Criss cross bag

Another simple zipper bag, just because they are so much fun to make!

For this one, i tried another technique from the book, Quilting Modern,

to make the design, you cut the background fabric and sew in narrow strips of a contrasting fabric,

I used some red scraps, since I liked the look of them against the gray.  

this is what it looks like from the back:

to quilt it, I just sewed wavy stipes in red thread,

I was happy that I had a carved cinnabar bead for the zipper pull, I like how it echos the asian theme of some of the red fabrics,

I think I am formally addicted to making these bags now. 
What is your latest mania?

Zippered Pouch,

Another zippered pouch!

I have had a copy of this book for some time now:
It is the "textbook" that Sandy uses for her class "Learn to Quilt with focus on Improvisational techniques"

I fell in love with Sandy's quilt which she uses as a sample for the class, and I wanted to learn more about how to create such quilts,

So, because I am on this Handbag maging spree, I decided to make some sample blocks from the book and convert them to handbags. 
This is the first technique I tried,

I had a few scraps of beautiful turquoises left over from a quilt i did last year,

Remember me?

I combined them with a really cute black and white dot,
Making the block itself was pretty straightforward,   I cut a piece of freezer paper to about 12" x 15" and just made the block fit within that rectangle,

I quilted the sections with separate patterns.    The turquoise thread is quite heavy, a 10 wt, so I used a size 16 needle.  It worked well on straight lines, but when I switched to some free motion quilting, it didn't work so well, so I used a thinner ivory colored thread.

the bottom of the bag has boxed corners,

the inside,

its not lined, (which I have found out that some bag makers think is heinous, oh well) the side seams are just zig-zagged, and the zipper tape makes the facing over the top seam edge,

I decided to start adding some zipper pulls to my bags, 

For this one, i cut a wee strip of a thin leather that i had on hand and threaded it through the hole on the zipper pull.  To secure it, I just cut a bit of washi tape in half to make it about 1/8 " wide and wrapped it around the folded over leather to secure it.

I liked having the book to refer to.  I think i will definitely make more of this sort of block!

Easy Zipper Pouch

I picked up some zippers the other day with the idea of making some easy little pouches.

(Still feeling inspired from the ones I saw at the modern quilt guild when they had their pouch exchange,)

To get me started, I first googled some images of fabric zipper pouches

From there I noticed a nice bag that had a flat bottom, and it even had a tutorial.

I used the idea of the shape, but I tend to avoid sewing extra linings when possible,so as i made my bag, I used more traditional quilting techniques.

Sadly, I cannot find that page again....

I had a piece of woven fabric that I had stitched on for a while last year. At the time I just felt like doing some handstitching,..  I had taken some one inch strips of brown fabrics, and did a simple over/ under weave, and basted it to muslin,  after a while it just landed in my basket of UFOs.   And you know how lately I've just been trying to reuse some things to get them out of my UFO basket.

The larger background piece that I chose is one of the Kaufman Essex linen fabrics

I drew out an outline on the linen and pinned the woven piece on top of it. The outline is about 15 inches wide and 14 inches tall in the photo above. Then I layered it with some leftover batting and for the lining chose a dark orange shot Cotton by Westminster, 

These photos show the machine quilting that I did through all of the layers. I didn't bother quilting the areas that would be cut away.

When I laid it out after quilting I noticed that it had  become askew and was slanting on the top and bottom edges.

So I just trimmed them off straight again.

I sewed that edges of the zipper to the top edges, but instead of selling in an extra lining, I just used a piece of Jacquard ribbon as a facing to cover the raw edges.

Sewed the side seams, adding in another bit of ribbon on one of them, and very importantly, leaving the zipper open! otherwise you cant turn it right side out later! then sewed the boxed bottom.

Zigzagged the raw edges where possible,

Turned it inside out,

And voila, the pouch was finished.

For the quilting I used a dark brown thread on the linen so that the stitching would show up.

Art to Heart Basics

This is a group that we have in the shop, and I've been dipping into it quite a bit lately…

It's a basics group in that it doesn't have any strong focus fabrics, but a lot of really nice blender fabrics. The designer, Nancy Halvorson, has written a couple of books to go along with the grouping

This project is in the book called Table Please, Part One:

Then, just because the fabrics were so prettily sitting on my cutting table, I decided to use them in this pencil case, a project from another book called so gifts

I think I'm going to make this pencil case again, and this timeI will make the outside of it quilted.

I think I'll choose a different color for the wooden part of the pencil as well, since this one doesn't have enough of a contrast with the background gray fabric.

But I must say I do like the orange inside, especially as it contrasts with the bright blue zipper.

Oh yes back to the art to heart fabrics, I am currently sewing another project with them! However I will make a new post all about that another day...