Sunday, September 6, 2009

Reuse and Recycle

I have been using the sewing machine as you can see. I am just doing some small things to learn as I go. This is the Kokeshi Stuffie from Melly & Me.




Cute and very easy. I have to work on sewing around the curves as these didn’t turn out as neat as I would have liked. I also ran out of stuffing material and it isn’t stuffed as much as it should. But overall I really like it. The embroidery was fast (as its all backstitch and few lazy daisies) and simple with minimal sewing. I am getting better at the ladder stitch to close up the turning holes.



This will show you the backing material I used.
This was my next project. These are crooked coasters from thelongthread.com.


I learned machine quilting and changing the feet on my sewing machine. I had to use the walking foot with the thickness of the material and batting. The linen set is some linen material from a shirt that I don’t wear anymore (the kokeshi doll was made from this shirt also). The white set is just some white cotton material I have had for a while to use with embroidery. I absolutely love these. I have a linen and white coaster on my desk at work. I haven’t washed these yet so they don’t have that quilted wrinkley goodness yet, but they will.



This set of coasters comes from a pattern from foofanagle.wordpress.com.


These were very fun to make. I learned to piece for quilting with this. The first few I made didn’t match up in size with the backing and batting and I realized I was using too large of seam. I changed that and they worked great. So, so fun. These were made from that linen shirt also with some scraps from some fat quarters I had.

These have been great to work on and have gotten me comfortable with my sewing machine and even hand sewing. I want to start a small quilt now.
As for the title of this post, I have used one linen shirt to make all of these projects and I still have more (I think I may make another Kokeshi doll). I have been going through my closet and the kid's closet for good material of things we don't use anymore or are stained or torn. I don't have a big budget for material so this has been a great way to reuse things that are old and really no one would want to wear. I have a closet full of acid wash jeans from my skinny days. I think I might make something from those.

2 comments:

Anne at Film and Thread said...

Thank you so much for stopping by my blog during the giveaway. Your work is beautiful! I hope you keep going. I just made a quilt out of my husband's old workshirts and I use old blankets sometimes for the batting, so the costs stay reasonable.

The pictures of the flash flooding are a little scary!

Suzanne said...

your little doll is so sweet! i'm going to go check her out and maybe make one myself. thanks for commenting on my blog's giveaway. check in and comment often. ps. i love the name of your blog. cheers suzanne.