Hi!  You’re here for the giveaway, I know!   Sew, Mama, Sew hosts Christmas twice a year.  If you’re here through subscription, check out the link above to enter hundreds of sewing giveaways.

I’m also hosting an Instagram sewing photo challenge!  You can join at any time.  It’s been super fun, and I can’t believe there’s already 800+ photos in the feed.  I’ve been laughing every day at some responses, you sewing gals and guys are pretty clever.   I rarely blog, but I IG every day.

Back to the giveaway – Read the Rules!

I’m giving away $20 in credit to my fabric shop, patterncrush.etsy.com.  This is a new(ish) shop and blog.  I’ll throw in free domestic shipping and $5 off international shipping, so you can really get something free if you don’t want to apply the $20 to something bigger.   You tell me what you want, I will set you up with a custom listing with $20 off and free/reduced shipping.

To enter, tell me which fabric collection you’re looking forward to this year!  I need ideas on what to buy.    Will you buy Briar Rose before or after it comes out (or not at all! No, you can’t be serious).   For an extra entry, follow the blog, follow me on IG or Twitter (@patterncrush), or like the page on Facebook - that way I can get you some coupons and show you what’s new.

Comments are now closed.

JEIFNER!  You’re my winner.

Here are some promo pics I pulled from Windham’s catalog.

The whole line is listed in my shop.  I’m devoting most of my yardage to bundles.

Psst – I’m offering a 10% coupon for my readers. Use code “ALLROSY” through April, maybe the beginning of May?

PPS – Kids Clothes Challenge Week starts April 22!

I find myself asking, what would Nina Garcia say?  What would Tim Gunn say?  And this isn’t limited to my sewing.

It’s not that I’m obsessed with that show, I have only seen two seasons. Regardless, Nina and Tim apparate over my shoulders whispering like the cliched angel and devil.

“That’s too commercial.”  “That’s very pedestrian.”  “This isn’t Project Seamstress.”  Nina Garcia does not want to hear my excuses.

My sister is having major life-event issues.  What valuable sisterly advice did I give?  “Make it work.”  Tim’s catchphrase is perfect: never judgmental, always supportive, can be inflected to mean anything you want.  My new motto, up there with valar morgulhis.

Anyways.  I quit my stressful, stressful job last week after a huge paycut.  I thought I would have spent more time sewing in my initial days off, but this has been, and needed to be, a restful transition for me to regain my poise and generally get my act together.  Thanks to my husband working, we will be okay financially.  As much as I have some anxiety, can I just say that I am really, really happy right now, spending time with my kids at home, and trying to allow myself, to give myself permission, to enjoy this time.

Pattern Crush, Inc., the fabric store, is going to go big this year, or go home, and I have a lot of planning to do.

I did cut into this pattern today, and hope to have it finished in time for Easter.

Burda 9551 for my daughter, using AMH fabric

Finally, for Sew Thinky Thursday, Emily, if I were a quilt block … I would big a zig zag block, because I go up and down and up and down.  I’m a classic and always in style, if I may so myself. (So humble, this one).

Finally -

If any of my readers are on Twitter or Instagram, I would love to follow you there @patterncrush.  I can’t emphasize enough how much I love those platforms and wish I got in on the fun sooner!  I’m so grateful to have a little network of girlfriends, even if they’re mostly virtual, to talk fabric with, and to support.

Today I did my printing for the Handprinted III fabric swap hosted by Maze & Vale.  My first design idea was inspired by Tibetan prayer flags.  I cut some foam squares to try it out, but it didn’t look like anything but a bunch of stupid squares.  My mom didn’t think it was that hot, and you know you’re in trouble when even your mom is like, uh, try something else.  As on Project Runway, if you have to explain it, you’re out. Also, I invested in a bunch of opaque Setacolor, and didn’t want to shell out more to re-purchase the same colors but in a transparent finish.  So, I scrapped that and moved on.

My next idea was big polka dots in CMYK with a camera printed inside some of them, but then I realized I don’t have any yellow.  With hand printing it seems like the most successful designs are the most simple, anyway.

So, I thought about the camera, and sewing, and made a pattern inspired by sewing bloggers, since we have to obsess about photos.

We hand-carved the scissors stamp and I used a camera stamp purchased here.

The most difficult part of block printing with such a small stamp is not getting residual ink on the design.  I applied the ink with a sponge instead of fooling with a brayer, and I’m so glad I did.  There are some mistakes (quite a few!) where the ink on my fingernails got on the fabric, and once or twice I actually dropped the stamp. Sorry, gals!  It adds charm?

Each fat quarter took about ten minutes to print.  Fabric is Kona in Bone.

I can’t wait to see what I receive!  And I may  need to make more of this, since I didn’t make myself any!

PS – Emily, the orange is for you!

I am a prints girl.  I love modern quilting, but I don’t think I would ever make a quilt from just solids again unless I really restrained myself.  It’s not that they aren’t aesthetically pleasing–they are!–it’s just not me.  That being said, every time I work some solids into a very loud project, I’m usually very pleased I did, so I try and take a cue from the modern quilting world of solid-lovers.  (And I will probably go back this.)

That being said, Snow is my most used, and most favorite, because it shows off my prints.  Plus, Snow and Bone are great to block print on.

I copied Emily’s mosaic idea (after all, she’s the host of this party!) and tried to pick the colors I would actually buy instead of worrying about a perfect value bundle.  My stash is 95% prints, so I could probably use a few solids.  And if I’m spending my fabric budget on what I consider a not-very-fun-but-necessary-basic-like-a-t-shirt fabric like a solid, I would buy and use these:

Wisteria, Melon, Baby Pink, Snow, Cadet, Pacific, Charcoal, Pomegranite, Buttercup, Bison, Bahama Blue, Pepper.

That’s pretty much me.  Missing half of the rainbow, you can remain in nature and out of my stash.  Until I need you.

I did read the badskirt sew-a-long archive a few times, which helped me feel more confident. Too bad Emily was at QuiltCon this weekend probably having the time of her life because I was tempted to take her up on her very generous offer to help me! (Thanks!)

Everything went fantastic, I pressed and pressed and it looked amazing, but when it came time to sew the yoke to the bottom gathers, I stitched them together, decided it was wrong (it wasn’t) and ripped the seam out (twice). That did not help my gathering! Then I decided I wanted to be done since I was so close, my parents were coming over, it was time to catch up on Downton… and just sewed both pieces together without pinning. So the yoke/bodice line is not straight .  I won’t do that again. I also have some funny puckering going on around the top left of the yoke, and the fabric folds a little when worn… somehow I ended up with too much fabric there from my terrible seam.

Anyway, if you’re thinking about making it, don’t be afraid, the instructions were very clear! If I hadn’t rushed and visualized those last steps, it would have been nearly perfect.

(Do most people learn how to sew clothes and things first, then quilt? I’m doing the opposite.)

Well, I learned a lot, and instead of being discouraged from venturing more into sewing clothes, I am ready to do another! It fits her, and the beautiful fabric (Joel Dewberry, Heirloom, in Roses) on my beautiful girl makes me smile.

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On another note, I’m thinking of cutting into THIS awesomeness from Yuwa:

I have been afraid to cut it up since it’s so perfect, and out of print. At first I thought I would simply add a scrappy border and make a wall hanging or quilt for my daughter, but is that really the best use? Seems kind of pedestrian. So, do I cut each square out and use it in patchwork, or would you cut the squares as needed and never mind the orientation of the text? Another thought would be to take the squares for my daughter’s name since no letters repeat and incorporate it into a zakka quilt for her.  I would love your thoughts!

Linking up with:

I’ve created an ongoing Pinterest board as an easy way to navigate and share the many amazing and generous fabric and sewing giveaways throughout Blogosphere. Anyone can follow. Please leave a comment if you’d like to add one I haven’t found, or if you’re interested in becoming a contributing Pinner. I think this will be more fun and much easier than a linky.

Dylan and I made a tooth pillow, since he is now 6 and ready to loose a tooth any day!  He’s really looking forward to that rite of passage.  I saw something like this on Pinterest, and thought, oh, I should knit that, but then it was pointed out that would be absurdly foolish and he would probably be in dentures by the time I finished, so I asked my mom to find me a super soft sweater at Goodwill, and bam.  He’s a little lumpy… not very impressed with the poly fill I purchased.  Any tips about that?  I may make another, since I could use a little practice sewing nicer curves on knits.

Started a baby quilt last night, which I hope to finish tonight or Wednesday.  Easy quilt, but hard to find time for sewing during weeknights.  My coworker had her baby early at 31 weeks after a scary surprise bout of eclampsia.  She and baby are doing wonderfully.

Wednesday Update: Still not finished, and those itsy bitsy spiders should not be all in a row.  Otherwise, I love how it looks, and I promise to start taking pictures with a real camera very soon.  I’ve never done a stacked coins quilt before and it seems like the perfect solution to an in-a-hurry quilt.

I have about 10 more baby quilts to make this year.  Apparently, my friends like to do it.

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On a selfish and unselfish note, I’m giving away four half yards of the new Riley Blake Shuffle fabric over at the wonderful and prolific blog Mommy’s Nap Time.  Deadline to enter the giveaway is Friday, 2/15.

Finally… I’m turning 30 on Thursday.       And we listed our house for sale last weekend.   Luck: we need it.

I paid $3.99 in the app store.  I probably wouldn’t be so critical if it were free, but if I’m going to pay, I expect it to at least not crash.

The bad font and graphics could be forgiven if the app worked.

I loaded six fabrics from photos found online and saved to my phone’s library.  Unfortunately, the app crashed in the middle of data entry for each and every one, without fail.

What’s most disappointing is that it appears you have to have an additional entry for each cut of the same fabric.  I could look at a screen full of the same fabric picture line by line and have to click each picture to see what I had of each cut.  For example, you can enter a quantity, then modify that by selecting either yard(s), fat quarter, or fat eighth.  If you have a yard and a half, I imagine you could type 1.5 then select “yards” and just have one entry, but if you have two fat quarters and a yard, you would have to make two totally separate entries, one for each type of cut (yards and then one for the FQs).  Kind of annoying, especially since most people have a bunch of scraps leftover.  Maybe you could get around that by just entering a note about it.  But you can’t, because there’s nowhere to enter notes.

The screenshot below is what it looks like when you have your own photo from your camera.  Unless you’re going to edit your fabric photos, it doesn’t look nearly as nice than if you take the time to download them.  It would also be cooler if you could view your stash in a grid view, because really, who cares about the name unless you’re doing a search.  I’d rather see more pictures on the screen and scroll less.

It’s also a little annoying how it says “Name:” before every one because that’s how it’s sorted.  I love that you can sort by color, manufacturer, and name, but those tags should be hidden to make the app cleaner.

There was no way to delete a fabric entry once you start, so if you stop halfway through there will be a big blank space until you add a photo and information.

There’s a feature where you can enter notions, needles, patterns, whatever you like.  Here’s the entry screen for that:

There’s also a “project” feature where you can assign fabrics to projects, but I did not explore that.  The “Wish List” feature was where you can enter fabric you don’t own, and is identical to the stash screen in appearance and functionality.  I tried the search function and entered “multi” because I know I used that as a color, but nothing showed up.  I searched “Andover” and nothing showed up.  You can sort by color and manufacturer on the main screen, though, and that did work.  So what the point in searching is, I don’t know, because it didn’t work for me.

Verdict:    If I ever want to inventory my fabric, I’d use a spreadsheet with downloaded internet pictures.  I really can’t see myself taking the time to enter every piece of fabric I have though in any kind of format, especially one that’s annoying and crashes.  Maybe instead of an app I will wish for a servant to do it for me.

This app could become useful with improvement.  I’ll keep an eye out for updates and let you all know later down the road.

Has anyone else tried it?

First week, first question:
When did you start sewing? Tell us a bit about your sewing history. When did you realize you were really hooked?

I started sewing after my husband moved us to his home in Illinois from Japan.  I didn’t know anyone.  I had just finished college and left the navy a year ago, and didn’t have any real hobbies to speak of since I lost access to my Gocco.  My mom was always crafty and my grandma quilted, and walking through the craft aisles I would always notice the quilter’s mats and rules and wonder what all that was used for.

I went to the library and picked up Teach Yourself Quilting Visually, then went to Wal-Mart and bought fabric, supplies, and a machine.  I had no idea.

My first quilt ever.

I didn’t purchase enough binding tape to get to the end.  My grandma said finish it and be done, it’s great.  Ehhh.  Not so much.  In fact, I didn’t even realize how much better it is to make your own binding until a dozen projects later.  Anyways, here’s my first quilt, and it really sucks, but I’m proud of it because I taught myself and didn’t give up.

Did I mention I had a son and not a daughter?  I didn’t make it with anyone in mind, though when I did have my daughter four years later I made sure she slept under it just one time.

My next few projects were a quilt I made for my son with flannel backing that I just folded the edges to the front to bind, and a pillowcase.  I almost stopped sewing forever because my Singer Simple was so horrible and I was convinced it was all me.  Thankfully, hubby got me a much better one, which is now dead, actually.

A few months into sewing, I discovered “modern quilting” and was so happy there was more out there to work with!  I believe Oh! Fransson was the first quilt blog I discovered, and then Film in the Fridge, back in 2008.  I realized I was hooked when I found the modern quilting community and started shopping on Etsy for really cool fabric.  A few thousand dollars worth of fabric and four years later, here we are.

Aside from Sew Thinky Thursday, I’m linking up to the Small Blog Meet at Lily’s Quilts, since I’ve been meaning to/it’s Feb 1/this is a great get-to-know-you post.  I would love to make more sewing blogger friends.