the perfect little gift

Last month I made a cute little Valentine's Day gift for Thing 1's college apartment - a fabric box filled with chocolate candies! I used this well-written tutorial found on the Seaside Stitches blog. You could make one of these quick-sew gifts for almost any occasion.

Per the tutorial, you'll need two coordinating fabric squares and one thin batting square each measuring between 8" and 12". I used 12" squares to make this box and the thinnest cotton batting I had on hand - Quilter's Dream Request in white.  Stitch all three layers right sides together using a 1/4" seam and leave a 4" opening for turning.  After you've clipped the corners and turned it right sides out, topstitch around the outer edges and then quilt as you like.  I segmented this square into triangles by marking the corner to corner diagonal lines, and then stitched a concentric triangle in each segment using the edge of the presser foot as my guide for spacing.

Here's a shot of the completed quilting lines on what will become the box interior.  The edges are a tad wavy from all the quilting lines, but don't worry if yours ends up like this too - it will all turn out just fine in the end :)

Since I started with 12" squares to make a larger box, I marked and sewed 2.5" triangles in each corner rather than the 2" triangles indicated in the tutorial.  This adjustment makes the finished box a little bit taller on the sides.

After sewing the corners and turning the box right side out you'll need to fold and press the outer flaps down on the box exterior.  You may also want to tack the inside corner flaps down with a bit of hand stitching.

Add some cute buttons to the points on the exterior flaps...

And you're done.  Fill it up with chocolate candies and you've got the perfect gift that can be used in so many other ways after the candy is long gone!

I'm going to make another one for my local Crystal Lake Modern Quilt Guild's April door prize filled with Easter grass, chocolates, and some other goodies.  Maybe I'll even engineer a way to add a handle to make it a real Easter basket :)

I think this might be my go-to 2015 hostess gift project.  Do you have other suggestions for quick and useful handmade gifts that you regularly sew?

UFO busting

Ah, Pinterest... how I love thee. I stumbled across a pin from Pat Sloan's blog yesterday that called out to me.

Source: blog.patsloan.com via Amy on Pinterest

Busting UFO's? I'm interested!

12 tips (aka steps)? I'm very interested!

I have quite an accumulation of UFOs that mostly cause me guilt, so I decided to dive right in and bust through them along with Pat. She seems like a fun and funny gal with project hoarding tendencies similar to mine, so who better to share the pain?

The first step is "Knowing What You've Got" which involves making a list. I excel at compiling lists - it's an inherited trait, right, mom? ;) Then I got to categorize the list into five separate lists! Woo-hoo! I am so on board with this.


So here we go with categorization of my 30 UFOs...

Group A - Almost Done! Really Want to Finish!

1. Sunburst baby quilt for teaching - deadline February 15!
2. Dotty Stars needs a label - easy peasy.
3. Twinkle - needs backing sections pieced and then off to the quilter.
4. SewMod row quilt - finish applique borders, then off to the quilter.
5. Green and teal baby quilts for church donation - quilt and bind these myself.
6. Spools quilt with Lorrie - applique borders, then quilt off to quilter.
7. Kaffe colored pencils needs a pieced backing then off to quilter.
8. Christmas pillow tops (2) - quilted and backs added.

Group B - Almost Done but Do I Want to Finish?

1. BOM table runners/toppers (2) from QIJ 2009 - GIVE AWAY!
2. Red hand-pieced sampler from late 1990's - GIVE AWAY!

(This is a short list because if I've lost interest, the project rarely gets to the "almost done" stage)

Group C - Partially Done but I LOVE it and Want to Finish

1. Tree of Life pieced
2. Tree of Life applique
3. Kaffe floral snowball
4. Rear Window
5. Fresh Modern Bee stars
6. Laundry Basket Quilts batik house table runner

Group D - Partially Done but Do I Really Want to Finish?

1. Yellow/orange batik placemats (2)
2. Picnic quilt
3. Sunflower wreath applique/embroidery
4. Grandmother's Window applique (3 of 12 completed)
5. "Merry Christmas" door banner

I'm not sure what to do about these items yet. They might be give-aways to friends or they might be moved to Group C before this UFO busting 12 step program is complete. Right now I'm awaiting further instruction from Pat regarding this category.

Group E - Barely Started and No Interest

1. Batik log cabin diamonds - I actually tossed these out!!!

I took a class with Flavin Glover at the IQF in Chicago in 2010, and finished only 8 of these blocks. The many dozens of remaining pre-cut strips have been neatly organized for almost 3 years now, but I'm never going to pick up this project again, so into the bin they went.


Group F - Partially Done, Don't Love but Keep for Gifts/Donations

1. Twister pinwheel Christmas pillow
2. Baby girl lava flowers quilt
3. Twister pinwheels "Hideaway" baby quilt
4. Dresden color wheel pillow
5. Amy Butler 16" pillow w/coral cording
6. Summer Sampler coordinating dresden pillows (2)
7. Zippy strippy bags (2) - brown w/birds
8. Christmas table toppers (2) Birds & Blooms

This last grouping was my idea - I like having a small stash of things that can be quickly finished for donations or small "thank-yous" to just the right person :) Sort of like a "gift stash" that people sometimes keep on hand.

And if you're thinking, "wow - that girl has got 30 UFOs!" you're right - that is a LOT of UFOs - but I'm already down to 29 because I tossed one out! And Pat has 42! You can see her categorized list here.

Sorry for the text-heavy posting; list making is wordy work! I think Step 2 is going to involve prioritizing, but I feel like mine are already in rank order, so I'll spare you any revisions.

Have you made a formal count of your UFOs? Think you can beat my total? I dare you!

trés excellent

Thing 2 recently made a new cover for her Nook e-reader. It's the newer, smaller version of the Nook, so the original New York themed cover that she made doesn't fit (too bad because it is so cute and well made!) But this one is even better!

C'est magnifique! She altered the Atkinson Reader Wrap pattern to this Nook's smaller size by cutting the pattern pieces 7.75" high instead of 8.5" indicated in the pattern. An easy change that you can make too if you've got a newer Nook and this pattern handy. She also used four pieces of elastic headband to hold the reader in place since the pocket on the original interfered with the touch screen. The coordinating zip pouch to hold the charging cord was made using the Atkinson Ca$h and Carry Pocket Zip pattern.

The fabrics are from my stash; so fun and fitting for this point in her life. She's become a bit of a Francophile thanks to a golden birthday trip to Paris, French language lessons at school, and movies her parents repeatedly watch such as "Midnight in Paris", "A Good Year", "Julie and Julia", "Chocolat"... the list goes on and on.

The fabrics were originally from my friend Vicki's stash but came into my hands via her fabric de-stashing "garage sale". Thanks, Vicki!

Thing 2 has also recently expanded into the blogging world with a fellow Francophile student at eiffelinlouvrewithfrance.blogspot.com. They've got a list of over 100 fun, French topics planned to share! If you stop over, leave her a comment telling her that her maman sent you :) Merci beaucoup mon ami!

I'm just a left-brained girl at heart

This is what my fabric scraps looked like yesterday morning, before I saw this photo on flickr prompting me to make an easy and harmonious improvement to the situation.

And now after a trip to the magical land of Target, they look like this...

I scored the shoe organizer for $7.99, added some 3M Command sticky hooks (oh, how I wish I'd invented those products!), and presto-chango... organization! The bottomless paper bag of scraps is off the closet floor, and I can actually locate a yellow-green piece when blue-green piece just won't do.

* Note the ROYGBIV classification system, further sub-categorized into print ROYGBIV and batik ROYGBIV. I ♥ ROYGBIV organization. The left-brained part of me is very happy today :)

organization - baby steps

I'm a big fan of organization. I love a tidy closet where all the towels are uniformly folded (with the folded edge to the outside, thank you very much) and arranged by color. But the actual act of organizing? Uh... I think I have a dentist appointment that day.


Here's a small section of my sewing room closet. Looks pretty organized, huh? I mean thread sorted by color - you can't get more organized than that, right? What do you say we step back and take a big-picture look at the entire closet?


Good grief, what a nightmare! So it's mostly tidy, but definitely not organized. Who could find anything in there?? And that's just the closet!

One of the main reasons for this state of affairs is that it's just too darn overwhelming to tackle all at once. So I'm going to take some baby steps here.

You know how all the "organization experts" tell you to take 15-30 minutes and organize ONE thing? Yep, did that today on this one bin - my bright stash of batiks (as opposed to the earth-tone stash of batiks which will be organized on another 15-30 minute jaunt - stay focused here, Shelley!)

Put on some music, plopped myself on the floor, and got busy folding and sorting. And look what happened! (Ignore the canine lack of enthusiasm...)

Most of these are fat quarter and half-yard cuts. The pile in the back right is yardage, but generally I don't purchase yardage for stash - only for backings and specific projects.

I'd love to show you a photo of these lovely organized stacks on the shelf, but I think I'll wait and do a big reveal at the end of "Project Organize" when ALL the bins have been sorted. For now they are safely tucked back (but uniformly folded and sorted!) in the bin.

I've got to do some research on shelf dividers. Any ideas on how to keep the stacks from falling over onto each other??