Cathedral Window Quilt: Complete!

It's finished!!  I know I got a bit behind on posting each of my blocks in the Cathedral Window Sampler Quilt-along.  You can see the detail on each individual block here in my flickr set.  I love how this came out so much that I decided to take it to one of my favorite spots for a little photo shoot.  I made this for my own living room, with fabrics from Fly a Kite and Outfoxed.  I used Maureen Cracknell Handmade's quilt-as-you go method, so when the quilt along was over all I had to do was sew my blocks together.

I added a cathedral window block of my own, based around a little cathedral window I already had waiting in my stash for just the right project.  Then I added two plain 12.5" squares of fabric to make a 3x4 quilt.  And I even remembered to add a label.

The backing is from Loulouthi by Anna Maria Horner.  I had it in my stash, and it happened to go perfectly.  I used the "self-binding" technique for the backing for the first time.  Basically, I trimmed the backing to 1.5" larger than the quilt (after quilting the backing fabric to the rest of the quilt) and then folded the raw edge of the backing in to meet the raw edge of the front.  Then I pressed the folded edge over the front and machine stitched all the way around.  Voila!  No hand sewing involved.  In the whole quilt.  Hooray for that!!

Here's a little better look at the quilting on the front...although the bright sunshine this morning makes some of it hard to see.

Perfect for a cold Alaskan morning at the beach!  And since the sand is frozen, it didn't even get dirty.

In Love With...

my Zakka Style Stem Messenger Bag!!  I have been looking forward to this project since the sew-along began.  I haven't kept up with the projects as much as I had hoped, mostly due to the last month of school activities and our town's community-built playground effort, but thankfully things seem to be calming down.

I jumped ahead a few weeks ago and made the zip organizer.  You'll have to wait til next week to see the finished product.  But I made the Stem Messenger Bag to match my organizer!  I absolutely love it.  Working with this book has me using linen for the first time, and it has such a great weight and feel to it.  Aside from having issues keeping it squared up when cutting out project pieces, I really enjoy the natural fibers.  (I have fixed that issue by ironing interfacing onto the linen of the correct size and shape before cutting the linen out.)

Sooo...here's my new favorite bag!  Completed just in time for the Great Alaskan Road Trip next week that my kids and I are taking...from Homer to Fairbanks and back, via Denali National Park.  This bag will hold all of my travel necessities- phone, wallet, notebook, iPad, Kindle (techie, here!), Alaska TourSaver Book, smaller camera, snacks... It has lots of pockets, and I added a magnetic snap closure on the flap so that things don't fly out while I'm chasing my 4-year-old.

Gray linen with Outfoxed and Fly a Kite

I made my own double-fold bias binding for the first time...I can see how that could get addicting!  I envisioned an entire Etsy shop with handmade binding.

Fab design in the Zakka Style book- outside pockets and inside pockets to hold just about everything.

I made my strap out of two pieces of black cotton webbing zig-zagged together with teal thread.  My loops are nylon from my local marine hardware supplier.

Pocket on the back.  Attaching the flap this way was tricky and it doesn't look very neat on the inside top edge.  Next time I'd probably put it on the "regular" way.

Just the right size.

Weekend Project: Girl's Messenger Bag

I started out my weekend with the itch to finally use these fabrics with the cathedral window block tutorial that I have been eyeing.  It was fun and really easy!  I upsized the initial square size to 14 inches to accommodate the size of the print in my feature fabric.

After completing a block featuring each the girl on the swing and the boy with the kite, I needed to make something with them.  I remembered seeing a fun embellished messenger bag and thought I'd give that idea a try.  I followed the general size guidelines in this tutorial from mmmcrafts, and then I put it together using my own method, adding tweaks along the way.  The more I worked, the more interested my 6-year-old daughter became in my project.  It slowly evolved from my bag to her bag.

The bag body is a heavy duck canvas

I installed a magnetic snap on the front flap, and picked up some buckle hardware to make the strap adjustable.  Since I live in a *very* small town in Alaska, I usually order my supplies or drive 80 miles to the nearest craft store.  Since we wanted to finish this bag ASAP, we took a trip to our local outdoor gear manufacturer's store and found plenty of options for hardware.  I decided that I'd like to use cotton webbing for the strap, so we stopped by our local fabric store, which is inside the TrueValue Hardware.  They are primarily a quilting shop and only had 1-inch webbing, so I put two lengths side-by-side and zig-zagged them together with red thread.  I think that detail makes the bag!

Outside pocket under the front flap

Inside of the flap

I posted a quick photo of the bag last night on my Facebook page and got a ton of positive feedback.  I think this is a favorite of everything I have created to date.  I have already ordered some more fabric (since I used nearly everything I had to create the bag) and hope to put some of these little beauties in my shop soon.  They are a great size for kids, but would also make a fun everyday bag for adults.

I added this to the list of fun weekend projects over at Skip to My Lou.

What I'm Working On: Stash Building

Now that my Etsy shop is up and running (and turning a little bit of profit), I have started buying fabrics that I love just because I love them.  I have several projects in mind, but I love these fabrics so much that I am almost afraid to cut them!  Washing them is the first step, so into the laundry they go while I contemplate what to start on first.

I have wanted these since I first saw them!  They are from the Washi collection by Rashida Coleman Hale.  I love the charcoal background coupled with the bright colors.  I plan to make myself a bag from them, but I'm still toying with the design.  They will also make super cute makeup bags and iPad/Kindle cases. Just waiting on my latest shipment of zippers from ZipIt before getting to work.

I picked up these two prints from the Echo line after seeing a gorgeous tote made from the charcoal print by Ivey Expressions in the Hawthorne Threads newsletter a few weeks ago.  The gray in the fabric on the left isn't an exact match for the charcoal in the other, so I'm not quite sure what I will end up making with them.  

This next set is not my usual taste, but it is so darn cute I had to try it.  It's from the Fly a Kite line.  I have bookmarked a cathedral window quilt block made by folding the background fabric oragami-style, and I think this fabric would be perfect to try it out with.  Then maybe it will become something with a zipper.

If you know me, you will find an uncanny likeness in this print to my own kids!  Right down to the red-headed boy and curly girl...

Finally, I found a fabulous deal on The Intrepid Thread for half-yards of the entire collection of the Primitiva line.  The purples and oranges really jumped out at me, and it's not too "girly" to end up as a quilt for my own bed.  I've been keeping a collection of modern quilt ideas on Pinterest and hope to somehow use these fabrics to create my first "modern" quilt.  I have quilted in the past, but only using the traditional block structure.

I haven't yet decided if I want to use just part of the collection...

Or the entire thing...

And if I am going to use the true "modern" style, I should probably add some solids.  But I thought these may function as solids/backgrounds, depending on what I end up with.

I like structure, so piecing a quilt on the fly is going to be tough for me.  I ordered a book about it, of course.  Anyone have tips to get me started on a fun design with these fabrics?