The LuckyStitchers have been working like MAD on their Eco-Quilts. They are still being worked on and you can flip through all the photos on Flickr.  Our Quilt Show will be up in June, if you are a local yokel – please come for a visit!

Hiding behind a stack of strips cut from clothes from our clothing swap to find materials for our Eco-Quilts. Our quilts will be made from clothing, bed linens and other scraps of fabric. Unless of course…

we had to try the clothes on….

and on….

It was a little wild…ly fun!

If anyone wants to sew along, please do!  A note – you don’t have to have a wild clothing swap to participate.  While it’s recommended, it certainly isn’t required. But you do have to have some fun.

I have been sewing quite a bit. A few birthday presents for kids that left before I could snap a shot. A little twirly skirt and a zippered pouch meant to hold tiny horses.

I finally finished the Doll Quilt for Iz. I started it a while ago, and finally finished sewing on the binding. I love her reaction when I make her things. So thrilled and she just loves everything I make, and you know that makes it so much easier to keep making her things.

Remember this hat I made for Iz last year. Well I’ve been noodling with the pattern and have already made this one, then I made this one:

I am really in love this with hat. The brim is nice and big to keep the sun away. I am even thinking of making a few out of felted sweaters for our nice cold spring, or next winter. (the lovely pics are from my HomeSchool LuckyStitchers – thanks guys! you ROCK!

I made a spring coat (Built By Wendy, Simplicity 3966), and I am so not in love with it. It’s HUGE! I made it two sizes smaller than what the pattern suggests, and it is still too big. The fabric is wonderful, I love the bright green lining and I am thinking big black bakelight buttons. I haven’t hemmed it yet, I think that I just need to make it the right length and it will be flattering. I’m bummed. I still need a spring coat.

I am almost finished with a lovely wrap dress. I’ll post pictures of it when I’m done (soon, soon, soon)

I am super excited about my next big project. The girls have been wanting to make quilts, and that’s what we are doing this month at LuckyStitches. I’ve also been trying to get everyone to think about their resources and using what they have, so I’ve asked them all to bring a bag of old clothes, bed linens and fabric scraps to share. These items up for swap go in the center of the table and the girls can grab and trade as they cut 3″ strips.

Or tear 3″ strips. Everyone got a bit of practice doing one of my favorite things, tearing fabric. With a little snip at 3″, then a good strong pull on either side and sheets and big pieces can rip beautifully. I love their faces when they make a little magic too.

Here’s the start of mine. From left to right – tweed pants, angora sweater, wool flannel pants. I’m not an earthtone kind of girl, but I am falling in love with these textures and colors. I have a bit more cutting to do as next week we’ll start sewing our scrap strips together.

I’m asking everyone to save all of their scraps from their cutting of the strips and we are going to try to use everything. I’m looking for scrap projects, so if you know of any, please share!

Happy Sewing!

I think you know that at LuckyStitches I offer classes to HomeSchoolers. Well, I’ve declared April to be Quilt month, and we are going to be making quilts! Let me tell you that I am no master quilter, by any means. I can’t stand cutting (but my rotary blade has certainly helped with that). I have made a quilt before, and I loved it! I still love it. Iz loves it too. They make for wonderful keepsakes. They also tell stories. I’ll be sharing resources with the kids so they can understand the history, passion and art in quilts too.

For this class, however, we won’t be going to the fabric store to make our quilt tops, we are going to be looking in the closet. Using clothes, linens, towels, blankets, anything made of fabric or fabric scraps. We’ll be making the ultimate in scrap quilts, turning something that doesn’t’ seem to have a use anymore (pants that don’t fit) into something eternally useful (a quilt!). For years I’ve used old sheets, blankets, towels and clothes and made them into something new, preventing the “old” item from going to waste or ending up in a landfill (did you know that the dyes used in coloring fabric are mostly toxic? You can read more here or here). Hopefully, by making these quilts, we can also raise awareness of our use of textiles, how they are made, thrown away or even better – re-used.

Here’s our tentative schedule if you want to participate or follow along:

Week 1 – Cutting. We’ll be cutting our found items into 3″ strips. We’re going to be holding on to all our scraps and perhaps use them along the way or figure out something new to do with them.

Week 2 and 3 – Sewing. We’ll be sewing our strips together. End to end then strip to strip. We’re just going to keep sewing until we have enough for a quilt that’s about 50×50 ish.

Week 4 – Quilting. We’ll be safety pin basting our quilts together, using batting if necessary and attaching a back. Then we’ll quilt it all together either machine quilting or tying.

Week 5 – Binding. Maybe using scraps or linings or something left over, we’ll stitch together strips for a binding and sew it on.

I’ll be posting inspiration, photos and stories along the way.

**Remember, I can sew, but I’m not a super duper quilter. I’ll be showing the kids some super basic techniques. Hopefully, this will give them the foundation they need to go and either take another quilt class or start on another quilt or even make their own pattern. Whatever the outcome, they will have made something that is eco conscious as well as get more practice sewing, and have it for the rest of their lives (as long as mom doesn’t clean up their rooms and throw everything out that’s on the floor…not that these will end up in a pile somewhere…).

I hope you’ll follow along. Even better if there are kids in your life who can follow along too! And if you do decide to participate, please let me know.