NPM: American Girl Doll Outfit!

So it's time for another New Project Monday, and today's project I am super excited about! I finally got back on my sewing machine and made a wonderful outfit for my American Girl doll! The patterns I used were from Simplicity 0380 which I can't seem to find on the Simplicity website anymore, but here is a google search of the pattern! 
I got creative and combined two outfits to make this one, the skirt is from "A" "B" "C" and the top is from "G" and "F". 
I made the skirt first and when I finished realized I didn't have anything for my doll to wear with it! I went to my sewing box, remember this one? and found some blue fabric that matched the skirt really nicely. I had originally wanted to use white, but the only plain white I had is for a quilt I'm working on, and is a little stretchy, which (I thought) wouldn't work too well here. I have had this skirt precut for a while, but wanted to finish it up, and realized it's perfect timing with the Olympics on right now, and my patriotic outfit!! 
I literally just finished the top and was so excited to see how wonderful it really looks together! Thankfully it was a sunny day so I ran outside and snapped some pictures :D

TA-DA!

Elizabeth is all ready to cheer for Team USA!!

  If you notice, the trim on the top matches the trim on the bottom :D

and with a flick of the wrist, this outfit becomes.......

this super cute jumper!! Look it was so easy to change she stayed in the same spot!

Now Elizabeth is ready for a night out!! Or...

a relaxing day by the pool!

I hope you all love this new outfit as much as I do! It was a ton of fun to make! I would love to know what you think :D

Be back soon!

~Megan~

RTT: Organization

So yesterday I was talking with a wonderful woman about crafts when we got to the topic of organization. She, like myself can get buried in crafting clutter, and while my *ahem* workspace (aka bedroom) is still not quite as clean as I would like I spent the better part of the morning organizing my yarn and sewing bins, pattern folders and other knick-knacky things. I thought I would share my pictures with you, and maybe inspire some of you to organize your crafting space (cause lets be honest, we crafty folks tend to have messy crafting spaces!!). 
So without further ado, here we go!

eep my sewing box exploded!! (I didn't think to take a picture of everything shoved in there haphazardly, I apologize :P)

first things first, organize my fabric. I have seen a lot of people organize by color on Pinterest, and I figured that would work for me too. All of my fabric used to just be stacked on top of one another which made it impossible to get anything from the bottom without messing up (and having to re-fold) every other piece of fabric. With the folders I am able to look inside a color folder to see my fabric without having to mess with the others. I recommend using folders that have closed sides like the one in the green box, it keeps everything form falling out, I ran out of these and started color coding my folders with my fabrics as well!!

Here is the finished sewing materials box, much easier to find everything now!! I have used a dowel (3/8 thick I believe!) and run my ribbon threw it so I would be able to keep them all together and able to be pulled out and rested on the top of the box, like it is in the picture. All my heavy weighted fabrics (quilting, and flannel) are folded in the bottom right of the box (they wouldn't work in folders very well!) and I have my fabric bundles and jelly rolls together, easy access for the new quilt I'm going to be making!!

A quick peek inside my knitting box, it's hard to tell in this picture, but all the skeins are stacked so that you can see the color when you open the lid, I wanted to show off some of my other tools that I love, I have my sizing chart, that lets me check if my gauge will be correct based on the weight of the yarn and the needles I am using, clipped to the lid are some highlighters so that they aren't lost in the mess of yarn. I use highlighters for my cross-stitching to mark what I have already done so I don't get lost on big patterns (like the one I'm working on now!) 

The green boxes are from Michaels and I got them on sale! They are super cute and hold a LOT! I stack my crafting books in-between the two boxes so I always can find the pattern or project I want!

The two glass jars are also from Michaels and I use them (and a lot of other ones not in the picture) to hold all of my small items. The left one holds various buttons and a few colorful rubber bands, the one on the right, paper clips, I have others that hold binder clips as well. I also find that DMC/Nicole brand floss holders work really well to hold small items that don't have any other home, like the ones I have in mine :)

This is something new I'm trying, these are all my small McCall, Simplicity and Liberty Jane patterns. I put them in plastic protectors and clipped them into (the only) binder I have empty at the moment. A trip to staples is in order to pick up a much larger binder!!'

All printed patterns and instructions (including the "take me I'm free" project guides from stores) are kept in an accordion folder, and labeled to make sure I can actually find things :P

This is my knitting box, I take this everywhere with me. My great aunt (the one who taught me how to knit when I was 8) gave me this and I love it! The top tray comes out and all the needles are underneath. I keep things like a tape measure, extra yarn, the little red things are quilters thimbles which I use with the really small knitting needles because they tend to rub against my fingers in a terrible way. 

 And lastly my wonderful sewing machine, I got my Singer Promise for Christmas this last year from my boyfriend, it was so sweet, I had mentioned that I always wanted a machine and he picked this one out for me :) I keep it in this awesome bag from Michaels (though it was clearanced out after I bought it... boo) it was meant for scrapbooking but it fit my machine better than any of the actually sewing machine cases! (and it's much prettier!)

So that's it for Random Thought Thursday, tomorrow I'm going to be introducing a new segment with Hank the traveling Hamster (and Harriet my girl version) it going to be kind of like flat stanley but funnier :P Hope you see you then!

~Megan~

New Project Monday: The Mini Quilt

Hi everyone!

So as I mentioned on my Thursday post I have been working on a special little quilt for a wonderful young lady. She has been going through a very trying time and I wanted to make something small that she could take with her that would remind her just how much she is loved. Here are the results of that thought:

Here is the "overhead" view of the quilt. I loved this charm pack and thought that they were bright and cheerful. The heart in the middle square I made following this tutorial (please be kind... it's the first attempt! :P)

I love the fabric on the back, it is hard to tell from this picture but it is made up of flowers and small white birds. It is also ridiculously soft and snuggly which was exactly what I wanted! I made the binding from the same material and was pretty proud as this was literally my first EVER quilt that I finished (and I made my own bias tape! which was not as easy as you think!) 

 The words "You are Loved" were hand sewn by me in purple thread. The letters were based of a font I downloaded from DaFont.com which you can find here. I typed the letters and pinned them where I wanted them to go and went ahead and sewed over the outline of the letters, then ripped the paper off... maybe I'll make a tutorial and upload it if anyone is interested!

This is the finished product on her bed with her beloved stuffed animals. I gave this to her last week and she has told me that she's slept with it every night. (It looks very tiny on her queen sized bed but it's probably around 30in x 30in. 

Hope you enjoyed my quilt! I had a blast making it and can't wait to *actually* make the quilt I have planned for my own bedroom!!

I'm hoping to post some of the products that I'm going to be selling on etsy within the week. Just working at this point on inventory :D

Thanks for reading!

~Megan~