Stash in transit!

I'm a little bit sad today :( 

We move house next week and, although the packers aren't coming until Tuesday, I've had to start packing up my sewing room. I could have left it for the removals men but I have a rule ... non-quilters are not allowed ... EVER ... under any circumstance ... to touch my stash. That's just the way it is.

First box, in went all the pinks:

And it just went on:

And on:

And on:

And I had some new fabrics to place gently in the box:

My shelves and baskets are empty:

It'll be a week before I can unpack ... a whole week before I get even half a chance to sew again :(

I'm going to head over to Karen's linky party for some therapy :)

Pants Bag casing tutorial ...

I've been making Pants Bags for my special blogging friends and recently made this one for the lovely Amy @ A Quilting Sheep - she wrote a super post about it :)

Amy really liked my casing and wondered how I did it. I was about to reply, 'see my tutorial' when I realised that because the bag in the tutorial was a mini Christmas bag, I had only attached single casing.

So here is a 'double folded casing mini tutorial' especially for Amy but also for anyone else who may like to use it (please note, my technique has evolved over 4 years of making my Pants Bags so I'm not meaning to take credit for this from anyone or am I saying this is the only way to make casing ... just that this is the way I now make it.)

1) Firstly, choose your fabrics - new FQs or scraps (or even use up your orphan blocks). This bag is going to be for my friend Jennie (aqua and yellow are her colours, I read on her blog this week): 

2) Make your outer and lining bags (leaving a 5" gap in the bottom of your lining bag for pulling the outer bag through later) to the size of your choice - I like mine around 14" x 14" - and I make both bags exactly the same size:

3) Cut 2 strips of casing fabric - 5" by the width of your sewn bag - in my case here, it's 5" x 14". The width is chosen depending on what size cord / ribbon you'll be pulling through, so I do vary this. Fold over at the ends and press then fold in half and press again:

4) Pin to both sides of the outer bag like so and stitch just under a 1/4" all around:

5) Turn the bag inside out. Drop in the lining bag and pin and again stich just under a 1/4" all around:

6) Pull the outer bag through the lining gap, press the lining and stitch up the gap with matching thread:

7) I have two ways of finishing to catch those ends where the outer bag and lining bag don't meet: I either top stitch around the whole bag or, using invisible thread, I hand sew the ends together. For this bag, I'm going to top stitch - so I pin:

8) And sew:

9) I've chosen yellow ribbon for the cord:

And voila:

Hope that helps, Amy :)

And here she is with my other finishes this week:

(Linking up with Amanda Jean and Sarah)

New quilting style ... well, for me anyway!

I am still buzzing about last weekend's fabby Strip Bee get-together: 

Did you see all the other bees' posts? Fran, Maria, Amy, Julie and Sarah - I loved reading them all and am still beyond thrilled at how happy everyone was with their finished quilts.

Over the weekend, we chatted lots about quilting, blogs, fabric - unsurprisingly! - and exchanged tips. I bemoaned my lack of getting on with straight line quilting and picked up some useful hints from Sarah and Maria. I started making this as a cushion (it's going to be a bag now!) and Maria got me started on the 'wavy lines' quilting:

And, in the best traditions of 'practice makes perfect', I have used this new- to-me quilting style on a little tote bag I'm making. Another charm square design from MSQ's tutorial:

I didn't have enough of the bottom of the bag fabric to make the handles so used up what I had left with some of the spare charm squares:

Aren't they cute? But is it sacrilege to use charm squares in the handles? Isn't all fabric created equal?

Just got to put it all together now:

I'm really pleased with this and love that I have a new quilting style to use. Linking up with Kelly and Lorna:

Jackpot!

You need 6 winning numbers to win the lottery?! Well, there were 6 winners in my garden on Saturday when we finally handed over our strip bee quilts ... I definitely hit the jackpot when I joined this online quilting bee :)

It all started a year ago thanks to Maria who asked us to make a strip of any colour and design, then pass it on to the next person for them to add a strip.  We didn't start out intending to meet at the end because we live all over the UK and Jersey - but thank goodness we did ... we had such fun - I was quite emotional:

On Saturday, we had the 'great reveal' and we were all reunited with our quilts. Here they all are - beautiful quilts, beautiful ladies:

Sarah:

(My strip was the bottom one)

Amy:

Not sure my photo in the garden does this amazing quilt justice so here it was on my table:

(Mine - the arrows at the bottom)

Julie:

(I added the baskets)

Me:

(I started it with the 3rd strip down)

Maria:

(I paper pieced the butterflies)

Fran:

(I added the fourth strip)

I also received some gorgeous presents:

And learnt some new tricks:

And thoroughly enjoyed having the girls coming to stay and play in my loft:

More importantly, I've made new friends ... aaahhhhh! I loved meeting all of you -  you'd never have thought we hadn't met before by the amount of chatting that went on! What a wonderful weekend ... fancy a reunion in Wales next year, ladies?!