Naaien & Stikken

Ken je het BBC programma The Great British Sewing Bee (BBC1, dinsdagavond, 21.00u)?
Zo nee, echt een keer kijken! Zo ja, er is nu ook een boek van!
En ter introductie van de Nederlandstalige versie "Naaien & Stikken" van uitgeverij Tirion, mocht ik een aantal weken geleden een kookschort komen maken. Samen met nog een aantal andere bloggers werden we ontvangen bij Textielstad in Tilburg. Hier lagen de stoffen al voorgeknipt klaar, dus we konden gelijk aan de slag.

Met dit schort als resultaat, geweldig toch?

 

En het verdere boek is ook echt helemaal leuk! Vol met praktische tips over stoffen, materialen, naaigereedschappen en technieken. En natuurlijk vol met leuke tijdloze patronen, van jurkjes, tassen tot tops en kussens. Ik ga zeker het jurkje van de kaft maken voor mijzelf deze zomer.

Intussen al een beetje nieuwschierig geworden, kijk hier voor een inkijkexemplaar.

Het boek hebben? Het boek is vanaf nu te koop in onze webshop.

Bedankt juffen!

Elk jaar voor de zomervakantie, maak ik een klein cadeautje om de juffen te bedanken. Het liefst in de stijl van het thema van de klas waarin de jongens zitten. Zo maakte ik al vlaggetjes met vlinders, vlaggetjes en mandjes van kikkerstof en dit jaar waren de olifanten en pinguins aan de beurt. Geen vlaggetjes deze keer, maar etuis. Ik gebruikte deze tutorial, natuurlijk gevonden via Pinterest, met een geweldige manier om een rits in te zetten (echt een aanrader!).

Infinity Scarf

Sommige stoffen passen zo goed bij elkaar, daar moet gewoon wat van gemaakt worden!
Zoals de Petit Pan stoffen, die onderling bijna allemaal met elkaar te combineren zijn.
En aangezien ik gek ben op sjaals (ik zou ze niet eens samen op de foto durven zetten, zo veel heb ik er), maakte ik er een "oneindige sjaal" van. Met kleine accentjes, zoals een bijpassend kantje en fluorroze stiksels. De tutorial voor de sjaal vind je hier. Laat de herfst maar komen!

Vlaggetjes

Telkens als ik stoffen vlaggetjes maak denk ik, "dit is de laatste keer", want ik vind het zo'n prutswerk. Maar als ze dan klaar zijn, dan zijn ze ook weer zo leuk, dat ik vrolijk doorga met vlaggetjes maken. Deze keer maakte ik ze van gecoat katoen voor in de tuin (gestikt aan een waslijn, dus ze kunnen lekker buiten blijven hangen).


En ik maakte voor in huis ook nog een vlaggenlijn van Petit Pan stofjes, met als extraatje een kantje ertussen genaaid.

In The Garden

With the weather getting better, it was time to clean the sandbox of the boys. They really like playing in it but they couldn't because the sand was dirty and the box needed a new cover. So, we bought new sand and I made a new cover for it. Very easy to make with laminated tablecloth and a few pieces of sewing elastic. Ready for a new summer!

Tutorial: How to make / sew a marble bag

I promised this already a long, long time ago and now on special request here it finally is: the marble bag tutorial!

If there is anything unclear, please leave a message and I will try to clarify it.

A marble bag is a very easy thing to make and it is a great gift for your kids to give to their friends at school or at a party and they can also be used to put in other stuff (jewelry, little cars, cards etc.)…

What do you need (Materials):
- 2 pieces of coordinating or contrasting cotton (not too thin) fabric, 17x23 cm (± 6,7x9,1 inch);
- 50 cm (20 inch) cord (3-4mm thick);
- coordinating thread.
If you want a template to trace your fabric with (very easy if you make more than one bag), you will need a cardboard piece of 17x23cm.

Tools:
- Pinking shears;
- Ruler;
- Pen / Fabric marker / Fabric chalk;
- Sewing machine;
- Safety pin.

*Note* Wash and iron fabrics before cutting. Use 1 cm (½ inch) seam allowance throughout unless otherwise stated. Seam allowance is included in pattern pieces.

1. Measure and cut your fabrics with the pinking shears. If you like to make more marble bags, you can use the cardboard template to trace your fabrics.


2. Pin the two fabric pieces with the right (printed) side together. Mark a 5 cm distance below the top of the 23cm long side of the fabric.


3. Start sewing 5 cm (2 inch) below the top to leave a space for the cord later on.


4. Sew around the 3 edges, leaving the 5cm space open, sew the other side till the top and leave the upper side open.


5. Fold the fabric (on the 5 cm/2 inch open side) to the inside (along the seam) and topstitch 5 cm on both sides.


6. Turn the bag right side out.




7. Fold the fabric on the top side to make a tunnel for the cord (3 cm/1,2 inch), stitch around 2 cm/0,8 inch from the top.




8. Pull the cord trough the tunnel and make a knob on both ends (you can use a safety pin to attach the cord to and pull it easily through the tunnel).


9. If you like to fasten the cord, you can make a few stitches in the seam.


10. Finished! Attach a nice label to the bags and they are ready to give away!

Brrrr....

I had a stomach flu last week, so not much blogging (or anything else) around here.
Before that, we celebrated the 3rd birthday of Karel, who was very happy with his vintage Tonka fire truck.

Of course there was a homemade birthdaycake.

And to celebrate his birthday with his friends on the child daycare centre, I made these keychain droplets (all the groups at the centre have names like clouds, stars, suns and his group is called the droplets).

Colourful Garden

We really like sitting in the garden until late under the shed in the back of our garden. To decorate the shed I made (much too much) cushions from all kinds of fabric remnants and crocheted flowers.

Together with a fabric garland and some laterns it looks really cosy and summery, also when the weather is not good.

New Old Skirt

I had this plain light blue skirt in my closet for a while and I thought it would be nice if I dressed it up a little bit. So I drew some flowers, cutted them out of double sided vliesofix, ironed them on one of my favourite fabrics, cutted these out as well, ironed the flowers onto my skirt and used a small zig-zag stich (stitch length of just above zero) to attach the flowers nicely to my skirt. Easy, right? I have uploaded the flower templates (in Dutch and in English) onto my website if you are interested in making your own flower appliques too.

Easy bag for school

I bought a simple green bag for Teun at the army dump store (only 7,50 euros!). I took of the straps and sewed on a nice car fabric. Sewed on the straps again and added a key chain with one of the boys cars. Such an easy project to make an original school bag (which I think are hard to find for little boys).

Recycling

I see so many great recycling ideas on other blogs, like here and here and here, that I thought it would be nice to show you one of mine. It is a paper garland, made from a map, a magazine and some origami papers, sewn together with the sewing machine. I found the idea browsing the internet (sorry, I cannot remember where).

Dress (for me!)

I was always a bit afraid of making clothes..... You know, with the blind zippers and lots of fabric pieces and stuff.
Last year, I already made a few skirts and I must say, when you start making these, you want to make more and more, especially withe the nice weather coming up.
And you want to make other things for yourself, like this dress. It is from an Amy Butler pattern. No zippers, just buttons. And quite easy to make. But I am still not sure if I like the dress so much and I do not know if it is the pattern or the fabric. Anyone a suggestion for another good pattern for a dress?

Easter Eggs

Not a lot of time for crafting this week. Teun had a very bad ear infection since last weekend and that kept us kind of busy, especially during the nights. Pfew! Yesterday, he started taking antibiotics and luckily he feels a lot better now....
In between, I made some easter eggs for my friends, who we will visit coming sunday for an easter brunch and for my mom, who was so sweet to come and take care of Teun, so that I had some time to work.
I found the tutorial here, they are very easy to make, so perfect as a last minute gift. The egg holders are from the HEMA by the way. I love them (I love the HEMA too!).
Have a sunny easter!

Ready for Carnaval!

Here are the costumes that we (my sister and me) made for the boys for the annual Carnaval party in the South of Holland. My sister made the lion costume for Karel and I made the grey wolf costume for Teun. They celebrate carnaval on school, child day care centre and of course this weekend in our city Oeteldonk (the name for 's-Hertogenbosch during Carnaval).

What to make with all those fabrics (2)

I received great pictures from some of my creative customers and I thought it would be nice to share them with you. I am always very pleased to see what other people are making with "my" fabrics.
This lamp was made by Anne for her sons bedroom. What a great idea, I am sure that my boys would love this too!


These pictures were sent to me by Anneke. She made a bag to store French bread in for her son and daugther in law as a christmas present.


The picture of this cute horse was sent to me by Karin. The horse was made by her creative mum, An, for her newborn daughter Hannah.

And last but certainly not least, a very cool apron, made by Ingrid. I love the way how she combined all the fabrics. Very colourful!

Good guess.... Maybe it was a bit too difficult? I am making little cushions. They are for the chairs where our boys sit on while they play (haha, so, they are not used very much). But they look nice anyway, this is how they will look like when they are finished (I still have to make the backsides).

Since there were no good answers, I still decided to give away the fabrics to someone who left a comment and I drew a winner: Marieke from MiekKs, you are the lucky one!

Guess....

What I am making...
If you leave a comment with the right answer (or send me an e-mail), you can win the fabrics that I used for this project (the one with the stars and the one with the zoo animals, 1 Fat Quarter of each).
If there is more than 1 right answer, I will draw a winner.
This "contest" will end on January, 21th.

To protect our new table

During the christmas holiday, we bought a new table for the living room.
The previous one didn't last very long (I think for about a year), because of falling glasses of lemonade, playing with cars on it and other unidentified falling items (read: toys).
To be sure that this table will last a bit longer, I made some coasters to put our cups on.
I received the fabrics via a 5x5inch (12x12cm) fabric swap via Swap-bot. I had them already for a while, thinking about what to do with them. They turned out to be perfect for this project.

Christmas Decoration Idea (4)

Feeling a lot better after a good night sleep, time for a new decoration idea.
For today an idea to decorate yourself with: a felt flower brooch. You can also make this flower with cotton fabrics, but I think a felt one is more wintery in a way.
Sorry for the bad pictures, it is quite difficult to make good pictures with the dark weather.

You need for the brooch:
Felt
Flower template (you can find it here)
Scissors
Needle
Coordinating thread
Brooch pin

What to do:
First print out the template and cut out the 3 largest flowers.
Trace the largest flower 3 times on your felt, the medium and the small ones both 2 times.

Cut out all the flowers.
Start your flower with laying a large flower flat. Fold another large flower double and place it on the flat one, sew these together.

Now, fold the third large flower 2 times double and place it on the others, sew them together.

Continue with the medium flowers in the same way and end with the smallest (while you are busy with the flower, you will see what is the best way to place your leafs).

When your flower is done, you can now attach it to the brooch pin.

You can also sew the flower on a piece of ribbon to make a napkin holder from it.