Sewing

I’ve been posting some photos on IG of my leaders/enders project and had some questions, so here is how I organize things so that I can make a bonus quilt without too much trouble while making other quilts.

None of this is new! You can read all about leaders and enders here on Bonnie Hunter’s website, Quiltville.

I follow Lori Holt’s scrap regime (found here), and you can read all about her leaders and enders procedure here. When I saw Lori’s scrappy crossroads tutorial I knew I wanted to make one just like it!

So I gathered all my 2 1/2″ scrap squares, cut some background fabric to the size required and placed it all in a small plastic tub to the right of my sewing machine.

Every now and then, while I’m watching TV, I’ll grab the tub of squares and start putting two of them together (right sides facing) and layer them, ready for me to grab and sew.

I put 16 pairs together, and then I take 8 of the background squares and place 2 of the smaller squares on top of each background square. I draw the sewing lines (I like to have the offcuts already sewn together so that I can make something with these later on ) on the back of these squares before put them back into the tub, and put it beside my machine ready to go.

Then, as I’m sewing another project, when I run out of that project’s pieces and need to do some pressing and/or trimming, I grab a couple of these 2 1/2″ squares and sew them together. I leave this in the machine with the needle down, and then continue with the main project. Every time I have to remove a project piece from the sewing machine, I sew another couple of squares together, leave them in the machine, and then continue on with my main project.

I use my large design board to sit my squares on once I’ve started sewing. This sits to the left of my machine.

Here is the area to the right of my sewing machine. The squares of fabric for my leaders and enders quilt are within easy reach of my machine. I can also trim right there, and throw the off cut half square triangles into that box in the bottom right corner, where they’ll stay until I get a chance to make something with them.

Here is the finished block – I love how scrappy these blocks are and they’re big so I think I’ll make 16 of them for my quilt.

And here are a few blocks together – don’t they look great! I’m going to love this quilt when it’s done.

Do you have a leaders and enders project? Please let me know by leaving a comment below.

Till next time,

I don’t know about you, but the area around my sewing machine can sometimes get very messy. Reels of thread, scissors, unpicks, pens, rulers, etc., etc.

It all came to a head the other day, and I thought to myself, “For goodness sake, make yourself one of those lovely sewing machine mats you’ve seen on Pinterest.”

So off to Pinterest to search for sewing machine mats. And I found this great free tutorial by Nicole over at Lillyella here:

I liked the selvedge pockets and that sweet paper-pieced butterfly. I had been saving my selvedges for ages and had two big Moccona coffee jars full of them – finally, something to make with them!

Sewing machine mat

I decided to use my Bonnie and Camille stash, so off I went. The tutorial was very well written, with lots of photos, and great instructions for those selvedge pockets. I had already done some paper piecing, but Nicole suggested the tutorial over at Cassandra Madge, which you can find here.

Paper pieced butterfly

I had a quick read through her excellent photo-rich instructions to refresh my memory. If you’ve never done any paper piecing this is a great tutorial to use.

I was going to make the main mat part from navy fabric, but then I thought it would just show up all those white threads (and dust! I’m not a fan of dusting!) So I used a mid-blue cotton hoping it would do better hiding the threads (and the dust!)

I’m so happy with how it turned out! You can add ties and turn it into a sewing machine cover, but my machine is in use pretty much every day, so I left off the ties.

If you were ever thinking of making one of these mats, I can highly recommend lillyella’s pattern and tutorial.

Well, of course, then I decided I needed an extra bit of organizing and found this tutorial here at Diana’s Sewing Lessons.

Mug caddy closeup

She doesn’t have a pattern as such, just a photo of the main piece, but it was pretty easy to replicate if you’ve done a bit of sewing! I really liked the look of the binding, so I used this tutorial. But there are others out there that give the exact measurements if you’d feel safer with that, and that have internal pockets (which I felt were unnecessary for my needs).

So now I am all sorted for storage around my machine – if only I could get a lovely photo of it!

Tidy sewing area

I’d love to hear if you have any great ideas for keeping your sewing area tidy – just leave me a comment!

Till next time