Quilt Market

Have you been waiting on pins and needles to see pictures of Quilt Market?  Because, let me tell you, it was fabulous.  So much eye candy!  So many designers to meet!

I'm not gonna lie, though.  I'm kind of lazy, and don't particularly feel like posting tons of pictures both here and on my Facebook page.  Cause, you know, it's kind of a lot of work, and my 4 boys keep me hopping as is.  So go on over and look at my Quilt Market photo album, will you?  And while you're there, might you consider become a fan (pretty, pretty please!)?  Because I'm still adding more pictures, and you don't want to miss those.  And I update my FB page a lot more often than my blog.  Since I almost never post on my blog, that's got to be an improvement, right?  Right?

Since I abhor posts without pictures, here's just a little taste of what I saw ordered last weekend:
Heirloom by Joel Dewberry for Free Spirit Fabrics


Prince Charming by Tula Pink for Free Spirit Fabrics


Secret Garden by Sandi Henderson for Michael Miller Fabrics



Circa 1934 by Cosmo Cricket for Moda Fabrics


Plus, I of course ordered a bunch of precuts (charm packs, FQ bundles, jelly rolls) from these and other lines.  Not to mention notions and patterns.  Oh, the patterns!  Cuteness, coming your way.  Get ready to bust out the old sewing machine, I tell you.

So there you have it.  Head on over and check it out!

All photos in this post were taken at International Quilt Market, Salt Lake City, May 2010.  Pictures are the property of Lily Bella Fabrics and are not to be used without written permission.

Buttercup Bag

Wow, it's been a long, ling time since I've blogged!  Whoops, sorry about that.  :)  Things have been crazy busy for months, so I've found that blogging gets left behind.

Did you have a nice Mother's Day?  I did!  We introduced our boys to the Three Amigos last night.  While they watched (look up here, look up here!), I planned a project that I've had my eyes on for nearly a year: the Buttercup Bag from Mady by Rae!  I love the way it turned out.



I used two fabrics from Joel Dewberry's Aviary 2 line (Lilac Palette):


You can't really see it in my picture, but I used the very dead center print (purple and aqua damask) for the lining.  I'm not a purple girl, so that was somewhat out of my comfort zone, but I think it turned out great!

Overall, the bag is quite small, but suited for what I have in mind (outings wherein I need no diapers, toys, sippy cups, etc.).  I like it so much that I think I'm going to do as Rae suggested, and make one that's somewhat bigger, just for kicks.

I can't seem to make anything without tweaking it just a bit (am I the only one?), so here's what I did differently:

First off, I fussy cut my fabric so that I could have whole birds positioned away from the pleats, so I used a little more fabric that called for, but not much.  I got by with a 12" x 44" cut for the main fabric, and a 10" x 44" cut for the lining and two (the pattern calls for one) pockets, which I tweaked to fit my cell phone and a couple of pens.

I wanted it to have a little bit more body, so I lined it with a scrap of heavy weight fabric.  I cut them them identical to the main fabric pieces, basted them together, and treated them as one.  I haven't tried it without the lining, but I like the moderate rigidity that mine ended up having.

I cut the strap a little bit longer--an extra 4 inches, I believe.

Oh yeah . . . I also left off the button embellishment.  It's not that I don't like it, I just didn't have any cute buttons on hand, so I scrapped the idea. I'll probably go back later and add either buttons or a fabric flower.

Anyway, it was a great project, and I highly encourage you to give it a try!  If you don't know how to put on a magnetic snap, never fear, Rae's got a tutorial for that, too.  Who would have know it's so easy?  Not me! 

Since I was delinquent and never even introduced Joel Dewberry's Aviary 2 line to you, I'm going to do it now.  Here's the whole, beautiful thing:



In addition to the Lilac Palette seen above, there's two others.

Meet Granite:


And Saffron:



You can find all of these fabrics in my shop.

I'm off to Quilt Market this weekend.  Huh?  What's that?  Oh, yeah.  That's an industry trade show (or something like that, I've never actually *ahem* been before) wherein I wander around all weekend and look at tons and tons of newly released fabric from most every major designer out there.  I can browse, order, find new great stuff, and even, ack, meet the designers.  I'm majorly kind of terrified of that part.  Wish me luck.

Happy sewing!

Winner!

We have our winner!  Thanks to all of you who entered (we had a total of 13 entries, I told you your odds were pretty good)! 

And the winner is . . .


#5, Emma Thomsen!

Congratulations, Emma!  Please send an email to christy {at} lilybellafabrics {dot} com to collect your fabric!

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Giveaway!

Ummmmmmm, pathetic.  I haven't blogged, facebooked, or tweeted in a month.  Whoops.

Let's liven things up with a little giveaway, shall we?  YAY!

My shop shelves are filling up with all sorts of lovely fabric.  And if you're here, I know you want it!  I am giving away 2 yards of any fabric from my store.   What do you want?  2 yards of your favorite print?  A set of fat quarters?  A couple of half yards and a yard?  You choose! 

To enter, just leave a comment! 

What was that?  That's it?  Yes, that's it.  I kind of hate those contests that give you the opportunity to enter 17 different times by blogging/facebooking/tweeting/following, etc.   It's . . you know . . . kind of obnoxious! 

That being said, I do want to show my customers some love, so if you bought anything from either one of my stores in the month of September, leave an extra comment for an extra entry! 

The contest will run through Saturday, October 2nd, at noon (MST).  The winner will be announced shortly thereafter. 

GOOD LUCK (and since this blog has about 2.4 readers, I'd say your luck is looking pretty good already)!

More Shirts

I made these today.  Tee hee  hee.







What's that?  You don't know what in the heck those birds and green pigs are?  If you have an iPhone or an iPod Touch, go download Angry Birds.  Now.  You're welcome.

How to Resize a T-Shirt

I know you've got one.  Or a dozen.  You know, shirts that fit poorly.  For you, for your kids, it doesn't matter.  They're too big.  Let's fix that, shall we?  It's very easy. 

Seriously, I am no super seamstress.  In fact, when I did this a few weeks ago, it was my very first time using a serger.  

I learned how to do this out of necessity.  Why?  We're going on a family trip to Disney World, so my sister and I got this grand idea that we'd dress the kids in matching shirts every day.  Geeky, I know, but this way when one of us has all six boys (ages 7 and under) all to herself whilst everyone else is enjoying Splash Mountain, hopefully said person will be able to keep track of the boys if they all match.  Makes sense, right?

The only problem is we're taking a pretty long trip, so we need  a lot of shirts.  36, to be exact.  I'm not about to shell out a fortune for 36 shirts, so I went the craft store route instead:  $2 to $2.50 apiece for plain, colorful shirts.  Of course, as they cost $2 to $2.50 apiece, they fit like crud.  I am no fashionista, but I am not about to let my kids gallivant around Disney World looking weird because they are in extremely ill-fitting shirts.

Enter the need to learn this skill.

Let's get to it, shall we?

Lay your shirt out on your cutting mat (or floor, or whatever), inside out.  Smooth it a bit, as you're going to be drawing on it.


To make the shirt the right size, you of course need to find a shirt that fits correctly.  Use this shirt as your pattern piece.  Turn the pattern shirt inside-out, and lay it on top of your other shirt.  Line up their shoulders, and center the neck bands.  Tuck the sleeves of your pattern shirt under so that you can draw that curve correctly.  Smooth the pattern shirt.


Got everything all situated?  Good.  Now just take a marker and outline your pattern shirt onto the shirt you're resizing.  It's not rocket science, so you don't need to be super picky about getting it just right. 


There you have it:  your pattern outlined onto your shirt.


Now take your handy dandy rotary cutter and cut along the lines you drew.


Next step:  sleeves.  Align the end of the sleeve on your pattern shirt to the end of the sleeve on the shirt you're resizing.  Align the tops of the sleeves as well.


Then flip the shirt up and out of the way so you can outline your sleeve.





Once you have one sleeve pattern made, just lay the other sleeve underneath it, and cut them both out at once.  Bada bing!


Take your shirt, still inside out, and serge from the armpit all the way down one side, and then the other.  Then serge the bottom of each sleeve.


I must interject.  Are you new to serging like me?  You must lift the, um, mast thing that holds the thread.  If you don't, your machine will jam.  I'm just sayin'. 


Here's the weird part.  Turn your sleeve right side out.  With your shirt still inside out, tuck the sleeve into the sleeve hole in the shirt body.  You'll lay it out the way it is in the picture below, only you're going to have the sleeve inside the shirt, and you're going to line up the raw edges.  Did that even make sense?


Starting at the seam in the armpit (which should be aligned with the seam in the sleeve), serge your sleeve and shirt together.


Ta-daaaaaaaaa!  Turn your shirt right side out and admire your handiwork.  Before moving on to your next sleeve, however, don't forget to turn your shirt inside out again.  If you don't, you might, hypothetically speaking, sew your second sleeve onto the outside of the shirt.  Hypothetically.


Voila!  One resized t-shirt!  You can of course shorten it if you need to, by cutting off the bottom, serging the raw edge, and hemming it up to the correct length, but that probably doesn't take a whole lot of explaining.  Plus, I didn't need to do that, so I have no pictures for you.
 

If you happened to start with a blank t-shirt and want to have some fun, pick up some inkjet t-shirt transfer paper.  With a little time in Photoshop, I was able to come up with this shirt for my 5-year-old's first day of school, wherein he will be showing off the fact that he thinks he's a gorilla:


If you have a light colored shirt and would rather not have the white background, you can get this kind of transfer paper instead.  Then your shirt will come out looking more like this:


Either way, your shirt will look great, and much less "$2 shirt"-ey.  Phew.

Nicey Jane Sale

It's heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeere!


Nicey Jane, you are so lovely.  You kind of make me wish I were this young woman:


But then again, I can't even keep up with all of my laundry using a washing machine, so I guess I'll stick with what I've got.

But where can I get this bike?  My husband has a cruiser.  We could match.




Go ahead, use this coupon:


You can find all 40 prints in my Etsy or eBay stores.  Go!
 

Crib Sheets

Do you have kids in a crib or a toddler bed?  Yes?  Good.  I have a project for you.  Crib sheets (as if you didn't guess that from the blog title).

I have a friend who's about to give birth to triplet boys.  She made them some darling quilts, but didn't have crib sheets to match, so I decided to learn how to make some.  After all, 3 sheets was still cheaper than a Costco box of diapers, and waaaaaaay cuter (yes, I know it's not a word).


You need 2 yards of fabric per sheet, plus 4 feet of elastic.  I borrowed my mom's serger to finish off the edges, so I'm sure you can imagine my current state of serger envy. 


The bottom line?  CRIB SHEETS = UBER EASY.

Rather than write up a tutorial, I'm going to refer you to the one that I used, which I found at everythingyourmamamade.com. 

Being a dork, I totally forgot to take pictures.  Yep, I'm awesome like that.  But I will give you a peek at the fabric I used.  It's from Riley Blake's All Star line, and I got it from my mom, who also has a fabric store (our family goal is world domination, obviously), Heart and Home Fabrics.  Really cute for little boys.  I promise, in real life the middle fabric is bright red, not pink.



Give it a try!

Brag Board, and some news . . .

Let's start with the news, shall we?  News is always fun.  Here's mine:



That's right, Heather Bailey's entire Nicey Jane collection is on its way!  It's supposed to arrive next Thursday (ish), so hopefully I'll have the entire line up in my Etsy shop and eBay Store shortly thereafter.  I'll be offering another whole collection discount for the first week, so if you're into Nicey Jane, start saving your pennies now!  :)

_________________________________________________________________ 

  

Now it's time to talk about you!  Or more specifically, Aimee, seamstress behind HaydenJ.  

 

Let's check out what Aimee can do with a little bit of fabric:

{made with Amy Butler's Fresh Start in Spruce}

 

So cute!  This fabric is heavyweight cotton sateen, so I can only imagine how nice and sturdy this shoulder bag is.

You know what else you can find at HaydenJ?  Non-dorky hip packs!  Anyone who can transform a hip pack into something cute deserves at A++ in my book.  

{made with Joel Dewberry's Dogwood Bloom in Sunglow, which is hopefully arriving soon}

You can check out more great handmade bags and accessories at HaydenJ by clicking here. Thanks, Aimee!

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Want to show off your fabulous creations?

Upload pictures of your projects to the Lily Bella Fabrics Brag Board on Flickr! Select pictures from the Brag Board will be featured on this blog!

If you don't want to join Flickr, you can email me your pictures instead, and I'll upload them for you.  Or put them on this blog.  Or both.  Send them to christy {at} lilybellafabrics {dot} com.

Brag Board!

Today I want to show you the handiwork of Ginny, seamstress extraordianire behind Side Stitch by Ginny. 

Here's what's great about Ginny:  a year ago, she did not sew.  Mmm hmmm.  That's what I said!  She stumbled upon a book of apron designs, decided to buy a machine and give it a try, and voila!  A year later, she's selling aprons, headbands, shirts, and skirts at her local farmer's market!  Check out some of her goods:

{L-R:  made with MoMo's Freebird, ?, Amy Butler's Lotus, Heather Bailey's Pop Garden/Bijoux}


{L-R:  made with Heather Bailey's Pop Garden/Bijoux, MoMo's Freebird}


{made with Heather Bailey's Pop Garden/Bijoux}


{L-R:  made with Amy Butler's Lotus, MoMo's Freebird}



{made with MoMo's Freebird}


{made with MoMo's Freebird}


{made with Joel Dewberry's Modern Meadow}


You can find all of these items and more on the Side Stitch by Ginny Blog.  Keep it up, Ginny! 

_________________________________________________________________

Want to show off your fabulous creations?

Upload pictures of your projects to the Lily Bella Fabrics Brag Board on Flickr! Select pictures from the Brag Board will be featured on this blog! 

If you don't want to join Flickr, you can email me your pictures instead, and I'll upload them for you.  Or put them on this blog.  Or both.  Send them to christy {at} lilybellafabrics {dot} com.

Brag Board!

Phew, this has been a long time coming, so let's get down to it!

I love the fabric that I sell.  Love, love, love it!   As I've said before, I'm not the world's best seamstress, plus I have a house full of boys, so I don't actually get to make much with my fabric.  So when someone buys my fabric, I love to see what they make with it!  Did you make something for your kids?  For your Etsy shop?  For your friend?  I want to see it!

More on that later . . .

I have a cute Etsy customer, Jennifer, who has an Etsy shop called Hold My Bag.


Jennifer makes boutique handbags and totes.  Oh yeah, with patterns that she created herself.  Hello, talent!  Let's take a look:

{made with Amy Butler's Wallflower in Sky}

{made with Amy Butler's Bliss Bouquet in Teal} 

{made with Amy Butler's Lacework in Brown}  

{made with Amy Butler's Wildflowers in Turquoise and Full Moon Polka Dot in Lime}  

Not only is Jennifer a great bag maker, she's also a very nice person.  I know this because she never once lost her cool when the post office delayed shipment of a large package that I sent her.  Yeah, they lost her package for a month, poor thing.  It eventually showed up on her doorstep in a plastic bag.  Not good.  But at least she was kind the whole time, and even helped me *ahem* plot to take down her local postal sorting facility if said package wasn't found.  But moving on.

You can check out more of Jennifer's lovely bags in her Etsy store, Hold My Bag.   Thanks for sharing, Jennifer!

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Sooooooooooo, I want to see what YOU (yes, you) make with your Lily Bella Fabric!  Did you make something darling? Because if you did, I know you've got a little problem.

You want to show your stuff off (because it's sooooo cute!), but you don't want to parade around trying to get people to notice your amazing skills (because, you know, that's just a little iffy).

Am I right?

Problem solved!

Upload pictures of your projects to the Lily Bella Fabrics Brag Board on Flickr! Everyone wants to see the fabulous things you've made, so you don't need to worry for one second about being that person.

Select pictures from the Brag Board will be featured on this blog!  

If you don't want to join Flickr, you can email me your pictures instead, and I'll upload them for you.  Or put them on this blog.  Or both.  Send them to christy {at} lilybellafabrics {dot} com.

So go on, brag a little bit. You deserve it.