I recently made a couple of Quilt As You Go Pouches by Svetlana Sotak from her book That Handmade Touch.
The pattern caught my eye for it’s cute shape and ability to make use of scraps. I’m such a scrap saver, and I love a project that makes good use of them. It feels like I’m cleaning up my sewing space and making something at the same time…because I am!
This is a great scrap project, because it can make use of any scraps big or small. Both pouches are made from some Jetty and Collection CF leftovers that I have in a basket from some other projects.
I generally tried to color each pouch a little differently, because I was making them as gifts for two friends.
For the quilt-as-you-go part, you make up two panels; one for the front and one for the back. I love seeing how the little details that you worked in to each panel get sewn up into the pouch.
This was my first time making one of Svetlana’s patterns, although I’ve admired them for years. It came together really easily, and I don’t think these will be my last!
Pattern: Quilt As You Go Zipper Pouch by Svetlana Sotak in That Handmade Touch
It’s not too often that I finish a knitting project, and so it’s a celebration when I do. This Shoji cardigan (pattern by Norah Gaughan) is a project that I started back in December 2016, and I finally finished it a few weeks ago. Yay!
I loved the project as soon as I saw it in a Brooklyn Tweed collection a while back. Living in Florida can make knitting challenging at times, because it’s never cold enough to warrant a ton of knitted stuff. What I liked about this design was that it looked like a cozy blanket that you could layer over whatever else you’re wearing. This seemed appropriate for how I tend to dress in the winter here. Plus I was intrigued by the shape and construction. It’s knitted as a long rectangle that gets sewn together and added a collar.
The yarn I used underwent quite a transformation after being fully knitted and dipped into a natural dye bath of cutch with my friend, and expert dyer, Kim Eichler-Messmer. Below are some of Kim’s very helpful samples dyed from a variety of things. They aren’t a promise for what will happen, but good approximations of what all can happen. My Shoji, a swatch and extra yarn pre-dyed are there at the bottom. It’s very different, right?
The yarn was a fun color to start with, but even though I alternated skeins every row the color variation was too much over the course of the entire project. It looked super patchy, and I wasn’t totally convinced by the shade of pink. As it was, I didn’t think I’d ever wear it outside of my house. I figured it was worth a shot to see what could happen with a little experimenting.
The color came out more gorgeous than I could have ever imagined! That’s it on the left. (We tried some other dye baths as well.) For some reason I figured the only fate for this sweater would be to become navy or black. Brown was not something I’d even thought of as possible, but after seeing her samples, I knew that’s what I wanted to try. I figured it could be a good fit.
The sweater fared the dying process surprisingly well. I know that it probably grew a bit, which is fine–it is still cozy. I ended up tightening up some of the seaming that was loosened during the process, but otherwise not much else needed to happen.
Now that I’m officially done with my Shoji, I can a) wear it(!), and b) get back to work on another knitting project that I started over a year ago. The front and back are done, and I’m working on the sleeves.
I can’t stop thinking about all of the sewn gifts I want to make this holiday season. Are you thinking about that too? If you are looking for ideas for quick favorites, here are some trays and pincushions in Jetty and Collection CF.
I always use Quilt Market as an excuse to make small, sewn things for the booth. Baskets, trays, and pincushions are always easy to set on the table to hold stuff. This time I made 3 trays using Noodlehead’s Tiny Treasures Tray tutorial, some pincushions and a couple of mini thread catchers.
The Treasures Tray is such a great project that comes together quickly, shows off some fabric and is super useful once they are done. I always find about a million uses for these around the house and in the sewing room.
Anna finishes her trays with leather handles, which is definitely a good-looking finish. I was surprised by how easy the leather handles and rivets were last time I made these, but sadly I didn’t have any leather scraps on hand this time. Rummaging around for an alternative, I decided to give webbing a shot. I like the look of the webbing, but I quickly discovered that it can be a little trickier than the leather. Mainly, webbing can be thicker, and so getting the rivets in place was a test in patience and persistence. I’m guessing that they make thicker rivets to solve that, but I made these work.
PSA: if you use webbing, it’s a good idea to hit the ends with Fray Check to prevent fraying.
Inside the basket are a couple of pincushions from my Crew pattern. They are G and H if you’re wondering.
On the black one I made sure to include some of the selvage so you’d get that fun white stripe on the side. The yellow one also makes use of the selvage design on the fabric.
It is a good thing that all of these projects are speedy, because it’s hard to make just one. I can’t remember exactly, but basically all of these came together in the same day.
Leading up to Quilt Market I couldn’t stop picking out pairs of fabric for possible Rye projects, which made the fabric pull for these super easy. They may not have made it into a Rye, but I found a use for them here.
The little thread catchers are the mini version from my free tutorial here. I LOVE traveling with this tiny size, and they come together in a flash. At the show they held my business cards nicely as well as the thread clippings from my demos.
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