Just because it isn't my style doesn't mean it won't be just perfect for another person.
I made this little dress yesterday. It has heart pockets but you can't really see them because they are made of the same fabric. I don't really have any trim to add to the dress since I've not sewn a whole lot for girls (having only boys myself). But I loved the fabric and couldn't resist buying it. I still have about a yard of the fabric and may try to make something for myself with it. I'm not sure what yet.
I attended my first quilt show yesterday. It was completely overwhelming. There were so many quilts to look at that after awhile my eyes went buggy. We were there on a rainy, rainy day and so there weren't many others in attendance. This was bad for the show but good for us (my quilting friend, Paulette, went with me) because we did not have to deal with the hustle and bustle.
Here are some close-ups of the bugs and Root
Children. There was so much to see in this quilt that I could have looked at it all day. We spoke with Mrs. Smith's husband. He told us that she started quilting after their son died several years ago to help her with her grief. He also told us that she was approached about making a book from her quilts. I can understand why.
I want you all to take a look at this website and if at all possible buy their new, absolutely fabulous album (oops, I guess they call them CD's now). Well, come to think of it, this CD was released on vinyl too and we have a copy (but don't have a working turntable to play it on). While you are checking out the web site (I must get Don to teach me how to do all of that Web design stuff), you should buy all their old CD's as well. They are all super fabulous and I loved the band before I loved Mike, but that's a whole different story.
