New sewing room - the big reveal

Drum roll...... ta-da! Here is my new sewing room. It is finally ready and I absolutely LOVE it!



I am especially pleased as the furniture and fittings (desk, cabinet, shelf, pegboard, accessories) came in at just under my budget of $300. I would have loved to have thrifted some items rather than buy brand new, but as I wanted the room ready as soon as possible, I went for the next best thrifty option: IKEA.



The room is the smallest in the house so it was a bit of a push to squeeze everything in, but I am glad we decided to keep the guest bed. I have already been crocheting on it this morning, with a cup of tea by my side.



I am a bit of a fusspot when it comes to dust, so I had to have a cabinet with glass doors to keep dust off my fabrics and yarns. This IKEA cabinet is just the right size - big enough to hold my current fabric and yarn stash, but not so big that I would be tempted to go on a fabric shopping spree to fill it up! I have my fabric on the top half, and the bottom half has my yarn, minky, and interfacing. Unfortunately my felt sheets were too large to fit the cabinet so they are sitting on top for now until I can figure out a more permanent home for them.



I had the pegboard cut to size at my local hardware store, and my husband mounted it onto a frame. It was a yucky dirty white colour so he gave it a lick of paint using some leftover pale pink paint from Alice's nursery.



For wall art, I created my own 'Keep Calm' poster, using the poster generator by Keep-Calm-O-Matic, then printed it and popped it into an IKEA Virserum frame.



I also displayed some of my hoop embroidery on the angled wall next to the desk. I am imagining this wall covered with hoops in a few years' time.



It is so nice to finally have a space that is completely customised and away from the hustle and bustle of family life. And with plenty of storage too.



But I have to say, the absolutely best thing about it is: it has a door ;)

Things for boys - part 1

One of my favourite blogs is Things For Boys, run by the very talented Abby. I don't think I need to explain what her blog is about - the name says it all! She has one little guy and another one on the way any day now (in fact maybe even as I am typing this), and she has a truly impressive number of tutorials to make almost anything you can think of for boys, but also some great stuff for girls and mums too. If you haven't discovered it yet you should go and check it out. Chances are you have already pinned a few of her tutorials on Pinterest.

The reason I mention her blog is because I have been on a bit of a mission myself to make more things for boys, as I get a lot of requests from my customers for more boy items in the shop. My style is very girly and floral so coming up with boyish stuff in keeping with that style has been a bit of a challenge. So one day I sat down and spent a long time looking at my fabric collection, doodling designs, and shortlisting ideas. So this will be a multi-part post - and this part is about bibs for boys.

I only had one boy bib design in the shop previously (the Aqua Life bib, which I blogged about previously here). I designed a second patchwork bib in the same style as that one. It is backed with a gorgeous dot minky in champagne with a soft silky sheen. You may have noticed that I now also have a new template for my boy bibs, which is different from the pear shaped template I use for my girl bibs.



I also made some bibs with bow ties, which turned out cute as! They come with 9 fabric options for the bow ties and 8 options for the bib fabric itself. I also lined these with a soft wadding material, both for absorbancy and also so they maintain their shape better (important for those cute birthday photos!)



My quest to make more 'things for boys' continues. This is what I am currently making for my 2 year old little guy - an aviator style crochet hat using some gorgeous chunky yarn. And there will be another hat after this one.



Coming up in part 2: Crochet hats for boys!

A mat and some strawberries

We have been a sick household this last week, all four of us have had this annoying cold. My sewing room has not progressed much as a result. I am getting quite impatient for my own space, so to satisfy that need to some degree I joined a sew-along run by Ros from Sew Delicious, and made a quilted mat for my sewing machine. One little step closer to my dream sewing space.



I used Fig Tree fabrics, except one square which is Lecien (the square with the embroidery on it). The backing fabric is tiny little white dots on beige. You know me, any excuse to add a little hand embroidery, so I stitched on some sewing icons. I pieced my quilt top by butting the seams, and kept the quilting simple - just straight lines on either side of the seam using my presser foot as the guide.

I was a little petrified about making my own binding and machine stitching it, but it was easier than I thought it would be.



For the binding I used Sew Delicious' tutorial, and also these two other tutorials have been very helpful (as I am one of those people who can't possibly try something new until I have read 17 tutorials on the subject first). Diary of a Quilter's binding tutorial was great for the mitreing of corners, and Red Pepper Quilts' tutorial shows you how to make a continuous cross-grain binding (with diagonal seams) and how to machine stitch it.

It's not too late to join the sew-along, it consists of a tutorial in three parts and only takes a couple of hours. It's suitable for beginner quilters with clear photos and instructions, and quite a simple project overall (especially if you use shop-bought bias binding). Ros also has a fantastic tutorial to make a sewing machine cover - I simply NEED to make one to match my new mat soon.



Did you spot the strawberries? All my favourite bloggers have been making them recently - I simply had to join in (see the ones made by Amy from Nana Company, Kristyne from Pretty By Hand, and Sandra from Cherry Heart here, here and here). They are so, well, me, and wonderfully satisfying (and quick) to make. I never seem to have a pincushion nearby when I need one, so these will be spread all over my working space.

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I don't think I will be able to stop making them now. I finally found a great use for scraps of my favourite fabrics (that I can't bring myself to discard). They can be immortalised in pincushion form. So I will probably end up with a collection of hundreds of them!

In love with apricot

I have a big crush on apricot shades right now. It all started with this crochet hat.



The crochet pattern is by Stitchykits. I found the gauge quite hard to get right so I had to improvise a bit, but it turned out OK I think. I love it, the only drawback is getting stopped all the time by people wanting to know where I got the hat from (I really should start carrying some business cards with me!)

Then my good friend Lauren gave me free rein to design a new floral bib for her friend's baby. I may have squealed a little.  Perfect for these apricot and cream fabrics I had in my stash for a while. From top to bottom, the floral fabrics are: Le Petit Jardin by Lecien, Strawberry Fields by Fig Tree, and the bottom one came from Cottonholic on Etsy (not sure who the designer is, as nothing is printed on the selvedge, but I am pretty sure it's Japanese).



Those who follow me on Facebook may remember that I ordered a big batch of Fig Tree fabrics recently (OK I went a bit nuts). I love their fabric ranges so much but they sell out so quickly! I got three layer cakes (Tapestry, Butterscotch & Rose, and Buttercup), a fat quarter bundle of their latest line Avalon (swoon!), and some yardage of their old lines Strawberry Fields and California Girl, which are becoming increasingly hard to find.



There will be a quilt made from these some day soon, and perhaps a cushion or two. However to begin with I am making this quilted mat to go under my sewing machine, as part of a sew-along run by Sew Delicious. Here are my 5 inch squares all cut and ready to be pieced together! After the mat I am also going to make a matching cover for my sewing machine.


Back soon with my finished mat!

New sewing room

I have been resisting it for a long time. Converting our guest bedroom into a craft room for me that is. I used to have my own room until I got pregnant with Alice, and we converted it into a nursery for her (I blogged about that previously here). Since then I have been doing all my sewing on the dining table in our family room. After eight months of this both me and my husband are fed up with the mess, and it is a total pain having all my fabric and craft supplies in a cupboard upstairs, and having to go up and down the stairs twenty times a day for stuff.

This is the room that will be my new sewing room, as it looks now. We were going to take the bed out, but for now we just pushed it under the window. Depending on how cramped the room gets it may or may not stay there. I actually like the idea of having a bed in there - I can put my feet up whilst crocheting or embroidering. It's not a big room, so there is just enough space for a desk and a cabinet in that empty space to the left of the bed. And that's all I need for the time being.



For planning inspiration, I pinned some fantastic sewing rooms onto my Craft Room board on Pinterest. How amazing would it be to have a studio like these to create in. I especially love that red polka dot armchair, I want one!



Having limited space and a small budget, these will remain a dream for the time being, so this is what I am planning instead. A free standing cabinet with glass doors (I am fussy about keeping my fabric and yarn dust-free), and a pegboard above the desk to organise all my tools. A drawer unit under the desk for my packaging supplies. Some glass fronted kitchen cabinets would be perfect above the desk, though probably not immediately, I think I will just put a shelf up there to begin with, and add the cabinets at a later stage.


(links to all original images on my Pinterest board here)

So we are off to Ikea this weekend to get the furniture (where else!). In the meantime, I have been organising my trims and ribbons. I roll my ribbon onto wooden pegs (another Pinterest idea). It keeps them tidy, and I use the peg to clamp the end of the ribbon, so no pins are required (which is handy - as I like to stick my hand into the jar to fish out ribbons).



For the trims, I found some delicate glass jars in Spotlight, with bird handles. The ribbons I keep in a large glass jar, which I am especially pleased with as it didn't cost me a penny. It consists of a large glass vase that I had for ages (but almost never used), which I coupled with the lid of a very large apothecary jar that our cat broke a few months ago. Somehow the lid survived the fall and it fits the vase perfectly!





Back with 'after' shots of the sewing room in a few weeks!

Happy Mother's Day

Today I am celebrating my third Mother's Day as a mum. It's quite surreal. I still get these moments of sudden dawning realisation that I am, actually, SOMEONE'S MOTHER. I gave birth to two absolutely perfect little people, who are growing and learning new things in front of my eyes every day. I am so proud to be their mum. I think I am going to do nothing special today, and will just spend it with my gorgeous little family. What can be more 'special' than that?



I wasn't going to make anything for Mother's Day as I have been literally submerged under an avalanche of shop orders. Then a few mornings ago I was reading something at 6am and saw the words 'Love without reason lasts the longest'. It reminded me instantly of a mother's love - totally unconditional and everlasting. And this embroidery idea just popped into my head. By 8am I had designed the embroidery on the computer, started stitching that night, and it was finished the next day. Gotta love a quick project! And I confess it was refreshing to do a 'grown up' project for a change, something to hang on the wall of my new craft room perhaps (more on that later).



So I am sending lots of love to all mothers around the world, and especially my own mum. Hope you all get pampered and spoilt today, and have a beautiful day. Here is a little card and some flowers for you all.



(Link to all flower images here)