Wee Braw Bag

 I might have had a moment a few weeks ago when I purchased three PDF sewing patterns.

God knows I dislike PDF's. Having to print out the pattern myself, tape it together.

I need to sew a dress up for myself and the pattern I liked only came in PDF form.
In a moment of madness, I went with it.

This wee drawstring bag is only five pages of instructions. It's all rectangles so you don't need a pattern piece for this. For the dress - more than 80 pages. Thank goodness it came with a copy shop option for a commercial printer to print it out on the big sheet of paper. That will be another blog post right there.

i was in a mood to sew something new and for once, I didn't have the energy to figure out the dimensions myself.

I took the pattern and ran with it.

It's fairly smallish but will hold a sewing kit. With pockets on the inside as well as the outside, it organizes small items quite well.

I just happened to have that orange and black striped trim in stash (think OSU Beavers possibilities). which jumped on the zebra bandwagon very nicely. The blue fabric is a cotton/poly that coordinated well. The zebras were purchased at the recent SewExpo so that's nice to use one item I bought already.

The picture on the wall is a needlepoint purchased at a garage sale. In fact, I recently found another that is similar. It's isn't framed, so now I'm looking for a similar frame at a garage sale so I can hang the other sewing-themed needlework art.

 WeeBrawBag: A Sewing Pattern by Laura Zuckerkuss   https://payhip.com/b/gmI4

The other two pdf patterns I purchased are The Fringe Dress  and The Augusta Moto Pant


I almost forgot to add dd's newest Study In Blue photos.
Byron Glacier, Alaska.

Reusable Gift Bags

 You can't go wrong with a drawstring bag. These are smallish - about 8" wide x 10" tall.
Perfect size for these birthday gifts I picked up at the local Spring In The Country Bazaar.

Some lotion ,some face scrubbies and who doesn't enjoy a good Lemon Drop.
The lotions and face scrubbies were made in my town. The Lemon Drop mix in Oregon.

My friend in Japan sent me the "This Took Me Hours To Make" ribbon which was about right. Haha. Perfect finishing touch.

 While out doing errands yesterday, some plants might have jumped into the car for a ride home. This one is a Primula and will need to stay inside for a bit longer until the night time temps go up. Then it will be part of an awesome patio pot outside.

It's on my kitchen table right now, getting in the way of taking photographs, but making me smile at the lovely lavender colors.

 Do you utilize re-usable gift bags?  I've seen IG posts where making a stash of these is a thing.
I have a stash of decorative paper bags. I don't think I want a stash of fabric bags too.

For the time they take - lined, reversible, I can't see someone shelling out cash for these.

Probably a bit like receiving handmade jam/jelly. If you return the jars, that person will gift you more jam.

Sandra's Snowman

I am supposed to be sewing the third item in my daughter's travel purse trio: the passport wallet.

ahem.

Easily distracted by super quick and easy, I was derailed by this cute snowman drawstring bag.
A tutorial is over here on Sandra's blog.

The most difficult part is trolling the button stash for big black buttons. You'll need seven of them. None of mine match either. (you could use felt instead).

One of my favorite businesses near my old work place is Garden Gallery Ironworks.
They were giving away teeny white pumpkins and hop vines. Cut your own. In the rain.

At their shop, I spied this most awesome wine shelf featuring a biplane!
It has holes for four bottles of wine, appendages to hold your wine glass collection AND it's a biplane. BE still my heart.

Last night I wandered around the house looking for a 36" wall space where I could hang this shelf.  The shelf sticks out about 8 - 9 inches. I found the perfect spot in the dining room but hubby is looking at me askance.



Hop Vines: Commonly used in beer making, they are also perfect for fall decor. I have another friend who uses them dried in her wedding bouquets she creates and also in the boutineers.

I stole a couple of photos to show her awesomeness.
She's mostly on Instagram: BohemianBouquets
(also on Facebook).

Happy Easter Eggs

 Happy Easter everyone.
We're having Baby Back ribs and Teresa's Carrot cake tomorrow.

 Ukrainian egg decorating. My library repeated a class they held two years ago. You start with a blown-out egg. Apparently, there is a tool to do this instead of blowing them out the hard way!
Funny girl bought a kit, so I blew out three green eggs for her - I almost get a headache doing it the hard way.

This time, we worked with white eggs. Two years ago, brown eggs.

Basically, this is a wax resist method aka batik. Using wax to trace designs, then coloring them, then more wax to enhance the design, then more dye and maybe another run through with wax and dye.

The tool in the right hand is called a kistka. A little tube to hold beeswax that is then melted over the candle flame.

Funny friend's sunny egg

Creative Girl's egg masterpiece.

 Late last week, an old friend emailed me to ask a question. As I still had a few plastic eggs left, I whipped up these drawstring pouches and mailed a wee present to the cutest little girl and her brother. This little girl used to bring me flowers at work - the kind with no stems. I had a little plastic dish to float her bouquets in.
*smile*

These were fun to make too.
These are yarn wrapped around a water balloon which you squeeze a chocolate egg or two into first. Soak the yarn in watered glue adn wrap, then let dry. Pop the balloon and you have candy trapped inside the stiff 'egg'.



My first attempt at Ukrainian eggs.

This year's eggs

Sewing

 Weekend sewing.

I was cleaning up my bookmarks when I found this tutorial from 2009!
Most of the saved bookmarks either won't open or have a broken link. Half the time, I can't recall WHY I bookmarked the link.

That's what Pinterest is for. Room for a photo plus the link. I'm not saying that in 5 years those links might not be broken but at least I'll have a photo to jog my memory.

This little cell phone thingy is small. 
We all have honkin'big smarty pants phones now which will not fit in the back pocket.
But still, this little thingy packs a wollop in the pocket department.
 

slightly elasticized Back pocket for cell phone

 And I free-motion quilted that backing fabric (rocket scientist). It gives a little cushion if you were to put a phone in there.

Clear vinyl front ID pocket

Inside - you can see plenty of room in the zippered compartment. Next to the bottom of the photo is the id pocket nestled up against the zipper. Those inside raw edges are all bound with doubled quilt binding - a regular bias tape binding would be fine and less bulky.

 The only thing I changed was to enlarge the id vinyl opening.
The original sizing was too small for my driver's license. I wanted my id # and address to show.

I made these first.
Two more of these reversible drawstring bags from Svetlana's tutorial.
Same fabrics.

 

 I put one "Stuff" label on the Daisy side and for the other - on the Rocket side.

I had some pretty grosgrain ribbons that were near the correct length.

These ribbons were a huge find at a quilty garage sale that actually was selling crafty supplies at garage sale prices. Too often when I go to a sale advertising fabric, the seller is putting retail prices on their half yard of blue. The general rule of  garage sale pricing is ten cents on the dollar. About a dollar per yard - or less.

"Rocket Scientist" - In The Beginning fabrics - Keri Beyer
" Daisy Dreams"  - Michael Miller fabrics