Puget Sound Sewing & Craft

Fabric Boards for Scrapbooking & Cardmaking

I’ve not seen this technique used by any scrapbook companies and it seems new to everyone that I teach it to. So this is a great opportunity to feature your photos in a unique and interesting way. Just make sure that you don’t use it on all your pages—as it does make your pages thicker—and your book will not close as well. Fabric Boards also work great for card-making and picture framing.

Here are the materials that we already gathered:

• Thin cardboard (Index cards work well)
• Glue Gun and Sticks
• Fat Quarters in your choice of colors
• Ribbon to match; 1/4 inch or less (Optional, but more cost effective to buy at Pacific than a scrapbook store)

Here are the steps:

Use the Fat Quarter of your choice (complement the color or theme to your photo if possible) and wrap it around the cardboard, securing it with hot glue. Pull so that the fabric is secure, but make sure that your fabric design is not stretched. Corners can be folded/finished if you desire.

Turn the fabric board right side up and embellish the edges as desired. For this one, I glued metal cats in two corners. I like the look of photos tucked under a ribbon so I also glued two ribbons diagonally at two of the corners (glue on the back only if you want to tuck pictures under them). In the past, I have also taken thick thread and made large stitches around the borders as an embellishment.

Glue your photo on the fabric board or use Easy Runner Acid-Free Adhesive to secure your picture.

Fabric boards can be layered with more than one (if different sizes) for a different or more elegant look. In addition, sometimes I string a tag on the ribbon or string to add a picture description.

Glue fabric boards with pictures intact to your scrapbook page or whatever craft that you are using it for. (A fun way to title your scrapbook page is by using your embroidery machine!)

Show it off and enjoy the reaction! Trust me, your friends will be asking, "How did you do that"?

P.S. All the Pacific Fabrics & Crafts stores have some scrapbooking supplies and embellishments. But the Everett store has a FULL scrapbooking department if you are interested in decorating your fabric boards with more than fat quarters and ribbon. What are you waiting for?

Project Linus Blanket Bee Results

On April 27 over 60 volunteers gathered to cut, sew and assemble quilts for Project Linus at the Northgate Quality Sewing Center. Project Linus is a national non-profit organization with the mission of putting a hand-made blanket in the arms of every ill or traumatized child.

Last October, the Quality Sewing & Vacuum Center & Pacific Fabrics & Crafts in Northgate completed 91 quilts. On April 27 the goal was to make 125 quilts but they almost doubled their goal and completed 151 quilts and had 97 quilts turned in, totaling 248 quilts! Wow, that is a lot of quilts for a great cause!

While 248 quilts and 60 volunteers is impressive, the event didn't stop there. All Pacific Fabrics & Crafts locations held this event on April 27 and between the Puyallup, Bremerton, Everett, Bellevue and Outlet location they completed about 380 quilts with over 100 volunteers. That is over 600 quilts made for Project Linus!

Thank you everyone who participated! To participate in the next Blanket Bee check out Pacific Fabrics & Crafts What's Happening Page or sign up for Quality Sewing & Vacuum's SewMail Email Updates or join Pacific Fabrics & Crafts Email List.

Happy Sewing & Quilting everyone!
Carmen
Quality Sewing

Craft Projects: Fabric Boards and Headboard Pads

I have two upcoming projects to share with you and I can't wait to get started on them. One is a Julie-original and the other one fairly uncommon so hopefully this will be new information that will interest you and make you...want to craft! If you want, get the materials ahead of time and follow along with me as I create. If you are comfortable, I would love to see your results too!

Fabric Boards for Scrapbooking

This is the Julie-Original and although fun and unique, too much can be a bad thing! How's that for a teaser? The benefit to small fabric boards is that they make an excellent background for the photos in your scrapbook. They are unique, will invite comments and make your picture POP! The downside is that you can't have them on every page or your book will be too thick to close (learned by-uh-experience)! So head to your fav Pacific Fabrics & Crafts store and get the following materials ready:

• Thin cardboard (think double thickness of a file folder) & good scissors
• Glue Gun and Sticks
• Fat Quarters in your choice of colors
• Ribbon to match; 1/4 inch or less (optional)
• Self-Sticking Photo Corners (optional but makes photo placement easier)

Headboard Pad

If you want to give your headboard a different look or add softness to it, this is the answer. A headboard pad with batting will add spice to your bedroom and is an easy way to dress up your room without a lot of expense. Quality Sewing & Vacuum and Pacific Fabrics & Crafts have everything that you need to craft this one. You will need:

• Your sewing machine ready to go (hand-stitching OK too)
• Fabric and thread of your choice (Measure your headboard first. You will be covering both the front and the back of the headboard. I will be doing one for a twin bed so it should take about three yards)
• Batting of the same amount
• Four feet of 1-inch ribbon to match your fabric

Get your stuff! We'll start next week...

Julie

Bellevue Pacific Fabrics & Crafts Quilt Show

Thanks to Andy and Roslyn, I had a wonderful visit yesterday at the Bellevue Pacific Fabrics & Crafts.

Children's Crafting

I loved the children’s crafting section. Everything you could possibly want for crafting with your kids is available, including Painting by Numbers, Foil Painting, Needlepoint, Purse Kits (there are also great purse handles to craft for adult purses), Crochet and Knit Kits, Coloring Kits, Beading Kits and much more.

I also really enjoyed digging through the oriental fabrics and seeing the massive array of buttons, beads and yarns available. If you ever want to see the full spectrum of colors available in crafting, I highly recommend that you check out these sections at your local Pacific Fabrics & Crafts store.

Quilt Show

Kudos to all of YOU for entering your wonderful quilts in the show. They are all beautiful and so obviously sewn with patience, care, life wisdom and heart.

 

The categories for the quilts are:

• Appliqué (I think my fav)
• Traditional Pieced
• Traditional Mixed
• Contemporary
• From Pacific Fabric Class
• Seasonal
• Employee
• Best of Show

The themes ranged from Home & Garden to Elvis to the Mariner’s, and more. The sizes ranged from small (think 15x20”) to large (think 83x98”).

“I’m sorry,” I had to tell Rosyn. “I can’t possibly pick a favorite.”

Well, she handed me a ballot anyway (ha) and it took me forever and a day to decide my vote in each category. I am including some pictures of my favorites with this post.

If you haven’t visited and voted yet, please do so. I may visit the shows at more locations. And listen—how about you enter next year so that I can see your quilt too?

Julie

Confessions of a Craftygrrrl

Anna-Beth, a SERIOUS crafter and one of the buyers at Pacific Fabrics & Crafts, has a confession for us today:

I’m getting a little worried about my sanity as the crafting bug continues to spread. There’s not many crafts I don’t dabble in – I quilt, sew, knit, crochet, mosaic, needlefelt and bead. I’ve dabbled in embroidery, cross-stitch, stained glass, tie-dying, candlemaking, textile painting, and scrapbooking.

I see ideas everywhere. Flying in an airplane, I look down to see fields as patchwork, mountains as trapunto quilting. Taking a lovely dayhike, I think of how I might use batiks to make landscape quilts of all of the sights I see. Admiring a friend’s wool sweater, I wonder if it would felt, and what I might make out of it. After seeing some adorable needle felted sushi, I picture all of my food reproduced in cuddly, fuzzy form.

My friends and family notice this fixation. My boyfriend walked out of the last James Bond movie with memories of explosions, stunts and gorgeous women. I walked out thinking of how great the opening credits graphics would be if it were a fabric line.

My mother, an avid gardener, asks me if I have my onions and potatoes planted. Alas, I tell her, no gardening, but I have three quilt tops done, a scarf and a hat half knitted, a jacket cut out and I’ve made six necklaces this month. My tiny house is bursting with fabric, yarn, interfacings, beads, wool roving, and various tools and notions.

There are some major upsides to this mindset – for instance, I am not tempted to buy expensive clothes or accessories – instead, I examine everything to see how it was made and find inspiration rather than temptation. Later, I make the garment, then a purse to coordinate, then a necklace, then perhaps a hairclip, with yo-yos and beading, all for a fraction of the price of the original, and all more distinctively suited to my taste and style.

The gifts I give are often unique and perfectly specific to the recipient: I will never forget the tears in the eyes of my goth friends who opened the machine-embroidered bat-and–rose themed quilt I made them at their bat-and-rose-themed wedding, or my bubbly happy Leo friend who delights in the eco-friendly shopping tote I made her of bright flowery fabric with lions drawn on it. I know every night that my mother, father, and my five closest friends are sleeping under quilts that I designed and sewed just for them.

There are worse obsessions to have – I could be taking home my 32^nd cat, or living with stacks of decades-old grocery-store mailers. Instead, I am productive and inspired. But I know it’s not normal to “have to” knit during a movie, or to daydream about machine quilting stitches, or to think it might be nice to take up tatting to add to my ridiculous repertoire.

Luckily, I know that I am not alone in my lack of normalcy – I can go to my local Pacific Fabrics store, or slip into a Quality Sewing to drool on the serger of my dreams (sorry about the drool, I’ll clean it up before I leave) and find others who are as crafty, and as obsessive, as me. With friends like these, who needs normalcy?