Category: Sewing

Owl Backpack: Beginning Assembly

Anya’s owl backpack is starting to come together. I’ve got all of the pieces cut, and the insulation bits are glued to the laminated bits. The glue needs to set for 24 hours.

The owl has been assembled – I want to embroider the face and maybe some zig-zag lines on his body and wings. The face and wings have a thin batting so I’ll get a quilting effect with embroidery. The body (pocket) does not have any batting because it is already a little thick with the laminate layers.

I’ve got the bias strips cut for the piping, and we picked up some 325 paracord to use as the “string” in the piping. Tomorrow, we’ll get the grommets installed on the mesh pocket casing. We should start assembling the bag once that is done!

 

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Owl Backpack – Cutting Pieces

I just started cutting the pieces for Anya’s Owl Backpack (a pattern we found on Moda BakeShop). I am making one tweak to the pattern — the front pocket (a.k.a. the owl’s body) is going to be lined in the laminated fabric. Leaky pens, melted crayons … hopefully this will mitigate staining.

We finished cutting the front and back pieces tonight. Tomorrow, we’ll cut out the top/side/bottom rectangles. I didn’t realize the bird fabric is 54″ wide … this may be the lining for several backpacks as Anya grows 🙂

I think the polka-dot fabric looks rather nice with the laminate. There’s a bird the same shade of blue, and there’s a bird the shade of pink I’ll be using for the piping and zipper.

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The pattern itself I found a little hard to follow. I love that they save paper/ink by not printing a bunch of rectangles, but there are instructions to cut a specific size rectangle from one of the fabrics or another scattered throughout the document. I read through the entire thing three times before I found the rest of the backpack back exterior. To avoid missing any pieces, I searched through the document for the string ‘cut’ and listed out each piece. This list is categorized by fabric. Odd, since they have a “recipe” at the beginning of the article, that they don’t do something similar.

Laminate:
(2)    15 1/2 x 2 1/2    zipper opening interior
(2)    8 3/4 x 4 1/2    side of backpack interior
(1)    10 1/2 x 4 1/4    bottom of backpack interior
(2)    <backpack back pattern>    front and back
(2)    <owl belly pocket>    owl pocket lining

Insul-brite
(2)    8 x 4        side of backpack insulation
(1)    10 x 4        bottom of backpack insulation
(2)    <backpack lining pattern>    front and back

Twill:
(2)    15 1/2 x 2 1/2    zipper opening exterior
(2)    8 1/2 x 4 1/2    side of backpack exterior
(1)    10 1/2 x 4 1/2    bottom of backpack exterior
(1)    10 1/2 x 9    backpack back
(1)    <backpack back half-circle>    backpack back
(1)    <front back pattern>    front
(2)    22 x 4    straps
(2)    2 1/2 x 4    strap attachment mount

Mesh:
(2)    5 1/2 x 7 1/2    mesh pocket

Piping Fabric:
(2)    7 1/2 x 3 1/2    mesh pocket casing

Random fabrics for owl:
(1)    <owl pocket lining>    owl pocket
(2)    <owl face pieces>    owl face
(4)    <owl wing pieces>    owl wings

Projects: Backpack Acquisitions Complete, Sleeping Bag Project

We got presents! While we were mowing the grass yesterday, I noticed a couple of boxes at our garage door. All of the bits and pieces for Anya’s owl backpack got here. Still haven’t unpacked the boxes, but I should be able to get started on her backpack this weekend!

Anya has been asking for a sleeping bag — primarily for camping in the woods, but I’m sure she’d use it as an indoor blanket too. I found a simple looking tutorial at http://crazylittleprojects.com/2013/09/kids-sleeping-bag-pattern-tutorial.html and think that’ll be my Christmas present project.

I’m thinking about using a black fabric with metallic gold stars for the bag exterior and a minky green for the interior. I found a zipper with gold teeth and green tape at The Zipper Lady — by the yard zippers! You can add your own bottom and top stops. Maybe case some elastic in the print fabric and use it to hold the bag when it is rolled.

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Back to School Project: Backpack

I’ve got a quick-ish back-to-school (is it really back for someone who has never gone to school?). Anya has been wanting a backpack for school – more because Daniel Tiger has one than any actual need for it. We googled toddler backpack and found a really cute owl one from Moda’s BakeShop.

Selecting the project took under an hour – Anya likes owls. Finding the pattern, though … that was an embarrassing number of hours over the next two days. I finally ended up on the designer’s Flicker group and found a comment with someone else who totally loved the design and wanted to make it … but couldn’t find the pattern referenced in the tutorial. Answer: if you scroll down to the bottom & open the ‘printer friendly’ version … it’s not just a printer-friendly version of the tutorial. It’s got the pattern appended to the end.

Finding a piping got rather challenging – the site with the best price on the fabrics I wanted had almost no piping. I didn’t want black or white, and I didn’t want to order it from another site (5$ shipping on 3$ worth of piping, not a deal). Checked out the options at JoAnn’s, but didn’t find any I liked there either. Then I found a great tutorial on making your own piping, and I’m rather excited to try it. I found a good write-up on using piping too – hopefully the piping will be a professional looking touch.

I’ve got a spotted twill fabric for the bag and a pink quilting cotton for the piping.

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And some cute birds for the laminated interior.

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I’m not going to make the interior pocket, but I am thinking about lining the front pocket with the laminated fabric. If any crayons/pens/etc get tossed in there, they won’t seep through and ruin the bag. Maybe I’m being extra-paranoid, but I just ruined a purse by leaving it in the car … and the handful of crayons that I keep in there melted into the fabric. If I make a three layer owl body – twill & laminate on the front, then another laminate attached to the bag – I’ve got some safety. I am also thinking about adding a little batting to the front twill/laminate sandwich & stitching some zigzag’s to suggest feathers.

I am also thinking about embroidering the eyes and beak – saves trying to applique the little pieces onto the face, and I will be able to get a cuter look than if I try to do it in fabric.

Anya Quilt – Part 1

I have been working on an Ohio Star quilt for Anya’s bed (figure anyone who lives in Ohio should have an Ohio Star quilt or two in their house!). Constructing a quilt is a great visual example of exponential progression. Piecing the four tiny triangles into fairly small squares … you’ve still got a whole lot of tiny pieces. Strips of three squares put together were still a lot of small pieces. But, the quilt builds up rather quickly from there – strips turn into 3×3 blocks, then these blocks form three really large strips with a border fabric between them. Then border strips go in between the star strips to form the entire quilt top.

I had the final top pinned together and took a quick picture to share. Something didn’t look right. Took the picture, folded up the project for the night, and went on to other things. Right before bed, I pulled the picture up again to send to my mom:

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Something REALLY didn’t look right … stared at it for a few minutes before I realized that two of my block-triangleblock-block strips were attached upside down! Instead of having a pink triangle along the center block, I have a white triangle. Looking back at the previous step, I do not know how I missed it:

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Evidently there is no historical basis for a humility block (an “intentional” mistake put into a quilt – sort of like small dead end roads used to copyright protect maps) … and, honestly, it always sounded like a defensive “I meant to do that!” kind of thing rather than a real “only God is perfect, so my quilt should have a flaw to avoid angering God” thing 🙂

My task for today is to rip out the two backwards blocks and get them stitched back into the quilt. Ugh! Very important lesson learnt — but all in all, not bad for my first quilt.

Pinwheel Dress – Part 1

I’ve started piecing together Anya’s Pinwheel Dress — all of the pieces are cut out, and the strips for the bias tape are sewn together. I’ve got one of the bias strips folded and pressed too — so I was able to affix it to the bottom of the dress layer. Right now, the flounce at the bottom and the bias tape are pinned on so I could visualize the dress. I wanted a really simple white dress with a dark colored bias binding. The binding is a marbled maroon fabric, although that detail is completely lost in the photos. I don’t know that the marbling comes across well in person either – we’ll see.

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This is the hemline – both the dress and tunic have a similar hemline. When worn together, they create a two layer flounce.

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Here’s a view of the trim with a little better lighting – it’s a maroon fabric with a marbled design on it.

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New Dress Projects

I’ve got two more dress projects starting — one is in the “picking fabrics and such” stage, the other is almost ready to be sewn.

First the picking fabrics one — this is another pattern from the Simple Life Pattern Company (who published the pattern for the V-back dresses I just finished). There are two looks that I like for this dress – one is two contrasting solid color fabrics. The other uses two patterned fabrics. I’m leaning toward the two pattern look … thought it might be a little more “fun” that way.

The second is a pattern from Oliver & S that I purchased almost two years ago. And promptly discovered that my sewing skills needed quite a bit of improvement. I’ve now managed to do all of the skills in the dress … so hoping it’ll turn out nicely. I got a white linen fabric for the dress and a marbled maroon for the bias strips.

Aisha’s Dress – Finished!

I’ve finished Aisha’s dress — so we now have two completed summer dresses (just in time for the mid-February blizzards, evidently). Not much difference from before – it was pinned at the waist, and now it is stitched. I tried the top-stitching as written in the pattern (basically another line of stitching through both the skirt and the lining, maybe 1/4″ under the waist seam). I didn’t like it – it looked a little off, and it drastically impacted the drape of the fabric. I serged the hem on both dresses and like the finished look a lot better. Serging in a circle is *not* something I do well – but since the seam is sandwiched between the skirt and lining fabrics … not like anyone sees the occasional overhang on the wrapping threads.

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I really like the rolled edge hem here – I found out that a nicer hem was produced on the lower end of the suggested thread tensions. Surprised me quite a bit – I thought the higher tension would make more of a roll.

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And here’s the less V’d back detail – not a huge difference from Anya’s deep V, but a little bit of a different look. I really like all of the options this pattern provides. Mom purchased the add-on pattern to put sleeves on this dress too – not sure that I’d want to wear an open-backed dress in weather cold enough to warrant long sleeves … but the back is pretty easily modified to something with a zipper or buttons.

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