Duvet Cover

I made these using STASH fabrics.  Can't believe I had the perfect stuff for the covers and never got around to doing it.  PR Stash contest saves the day!

This first comforter cover is for a Cal-King size bed and measures 88"x102".

And this one is for a twin size bed and measures 88" x 65"

Here's a quick tutorial on how to make a basic duvet cover (comforter cover).

First, take measurements of a cover you have.  Usually, you'll find that it's a few inches bigger than the comforter... sometimes up to 4" larger.  This allows for the "fluff" factor.  So if you don't have a cover but want to make one, take measurements and add a few inches.

My covers have pieced tops.  It's not hard to do,  just takes a little bit of math to add seam allowances where you piece.

It's easiest to place your button band along the bottom of the cover.  To do this, add an extra 2" to the bottom edge.  Then cut a facing piece about 2" wide by the length of the bottom edge.  I cut mine using the red fabric since I was nearly out of the taupe linen.    Make sure you interface the button band. Finish the facing edge.  Apply the facing to the bottom of the cover.  Turn, press and topstitch. Here is a view of the top and underside of the button band for the comforter cover top piece.

Make the buttonholes.  Here you can see what it looks like on the top and inside view.

The top of your cover is ready.  Now, I used a flat sheet to make the underside of the cover.  It's smooth, easy and it was already in my stash.  But... it doesn't quite match my comforter cover.  That's okay.  It doesn't bother me, and I'm saving the last of my fabric for the matchng pillow cover.   However, if you have a spare flat sheet that you'd like to use, but still have a some leftover fabric from the cover top, you could sew a border around your bottom piece using the face fabric. I didn't.  Sadly, I've now just about run out of that wonderful taupe linen. 

Anyway, to prepare the bottom section, measure the finished top piece and cut the same size piece, adding 2" for the button band.  At this point, if you want to add the border to the bottom piece, you could sew your extra fabric around the edges.  Cut 6" strips, fold 1/4" along one edge and topstitch it to the bottom piece, matching the cut edges.  You can simply overlap the corners, or get fancy and miter them.   Finish along the button edge, fold over 1 1/2" apply a strip of interfacing and stitch along the edges.  When that's done, place the top and bottom pieces right sides together and just sew around along three edges, leaving the bottom open.  Finish the edges, Give it a good pressing, sew the buttons on... and it's ready!

Kinda like sewing a giant bag... not so bad eh?

TIP:  If you have some card tables, place one behind your sewing machine, and one next to you.  It'll help support the huge amount of fabric you'll be working with.  Oh.. and it's best if the tables are either the same height or slightly lower than your sewing area.

Go to it!  It's such a rewarding project. And heck,  your bed won't mind if your stitching is slightly off or the fit is not perfect...Beds are forgiving like that...   :D

Duvet cover and Pillows

Thank God for the stash contest on PR.  I had all this wonderful fabric waiting to be made into something useful and FINALLY!  I got to work on it.

So here's a peek at my duvet cover made with a beautiful butterfly batik I found at Walmart quite a while ago... I can't remember when, but it must've been around the time I was into making shower curtains because there's only enough for a shower curtain.  I had this, plus another similar butterfly batik (I must've forgotten about buying the first one), several sashiko medallions I had made, and some leftover linen/cotton from my wedding.  The only thing I had to buy were 15 coconut buttons at 4/$1.00.  Wow.

Here are the pillows I made to match the duvet cover.

These have invisible zipper openings,  (see if you can find it in the first picture below), and the two different butterfly fabrics.  I also used the last of my navy linen to make the piping.  I had to use the second butterfly fabric when I ran out of the first.  But boy... I like it!  All of it was in my stash... including the zippers, so shopping my stash paid off!  :D  I'm happy!

I'm working on another set in barkcloth and linen for my daughter's bedroom and will include a better picture of my duvet cover and a simple tutorial next time.

Flanged Pillow Coverings

My daughter picked up the Owl panel in Japan about 9 years ago and I've been wanting to make it into a pillow cover since then.  Just never found the time or the perfect fabric.  Who knew that it was sitting right here in my stash since I got married 7 years ago!  The navy blue linen was made into table coverings for my reception, and I've been saving it in my stash.  I used some of it for curtains when we bought our home but the remainder was stashed away for a duvet cover (tutorial coming soon).

Anyway, here's a quick tutorial for simple flange pillows.    First, you'll need your fabric panel.  The edges should be prefinished.  I've already sewn my panel onto the pillow top piece.  It's cut 2" larger than the panel.  A 2" flange looks just right for an 18" pillow, and I'll be sewing the flange along the inner edge of the red border.  That'll give me a 1/2" seam allowance.

To cut the back pieces, add about 6" to half the measurement for overlap.  There will be a simple overlap in the back to insert the pillow.   You'll need 2 pieces.  Here are the pieces... not much to it eh?  :)

You will need to cut interfacing for the flange (in my case, 2 1/2" wide and whatever length it will be to cover the flange area).  You will also need to cut interfacing for your overlap.  It will help make keep the edge from stretching out and keep it crisp.  I cut mine about 2" x the width of the pillow.  Interfacings will be applied to the pillow back pieces.  Clip off the corners so the finished corners will be look crisp.  And finish the edge for the overlap.  Then adjust the pieces by laying the pillow backs onto the front piece, match the edges and fold over.  I simply folded about 2" and have about 2" overlapping.  The opening is not in the center, but I don't mind.  I prefer to have it below the center. 

After the prepping all the pieces, pin them right sides together and sew a 1/2" seam allowance all the way around the edges.  Press flat.

To make the flange,  I changed my top thread to red and used navy in the bobbin.  Then I sewed along the inner edge of the red border on the pillowtop, creating a 2" flange.  After that, I closed the overlap on the flange by hand sewing it shut.   This is the underside of the pillow. 

Helpful tip for turning corners neatly:
1)  Fold along the stitching lines first to form a nice folded corner.
2)  Lay something somewhat pointy, like a chopstick, at the corner, using it to support the corner before you turn it.
3)  Turn the corner, keeping the edges folded, and use the chopstick to push the point out.  Make sure the inner folds don't shift or it'll be like stuffing an elephant into a refrigerator. 
4)  Press.  Nice corners :)

Mitered Corner napkins

As promised, here are the mitered corner napkins I made using some leftover cotton fabric. These are my favorites and for our family, I think the smaller size works best.  We use them to wrap breakfast to eat on the road, and they are small enough for children to manage at regular mealtimes.  The bigger ones seem to end up knocking over milk cups... which kinda defeats the purpose of using napkins... mess prevention.

On the larger, dinner sized napkin, the central square measured 18" and the border is 2" wide.  It took about 1/3 yard 45" fabric in order to make this border, 2 strips, each cut 5" wide.
The smaller napkins are cut 10 1/2" with a 1 3/4" border.  I chose this size because I could get 4 napkins out of  1/3 yard of 44" fabric.  And I'm not sure how much yardage I used for the borders, but it took about 1 1/4 strips to make one small napkin.

Here's how I cut my small napkins:

Cut your central square whatever size you'd like.  In this case 10 1/2".  1" of this will be your seam allowances. (1/2" each side)

Cut your strips adding 4 times the length + twice the finished border width for each corner.  The width of the strip should be twice the depth of the border + 1".  For mine, it's 4 1/2"... 1 3/4" + 1 3/4" + 1" = 4 1/2"

Sew the strips together and press open your seam., then press the edges up 1/2" on both sides, and fold in half, matching edges and press flat.

Now, make the corners.  It's a bit hard to explain this, but you open your border and use the fold lines to construct your miters.  To make those miters, fold your border piece right sides together, matching the folds.
Then measure the width of your finished border  (1 3/4" here) along the top and bottom fold lines.  Mark.  Connect these marks to the center fold, forming a "V"... this forms the mitered corner when you're finished. Sew from one mark, up to the tip of the V, then down to the bottom mark. 

The measurement from corner to corner at the beginning of each V is 9 1/2"(see picture above).

Here's a close up.  The measurement from the vertical folded edge on the left side to the little mark where the start of the V is measures 1 3/4".  This is where you start sewing.  Don't sew into the seam allowances.

Trim the corners and close off the border.  From V to V on my napkin, it measure 9 1/2".

 Turn and press, making sure the folded edges match.  Now you've got a nice frame to work with.

Pin the center piece in, sandwiching it between the border edges.

 Sew it in.

The nicest detail here is the stitching used to sew the border on.  I used one of the decorative stitches on my machine and it came out looking very nice.  It also assured that the border on the opposite side would be caught in the sewing, even if I was slightly off.

And that's all folks!   Oh...  if you want the napkins to look good on both sides, simply double your center fabric and place them wrong sides together.  Nice!   These would make a great hostess gift for the holidays...  Gonna have to dig through my stash and see if I have some nice holiday prints! 

Coasters

So ya know, I ran out of fabric to finish those mitered napkins and got sidetracked...

I made some very simple coasters instead.  My DH is constantly putting his soda glass right next to my little laptop and of course a puddle ensues.  And I started to worry that someday, the laptop would be sitting in water and ZAP!  no more laptop.

So I made coasters and keep a couple right next to the laptop so he has NO EXCUSE for letting the water pool anymore.

They're simply cut into 4x4" squares, and sandwiched with a layer of thin cotton batt in between.  I used two different types of fabric, didn't have enough of the green one but lots of other scraps....

Then I serge all the way around, trim threads and dab the corners with some Fray Check.

  Took less than 20 minutes to make 4 of these.  And I made more napkins, dinner size, for a matching set!  Woohoo! 

 And yes, I'm trying to avoid going to the fabric store...  You know how that goes...  :D

Faith Hope Love by McKenna Ryan

I finished them all!  Here they are and they're ready for hanging.   As promised, here's a view of the back, after I finally got the invisible thread working properly... 

And this block is my favorite... mostly because of the quilted butterfly sitting on the "e".  

This project was incredibly challenging.  I think the hardest thing was keeping that thread under control, but the results were well worth the trouble.  I have McKenna Ryan's Forest Hollow pattern as well and will soon work on that one.  I'm planning on using it to create blinds for my daughter's bedroom.  She loves owls.

And on to the next project....Hmmmm... that dragon is still waiting for his wings, but I think I wanna clean up the mess here and de-stash a bit.  Maybe make something with my scraps next... I'm thinking cloth napkins...

Quilting with Invisible Thread

 First off, a huge Mahalo to Julia and Janyce for all their encouragement and tips as I struggled with this thread.  I would've given up without you guys!

It's a pain.  After a few hours of fiddling with tension, changing needles, varying spool pins, trying a few different brands of invisible thread and playing around with my BSR foot, I finally got it... maybe.  Okay... I'm not so good at it yet, but I'm learning.  Here's what it looked like at the end of day 1.

Here's some creative threading...  If you look carefully, you can see that I completely bypassed the tension discs.  The thread is running across the front of my machine.  It left a mess on the backing, but at least I got it sewing. 

I gave up pulling out the threads to start over but had to stop doing that as the appliques were getting a bit frayed.  Here's the mess on the backing that I finally decided to live with.  

I've discovered that all I really need to do is sew faster.  Oh yes,  there are a few adjustments I had to make with the tension (like bypassing it completely), and I do keep my spool in a coffee cup with a thread net around it.  I used my BSR foot UNplugged, so I'd be able to use the clear plastic foot.  Need to be able to see what I'm doing y'know.  And overall, the stitching is decent.  I'm not good at it yet, so my stitches are uneven (which is something the BSR would've solved if I had been able to make it work).  But it's finicky thread and I just wanted to do SOMETHING....

So I enjoyed sewing for the rest of the day, got a few blocks nicely quilted and quit for the day.  Looking good eh? 

DAY 2

Then I tried again later...  And darn if I'm not having the same problems. I did the same thing, had the exact same settings, and still there's a mess of thread underneath. Everytime I changed direction, I heard SCRUNCH.......;WRRR.........WHIIRRRR... So I had to stop and found a mess of thread tangled up in the machine.  So this time, I thought maybe it's being finicky about the foot.  I removed the BSR and used my free motion quilting foot.  Unfortunately, I don't have one with good visibility yet,  (NOTE to self:  GET FOOT #24).  But again, darn if I'm gonna stop now that it's working again. 

Here's a pic of what was happening.  Again, I couldn't keep pulling out thread because the appliques were getting a bit frayed. So I left this mess and decided to go on. 

Eventually I got it working again and managed to finish the rest of the blocks without much incident over the next few days.  It appears the problem was with the foot.  I have no idea why I can't use the BSR unplugged, but it doesn't work like that.  I used my Foot 27,  free motion quilting foot with the teardrop opening.  It worked well... forward, sidewards and backward.

I'll post pics of the finished ones later... maybe even back AND front views.

McKenna Ryan's Faith Hope Love art quilts

The other project I'm working on is the art quilt series "Faith Hope Love" by McKenna Ryan.  I found it at Nancysnotions.com for just under $200.00.  And it was a kit of patterns and fabrics.  I'll have to pick up batting and backing but I was surprised that everything was there.  They did substitute a couple of fabrics, but it is SUCH a great deal that I couldn't pass this one up.   The colors of the fabrics are slightly brighter, not as neutral looking.  But I think that will be nicer for my home.  My home is rather bland, which is why I thought something like this would look nice.  The slightly brighter colors will bring a more cheery look to my otherwise neutral home.

I've already finished making the blocks, just have to get the backing and quilting done and then mount them... so here's what it looks like right now...

I hope the fit nicely onto the frames.  This week, I plan to get some of the quilting done, and maybe have them all mounted before the kids are out of school.  While they're in summer school, I'll be teaching my niece and her friend how to sew, so that will keep me busy. 

Will post an update on this batch when it's done and mounted on my wall!