Small Things

Simple things, easy things, no-brainier things.  
That seems to be my typical summer activity. 

I've just been working on a few little projects to fill in a few hours here and there and to escape the sun and the heat of summer by retreating to my cold, windowless basement craft room. I really would prefer to have windows in my craft room but in the summer, windowless is perfect. I'm not a summer person. 

This is a pencil case, or a zipper pouch for anything. Made with Grunge Basics by BasicGrey for Moda Fabrics in bright colors and a print from the Doe collection by Carolyn Friedlander. These are some of my new favorite fabrics. 

This is my First Aid bag. Someone is always looking for a band aid and for some reason they always seem to end up in two or three different places around the house. And all the other little things that go with them. Where are they?  This is my solution. One bag to hold it all, in one place, and very obvious. It might work for awhile.

A little butterfly bag. This was actually suppose to be smaller to use as a tarot card bag but it's a little larger than I planned on making it. After I started to make it I realized the butterfly print was too wide for the size bag I was planning so I just worked around it and made a little bag anyway. We can all use an extra little bag for something, right?

And a scrappy table runner. I've seen a number of examples of the Trip Around the World quilt block made with scrap fabrics online. They are all so unique and interesting and such an incredibly simple pattern. I see it as a sort of organized randomness, the best of both worlds. And a great was to use up a pile of scrap squares. 

Thanks for reading. 

Aileen 

This and That

So I've been working on a little of this and a little of that.  That's another way of saying I'm just doing what I feel like at the moment.  One day it might be sewing, another day it might be artwork, or it could just be doodling. 

Artwork. 

I finally finished the collage I started working on some time ago. This started as a canvas covered in narrow strips of fabric, painted in shades of purple and used and the backdrop for the smaller squares the small squares are made from thin strips of various purple fabric prints collaged onto painted card stock paper that was then cut into 1 1/2" square and the edges dipped in dark purple paint. The squares were then glued to the background canvas and coated with clear acrylic gloss medium. 

Doodling. 

I decided to try to turn this doodle idea into a font using the iFontMaker app on my iPad so I could use that font in another idea I have to create a print in Photoshop. 

My cell font idea. 

Sewing. 

I love all the new fabrics with unexpected prints especially all the text and graphic elements. And I love the Grunge Basics line of Moda fabrics especially the turquoise blue, so I decided I needed a new pen/pencil case made from this fabric because it will be something I use every day. 

I didn't like how the first one came out (that little misalignment is driving me crazy) and it wasn't quite the right size for my collection of gel pens, so I made another one.  

This is perfect and big enough for my growing gel pen collection. 

I started using gel pens when I found out they don't bleed through any paper especially Moleskine paper and I have several Moleskine notebooks and planners I write in daily.

How many gel pens in your collection?

And I had this little crazy piece of over stitched patches that I made just as an experiment and decided to make it into a little bag. 

It's full of sharpies. 

Thanks for reading. 

Aileen