Scissor Organizer

What I have done this week is absolutely NOT limited to this small project, but you'll have to wait for next week to see the full extent of my busy-ness from the past 2 weeks. In the midst of the big projects, I couldn't shake the need to make this scissor pocket organizer I saw on One Pretty Thing. I whipped this one up without reading the tutorial on Expect Moore, which I should have read because I like hers much better. Mine was probably a little easier, but hers is more compact and cuter. Oh, well. It still holds scissors, and anything else I care to slide down into the pockets.
This is actually sort of a project for the men in my life. To start with, the scissors are the first thing my ornery 18 month old son goes for when he sees Mom's sewing table unmanned. Now they're high on the wall--how handy! And secondly, dear husband doesn't know where any scissors in our house are, ever. Now I can say, "Upstairs in the sewing room, hanging on the wall above the drawers on the desk--and DON'T use the red ones!!!" :)

So, here's what I did:

1. I used a scrap off a denim skirt that I shortened for a friend for the back, and 2 Salvation Army cloth napkins for the pockets. They were something like 25 cents each. Might have been 10 cents each, but for the sake of overestimating and still being proud of myself, I'll say 50 cents total. I folded the napkins in half and ironed them flat, then stitched the long sides closed along the edge.

2. I centered the napkins onto the denim, pinned, and stitched around the sides and bottoms. Then I divided the napkins into equal sections--4 on top, 5 on bottom--and sewed a straight line to form individual pockets.

3. I folded over about 1.5" on top and stitched it down. If I want, I can run a dowel rod thru here. However, even a dozen pair of scissors aren't too heavy so I didn't mess with finding a rod this time.

4. Because I was skipping the rod option, I grabbed a ribbon scrap, cut it into 3 equal lengths, folded it over like an awareness ribbon, then pinned and stitched it to the top edge of the organizer. Make sure all your loops are of the same length, or it will be tough to hang it evenly.

In order to keep the option for a rod open, I didn't sew it onto the tube. I put my stitches even with hem.

Hang it, load it, and you're done! I didn't even bother finishing the edges. I mean, it's denim. Who cares?? :P And I tacked down the bottom corners with thumb tacks, just because.
This is an excellent, excellent beginner project, and a very good way to solve an organization problem with very little monetary and time investments. This whole thing might have taken 30-45 minutes, and wasn't more than 50 cents! I didn't have to finish any edges or do any real cutting, of course, but if you go thru your scraps, you might find that you don't, either! :D

And here's a bonus pic, because it's the first belly picture of me during this pregnancy. This was at 10:30 pm, so please forgive the hair and makeup and PJ situation. 26 weeks. And yes, there's only one in there.

The Bib You Never Knew You Already Had!

Because I am terrible at getting stains out of clothing, I have finally given into the fact that bibs are not just for drool and have taken up the challenge of keeping one on my son while he eats. Wish me luck with that! But just after I strapped one on him for breakfast, I noticed that our bib collection is severely limited. So, off to work I went!

I cannot stress enough that there are 1000 ways to construct a bib, 1000 different materials you can use, and lots of ways to close it. Here I'll share how I made a completely free, lined/reversible, embellished baby bib using only items that I had at home already, which cost me little or nothing in the first place. To make 2 bibs took about an hour, give or take a wet diaper, a couple of boo-boo kisses, and a "No, no! We don't push!" or two. This is the kind of project that leads me to believe that I'd have made a good homemaker during the Great Depression, when you had to make do with what you had! :D

TIP: If you're reading this with the intention of making your own, first go take a look in your crafting stash and linen closet. Who knows what adorable, free thing you can put together!

To make the bib, I used an old bath towel and a flannel pillowcase. You'll need one bib-shaped piece of each (while you're cutting, you might as well make 2 pieces of each fabric and make 2 bibs--just a thought). One pillowcase and one regular bath towel will make about 4 bibs, in case you were wondering.

First, I traced the bib that I had on hand which fit the baby in question, and extended the length a bit. I used only half the pattern and folded the fabric into 2 layers to help with symmetry. To do this, fold your fabric in half the width of the finished piece and lay the pattern edge that would be the middle of the bib along the fold of your fabric (the zig-zag edge of the pattern in the pic, if you can see it). Cutting out two layers at once, rather than individually, will help both sides of the bib match.

You'll have identically shaped pieces of each fabric (sorry--this pic's a little wonky, but they did match!).

With right sides facing, line up all the edges and pin the pieces together.

Sew around the edges. The trick for a bib that doesn't bunch up around the seams when it's finished is making sure that your pieces are lined up flat together, and that starts at this step. Sew within 1/4 inch of the edge, leaving a few inches at the bottom of the bib open so that you can turn it.

Trim off the excess material around your stitches. Make sure all your edges of each piece are within your stitches.

Turn right side out and press if you're not too lazy (I am). Straighten out your edges so that it all lays nice and flat together, and pin around all the edges (this is important; don't topstitch without pinning it all down first).

Topstitch around all the edges of the bib. Try to stay about 1/4 inch away from the edge all the way around.

Be sure that you turn your open area under and catch all folds of material in your stitch. You don't want any raw edges sticking out.

Look what I found! In this collection: 2 patches sent to me from my lovely online buddy ConnieJ6; velcro pieces that were attached to a ribbon that wrapped up a baby blanket that was a gift; plastic snaps from a cotton bag that a store-bought sheet came in; and the metal snaps from a onesie that I turned into shirt for Little Miss. All completely functional, all completely (well, basically, to me) free! Hmm, decisions, decisions...

For the closures on my 2 bibs, I went with the snap from the sheet bag and the velcro, which I trimmed down a little. And here's where I got REALLY lazy. I hot-glued them all into place!! :D

And while I had the hot glue gun out, I attached the patches to the "front" of the bibs. I mean, you can't iron patches onto terrycloth, right?? That's what I told myself as I took the easy way out. :) I use the towel side as the front of the bib because that's the side that'll soak up more spills, but, as Little Miss pointed out when she had to match her brother at lunch, you can use the other side, too.

I've never asked this before (mainly because I don't really believe anybody reads what I write!!), but if you make a project based off of something you saw in my blog, I'd be so tickled to see it. There are just SO MANY different ways you can get creative with this particular project, I'd love to see what happens when you shop at home first!

Leave me a link! It'll make my day.

T-shirt Recon: Ruffly Gathered Pillow

Today, I saw the inside of my sewing room for the first time in weeks. Feeling nauseous will somehow sap every ounce of energy right out of a body, and I just haven't had the gumption for much of anything. In fact, if you see my husband, thank him for feeding our family lately because I've barely even been cooking--let alone sewing! But the projects are piling up, and I so hate telling someone I can do something, and then NOT doing it. So, this morning I chose to work on Connie's pillow. Connie J6 is my internet buddy who sends me fun stuff like fabric and notions, and I make things for her in return.

Today, it was this...

I cut a rectangle out of the front of the shirt. I used all the logo that I could, but the collar got in the way of the top arrow.

Then I cut out the largest rectangle that I could from the back of the shirt:

I laid the logo rectangle onto what might have been a body pillow case at one time--this fabric remnant was free in a batch of stuff that was given to me. You'll need 2 of these. This is the size of your pillow. Since t-shirt fabric is stretchy, you'll want a non-stretchy material so that your pillow will keep its form.

Pin and baste stitch the logo rectangle to one of the white squares. You could use any kind of fusing to put it together, but I didn't have any of that on hand and it costs money, which I hate to spend! So I sewed it together:

Run gathering stitches evenly across the large rectangle. Gather it up and pin it to fit the second white rectangle:

Baste stitch the edges in place:

I ran 3 lines of stitches down this piece once the gathers were all smoothed out. This will keep it in place when you add the ruffles. If you didn't make evenly spaced gathering stitches, don't worry! It doesn't really matter. Here's where you sew a straight line anywhere you want a ruffle, and remove those gathering stitches if you need to (if you're covering them with a ruffle, why bother?). Cut ruffle strips, one to two inches wide, out of the sleeve of the shirt:

Sew a gathering stitch down the middle of all three: Gather them up to fit your pillow. Pin in place, then sew in place. It doesn't have to be perfect, since it's such a scrunchy look.
A tip I found handy: It'll look nicer to take your gathering stitches out of your ruffle strips. To make this easier, try putting the gathering stitch just a smidgen to one side of the center of the strip. That way, you can sew down the middle of the strip when you attach it to the pillow without sewing over the gathering stitch, which will make that stitch harder to remove.

Pin the rectangles together, right sides facing, making sure all pink edges are outside of the hem:

Sew three sides of the pillow, leaving 4 or 5 inches on one side open for turning. Make sure you're sewing inside all the previous construction stitches:

Clip corners and trim edges: Turn outside-in and stuff with polyfill, or your pillow stuffing of choice. You could even use fabric scraps, if you save them (as I do, but since this project is for someone else I went the more professional route and used polyfill): I was very tempted to use my sewing machine to close the opening, but I knew that hand-stitching it would look a lot better. So, again, because this is for someone else, I took the time and did a better job (that's how I approach all my sewing, in case you were wondering!): Make sure you carefully stuff it so that it's not lumpy and floppy.

I'm very happy with how this turned out! I sure hope ConnieJ6 is, too.

TOTAL COST: one old T-shirt and some fabric scraps. So, in most cases, FREE!

Pink Sweater Top Recon Part I: Ruffles

I found a beautiful, soft, pink sweater top at the SA and I've been trying to figure out how I'm going to revamp it. It's a Sag Harbor brand petite medium acrylic knit top, very nice. I know I want ruffles, and I'm thinking about a belt. As I was cutting and sewing, it occurred to me that there are many things that I could do, and many stopping points along the way if I didn't want to do any more. For instance, I could put ruffles on the collar and call it done. That would be fine. And that's what I did today.

However, I'll also probably put a belt on it, some buttons, and maybe make a brooch to go with it. Those will be subsequent Parts. Today, here is Part I: Ruffling the neckline.

1. Lay shirt flat. Cut a straight line up the middle for the new opening.

2. Cut off the collar. Even up any wavy parts, so that it is smooth.

3. VERY CAREFULLY, turn the new raw edge over and hem it. I did the entire front opening and the whole neckline. I'm not sure that this part is actually required, but I wanted a more professional look. Make sure NOT to stretch it AT ALL. Since it's a stretchy material, it will turn out wavy if it stretches as it goes thru the machine.

4. Trim up the pieces that you cut off of the collar. These will be the ruffles.

5. Sew a running stitch down the middle of each part, using very loose tension and long stitches. Pulling the bobbin thread, gather the piece up to the desired length and pin it in place on the collar. I didn't have enough ruffles to cover the whole collar, so I did the two front parts, leaving the back bare.

6. Sew the ruffles to the collar. Remember, don't stretch it!

7. Round off the edges of the ruffles and trim your threads. There ya go! How pretty!

Because Sometimes It Doesn't Work Out

Here's to mistakes!

*insert glass clinks and "Cheers" here*

I had two t-shirts that I bought for $5 each at JC Penny's a year or two ago, and altho they were my size, my style, and colors I like, I almost never wore them. Well, obviously I wore the purple one enough to get a bleach spot on the collar, but otherwise they were in perfect, barely-worn condition. I decided to get a little bit of toddler-dress practice in and try doing a shrink-down. This post is for all of the people who ever had the idea that I don't end up with nothing but a pile of scrap fabric sometimes. There probably aren't any people who think that, but let's make sure it stays that way. :D Even tho Little Miss loves this dress, I have still dubbed it a disaster. But it was worth the practice! And the liberated hanger in my closet.