Out fishing

My little boy loves running around with anything that can be used as a fire hose or fishing rod. It started getting a bit dangerous swinging ropes and sticks around, so I decided to make him a fishing kit.

The bag was taken from a lunch bag tutorial I found on A Lemon Squeezy Home.

I didn't have much fish fabric for the outside, so I went with turtles instead. The inside fabric is more heavy-weight to make the bag stand by itself. There is a small plastic inserted in the bottom, as suggested in the above-mentioned tutorial. The bag measures 6"x9"x4" (16cmx19cmx16cm) with the flap down. The flap is held down with velcro.

And the fishing idea was from From an Igloo.  

The fishing rod is made of very soft light wood and measures appr. 9,5 inches (24 cm); fitting nicely in the bag on a diagonal slant. Paper clips were firmly sewn into the fishes' mouths and tied a ring-shaped magnet at the end of the line.

The fish were made out of fabric, stuffed with some polyester batting and paper clips firmly sewn in at their mouths.  Some of the fish I drew myself on white fabric, while the rest are from pre-printed fabric which were either already colored or I painted myself with fabric markers.

 The strap is actually a zipper, which can be closed and carried over one shoulder, or...

... opened to be used as a back-sack. A really clever idea, which I am not taking credit for.

I made a second fishing rod for his little sister to avoid fighting, but they still have to take turns or their fishing lines get tangled or magnets stuck to each other in the bag. To make the game more interesting, one can decide that whoever catches a particular fish (or star fish in our case) wins.

Here's hoping you catch a whopper!
Christine 

Christmas stockings - a little late, I know.

I thought I would just hurry up and post pictures of the personalized Christmas stockings I made for the kiddies in my family last Christmas. It was something my mother did for me and my cousins when we were kids, so I thought I would carry on the tradition. 

I found this wonderful tutorial on Cluck Cluck Sew, which was very easy to follow.

(Again please excuse the amateur pics, as I did not know then that they would end up in a blog!) 

I used green for boys and red for girls. I would have preferred a darker pine green, but I thought I use up some of my stash before our big move.

 This was a great opportunity to try out different patchwork blocks.

I just love how the penguins peek from the edges. I was not equally fortunate with the snowman heads, though. Live and learn.

Though it is not shown here, I stitched the individual names on all the stockings. I hope they will be used for years to come. 

Cheers!

Christine

Wonky stars baby quilt

Another quilt for another member of my extended family made Fall 2011. This one was for a crib and inspired by a mini-quilt on Fresh Lemons. The mother requested pink and white, but since I had already done a quilt in pink overload (see post "Getting back in the saddle again"), I thought to add some purple and some brown to tone it down somewhat. Luckily the mother was pleased with the result. These pictures were taken before quilting. Wonky stars and wonky picture-taking...

It really is fun to make baby quilts and this one was quickly done once I got used not trying to be so precise. I even managed to use up some scraps.

The back was a single fabric with pink background and yellow wonky stars, which really suited this quilt. I quilted vertical lines on each side of the seems.

Have a nice day! 

Christine

Getting back in the saddle

My first attempt at patchwork and quilting in almost 20 years. I made quilts for my four nieces and one nephew in the Spring of 2011 using ideas found on the internet. Red Pepper Quilts has been a great inspiration to me. Living in Bogota at the time of making these, I did not have access to better quality batting and had to use polyester, which I had a very hard time quilting with. Apologies for the poor picture-taking, as they were quickly taken while the recipients were impatiently awaiting their presents.

The front ...

... and the back

Front (my first try at appliqué inspired by Don't look now)

Back (This was originally thought to be used for the front, but I decided upon the appliqué shown above that reflected the bird patterned fabric shown here.)

Front using pinwheels

Back (the recipient is a Pippi Longstocking fan, so I printed some images of the character on ink-jet fabric to apply to the quilt)

Front using HST (the recipient loves pink, so I provided it in full!)

Back (with grey linen and a lovely silk-like butterfly fabric, as used on the front)

Baby Blanket using blue and green linen fabric and brown and yellow cotton mixes.
Front (Pattern from Empty Bobbin Sewing Studio)

Back

More quilts to come from 2011 in my next post. Enjoy your Sunday!
Christine

Contact

If you have any questions or would like to make a specific order, kindly contact me at my e-mail:
sewbossi@gmail.com.

A new beginning

This is my first time venturing out in blog-land, and I thought the timing to be quite a good one as we have arrived to a new country and new city. So much to discover and enjoy! My little family and I have just moved from Bogota, where we lived for nearly three years. Now we are in Jerusalem and are settling in nicely. We will be staying here for at least two years, and in this time I thought I would let my creative juices flew. In 2011 I took up patchwork and quilting and dawdled in baby and children's articles, as my little ones were needing or requesting items that I could not find in Bogota. I got such positive feed-back from friends and family, that I thought I would become bolder and expose my handicrafts online and see where it would take me. Please feel free to browse and constructive comments are very welcome.

So here is to new beginnings and a fresh new start. Oh, and a be-lated Happy New Year !

Christine