Swaps I Made

Holiday Traditions

| terriaw

Like most families, my family has a lot of traditions.  Since my brother, sister and I are grown up and have families of our own, those traditions with my parents have changed over the years.  We have also added new traditions over the years with our new families.

I participated in Sew Liberated‘s Holiday Traditions Exchange this year.  Meg at Sew Liberated matches two people to share  our crafts, cultural, and thoughtful reflections about what the holidays mean to our family.  This includes things like:

  1. a handmade holiday decoration,
  2. our family’s favorite holiday recipe,
  3. a “tradition” tutorial, and
  4. a mix CD of our favorite holiday tunes.
Exchange Package

My partner is RaeAnn, who lives in southern California with her husband, three boys, and a little girl on the way!

My most favorite holiday tradition I wanted to share was our annual Cookie Day where all my aunts, uncles and cousins on my mom’s side get together the Saturday after Thanksgiving and bake as many cookies as possible.  Our record was 26 different kinds!  I made this apron for RaeAnn’s holiday baking.

Poinsettia Apron

I also made the patchwork basket picture below to hold a couple of my favorite Cookie Day recipes.  We are also a very crafty family so we also make lots of things for the holidays, mostly ornaments.  We usually exchange ornaments with each other so I knit these mini mittens, sweater and stocking ornaments for RaeAnn’s tree.  Those ornaments were packaged inside the patchwork drawstring bag.

Ornaments for ExchangeI included a copy of The Christmas Carol story, a play we try to see every holiday season; and the soundtrack from The Charlie Brown Christmas Special, a favorite in our house.

Exchange Book and CD

I hope my partner likes her package and shares in some holiday traditions from my house.  Merry Christmas, RaeAnn!

Be sure to go to the Holiday Traditions Exchange Flickr Group to see more photos of what others are exchanging this year.

Fall Fabric Swap Goodies

| terriaw

I was so excited to receive an airmail package from Australia – from my partner for the Fall Fabric Swap, sponsored by Marvellous Mouse Designs. Yay! Woo hoo!

Each participant in this fabric swap was connected with a partner and given instructions to send her a total of one yard/metre of fabric made up in any increment.

Check out the loot my partner sent me:

I feel so lucky that Karen who lives in Australia got my name. She included a flower piece of the new Pop Garden fabric collection by Heather Bailey, a striped piece that might be from Sandi Henderson’s Farmers Market fabric collection, and other pieces of pink and green that will look great together, perhaps in a log cabin patchwork block, which is what I have in mind with an embroidered friendship message on the other side.

The goodies don’t end with these great fabrics. She also included this adorable fabric basket:

and this cute pattern for a glasses case (I love the embroidery on the flap):

and these notions – trim and buttons:

My swap partner also included a notecard with a letter handwritten inside telling me about herself. I love it! It’s like having a new friend on the other side of the world. It made me feel a little sheltered that I don’t know much about Australia, but it also got me excited to make a new crafting friend and a chance to learn more. Thank you Karen!

Placemat Swap Part 2

| terriaw

I signed up to participate in the Placemat Swap for the Bend-the-Rules-Sewing swap. I finally finished making the set to be exchanged with my partner. She doesn’t know yet that I have her name, so don’t spoil the surprise before she receives my package.

She requested a set of six placemats and napkins for her family and guests. Her decorating style includes brightly colored paintings and artwork, and she likes Amy Butler and April Cornell fabrics. The fabric shop I went to didn’t have any Amy Butler fabrics, but I found a huge selection from the Kaffe Fassett collection, which I thought would be similar in style.

I chose to use some fabrics from the Kaffe Fassett collection. The focus fabric is Teal Paper Fans, which I chose because of its artsy look and the red accent that will match my partner’s red and white dinner ware. I framed the focus fabric in shot cotton white, which shot cotton teal backing. The napkins are a combination of the paper fans and shot cotton in teal.

FabView

I will admit that each placement and napkin are not perfect, but I tried very hard to make them as perfect and professional looking as possible, in the hopes my swap partner will still like them.

I have made other projects from the Bend-the-Rules-Sewing book, including the mixy-matchy napkins, but not the placemats. I must say I really liked this pattern. The directions and illustrations were easy to follow, and the results are fantastic. I hope my swap partner thinks so too!

Placemat Swap

| terriaw

My husband always teases me when a package arrives in our mail box. “Let me guess,” he says. “You ordered more fabric!” Well this week a package arrived, and for the life of me, I just could not remember ordering anything, even fabric. I had a feeling it was going to be something good because anyone who mails me anything mails good things to me!

I recently entered the latest Bend-the-Rules-Sewing Swap, where you agree to make a set of placemats and napkins using the pattern from Amy Karol’s famous book. I received my partner’s placemat set this week, and I wanted to call her to thank her (except that I don’t know her or her phone number). Isn’t this a beautiful set?! In my preferences, I said I love Amy Butler fabrics, which are featured in this set. I also said we just painted our kitchen Concord Ivory, which is a golden yellow, and these match perfectly.

She even went beyond the original agreement and made four matching coasters (in the upper left corner of the above picture), AND she included the scraps that were leftover from her project. What a nice touch!

(I included her picture above from her flickr page, since it’s cloudy today and my pictures aren’t as good)

The best part of this package was the letter Shawn wrote to me about her efforts in making this project, about her life, and her sewing experience. Now I feel as if I truly have a new friend. There’s always room in my life for new sewing friends! Much better than getting a plain old package of fabric in the mail. Thank you so much Shawn!

PS – the placemat set I’m making for my partner isn’t finished yet, so I’ll show that in another post.

My Holiday Ornament Plans

| terriaw

I was inspired by this post from Adorn magazine’s blog to take stock in the ornaments I have made in the past couple years, and to decide which ones I have time for this year. Of course, I want to make ten of ALL of them. My first and foremost deadline is for the Holiday Ornament Swap 2007, which is due December 15. I haven’t been able to begin many projects until the last class of my semester, which was last Tuesday, Dec. 4 – yippee!

Rustic Felt Ornaments from Rustic Winter by Marilyn Gash and Indygo Junction

Rustic winter ornaments

I ordered the wool and thread for these gorgeous stars, which I absolutely adore! Molly’s Wool Felt Stars from The Purl Bee

Molly’s wool felt stars

Wool felt mittens from disdressed blog

disdressed blog mittens on the line

I have made many of these over the years for other ornament exchanges and gifts for my family. Knitted sweater from Last Minute Knitted Gifts
Sweater ornament
Knitted stocking from Last Minute Knitted Gifts
sweater & stocking ornament

mini stockings

Knitted mittens from (Creative Knitting November 2004 issue)

mittens ornament

Wool Felt Snowmen from Liberty Rose

wool felt snowmen ornaments

Here are some of my own ideas:

Folk Art Soft birds – in progress

soft bird ornaments in progress more soft bird ornaments

Felt gingerbread men (cookie cutter shape, tan felt, brown embroidery thread, black embroidery thread, tiny red heart buttons)

gingerbread ornament in progress

Felt cardinal (cookie cutter shape, red felt, yellow felt, red embroidery thread, black embroider thread)

cardinal ornament

Think I’ll enough time to do everything? Probably not, but that’s part of the fun. I hope you are finding ways to be creative during the holiday season!

Completed Projects

| terriaw

I have been busy lately working on some unfinished projects. Here is my new apron from cherry and solid red fabric – it worked well while I made beef enchiladas and chocolate chip cookies.

Cherry Apron

Next I’m finished a scarf from Noro and Cascade yarns to match my favorite hat and mittens set.

Hat-Mitten-Scarf set

I hope my bookmark swap partner receives her bookmark soon. I embroidered a piece of scrap hand-dyed wool from my local fabric store.

Bookmark Swap

Now I better get started on my ornaments for the holiday ornament swap! Hope you are finding ways to be creative today too.