Christmas Inspiration

Ok ok, Im sorry if you're getting sick of reading about Christmas in blog land, but Im in serious need of some inspiration at the moment!  So what do I do?  I turn to Pinterest! 

Doing accounts have dulled the creativity in my brain of late so I needed a little crafty eye candy to get my imagination working again.

Here are a few of my favourite festive projects I've found on Pinterest.

This would make a perfect gift for a sewing friend, or you could even adapt it for a child who wants to learn to sew!

From grosgrainfabulous.blogspot.com

I want these for my little ones!

From thismamamakesstuff.com

I've got so much left over card stock from when I used to be into cardmaking, this project would be perfect and you could make baubles in almost any colour theme!

From Homemade gifts made easy

Perfect stocking fillers for a friend who travels or even for your childs school bag!  Definitely going to give these a go as I have so many scraps that would be perfect...

From Project Naptime

I love these trees!  Have seen them several times around the interweb and always say Im going to do them.  This year, I might even get round to it!

From UK Lass In US

So those are a few of my favourites.  I'd love to see any inspiring Christmas makes you have going on at the moment?  Please feel free to leave a link in the comments.

If you want to see more of whats inspiring me, all our Pinterest boards can be found....here!

{Giveaway} Merry Christmas Craft Pack

Ok so now that Halloween and Bonfire night are officially out of the way, surely I'm now allowed to talk about Christmas?!  Especially as the weather has taken a decidedly wintery turn and a lot of people are already talking Christmas decs!!

Bearing this in mind, I decided to have a little giveaway to get you feeling festively creative.  The giveaway is being hosted over on our Facebook page but if you're not on Facebook, please feel free to enter here!

The prize is one of our Merry Christmas Craft Packs (as the title would suggest!) which contains a FQ of Christmas fabric and a selection of co-ordinating buttons and ribbons.  Simply follow our blog and comment below to say you'd like to enter!  The giveaway winner will be announced on Sunday at 8pm.

Of course if you cant wait until Sunday to find out if you've won, you can always purchase direct from the site.....here and all our Christmassy goodies can be found....here!

Good luck!

{Tutorials} Lots Of Reasons To Sew!

Do you follow our boards on Pinterest?  If you do, you may have noticed me pinning lots of sewing tutorials lately (as well as lots of other things....its so addictive!).

 

In particular, I've been looking for projects using Fat Quarters.  My love of sewing started with a fat quarter of fabric I picked up from my local fabric shop just because I fell in love with the print!  The possibilities are endless and you can do so much with just a fat quarter of fabric.  Ok, you're not going to make thirty metres of bunting with it but you can make a fair bit!

 

So, if you are looking for an excuse to buy fabric (and lets be honest, who needs a reason?!) here are some of my favourite tutorials from around the web, using fat quarters.

 

Monograme Hoop Décor by Crystal from A Pumpkin and A Princess

A Fat Quarter Drawstring Bag by Amy of Diary of a Quilter
 

Pretty up your desk with a fabric mouse mat!  Tutorial by Funky and Delightful

These would look so cute in this fabric for my nephew! A quick tutorial
by Very Homemade.
 

A very useful kindle cover by Skip to My Lou

And last but not least, a cute little tutorial by yours truly! 

So there you have it, lots of very good and valid reasons to buy fabric this weekend!



 

The Sewing Directory Exeter Meet Up

I was really delighted to be invited to a meet up in Exeter organised by the lovely Fiona of The Sewing Directory way back in May.  The time has whizzed past since so I was really excited when Fiona emailed with directions and info about the event at the beginning of September!  

It was the second event Fiona has organised following the huge success of the first one and I was invited to bring along some lovely fabrics to tempt all the lovely sewists that would be attending!  Exeter is only a two hour drive from South East Wales where Im based so I packed up my little shop and off I went!

Tempting fabrics!

Habdash section

I met some really lovely people who were all their for the same reason...because we all love sewing.  We were sewing bags for Making For Charity and I can honestly not think of a better way to spend an afternoon...surrounded by like minded people, sewing and drinking coffee (there may have even been a cake or two!)

The lovely people on my sewing table

We were given excellent tuition by Kerry from verykerryberry who demonstrated different appliqué techniques we could use to decorate our bag.  I'm afraid I wasn't very adventurous due to a huge amount of time spent talking so my bag had some raw edge appliqué and that was about it!  

The finished results!

Kerry gave us a set of templates to use for the appliqué and it's amazing how many different variations people came up with.  

All in all, a very lovely day was had by all and Im very glad to have made the trip down, if only to have met some wonderful people.

 

{Spooky Bundle Giveaway} We Have A Winner

I was going to use the random generator to work out the winner, but there was just too many ways to enter and too many people who entered!  So I went back to the trusted method of writing out all the names (three times in some cases) and pulling them out of a hat, or in my case, a very pretty heart shaped basket!

The were given a good mix before I picked.  I would have asked one of my little helpers but they were in bed.  You may have already seen the winner over on our Facebook page but incase you didnt, the winner was....

Congratulations Hannah!  Your prizes are winging their way to you as we speak!

{Whats New} Bake Sale

So we're back to our routine, kids are back in school and for the first time in a long time, all is quiet at The Sewing Boutique HQ.

Good job I've got lots of orders and new fabrics arriving to keep me busy!  I might even try and squeeze some sewing time in soon as our latest range of fabrics that arrived today has got me thinking of kitchen projects!

Its full of summer brights, flowers and fruit with a bit of spotty fabric thrown in for good measure!  

So what am I going to sew with this??  The first project on my mind is this for my youngest....

From youcanmakethis.com 

My youngest adores her dolly so Im thinking she would love and apron for her and a matching one for "baba".  I think these fabrics would be perfect for that!

Im also putting together an oven mit tutorial with some matching pot holders so watch this space for those!

What would you be inspired to make with this range?  Does it say anything to you?  Would love to hear your thoughts on our latest range!

p.s. pop back tomorrow as we'll be announcing the winner of our Spooky Giveaway Bundle! 

Pretty Patches Magazine

One of the (many) things I love about being a fabric shop owner is that every now and again, Im lucky enough to receive copies of the latest crafty magazines.

The newest kid on the block is a magazine called Pretty Patches.  The title alone is something that grabbed my attention and straight away I knew it was going to be right up my street!

Their website says..."If you love fabric, you'll love issue 1 of Pretty Patches magazine. A 100-page bundle of pretty projects, easy-to-follow tutorials, fabric collections, haberdashery, shopping, chats with designers and fellow makers, must-try sewing courses, and all the latest from the world of quilting patchwork and appliqué."   They're not wrong! 

The cover is exactly as you'd expect it...so pretty and as the tag line says "If you love fabric, you'll love...." indeed you will.  There's loads of inspiration for fabric lovers and sewing enthusiasts out there.

There are a number of projects in the magazine that come with easy instructions so, although they may look complicated, I reckon even a beginner could give them a good go and end up with some fantastic results.

This is the project on the cover of the magazine and this photo alone would make me pick it up!  Its a simple enough project, I reckon the big patchwork would make this come together so quickly you could probably do it from start to finish in an afternoon. 

There are also a few really inspiring interviews from crafters and quilt makers and all round crafty peeps from the industry.

Ooh look, there's even a crafty little advert for your favourite sewing shop ;) 

I dont know why, but sometimes when I've bought crafty magazines, I've been left feeling a bit...dare I say, deflated.  The cover promises so much and looks so tempting, but the projects are never something I'd try and the interviews just dont inspire me.  So many of them are trying to be "edgy" and appeal to a younger market group.  Not so with Pretty Patches.  Now Im not saying that will be the case for every issue of this really new magazine, but so far, very good and I hope it continues.  

So, to conclude, I LOVE the new Pretty Patches magazine, a lot!

p.s. I was neither paid nor asked to write this on my blog.  Just thought I'd share how happy I am to have found a new favourite magazine :) 

Market Night - Tonight!

Ok, so I probably should have let you guys know about this before hand, but I'll be honest it's kind of been a last minute idea.

I've got quite a lot of ends-of-roll remnants that need shifting.  They are odd shapes and leftovers from when a roll of fabric is finished but its not enough to make up a FQ.  So I decided to host......

What is a Market Night, I hear you ask?  Basically, its like a real shop having a sale, but this one is virtual and takes place in the comfort of your own home!  The event will be run via Facebook as that is the easiest platform for me to put up an album.  There are a number of designer and non designer fabrics going in the album and just to give you a teaser, here are two...

Anthology Fabrics - Raining Rainbows - Dots

Riley Blake - Happy Ever After - Dresses

At 7.30pm tonight (GMT) the virtual doors will open.  I will be putting up an album of our remnants with the size, price and postage.  The first to comment "SOLD"* will then need to send me their PayPal address and I will send out an invoice.  The invoice will need to be paid by midnight tonight to make it fair to everyone as the album will be up until 12pm tomorrow.  

So that's it, simple really!  Click on the picture to go to the event on Facebook and be there at 7.30pm** sharp to take part.  Any questions, please dont be afraid to ask!

Good luck and hope to see you there!!

* obviously the "SOLD" doesnt need to be in capitals!  In the event that two people comment at the same time, the only fair way I can do it is to give it to the person who Facebook puts at the top of the list.

** I may put the album up sooner but please dont comment before 7.30pm. To be fair to everyone, any comments made before 7.30pm will be deleted.  All in the name of fairness!

{Giveaway} A Spooky Bundle!

Its been ages since we've had a giveaway of any sorts, and this ones a good one, even if I do say so myself!

A little while ago, just before my jolly to Weymouth, we reached 6000 likes over on Facebook, or as I like to call them Facebook Friends!

We had a bit of an issue with how to do the Giveaway via Facebook as there seemed to be lots of rules and regulations.  You had to use a third party app, most of which I didnt understand, you couldn't notify the winner via Facebook but had to be by email, well I dont have most of my likers emails so how did that work??  I know we have run giveaways before via Facebook but I didnt want to risk my page being shut down and losing all my lovely Facebook Friends

Anyway, to cut a long and not very interesting story short, Facebook announced within the last 48 hours that their rules have changed and I can now host the giveaway exactly as I want to!!

So here it is lovely bloggy friends....

Its a spooky one!  You can win four FQs of Halloween fabric and six metres of coordinating ric rac and ribbon.  This is especially good if you're looking for inspiration for your Halloween makes this year as the possibilities are endless with this bundle!  Perhaps you could add some black binding to make some spooky bunting for a Halloween Party?

To enter, just pop on over to our Facebook page and like and share the giveaway.  For extra entries, simply follow our blog over on the left or follow us on twitter.

Feel free to comment below or over on our Facebook page and you have until Wednesday 4th September to enter.  Winners will be announced on Friday 6th September.

Good Luck!!

{Whats New} Autumn Feel Fabrics

Oh how I love autumn.  Easily my favourite time of year...summer is to hot, winter is too cold but autumn is just right (in the words of Goldilocks!).  I love the colours that are associated with autumn and when I saw this collection, I new I had to have it in the shop because it would make perfect little dresses for autumn!

The collection is by Sue Daley for Riley Blake Designs and is called Tueigs and Grace (pronounced too-igs? Please correct me if Im wrong!)

Calico in Pink

Damask in Cream

Garden in Pink

Petals in Brown...and my favourite!

The Petals is my favourite and already, I have a picture of a little pinafore dress with tights and boots for the winter for my littlest one! 

So, thats this week new fabric, Im looking forward to the next lot already!

Which print is your favourite??