Ohh! A Favorite Find!

 Another winning streak continued for me with a

vendor prize at a quilt retreat. I used my gift 

certificate to buy this little goodie.

Here it is all set up.

I am hoping it will keep me from having to do

a clean up on the sewing table every time I get a drink.

This contraption holds a drink, and has a side hook

for a thread catcher, sewing scraps or even some garbage.

I was going to pack it away in the retreat supplies,

but I realized I do more spilling at home

 than I ever do at a retreat!

Here it is all set up with not bag as

there are waste baskets nearby.

A little homage to the US here, as it is election day today!

A new plan came up and 

now there is a baggie hooked on to collect

dog bed scraps.  

There is a debate on using scraps for

bed filling but some vets find the 

beds useful for recovering animals.

A win for everyone!

Happy stitching

A Favorite Find

 The recent provincal quilt show shown the light on 

a cool little gaget made by my friend at SEWCLEVER.

It is a great little binding tool!  It measures, folds and 

stores bindings! You can even hang them together on 

near completed projects or organize your entire binding library!

They come in three different widths and are one 

 the niftiest tools I've seen. Visiting the website

https://sewclever.ca/ is a great way to browse

 

some fantastic useful templete and a wealth of 

sewing tips too!

Another tool demo was the 

corner trimmer. 

What a great tool!

You can visit the website by 

clicking on the link below

Sewclever

Clean and Designing

 Wow, sometimes inspiration just hits. 

I got very tired of my too small and oh so 

thready design wall and needed to replace it.

While putting fresh towels in the bathroom, I 

stumbled across a comforter bag containing 

the last of a bolt of too stiff and too narrow 

needle punch batting.  Purchased from a 

store closing clearance, it was supposed to 

be a double width cotton but turned out to 

be  a narrow compact craft bat.  I used it 

for everything but quilting.  Some was gifted 

for fabric bowls, some used as mattress covers, 

table matts and even some window insulation 

during a cold snap.  

There was just enough left to almost cover 

a larger space for a design wall. It will get 

a bit more tacky as it is used but for now it 

is clean and tidy and a few well placed pins 

hold the blocks up nicely. Pinned in place 

with some unused lady bug pins it looks wonderfully 

white. Ta da! So beautiful and crisp! 

 

I will use my smaller gridded design sheet to start 

planning my Gypsy quilt made of orphan blocks. 

The first quilts have gone up on the new design wall 

and the blocks are now up in the 

summer sewing room for assembly. 

All pinned and ready to stitch !

 

The was not quite a Marie Kondo rid out but 

definitely a repurpose save!

Stay safe and tidy!

Bounty from a Quilt Show!

 May is a great time to visit quilt 

shows. The world wide event is over, 

summer is breaking thru and the roads are clear.

My good buddies coordinated a meet up at 

a mid province quilt show, The Central Alberta Quilter's Guild. 

I picked up a few goodies and boy are they fun!

First up, a brand new rotary cutter! 

 Yes, I did just rid out 

a bunch but this style is my favorite. The price and 

colour called to me. It is by a newer to me vendor, Ormkraft. 

They sell rotary blades at reasonable prices and this 

cutter has a good feel and action. They do mail order in Canada. 

A local shop did a whiz bang demonstration on notions and 

tools and we were almost cheering from the front! The shop 

owner/presenter was entertaining and we joined the que at

the booth after and came away with a wool mat cleaning tool. 

One of my good buddies MV (we chat almost every morning)

gifted me lovely wool mat material yardage . I put it under my 

ironing board cover so it does not collect thread.  However, 

my design wall has enough thread to do its own embroidery!

This little Gypsy brand tool really cleaned up the space and 

is made of metal  so will last forever!  Great find!

Last but not least is the ITCTA ( Item Too Cute To Avoid). 

These adorable mini cutting mats also by Ormkraft.

A set of four was under $10 so they came home with me!

They will be great for random small piece trimming and 

even coasters for a quilt chat. 

It was certainly a great time with friends and shopping. 

The show was great too!. 

Stay safe and sew on !

 

Labels All Around

 Don't you absolutely love when you find a good deal you can share!

This is one of my favorite finds.  The first part was so good it never 

happened again but I did find more at a great price too. 

Labeling is always important for both craft projects and quilting.

 

I have even started labeling family 

heirlooms so their history is not forgotten. 

 I was inspired by finding an adhesive tape  label on 

the bottom of a turkey platter. The platter has been in 

use for years but the label from the previous household

is still firmly gripping the bottom. 

A big stash of yardage/panel labels

is on my shelf and gets lots of use, but I 

do enjoy making custom labels also. 

My good find today, is quilt label fabric.  

Three years ago, I stumbled onto a packet of cotton fabric 

sheets for making labels at a dollar store!  

There were five in a pack for a loonie.  I snapped up the last one, 

but I was never able to find them again.  

So, using the package I searched for the 

manufacturer and local distributors and voila!  

A local art store carries

 them in two different quantity packages.  

More economically priced than our usual

providers and they come in 30 and 10 sheet packs. 

A friend need some lately so I was able to get 

for $2.70 a sheet. A considerable savings!!

My new, latest, favorite find!

Holiday Seating!

 I am categorizing this under my Favorite Finds.

It is so rewarding to find a perfect item unexpectedly!

This story requires a back story!  Every year there is a 

large highway long yard sale/festival. Highway 39 runs 

between two rural towns and the one in the center hosts

a community festival. It is all very local and small town. 

A giant sale/ flea market sets up along the main street

sidewalks. You can find almost anything for sale there, 

from locally grown honey , to puppies and even pigs!

Anyway,  my buddy and I were strolling and found the 

perfect chair frames to match a family antique set I have

but they wouldn't fit in the car.  So we got the seller's contacts.

I called later but could never reconnect with the vendor. 

Fast forward 2 years, and I was in another small town

for a holiday lunch and visited a nearby thrift shop.

Surprise!  Two perfectly matching chairs!

The one on the left is one of the pair I found and the 

right is from our dining room. 

I turned around and found a matching stool!

They are leather seated but the frames are very complimentary

to my set. The stool will need a recover but with a good wipe down,

 they were perfect to accommodate the family bottoms at Christmas!

The price was good, the shop supports a local charity, 

and the staff were wonderful. 

 I also found a lovely watercolor for a gift. 

 It was painted by a local artist and the frame 

just needed a bit of stain to freshen it up. 

It also needed a new back but that was no problem.

A bit of acid free craft paper and a glue 

stick and it turned out very well. 

 

The other good find of the day was a small pitcher. 

I have veggie family member so I always make 

a mushroom gravy .  Everyone likes it but the new

gravy pitcher will designate veggie content only.

It was a great day shopping and ended with a few great 

additions to the family possessions pile.

Happy Hunting!

 

Great finds !

Fall is in full swing with lots of quilting 

goodness happening with in person meetings!

A fantastic time for socializing and sharing.

I was gifted a pattern and wow is it a good one. 

Borrowing this was on the horizon, but now

I can not get it finished from my own book! Haha!

Paper piecing should help me be successful and 

I found the perfect frame for 6 little blocks. 

Can't wait to get started, but another UFO?

For sure!  

Enjoy your week, stay safe and sew on !

Baby Bowl!

 Wow, it has been a while since I posted about a good 

find but this little one is great!

A small magnetic bowl!  

It is adorable in appearance and just 

incredibly cute. I even talked my 

sewing buddy into getting one!

It turned out to be very handy in use and 

keeps my pins off the floor. 

It is even small enough to sit nicely 

by the sewing machine

To find one for yourself, 

just check out your local quilt shop!

They are very reasonably priced too!

Great finds! One, two...

           Great  Finds

 Sometimes you just find things

that are great to upcycle.

Often, you don't know how

you lived without them.

Recently we were clearing

out a rental property and

came across some foam core that is

perfect for whiteboards.

 We're going to use one of them

to do some vacation planning.

We can brainstorm where we'd like to go,

write it out and cross it off easily without

destroying endless sheets of paper.

The main reuse is fabric/scrap sorting!

 I found that I was putting bits of tape all over

my cutting tables and mats every time

Cutting would be a treasure hunt of trying to

find and remove tape from pieces!

Even my my rulers and cutting blades got taped!

 After cutting over the tape a few time the

little pieces were really difficult to remove.

 Since I just made a cheat sheet of all the sizes

I'm going to cut scraps in, I decided to use the boards to

layout my scrap cuts.

I put the tape on the whiteboards and

use that as a quick portable place to

put my sorted scraps before

moving them to their final resting place.

(I really mean the ready to use spot!!!)

That way I can move it quickly if I

need to use the cutting area or

need space for pinning.

The measurements stay on the tape

and don't transfer to fabric or hands.

It is working very well. The squares go

above, the strips below. When it is

getting crowded , the pieces are

placed in assigned boxes, ta da!

"Very clever." says my great uncle!

The only downfall is the need to

sort out a few of the storage boxes,

but that is an adventure too!

Just discovered a wealth

of 2" 1/2 squares!

This great find had a previous life,

are you ready! One, two ... Tattoo!

The renter was well known

tattoo artist ! The boards were for

sketching out designs when

video conferencing with the customers!

Only used in a home design studio

so no worries there. This fella just

designed , very creative!

The sorting is starting to go

a bit better, long road ahead

but a system is developing.

Press scraps into a stack or two,

take a stack to the cutting table.

Process, repeat.

Strips first, then bricks then squares.

Leftovers go to strings, crumbs or bin.

Surprising to me is that there is not

nearly as much waste as expected!

Hmm. Also assisting is another

great find, a stack of postage labels.

Found at a thrift shop, each

sheet has 2 - 2 x 6 inch labels!

Best 3 dollar purchase ever!

I can color code the year of

my projects and leave the

names the same . The scrap

boxes can get labels that

wont peal off! Yay!

Back to my scrap taming!

Stay safe and sew on!

Linking up with:

Oh Scrap

RSC 2021

Hand me that thread friend!

Oh let me tell you about an old friend of mine! 

 It is my threaded needle caddy.

  It holds 10 needles threaded 

with about a 1 meter length of thread.

 One is kept well stocked with assorted colored threads 

and one just for the basic 3 colors

( black , white , beige) for quick jobs.

               

It is a real life saver  for

 some older sewers I know. 

Speed binding!!

 

Wowzer!

All I can say about this is ,

"Where have you been all my life!"

I managed to bind four bed size quilts in 

one day using this foot. 

This technique is used when the 

binding is sewn to the back of the quilt 

and then folded over onto the front. 

It manages to keep the stitching exactly

 placed on my binding

 and lets me speed along, stress free. 

Here is how it works. 

The guide that is in the middle and is

 usually placed in the " ditch or seam"

 for quilting is used as a 

guide for the edge of the binding . 

 Set the needle position to right of the binding edge

 as desired and then 

top stitch the binding in place. 

This foot is called a "Stitch in the ditch foot"

You should easily be able to find this foot 

at any sewing machine store or supplier. 

You may even find this in you sewing 

machine tool box!

Pins on Walkabout!

           TRAVELING PINCUSHION

This great little item is perfect for traveling

 to classes, workshops or even 

just with on the go projects.

It is a traveling magnetic pincushion!  

The top has a cover so the pins don't brush off in your bag. 

 The bottom has a detachable drawer/container 

that can store everything 

from small scissors, to bobbins to buttons!

                     
 

                     

Thrifty Treasure

"It was a cold and stormy night..." 

but look what it did to the trees!

I just had to show off this beautiful 

Grinch tree covered with frost by the  ice fog !  

Gorgeous!

Anyway, here if one of my all time great

thrift store finds.  

TV Tables!!!

These small foldable tables are very

 popular for small living spaces

but have endless uses for sewing and crafting too!

This set was under $20 and came with 4 tables and a stand. 

I use one ( or two) for a portable ironing station and 

used a scrap of heat resistant fabric to make a cover.

It makes a handy ironing board when the piecing

 fever hits and can snug right up to the sewing nest. 

Another one gets commissioned as a cutting 

station for trimming. A lazy daisy turntable and a 

mat make a nice place to trim blocks and is very portable. 

One even got set up for scrap sorting 

while I was on the phone. 

Definitely one of my best finds ever!