Free Motion Sampler Quilt

Wow!  Two posts in one day.  This is a rare moment for me because I've been busy all summer chauffering the kids around to their various classes.  But they will be back to school next Monday.  Yipee!

Back in May I finished my first free motion sampler quilt.  Some of the quilting designs were inspired  by  Leah Day, author of Leah Day's 365 Days of Free Motion Quilting Filler Designs.  http://www.freemotionquilting.blogspot.com/

Titled "Matrix" from Day 17 from Leah Day's blog.

Titled "Heat Coil"  from Day 101 from Leah Day's blog.

Titled "Rainforest Leaf" from Day 112 from Leah Day's blog.



And here's a look at my sampler quilt

You may ask why I have to complete this quilt?  This beginner level free motion sampler quit is actually a required project for my machine quilting certification class.  The advanced level class will start in October. 

Personalized Book/Journal Cover Tutorial Part II

Hi, everyone!  Do you have your two strips of fabric ready?

                                     draw a 5 cm line on both sides of 2nd strip

Next we're going to fold at the 5 cm drawn line on both ends like so.

                          This is what 2nd strip looks like at this point.

                                  place 1st strip on top of 2nd strip right sides together

                        This is what the layers look like from inside.

  Turn the fabric rightside out and the slip pocket (folded area) is on top of 2nd strip.

                        Turn the slip pockets in so that they are on top of the 1st strip of fabric.

                                                       You've done it! 

I hope you've been able to follow this "pictorial" tutorial.   I would love to hear from you if you make a book cover by following this tutorial.

Happy Sewing!

Free Motion Thread Painting

Here's my first attempt at free motion thread painting. 

  So there I was holding a small piece of fabric that was initially designed for an applique, I changed my mind in the middle of the process.  Without much ado,  I proceeded to iron on light weight stablizer and took out my collection of Metteler threads.    Took out my Bernina BSR free motion foot and started my first thread painting mini-project. 

Ha! Ha!  My daughter was happy enough with the result.  The overall effect could have been better if I had a bigger piece of fabric to hold on to and I used the "BSR2" instead of "BSR1".  I'll have to try again...!

Personalized Book/Journal Cover Tutorial Part I

Has another week gone by already?  I know I promised to post the book cover tutorial last week.  I did!!  But I hit the wrong button on my keyboard and the entire post vanished before my eyes.  So, I'm trying again and hopefully this will be a successful post!


The book cover which I made for my daughter is quite simple.  You only need...

 1) dimension of the book
 2) two strips of fabric cut according to those measurements
 3) Personalized the fabric with appliques or embellishments
 4) stitch two lines
 5) turn and press the fabric

Then you're done!

Step I:   Measurements

Below is a diagram of an English paperback book I've been reading! 

**Measurements are in centimeter and seam allowance not included.**

Step II:  Cutting the fabric

You need to cut two strips of fabric according to the measurements

1st strip =

 (17.2 + seam allowance of 2 cm)      x   (B+C+D)   

  = 19.2 cm  x  (10.5 + 2.5 + 10.5)

  =  19.2 cm   x   23.5  cm       length x  width

2nd strip = 

(17.2  +  seam allowance of 2 cm)  x  [(Ax2) + B + C + D + (Ex2)]         

= 19.2 cm   x  [(5x2) + 10.5+2.5+10.5 + (5x2)]

=  19.2  cm  x   43.5 cm      length x width




Step III:  Personalized

Take the 2nd strip of fabric and personalized to show your creativity and style.  For my cover I chose a flower print so I won't need to add any embellishment.  But if you want to applique, you probably need to iron on stablizer to prevent any shrinkage.


Next week, I'll show you how to turn these two strips of fabric into a book cover.  In the meantime, please leave a message if you have any questions or comments regarding Part I of this tutorial.  I'll be happy to answer them!!

Happy Sewing!

Personalized Book Cover

 This is the new book cover I made for my daughter.  She wanted to have a plain background fabric with her favorite cartoon characters appliqued on it.  These are characters from a Japanese cartoon called "One Piece"    This book cover took less than 30 minutes to make!!  My kind of project. 

Before I made the book cover for my daughter, I went through my collections and found these two covers I made a year ago.  The one in the middle is a wallet-sized business card holder .  I choosed panel fabric for this particular one.  The one at the bottom is also a business card holder.  For this one I needlepunched the heart design before I sew the fabric together.

It's really quite easy to make a personalized book cover.  All you need is the dimension of the book and  two strips of fabric.  Then you'll be on your way...!

Stay Tuned for Personalized Book Cover Tutorial coming up next week.

After the rain...

After a few days of continued rain, these lovely flowers sprouted from the ground to grace my garden with their beauty. 

Do you see a pot of orchid at the bottom right hand corner of this photo?  That orchid is one of my husband's orchid collection.  It has never bloomed before.  We don't know if it's because the weather is too hot in Kaohsiung or we need to place it under the shade during the hot summer days.

I feel embarrassed to say this, but does anyone know what kind of flowers (has bulbs) these are?  My husband said it might be in the narcissus family!  When there aren't any flowers, all we see are the long green  leaves. 

So, after the rain... I finished another oilcloth tote!  The oilcloth is a MIT (Made in Taiwan)  product.  It has that English countryside/ Laura Ashley feel to it, don't you think?  

This time I challenged myself to sew a tote that's made of oilcloth both inside and out.  Some helpful hints when sewing oilcloth can be found at my last post. 

Happy sewing!

Oilcloth Tote

This is my first oilcloth tote made possible by participating in a tote bag quilt along hosted by Hana.    I've had these oilcloth for ages.  Though they are not Cath Kidton's design, the color and print are timeless classics.

I encountered a few technical difficulties while making this tote. First, it was difficult to run the oilcloth under the foot because the foot grips the oilcloth. Usually you can just buy a "leather foot" designed for sewing specialty fabrics like leather and oilcloth. I didn't want to spend the extra money on this accessory. So, I remembered that there was one fellow blogger who had suggested placing a piece of paper on top of the oilcloth to help the foot "glide" through the fabric. I tried it but didn't work that well; plus I would had to tear off the paper afterwards. Then I remembered seeing one seamstress placing a drip of sewing machine oil on top of the oilcloth. It worked. But got to remember to use a larger size needle and adjust the stitch length to about 3 (on my Bernina)

The second problem I had was that the seams wouldn't stay tucked under because I didn't want to pin the seams fearing that the pins would have left holes on the oilcloth.  Hence the solution of using   double-sided tape (designed for fabric use) to tape down the seams. 

After thought:  We had rain on and off during the end of May and beginning of June.  This oilcloth tote sure came in handy on those rainy days.  I love it!