Well, My daughter wanted to do a swap since I've been participation in so many. She had only done a little bit of sewing. She wanted to make a crazy patch pincushion. She chose all the fabrics herself. Then I showed her how to use the iron, and used fusible web to put her little pieces of fabric to a basic square piece of material. I watched her closely during this process. Then I taught her different hand embroidery stitches for her to use on the edges. She did all the work herself. The only thing I helped her with was making the knots and the blind stitching to close the pincushion when it was stuffed. I'm so impressed at how well she did. She is swapping it with my Mom. Who also had never done a swap before. She was just as excited as my daughter. So my daughter is sending her pincushion in the mail today. 
Yesterday, My mother-in-law told me she was going back to Northern Ontario on Friday to go to a baby shower for one of her nieces. I asked her why she waited so long to tell me...I would have made her a baby quilt. Well, since I was off work yesterday, I decided to just whip up a simple baby quilt with stuff I had. So I got it all done in about 4 hours. I think that's quite good. I even machine stitched the binding. I had never done that before. It turned out nice. I wouldn't use that method too often, but it's nice to know I can manage it at crunch time. I hope you like it. It's very simple. I tried the wavy quilting that I've seen others used. I like it. All I had to do was wash the quilt. Then it would have that nice crinkly look. 
Hi everyone! I hope you all had a great day. I worked today and ended up being forced to stay at work for an extra 2.5 hrs. I was not that happy about that. But there wasn't much I could do about it. One good thing about today is that my Snickerdoodle Paper Bag Swap partner received the package I sent her. So now I can show you what I sent her. I made her a wall hanging mini quilt. I hand pieced it and hand quilted it. I used the pattern Patchwork Cottage by a Canadian pattern company called The Rabbit Factory. I made a few changes to it since this pattern is for a whole quilt and I only used one of the blocks to make my mini quilt. This pattern was great and the instructions were very easy to follow. 
I gave her a nice notebook and also gave her the Patchwork Cottage pattern. Just in case she would want to make the whole quilt. I really enjoyed making this little quilt. I almost didn't want to send it to her, because I loved it so much. But I was also excited that I had put my all into this little quilt, and hoped that my partner would love it as much as I did. And she did. I'm so glad. 
So, then I got adventurous. I decided to try to make a bag for one of the boys. I find it hard to make things for them, without them looking too girly. So, I made a small bag with a zipper that he can put over his shoulder and be hands free. I wanted it to have a zipper on it, because they all seem to misplace things that were in their pockets. So I though this would work. The outer material is canvas weight. I think it turned out pretty good considering I just did it without a pattern or anything. It's a large coin purse that I just modified a bit. I added a few front pockets. The boys couldn't believe that I made it. So that's a good sign. My older boy said: "It looks like a purse. But I don't care what others think. You made it for me." He is so sweet. You gotta love them. My oldest is 13 and is taller them me by about 4.5 inches. He's going to be a big guy. Well, I have to go. 
