Organisation

In a fit of enthusiasm the other day, I decided to fold and pack all my bits of quilting fabric neatly.  Here is the result:

These are all my fat quarters (or bits thereof) and other small lengths of fabric bought for quilting not dress making.

Now I just have to decide how to organise them.  By colour?  By pattern?  By theme?

How do you organise your fabrics?  If you have the same fabric in a few different colours do you store them together, or in their own colour piles?

Monthly Design Challenge: Music & Dance (A late entry)

This wasn't my first idea for the April Monthly Design Challenge but my first idea didn't serve any current purpose so never got beyond the research stage.

Friends of mine recently announced that they were expecting their first child, 7 weeks after me (who isn't pregnant at the moment??).  She had never really wanted children, he always had, she'd finally made the decision that she would do it for his sake because she didn't want to deny him that.  I've spent my whole life wanting to be pregnant and now am struggling with it, so I wondered at how she might be coping considering it's not something she'd ever thought she'd do.  I wanted to make her something to help her enjoy the experience a little.

I found that as soon as my belly started to gain a little weight and size, it was very uncomfortable sleeping on my side, but a small, squishy pillow I'd made my husband previously was just the thing to support the baby when I was lying down.  So I decided I'd make something similar for my friend.  Simple,  small, easy to post (they're in Sydney), and personal.

This is the result

The treble clef is machine appliqued and, although it doesn't show well in the photo, is fabric with music printed on it.  The back of the cushion is the same blue fabric.  It's machine appliqued using a blaket stitch.

My friend is a music teacher and her husband (also a dear friend of mine) loves dragons so I wanted to combine something of them both.  It's about 30cm high and is only fairly lightly stuffed so it can be squished and folded as needed to create comfort.

It was handy that she is a music teacher because a gift personalised to her also fitted the design challenge theme.  I had thought of it before the end of April, but everything around here takes twice as long now.

The only other creative-ness I've done lately is a pair of tracksuit pants to fit my belly and a t-shirt for my hubby.  This weekend I hope to start cutting out the applique pieces for the coffe quilt.

Why I hate dressmaking

Actually I love dressmaking, but even when I don't have an ever-expanding belly, in order to get a vaguely decent fitting garment, I have to turn this:

 into this:

And of course then adjust any facings and the back to correspond.  At least I don't have to mess with the armhole because that sucks.

For my efforts though, I now have these (from two different patterns):

I added fabric to the front of the woven ones so I have more space for my belly, but the knitted ones had a bit of room anyway.  Hopefully they'll last me for a few months.  The brown one was actually a bit of a protype before I'd done the proper pattern adjustment.  I was feeling lazy but realised if I wanted a nice top I'd have to put the work in.  I have fabric to make another like the purple one, but I think now I'm going to work on pants next.

Unfortunately I don't have any old pants I'm willing to cut up to make maternity pants out of so might have to try from scratch.  Otherwise I'll see what the op shops have to offer because I'm taking a tip today.  Also have fabric for trackie pants, but right now I need work/weekend pants that I can wear out.

Also want to have a go at making Megan Nielsen's maternity shirt, so will be looking for a shirt to do that to as well.  I can't pinch one of hubby's shirts because they were all too small for me before I got the big belly.  Damn skinny boys!!

On a separate note, off to the Australian Quilt Convention tomorrow.  I have a small spending allowance because hubby splurged on something last week, and I have a few projects that need some extra fabric so hopefully it will all work out well.  Either way I think I'm bound to see some lovely quilts!