Black Friday Sale!

Black Friday is coming! Are you ready? Well, I'm having a sale in my shops to add to the fun!

30% off on all orders, before shipping, in both my Etsy shops! Enter code "Black Friday" in your note to seller & your money will be refunded through Paypal.

Valid November 27, 2009 only.

Exludes custom orders.

Have fun shopping!!!

It's all too much!

Well, I have totally neglected my poor blog and all you wonderful readers! But I will be honest, I’m totally stressed out! I know, I know, you’ll say “but Heather, you JUST had a baby… like, what, 4 weeks ago?”… Yeah, right! Jameson is 7 weeks old now. He’s out grown his newborn cloth diapers and I’ve been scrambling to get the next size of cloth diapers sewn. I made 16 medium sized (12 to 20 pounds), half of which are all in one’s and the other half are pockets and of those half have snaps and the other half have Touchtape… so that’s 4 (all in one’s with Touchtape), 4 (all in one’s with snaps), 4 (pockets with Touchtape), 4 (pockets with snaps)… for a total of 16. Confused yet? Good. So am I. Ok, maybe I’m just tired. Then, my husband, hard worker that he is, is out of town for the 4th non-consecutive week of Jameson’s 7 weeks of life. I say non-consecutive because he was home last week but is gone again this week. It’s tough with a newborn and it sucks for all of us. He’s military so I expect no less. It’s life! It’s just hard on all of us especially my almost 7-year-old son, Ian. You would think we’d be used to it by now. Oh and I just had another thought… Ian will be 7 at the beginning of December! I feel old now… and I’m not really old in numbers really. I’m 25… there I said it! Anyways, what else is stressing me out? The holidays. This is one of those years that I could really care less and would like to just lock myself away with a bottle (or 2) of really good wine (maybe that pear wine my hubby is brewing in the basement will do). Lol Why? Well, it’s not just because we are short on money. Lord knows, everyone is short on money. But because I feel no spirit in this holiday season… just obligations, things to do, stuff to be made. My Etsy stores have always brought me joy and satisfaction but I could honestly care less about them right now. I’ve had lots of requests for custom items and when I respond with pricing, time frame, you know the usual business stuff, well, I get no response back. What’s a reasonable time to wait for a response? I would say maximum of a week but it’s been longer and yet still nothing. SOOOOOO….. all custom order possibilities have tanked so far. It’s very frustrating and sometimes I wanna cry. I’ve been thinking I should just let my stores run themselves for awhile. What I mean by this is I won’t be sewing anything new or listing anything new but I’ll just relist items when they expire and ship items when/if they sell. That way I won’t be setting myself any goals that I know are completely unattainable right now and I won’t feel let down by not being able to attain said goals. I have more important things to worry about right now! I really want to make myself some aprons. I have made myself 2. Yes, the lady who sells & sews aprons, has only made herself 2 measly little (not so pretty just functional) aprons. *Sigh* I want some pretty, seasonal, holiday aprons. I also want a clothespin apron. So that’s what I’m going to do instead of sewing for my shop! Who knows what will really happen but it’s worth a try! Now, I’m off to Facebook because I’m an addict…

Love ya!

~Heather

Garden Bouquet Quilt: Month 12- The Zinnia

“I suppose that I should have kept the zinnia for the last flower since it comes last alphabetically, but I am so fond of the stocky, sturdy blossom that I had to put it in sooner. Zinnias always make me think of autumn luncheons with decorations in the warm, soft tones. There are the dull old yellow, the faded pinks, the sooty purples and lavenders and the burnt orange shades. As you can see I have suggested petals by scalloping the edge. And the gradation in color is made possible by the four sets of circles on top of another.”

“How would we appliqué those circles, Nancy? Should we have four complete circles with an upper layer always superimposed upon the lower, or shall we cut for scalloped discs?”

“You will find it easier to appliqué and keep in shape if you cut the four circles and then lay one on top of another. Of course, that means that there will be four thicknesses of cloth at the center of the flower but that is not serious.”

The members had pieced the lower half of the diamond-shaped block. It made the urn to which was seamed the upper triangle of white. On this was appliquéd the zinnia with its stem and leaves and the two birds. Some of the members appliquéd the birds ahead of the appearance of the flower. They had spare time and could do it easily. These women usually used the same material for all the birds. But those who changed the coloring of the birds to match or contrast with the coloring of the flowers waited until the new pattern appeared.

In every case the urns were all made of the same colored material. This gave a repetition in the quilt which made for beauty. The pattern as given in today’s paper was cut, along with its accompanying directions, from paper.

Then a light tracing of the design was made on the white triangle. This helped to place the pieces correctly when they were ready for appliqué. Next a tracing of design was made on light-weight cardboard. This was cut into its pieces and laid on the color fast materials which are used for the pattern. The zinnia petals were made darker toward the outside. That is, four shades of the color chosen were used. Plain color is better for this flower than a figured pattern material. In cutting the pieces of cloth a quarter inch allowance was made on all sides for turning under of raw edges. These were turned, basted and pressed. Then they were laid in place on the traced outline on the triangle, and the pieces pinned in place. They were appliquéd with slanting, invisible hemming stitch.

Sometimes Nancy advised making the flower stem a little longer than shown here. This raised the flower above the birds’ heads. Because of the limitations of size in the paper it is impossible to make the stem quite as long as Nancy would like to see. Bias tape is used for stems.

The members were so enthusiastic about the zinnia they wanted to make another one, but Nancy said no. She promised them a phlox for the next flower.


I haven’t been able to work on my Zinnia block so I don’t have anything to show off. I will update this when I do get the chance!

Do you have any Garden Bouquet Quilt blocks to show off? Leave a link to your blog post about it in the comment section or email me a photo at heathers_custom_sewing{at}yahoo.com so I can share with everyone!

I hope you are enjoying this series!
~Heather


Quick Links to:

Month 1: Beginning Instructions, Urn, and Basket Instructions
Month 2, Part 1: The Tulip
Month 2, Part 2: The Saucy Bird
Month 2, Part 3: The Meek Bird
Month 3: The Cactus
Month 4: Lily of the Valley
Month 5: The Wild Rose
Month 6: The Trillium
Month 7: Canterbury Bells
Month 8: Nasturtium
Month 9: The Pansy
Month 10: The Tiger Lily
Month 11: The Primrose

Hand Appliqué
Machine Appliqué
Alternate Method of Appliqué Tutorial
Biased Binding Tutorial

Surviving the Holidays

Winter nostalgia by Marcel Lorange

The holiday season has quickly come upon us! It can get a little crazy for me as I deal with family and business commitments.

The best advice I can give is to learn how to say “No!”

Sometimes that is hard to do when I have customers approach me for custom orders and I really want to make whatever they request or when I have 3 different families expecting us to come over for Thanksgiving dinner and Christmas Eve for presents.

For my Etsy stores I have found that creating a custom order dead-line is essential. Basically, you must get your orders in by the first week of December so I have time to sew everything and ship the item. I don’t want to commit to something and then not be able to complete it on time! I’ve also had to turn some people away so that I don’t over extend myself. I hate doing that but it’s a must if I’m to survive the holidays in one piece. I also tend to make to-do lists and set goals for myself. That way I can see what I accomplished. Instead of going throughout the day and ending up feeling like I did nothing, I can go back to my to-do lists and think “oh yeah, look how much I got done today!” This is a must for any time of the year not just the holiday season.

When it comes to family commitments I’ve also had to learn to say no. What works for us is to rotate holidays with everyone. We may have Thanksgiving dinner with my family one year but not come to visit on Christmas. We would switch holidays the next year. My husband’s parents are divorced and remarried and we also switch holidays with them. Sometimes if one family has an event early we’re able to make it to another family’s event later in the evening. I think one Christmas we decided to stay home which was great for our stress levels! Switching who we see on holidays also cuts down on Christmas gifts, which is easier on our wallets and on my sewing machine. Doing things this way doesn’t always make our families happy but I would rather have them unhappy then us being harried and stressed because we spent most of the holiday in the car driving from one family to the other (and only being able to spend an hour at each house). Talk about serious burn-out!

So that is basically how we survive the holidays. I hope it gives a few of you some ideas to help you survive this holiday season!

Happy Halloween!

We had a great Halloween night! My boys dressed up and we went trick-or-treating around our little town. Ian dressed up as a military commando. This was the very first costume he saw and he didn’t want anything else because he wanted to be like dad. (Ian is almost 7 & I’m already preparing myself for him to join the military because I just have this feeling that he’ll be joining as soon as he’s old enough.) Jameson was a teddy bear. He was so cute and we got lots of compliments! We stopped at my brother-in-laws house and he thought I was holding a stuffed animal at first until the baby moved. LOL Here’s some photos!