Week 15: Stuffed Easter Bunny

First of all I just want to say that I am happy spring is here!  Here's a picture of me and my dog Harley who loves to get his belly rubbed!

I wanted to think of something fun to send my nieces for Easter and Spring, and came across what appeared to be an easy tutorial to make a stuffed bunny.

I scoured through my extra fabric and found this skirt that was a stretchy material and a different color pink on each side.   I was glad I held on to some of the things I was going to donate to goodwill...I knew some of those fabrics would come in handy some time.

Next I printed out the pdf pattern and cut out the paper pieces, pinned them to the pink fabric, and cut them out.

I followed the tutorial directions and began sewing.  At first a lot of the sewing was sewing the right-sides together for the front body, moving on to the head, stitching eyes, nose, and mouth with different colored thread, then attaching the head to the body.

Once everything was assembled, I turned the rabbit right-side out, filled it with poly-fill (stuffing), and began to hand-stitch up the back.

The tutorial called to use some pellets to fill the rabbit so it could sit upright, but I didn't have anything heavy to put in it.  I had to admit it looked a little strange without anything holding it up!

 

So I decided to make a fun little pink pouch with some leftover chevron print for the bunny to sit in to keep the rabbit from looking so plain.

I did get the report that the bunny got to ride in my niece's play car, and also accompanied them at the dinner table so although it looks a little home-made it sounds like Ceci liked it!

Week 14: Backyard Lawn Furniture Cushions

Back in the fall we purchased some white wicker lawn furniture from Craig's list.  It was in pretty good shape, and best of all came with some really comfortable, thick cushions.  However, the cushions looked like this:

Yes, a little too old fashioned for my taste!

So before I get into recovering the cushions, let me give you a little background.  I was on a spray painting rampage this fall and decided to paint the lawn furniture turquoise and red.  This in itself was a ridiculous process that required WAY more spray paint than I thought, and after seeing how the spray paint weathered and chipped away, once spring arrived before I put the lawn furniture back out I had to do another coat and had to use a lacquer to protect it from the elements.

Finally when I recoated the wicker (and painted the little side table and planter my mom's husband bought for us),  I was ready to try my hand at recovering the bird and flower cushions.

I went to Jo-Ann's and the only outdoor fabric I found that both Jake and I could agree on was this:

So I got out my trusty measuring tape and started cutting and pinning away!

I started with the fabric inside-out, and made the fabric fold over on the part of the cushion that would be facing away from the back of the chair so there wouldn't be a seam.  Next I pulled the fabric snug and pinned all the way around the cushion.

I knew I would have to eventually take out the cushion before I started sewing, so I used a pencil to trace along where I pinned around the cushion.

Next, I unpinned a section long enough in the back to maneuver the cushion out of the pinned fabric, and started sewing along the pinned lines.  I next sewed a zigzag stitch next to the straight stitch to reinforce the seam since it is a cushion and people will be sitting on it and pulling the fabric a little more than normal. 

I cut the fabric down a little closer to the seam, then I flipped the fabric to see it right-side out.

Then I pretty much folded the pillow in half and shoved it back in the cover.

Next I folded the open seam under and pinned as close to the the cushion as possible, and hand stitched the open area closed.  I figured since this side will be facing the chair, the hand-stitching wouldn't be very noticeable.

I repeated this process for the other chair cushion and the couch cushion.  Here are some other pictures I took while making the other two: 

The corners on the couch cushion ended up being a little trickier to fold, pin, and sew, but I somehow made it work :)

For the couch cushion, I was able to sew along the long edge and one of the short edges, then wiggle out the cushion from the open edge to pin and hand stitch the rest.

Finally I have 3 finished cushions!  However, I thought they would look a little better if I added some decorative buttons that matched the fabric since the original chair cushions were gathered in the middle and the long couch cushion was gathered in 3 different spots.

I found enough buttons that were the same/similar size in my stash so it was nice I didn't have to buy any new ones to finish off the cushions.

I read online that to make a covered button I could just add a little bit of poly-fill used for pillows, stuffed animals, etc. (that I also had at home) to cushion the button from the fabric cover.

I then cut the material down and hot-glued it around the back of the button.  

Next, I marked the center of both sides of the pillow where i wanted the button to be placed.  I found the longest needle I had and threaded through the front and back of the fabric numerous times so the thread pulled the fabric tight.  Once I thought it was pulled enough, I knotted the thread and hot-glued the buttons on to both sides.  

I repeated for all cushions and after seeing the before and after of the cushions with and without the buttons and gathering, I think the additional touches were worth it.

After I got the cushions on the furniture, I realized it was quite a lot of red, but I like the way they look much better than they did before I repainted the wicker and covered the cushions!

I think the next step is to add a piece of glass to the top of the planter next to the couch to make that a little table as well.   This was not too difficult to do and only cost me about $30 for material, which is much cheaper than buying some cushions that are less comfortable for a lot more money :)

Week 13: Yes, Another Baby Quilt

So after me going on and on with how I made the baby quilts for family and friends in my Week 7 and Week 11 posts, I figured in this post I would post pictures I took along the way in making my friend Lisa's baby quilt that I finished this week.  Lisa told me she was going with a butterfly theme and using peaches, pinks, and golds in the baby's room, so I initially tried to find some pretty peach, gold, and ivory colored fabric for the quilt.  I quickly found that Jo-Ann's had pretty much zero fabrics with golds in them, so when I started looking through pastel colored fabric I was really happy to have found these two coordinating fabrics with butterflies in them:

And, there was even a 3rd fabric that went with these two in a different color.

I decided on the flowers and butterflies fabric for the back of the quilt and for one of the squares in the front and the fabric with just the butterflies on them for the border.   I was able to find some coordinating fabrics in some peach/corals, turquoise, and a light purple-grey fabric.

I love the way the fabric looks after it is cut and laid out!

Next I started laying out the square to get a good visual before I could get started sewing the pieces together:

After getting the front pieced together, the borders added, and the batting and backing put together, I laid out my binding strips to go around the edges.  In retrospect, I do wish I would have switched out the front squares coral pattern that was the same pattern as the green binding so there wasn't as much coral, but oh well.  As the saying goes, woulda, coulda, shoulda!  This is what the binding looks like before I sewed it together in one long strip then binded the quilt.

After everything was assembled I ironed the quilt, cut all the stray threads, and then took some pictures of course!

As I mentioned in my Week 12b post, I was even able to make a little headband with some of the scraps!