A mess of playing musical shelves

It all started about a week ago, but let me give a bit of back round first. For the last 5+ years I have been storing my fabric stash on some wire clip together shelves from target, which have held up well. They are now starting to bow and once in a while un-clip them selves from each other because of the weight of the books and fabric.

Before: wire clip together shelves

So I have been on the hunt for a sturdier shelf to use and last Tuesday I thought I had found one. Enter the white 6ft shelf from the thrift store. It was perfect until I had taken all my fabric out of the old ones and was ready to put it all back in the new white shelf. It had less space then those cheap clip together shelves!

I am now in a bit of a panic, this was just supposed to be a quick one day reorganization job and now its not. There is no way I'm putting all that fabric back on those clip together shelves that were starting to bow. So now I'm stuck. By the way I'm in the middle of sewing some curtains for a client, but with fabric taking up any and every flat surface, umm I can't really sew.

I call my husband and tell him all about how this new shelf is not going to work and I need something different now. We decide to build some from a really cool blog called Knock off wood
but then we discover while we are at Home Depot (2 days later) that it would be cheaper and less time consuming to just drive down town to Ikea and get some of their Expedit shelving units. So we drive 45 minutes down to Ikea at 8:15 at night with 3 tired kids. What were we thinking?

We get the shelves and get out of there at about 10:15pm to drive 45 minutes back to our house. We are never going with 3 kids at that time of night again. We were crazy. So anyways, I now have better shelves. I just had to play musical shelf to get there. My sewing room is getting organized again and I think I might get to sew tomorrow.

I should have taken pictures of the mess but didn't. But when I'm all done I will post before and afters.

Pillow cases with french seams!

I whipped these up from cutting them out to finished in about 2 hours flat! They are so easy; I'm wondering why I haven't made more before this?

I was at Walmart the other day and my son spotted this fun turtle fabric, he asked me right away if I could make him a blanket out of it. I said how about a pillow case instead, he said "Yeah, mom that's what I want, its really cool fabric."
I made 2 so that both my boys could have one, no fighting over it that way. I also made them with french seams. An extra step yes, but I didn't have to retread my serger that way. I think retreading the serger would have taken me longer, plus I wanted to try it with the french seams and I have to say I will be using them the next time I make a pillow case.

For a trip

As I mentioned in the last post my sister got married recently. We had to travel to Utah for her wedding (a 24 hour drive for us here in Texas). I thought it would be a good idea to make up a few smaller things to bring with us.

This is a coloring station for my 5 yr old. He really like the crayola color wonder sets, but the markers seem to get all over the house so I made this to hold everything together.

This is the front, I used about 2 1/2 fat quarters to make the whole thing and some scraps of thick sturdy interfacing. I love the yellow button on the front.
Here is the inside. The markers are in the pocket on the left and then the coloring book on the right. I thought about putting something above the marker pocket but opted not too.
Here you can see the orange buttons that hold the flap down so the markers don't fall out as it is being carried around.
The pocket that holds the coloring book in place.
And a view of the markers in there place.

My sister asked me to make four bow ties for her wedding. They are for the four little nephews that would be there. This is one of them in progress, I didn't actually finish them until I was in Utah.
The last time we went to visit family we had to put every ones clothes in suitcases. Which would be fine if we didn't have to bring one for each person, and try and fit it all in the car. This time I made the kids small/medium sized duffel bags with a drawstring top. They fit better in the car, because they can be put in any space.
The first one is my 2 yr old's bag. I let each of my kids pick out the fabric they wanted for there bag. He is in to fish lately so this is the fabric he picked. My 5 yr old picked the Thomas the train fabric below. The bottoms of the bags are a jean circle so there is a more weighty fabric to lend more support.
These were easy and fun to make and I'm sure they will be used on many trips to come.

Fabric stash

Over at Sew Mama Sew they are asking about everyone's stash so here is a bit about mine.

What do you usually sew? Lately it has been quilts and small crafts but I like to sew all kinds of things, I have a few shirt patterns and fabric calling my name.

When you shop for fabric, what size cuts do you usually buy? (i.e. If you see something beautiful, but you don't have a use for it right away, how much do you buy?)

Every time I am at a store that sells fabric I check the remnants. Sometimes there are some really great prints in there. If I see a print I can't live without then I will usually get at least a yard but sometimes more.

Do you buy on impulse or do you go out looking for something you need?

I usually go looking for something I need. Unless I'm in a super store with a fabric section(i.e. Wal-mart) then I will be more tempted, but I try to keep it under control.

Are you a pre-washer? If you are, do you wash your fabric before you need it, or only when you're ready to use it?

I very rarely pre-wash, I don't like to iron much and I don't like having to wait for it to be done so I can start using it.

Do you iron it? If it needs it, but if I can get away without doing it then I don't.
How do you sort it? (color, print size, collection, etc.)

Color mostly, I also have stacks of novelty prints and stacks that are for a particular project. I also sort by fabric type: cottons, flannel, fleece, etc. I would say only about half my stash is really sorted, the rest are all mixed up.

Do you have any special folding techniques? Nope, I just fold it so it's about the same size as the rest and stack it.
How do you store you fabric? I store some of it on open shelves but I don't have enough shelves so the rest is in totes, boxes, and a few baskets. The shelves are organized the totes... not so much.

What tips do you have for building up a well-rounded stash?

Umm, look for colors you don't have very much of, and always check the remnants.

When do you say enough is enough? I think I'm getting to that point, I'm starting to run out of space for new fabric so I better start using it up.
What are some of your favorite stash-busting projects? I'm thinking a crap quilt would be good, but I'm up for any other ideas.

Do you have a current favorite print in your stash? Let's see it!

So many, I really like Farmers Market prints right now but I wish I had more of them.

What's your definition of the perfect stash? I would say one where you can just go pull something off the shelf and be able to make what you want with it, without having to go to the store...but then again I love going to the fabric store.

Welcome to my first give-away!

It's my first give-away! I just created this blog a few months ago and I'm excited to have you all visit me over here! So on to the give-away. I'm giving away a set of 4 napkins (about 15" square) that would be great for late summer or fall and some fabric to help you get started on your projects for spring!


The napkins are double sided so you can use either side. I love these!
Here is a close up of the fabric. There is half a yard of the pink one and the yellow one is a strip that is about 8 1/2" by 43/44."
Just leave me a note and tell me a tradition you share with your family during the Holidays. I'll pick the winner tomorrow night after 6pm. So you had until 6:00pm (Central time) tomorrow night!
I almost forgot I will only be shipping in the US.

Christmas cheer anyone?

I made these for my churches women's group. They are some square table cloths and a quilted table runner. I have to give some credit to Kathy from Pink Chalk Studio

for the basic table runner idea I saw hers and just had to try it out. Kathy's was featured on the cover of Quilting Arts, she did a post all about it.

Anyways, this was so fun to make and I am in love with it so now I will have to make one of my own. If I only had the time, it might have to wait until next year... we'll see.
I love this snow flake that I designed, but I didn't like appliqueing it on. It took so long!
What are you making for Christmas?

Quilt Festival

Quilt Festival was great! There were so many inspiring things that I forgot to take pictures until the very end. My friend Jena and I went together and we got there just as it was opening. They had 20 isles of booths with about 12-16 booths per isle on each side I think. Then they had a whole other section that was just quilts on display, We didn't get to look at all of those we never would have gotten out of there.

This is the fabric I got there. A charm pack of Moda's Woodland bloom line by Lila Tueller, a fat quarter butterfly print (I can't remember the line), ginger blossom by Sandi Henderson for Michael Miller, and the red and pink apples from Farmers Market. I was the most excited for the apple print because I have been wanting it for awhile but all the places I have seen it online have been out of stock on this color. So when I spotted it I had to get some right away.
These are pictures of some giant size ric rac that I saw; and if I can dream up some project to use them in I will be ordering some. If you have any ideas let me know.

This is me at the serendipity booth where I got my fabric.
I put this picture in here for fun. Its a huge shirt to advertise a steamer iron I think. I just saw it and thought I would never want to make that or iron it.