Princess bed curtains for Anastasia's fifth birthday.

My oldest granddaughter Anastasia turned five in October, with her mom's fabulous help we made curtains for her.

 First we chose the drapery fabric from my stash.

Since I live in Manitoba and Shannon lives in Ontario I packed the fabric in my suitcase to assemble at her house.

We made a trip to a fabric store to get the purple fabric for the ruffle and top banner as well as Michael's craft for the purple ribbon.

Shannon did the ruffle gathering and pinning.

The ribbons are attached with Babyville snaps easy to put up and take down. Also, if they kids are pulling on them they unsnap.

Shannon made the curtain tie backs.  They are attached to the bed posts with snaps and velcro closures around the curtains.

 Shannon added LED lights around the top.

  Anastasia loves her new princess bed curtains. 

reversible bucket sunhats - adult size

Made sunhats for the grandkids using this free pattern.  The pattern was upsized to adult by Jennifer here.  The first adult size is for my daughter Shannon.

 Pinning hats right sides together.

Stitching hats right sides together at brim and leaving a 2 inch turning gap.

 Setting brim in place for edge stitching.

Shannon chose multicoloured butterflies with rainbow tie dyed batik.

 

Shannon's chin straps have yellow velcro hook and loop tape closures. In the photo below I tied the chin straps under my hair.

This lovely floral hat is mine. 

 The chin straps on my hat are 20 inches long no need for velcro, just tie them in place.

 Great practice sewing straight lines on a curve. 

 Love this hat. 

Bring on summer. 

Happy stitching all.

Reversible Toddler Bucket hat

Doing some sewing for my grandkids with this fabulous "Hungry Little Caterpillar" print. First things first fabric auditions:

The caterpillar and cupcakes are on white, lots of colours to choose from.

 Batiks

 Yellow and rainbow batik

 Rainbow batik one side and cupcakes the other.

 Or mix them up?

No did not mix them up.

 Size small for our two year old granddaughter.

The free pattern (update January 2021 pattern is no longer free) has templates from xsmall to large size.  There is a step by step tutorial as well.  I followed the instructions in the pattern, made the hat then checked out the tutorial.  The tutorial added a step of stay stitching the top edge of the hat sides before clipping the seam allowance to fit the top circle and stay stitching the top of the brim before clipping to fit bottom of the sides of hat.  This was is a good added step.  According to the instructions in the pattern and tutorial you make the brim then clip the seam allowance to fit the bottom sides of the hat.  Next stitch sides A of hat to brim with right sides together.  Then press 1/2" edge wrong sides together of side B pin side B to brim in place matching the side seams.  Hand stitch hat B to brim then top stitch to secure it.  I eliminated the hand stitching part, just topstitched hat top B to the brim.  

My daughter suggested chin straps.  Introducing "Ball Head" my toddler hat model. 

The straps are two inches wide and 8 inches long.  I sewed 1/4" seam allowance, clipped the corners and turned it.  Edge stitch the length and ends of the straps.

 It fastens under the chin with velcro hook and loop tape.

 

 Buttonholes to transfer the straps to the other side. 

Version 2.0  I sewed rainbow batik hat A and hungry caterpillar with cupcakes hat B separately as two hats. 

Attached the chin straps to hat A.

Then put one hat inside the other right sides together, stitch the bottom of the brim all the way around leaving a two-inch gap to turn the hat.  

Wrong side view of hat before turning.

Clipped the seam allowance close except the turning gap.  

After turning the hat right sides out, the brim seam was finger pressed, then pinned in place before pressing with a steam iron.  Next, I opened up the turning gap to clip the seam allowance of the turning gap before edge stitching all around the bottom of the brim, which closed the turning gap.  Next top stitch rows 1/4" apart to finish brim.  Then make buttonholes for the chin straps.  Lastly, sew the velcro hook and loop tape to the chin strap ends.   Bucket hat version 2.0 is completed. 

 

 Hat A Version 2.0 has more pink and less blue.

 

 Brim down? Brim Up? 

After I finished this hat I realized I forgot to edge stitch lengths and ends of the chin straps like I did in Version 1.0.  Ooops.  The straps look more finished with the edge stitching.  Hat making is fun.  For me it was much easier to sew hat A and hat B separately first as I did in Version 2.0 instead of following the instructions in the pattern and tutorial. 

Morning Glory wall hanging for Palliative Care

Last month a fellow quilter was downsizing her stash.  She donated several blocks as well as other UFOs (unfinished objects) to Nifty Needlers and Project Linus.  This Morning Glory was 16 blocks paper pieced, there was no outside border, batting or backing.  First I removed the paper from the blocks and stitched them together.  Then I went through my stash to find suitable border fabric.

As the finished piece will be hanging in patient's room who is palliative care, I wanted it to be extra special.  Opted to add high loft batting behind the blossoms for trapunto quilting which would give the flowers a 3D look.  The high loft batting was stitched to the top with water soluble thread.  Then the extra batting was cut away to the stitching.  Next the top was sandwiched together with 100% cotton warm and natural batting and an ivory muslin back.

The green leaf veins were quilted with 100% polyester machine embroidery thread. I like to use embroidery thread for free motion quilting because it is shiny.

The background pebbles were done with a thread colour called White Sand.

Densely quilted to make the blossoms pop up, add texture as well as visual interest.

 Heart-shaped leaves design on the outside border.

 Binding is Susie's Magic Binding technique. 

The pattern used 16 - 1/2" yellow buttons for the centre of the blossoms.  I have six big jars of buttons but not 16 little yellow buttons.  Instead of buttons, I appliquéd small yellow circles of flannel.

Ta da!! The finished piece measures 30" by 30".

Then I spent the rest of this afternoon, hanging a curtain rod and turning my large piece of flannel into a quilter's story board.

 Happy quilting all.