Showing posts with label TUTORIAL. Show all posts
Showing posts with label TUTORIAL. Show all posts

05 February 2019

Monkey Wrench tutorial

Trina and I have been working on the Squared Away block of the month for the past year.  We got to the end and I didn't like the bonus square (and one other).  So I broke the rules and picked one I liked!  I found this Monkey Wrench block here but it used a paper piecing method, which wouldn't have matched the rest of the quilt.  So I had to figure it out on my own.  It was pretty straight forward, but to help Trina out when she was ready to make her own I made up this little tutorial.

Cut your fabric.
Purple: 
one 6" square (for magic 8 HSTs)
four 4.5"x2.5" rectangles
one 10.5"x2.5" strip 

White:
one 6" square (for magic 8 HSTs)
five 2.5" squares
one 10.5"x2.5" strip 


Make your pieces.
-Use your 6" squares to make eight HSTs. - VIDEO on how to make magic 8 HSTs.

-Mark four of the white squares with a diagonal line.  Put it RST on the purple rectangle.  Sew on the line (shown in red in the picture below).  Trim a 1/4" seam allowance (green line).  Press open.  Note: Make sure your diagonals are either going ALL one direction or HALF the other direction.  Either way works, just be aware of them.  I made them all going one direction, so that's what the pictures with show.

-Sew the two long strips together.  Trim into 2.5" sections. (Just like we've done throughout this whole project).

Note: I have no idea the best way to press the seams.  Most of them were open because I wasn't sure.


You should end up with this...
eight HSTs, four diagonal rectangles, four white/purple rectangles and one single white square.


Sewing!
Start with the HSTs.  Sew them in pairs.  To keep it quick I just made them all the same direction and rotated it in my final placement.

Sew the HSTs to the diagonal-rectangles.  Again, all four will look exactly the same. 

Add a purple/white rectangle to TWO sections.  (You can't do all four at once! Ask me how I know.)  While you are at it you can add the lone white square to another one of the p/w rectangles.

These seams will give you three long pieces.  Be aware of the direction you place things.

Finally, sew the two larger pieces to the center strip.  Press and admire!

19 October 2016

L is for lanyards ... lots and lots of lanyards

This is a way-overdue post ... I did L during the summer but couldn't post it until I finished J and K first! K was done kind of at the same time as L, but it took until now (the fall) to backtrack to J.

L is for lots and lots of lanyards. Sixty, in fact. This was my main sewing project for the Activity Days/Faith in God day camp I put together for this summer. Yes, I made every last one myself. I worked on them off-and-on in May and June, but once I had my registration numbers, I really cranked them out in July. I finished the last ones the night before camp started.

Adult leaders: sunflowers, teen junior counselors: the purple/cream in the middle, 11 year olds: green, 10 year olds: purple, 9 year olds: blue, 8 year olds: pink.

I came across this Noodlehead post last winter and instantly decided to make all the lanyards for the name badges instead of buying them. I had some fabric contributed by a friend but most of this was what I had sitting around in my storage room - nothing was purchased except the clips on the ends. There aren't precise directions for the lanyards that I could find, so this is what I did:

1. Cut a strip of fabric 36 inches long and 2 inches wide. This length works for both kids and adults.

2. Press the two edges in just barely, like with bias tape.

3. Fold it in half and press again, so the raw edges are tucked inside. OR, as Mindy pointed out, use a bias-tape maker for all of that. I did try that but wasn't figuring out the bias tape maker, so I did it the longer way.

4. Sew it closed, as close to the edge as possible.

5. Sew it down the folded side as well along the edge, so it matches.

6. Put the ends together, fold over the raw-edge end so it's tucked in, then wrap around the ring on your clip before sewing. I went back and forth about 3 times to make sure it was secure. The ring/clip combos were ordered on Amazon.

One of the lanyards in action, on my own kiddo, when they were decorating cookies and cupcakes to give to the Hartford Temple construction workers.

Additionally, to go on the lanyards, I put together four different clips with felt on alligator clips, to go with the Faith in God sections. The overall theme of the camp was "Stand Tall" and we had a devotional each morning of the camp to go with the three sections of the Faith in God book. I had a lot of help making the clips - I made the yellow triangles with the teeny orange feet myself. I didn't touch the hearts or the flowers - the sister missionaries, a friend, and SM spent an entire afternoon at my craft table getting them all knocked out. I split the temples with the friend. We made about 50 of each clip - we had 30 girls, 6 teen junior counselors, and 17 adult leaders working on various sections of the camp. The clips had narrow grosgrain ribbon hot-glued to the clip, then the felt shape glued onto that - the ribbon helps hold the felt to the clip better (and yes, in the past when making hair clips for my girls, I've left the ribbon off. Mistake.)

Our camp theme: Stand Tall. CLIP: yellow felt triangle, orange cardstock cut with a baby foot punch from the scrapbook section at Hobby Lobby. The Stand Tall/feet theme came from the January 2016 Friend Magazine.

Learning and Living the Gospel - in addition to the devotional, we had an outing to the Hartford Temple. CLIP: Light blue 2x1 rectangle, white felt cut in the temple shape, yellow ribbon at the top, green scrap across the bottom, glitter over the whole thing.

Service - we decorated cookies and cupcakes, and took 90 treats and thank you cards to the construction workers working on the Hartford Temple. CLIP: red or pink felt cut into heart shapes of various sizes, ribbon and lace added with hot glue - just various things from my scrap box.

Developing Talents - as we develop our talents, we become more beautiful like flowers do. CLIP: I've been making this style of felt rose for a long time - here's the tutorial. The flowers were then glued to a wonky random-cut green triangle for the leaves, then glued to the clip.

This day camp was a test run to see if this is something our church group will do regularly. There was an overwhelming positive response from the girls who participated as well as their parents, so we're going to the region level next year. It's been requested that I do the felt clips again, and I should probably spend the winter making another 100+ lanyards!

10 November 2011

trick or treat bags

Sorry I'm late getting these up as an idea. Maybe for next year? Anyway ...

I've been stockpiling felt and a friend was commenting in early October about wanting a particular shade of green to make Frankenstein face trick-or-treat bags for her little boys. I had the right shade so I gave her what I had and some black ... and she gave me the idea. So I sat down with my girls and let them choose what color they wanted for the background of their bags, and gave them options for the shapes on the bags. I did all of this free-hand.



1. I had 2 9x12 sheets of felt (I think that's the size - whatever you get in the little sheets at craft stores) to be the bag. I cut about 1 1/2 inches off one end of each to be the handles.

2. Before I put the bag together, I cut out and sewed on the character shape things. Not sure what to call them. I sewed all the way around the face cut-outs on the jack-o-lanterns. At first I didn't but it looked funny so I went back and fixed it. The stitching looks awful. Do not examine these bags too closely.

3. I sewed the handle on each side of the bag.

4. I put the bag wrong-side out to sew all way around the edge, leaving the top open of course, and then flipped it right-side out.

They're fairly small bags but I have small children (the oldest is 5) and really - how much candy does one kid need anyway. They filled the bags twice - once at a church party, and once going around our neighborhood complex.

I'm really getting into this sewing thing. I like the idea of creating stuff, and I like the little rush I get when I finish something because I can say, "I made that!" Wait until I can get some of my Christmas gift projects up here. I'm making most things this year and that makes me a little giddy. (And a little stressed because hello - Christmas is in less than 2 months.) I just came up with some ideas so they're not started yet, and other things are mid-stream.