Matching Pouches

I wanted to make a matching pouch to go with the bag I made awhile back with the Go Anywhere Bag pattern. Pouches are a great way to use up scrap fabric. I had just enough extra fabric for these pouches.

After doing some research online, I decided on this popular dumpling pouch. It's quite cute and looked very simple. However, I must say I am not a fan of this pouch. It doesn't hold up very well, and when it's open, things fell out of this pouch easily. Also, because there are no ears on each side of this pouch, you really can't hold on to anything to zip or unzip it. I usually purchase my zippers from Jo-Ann, and these zippers are usually great, but not for this pouch. I had a very hard time opening and closing this pouch. I think the curve of this pouch made the zipper very difficult to slide up and down. I even waxed it! Who waxes zippers!?!?

Not bad!

So of course, I decided to put this one aside and make another one using this tutorial. I have used this tutorial many times in the past and highly recommend it. Except this time I decided to modify it a bit  so it's slightly bigger for my mom to store a few more things in it. I used the same zipper here, and it's no problem! Lesson learned: buy a nice zipper when the shape is curvy!

Same fabric but with a pink zipper. It's so feminine... I love it!

So cute together! I gave both of them to my mom so she can decide which one to use.

I splurged tonight and bought some super nice fabrics from Japan. I cannot wait to have these fabrics in my hand! This purchase inspired me to organize my existing fabrics and look at what I "discovered!"

 So dreamy...

I had these fabrics already all cut up into 6"x6" squares! Can someone tell me why they have been put away all these years!? I didn't have a rotatory cutter back then and used a scissor to cut them up at the time. It is fun to look at all these unevenly cut squares :) 

Hope you are having a great week so far.

Happy Mother's Day

Recap of mother's day this year...

An amazing and simple summer dessert. This idea came from Angie's Pantry. Basically you take an orange and slice off the end of it so it can stand up. Then you slice off the top and save it for later. Remove as much of the flesh of the orange as you can and place the empty orange cup and top in the freezer. Instead of using orange sorbet as per Angie's instructions, I used strawberry sorbet, vanilla ice cream, and passion fruit sorbet (in that order). These Belgium waffles are from Wholefoods. 

 This was a huge hit!

Beautiful peonies for my mom; these peonies are as big as my hand and the fragrance is simply unlike any other flower. I think this is my favorite flower of all time. 

Love the bright colors. 

 And of course, hot chocolate to conclude this wonderful day.

Wishing all mothers a very happy mother's day. You deserve the best, and only the best. 

Lavender Field

We have been blessed by nice and warm weather in our area, so we spent a good amount of time in the garden today. While we were in the yard, I noticed my lavender field is blooming! Just a few months ago I thought they were dead! Good thing I didn't get rid of them.

I cut them up and brought them into my house :)

I placed them throughout my house for the fragrance.

They are tied up into small bundles using twine. 

These lavenders are so beautiful in their own way. I love how they are not huge, but make such a presence... field of lavender is a breathtaking scene. Also, did I mention that the fragrance is so fresh, clean,  and sweet?

Pretty Little Pouch

I wanted to stop by and show you pictures of this beautiful little pouch Katie made. Katie writes at There and Back and she has some of the most beautiful creations. I came across a pouch she made on flickr for one of the swaps I participated in; I noticed she made another one with different fabric. I commented on that post and was the winner of the pouch! Can you believe it?! Over 68 people commented, and I won! Woohoo!

Pouch

Pouch - inside. I love this subway map fabric! *gasp!*

Combination of solid fabric and random placement of these fabric makes this pouch an eye catcher. Katie also spoiled me with tons of goodies, including Aruifil thread and a modern pink key holder! I have been wanting to try Aruifil quilting thread since so many people are blogging about it. I think she made the key holder? I have to take a picture of it to show you. It's amazing. 

Katie: thank you! This is such a lovely pouch and all the goodies you included are so wonderful!

Baby Lamb for Baby Shower

I have been tasked to design and make invitations for an upcoming baby shower. I took my honorable task very seriously and started to sketch out a few designs that can be created easily. The theme for my friend's baby shower is lamb. After scratching out a few ideas, here is the one I decided on.

Love gingham! So appropriate for baby shower.

These measure approximately 2.5"x3.5" and will be placed in the lower left hand corner of the invitation. The invitation itself will be printed on nice white card stock paper and layered on top of a blue shade card stock. I am sure green grass and simple flowers will be drawn somewhere on that as well. 

All stacked up and ready! 

The hardest part of designing this lamb was making sure it can be replicated easily. Body parts were glued using glue dot foams. I love this product; it makes the end product three dimensional! I hope recipients of these cards find them adorable and show up to my friend's baby shower with bells on. 

Some of you may know that I love Sunbonnet Sue, especially the Japanese version. My dad knows Sunbonnet Sue is my favorite sewing character, so he went out of his way to buy me one of the last few limited edition Sunbonnet Sue coaster sets!

 The clothesline/laundry one is my favorite. 

These coasters are backed with cork and when not in use they go into this little container.

I can tell you that I will probably not use them as coasters; they are way too cute for that purpose! I will find a way to properly display them. Thanks, dad! He not only took the train to get to the store, he even fought the crowd to get one of the last two! And he didn't even tell me about it until he went through the trouble of buying them. *happy*