Coffee cup holder

As some of you know I've started a new job at a well known coffee shop. Since I will be drinking there even more regularly I thought it would be a good idea to have a reuseable coffee cup holder.

 To make it I used one of the disposable cupholders as a pattern and cut fabric and wadding out around it leaving a good seam allowance. The fabric I used is the yummy Twitterpated fabric. I may have to order another pack as I've sewn through mine in no time!

On the close-up picture you might be able to see that I added some quilting vertical rows to hold the shape well. I decorated it with Fun Flowers die cuts from the same pack of fabrics. The Big Shot is just great if you are cutting out fabric as you get detailed shapes that would take me hours to cut out by hand.

Today I am running my first 5km race. I hope it goes well as I've never done anything like that before....

Garden Party 40th

Today is one of my best friend's birthdays. Jo is celebrating her 40th in style hosting a fabulous garden party for all her family and friends.

I made this card for her using lots of products from the Summer Mini catalogue and a few forgotten products that I thought needed an airing!

The edging was stamped from the set Bordering on Romance, which comes from the same suite as the papers, Twitterpated. I used markers to colour in the flowers on the Crumb Cake base: Blushing Bride and Baja Breeze picked out the colouring from the papers.

The birthday greeting comes from the Hostess set, Happiest Birthday Wishes. My absolute favourite of all time Hostess Set. I will cry when this set goes!!

It was long overdue to use these lovely treat cups. It's so easy using the 1 3/4" circle punch to cut a hole where the cup is going to go, fill the cup and then stick it down using the self-adhesive strip. To get the treats out without wrecking the card I scored the Crumb Cake base using my Cutter Kit.

I hope Jo has a wonderful birthday and party and I'm so happy we can be there to help her celebrate!

Cuuuuute

A while back I went to my lovely friend Amy's baby shower. It was a HUGE party with over 30 guests and although I wasn't able to stay long I had a great time.

I was thrilled to receive this thank you card made by Amy for the candle I gave her to focus on during the early stages of labour. It's got some Big Shot embossing and the cute baby comes from the set All in the Family. The sentiment is from Teeny Tiny Wishes and was punched out with the Word Window punch.

Here is the candle I made as a gift:

It's a plain church candle and I've stamped baby foot prints and a sentiment from the baby set in the Summer Mini 2012 onto white tissue paper. The tissue paper was then attached to the candle using heat from my heat gun. Simple!

To finish I wrapped it in cellophane and added some bows and a label (that's hard to see in this photo). The label was made from parchment paper that was punched and embossed with white onto Baja Breeze card.

Apologies for the rubbish photo! I forgot all about taking a photo until I was just about to dash from the scrapbooking day I was demonstrating at to the party!! I feel glad to have taken a photo at all.

Sewing Machine overload

The past week or so has given my sewing machine such a workout it doesn't know what's hit it! I've got the bug it seems, so old clothes have been repaired and I've been rummaging through sale rails to find bargain t-shirts to cut up.

Here is my first one to show you. It was made with a XXL mens t-shirt so that I had fabric spare to gather.

 Here is a back view. My DH was such a darling and said that it looked like I'd put my top on back to front when I showed him but I am sure that's just his mad humour. At least I hope it is!

 This second one was an XXL long-sleeved t-shirt which I altered to make it 3/4 length fitted sleeves. Not the most flattering photo of me but I was attempting to cook dinner whilst I took this photos so speed was of the essence!

 The excess length that was cut off the body part was sewn on as pleating down the front. I couldn't resist using some Baja Breeze satin pleated ribbon too!

This dream-like photo gives you a bit more of a close up. I am not sure what happened with the lighting there but hey-ho!

Circle flowers

Last night was scrapbook class night! We had a good laugh, as usual, and this was the page that the ladies we using as inspiration. As is often the case with my projects lately it was inspired by a very similar page by Jenni Pauli.

I used Sahara Sand and Baja Blue but I think Jenni used Pool Party instead. It was a simple page to put together and making the flowers was great fun. Each flower petal is made by a circle that has had two sides folded in. These are then arranged in a circle to make one single bloom. I used different brads for the centres: silver, glimmer and antique!

The swirly stamp in Creative Elements created a nice elegant background that I finished with tonnes of pearls and rhinestones.

Yet another page made for our wedding album!

Tote-ally loving it

Recently we increased our "flock" of one chicken with the addition of 5 new chickettes. Teenage chickens if you will.

To celebrate I thought it would be good to make a bag with this lovely fabric from Stampin' Up!

 I've been using it as a handbag this past week and it's surprisingly roomie. It's made from a fat quarter folded in half.

Here is a close up of the pocket:

 You can see I sewed a length of Victoriana lace and added some teeny little buttons in Blushing Bride.

Since I lined it I'll show you that too!

I made this in less than an hour and am really pleased with the result. I hope you'll give the fabric a go soon!

Sew loving it

EDIT: Apologies for the lack of post yesterday. Blogger must have had a fit or I am losing my mind. Maybe a bit of both. Don't despair I have many more posts scheduled for this week!

Hooray hooray another sewn project.

Although I am not a good seamstress I do like to have a go and these Twitterpated fabrics have really caught my eye!! They are so cute when they are together I can't help myself.

I bought the tote bag plain and sewed HEMMED strips across it. Yes, I even hemmed the fabric. Don't get too excited at how I've changed because I didn't hem the embellishments!!!

Here is a close up of the embellishments:

These took no time with the Big Shot to cut out. Then it was just a case of snipping some Marina Mist, Pear Pizzazz and Blushing Bride ribbons, picking out some buttons and adding a key embellishment. I know the keys are not available at the moment but it looked so cute laid out there that I had to sew it on!

Really simple and took maybe an hour. A lot of that time was spend unpinning the bits I had pinned in error!

This would make a lovely gift for a friend, sister or cousin!