Little and quick.

My favourite things to make usually come under the category of cute and useful, they are also usually projects that are fairly quick to make and don't use too much fabric!! Well here are my top 3 quick gratification projects for this month!!
First up is a really cute felt purse in the shape of a heart, using this tutorial Heart pouch what I love about this is the minimal supplies, just bits of felt, a small zip and embroidery thread!! Plus the fact it can easily be made by hand, I just have to work on keeping my stitches neat and even, here is the heart I made



Next up is a really cute zakka inspired pencil case,(from the Japanese 'zak-ka'（雑貨）or 'many things) the tute is here Zakka case
And here is my version:

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And third is just the sweetest needle case, I am a sucker for needle cases, and this one is just so sweet and I love the inner embellished felt pages, plus it's a good way to use some tiny scraps up!! Needle book unfortunately I didn't take a picture of my needle book before i sent it to its new owner, but i had put a bird and a toadstool on the front, it was pretty cute, however, here is a photo of the one sent to me by Whitney in U.S, I just love it!!

Child's Rapunzel costume, simplicity 2065

My Rapunzel pattern arrived in the mail yesterday and I couldn't wait to get started so had a look in my cupboard and came up with some lilac poly cotton and lilac organza! Wasn't I lucky! So I set to work and read the instructions...hmm an awful lot of fabric needed!! So I had a look on Sewing.patternreview.com
And read a few reviews, the bodice runs small apparently so I cut a size 5 for my 3 1/2 year old (I figure she will get a lot of wear out of it) I also didn't want to put in a zip so I cut my back piece on the fold, out of a pink knit that I had in my cupboard, I also cut the centre panel in the bodice out of the knit. So it be easy to pull on and off.

Now, I don't know why there are so many skirt pieces in this pattern, I only had enough fabric to cut 2 front and side panels from my poly cotton, and the same from the organza, so omitted the front skit pieces entirely, I don't even see the need for them!!
I also didn't want to do the grommets and ribbon, it just seemed way too fiddly, so I laid my trim down in a criss cross pattern and managed to sew it together neatly by French seaming as I am not lining the bodice.


I ran out of my pink trim so for the sleeves all I could find was a pink stretchy lace, Archie is helping to keep the lace flat!! ( actually he was a pain and kept on playing with it!)



I actually found the hardest bit was French seaming the sleeves and the bodice to the dress, the sleeves turned out good but when I sewed the bodice and skirt together it was a bit lumpy, from all the gathering and the organza as well.
when I get my overlocker sorted I will probably redo that bit. Anyway here is the finished dress. This picture was taken before I got to hem the bottom part, as Skylar had been waiting all day for the dress to be finished. Voila







So all in all, I didn't exactly follow the instructions, I skipped the long sleeve entirely and only used the bodice, sleeve and side/front skirt & over skirt pieces, the pattern could have been made so much simpler and easier! But my daughter loves it and I will probably struggle getting it back off her so I can sort the hem out.

Xxx

Tiered skirt pattern

I recently ordered a couple of patterns from a German based company, so yesterday decided I would make the skirt for my daughter. The pattern can be found here: Lara skirt

I definitely enjoyed making this skirt, although I probably would have been quicker if I could read German, however there is an English translation but I still had to double check more than usual, and the photographs in the tutorial that came with it definitely helped!
But the other thing is that the pattern said to cut 2 each of the front yoke and back yoke, which made no sense so I only cut one of each. I used 4 different types of corduroy as that is what I had, I think it turned out pretty cute!!



- the shambolic crafter

Super cute pillow cases

After spending all that time sorting out my scraps I then had to catch up on a swap to make a pillowcase using this tutorial: Sham tute

Well I am so glad that my scraps were organised as they needed to be to complete this project, there was so much to cut out!! Look at all those little squares, and this was not all of it!!


Putting the pinwheels together


The finished pillowcases!! I just love them and found it quite hard to send them off to my swap partner!! I would make these again as they turned out so pretty, but it was the most time consuming swap I've ever done, it took me about 4 days on and off to make them!!

I love my local sewing shop!!!

Woohoo I had a winning lotto ticket (just a small win) last week so thought I would treat myself to a new cutting ruler, so popped along to my local sewing shop in Waiuku and got my ruler, but I also saw some beautiful fabric on their bench, but as soon as I touched it, Clare, the shop assistant told me off!! Yep she had claimed a heap of beautiful sample offcuts for herself, well I still had a good rummage in the samples bin and came away with a few pretty pieces, it's a good score $5 for 6 pieces, anyway, I thought about that fabric for two days then went back to the shop this morning and had another good rummage, I paid $15, which I think is not too bad, especially when a lot of my projects recently have been small items and scrap pillow cases and I am planning on making some pencil cases too.


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