(Thanks Zack for being my fabulous model and rockin' out my apron! You are a great kid and a really good sport!)

Supplies

1 tea towel (mine measured 20" X 28")

1/4 yard of coordinating fabric 44"-45" wide

4 yards of ribbon (mine was 1/2" wide)

about 21" of twill tape (width of towel plus a touch extra to turn ends under)

Before starting pre-wash fabric and tea towel

The Ruffle

With right sides together sew across each end of fabric.

Turn right side out and press.

Gather the fabric. I zig zag stitched over dental floss close to the edge, then pulled the dental floss to make my ruffle.

Sew ruffle to bottom of tea towel(right sides together). Before turning lay a piece of twill tape across the raw edge and stitch using a long stitching length. Tuck ends of twill tape under before stitching

Turn (open ruffle flat) and lightly press. This is how it will look from the back.

Edge stitch across on the front.

The Apron

Fold in top two corners  of the tea towel and trim. I folded my towel in thirds to decide where to cut. If you want it wider at the top try folding them in only 1/4.

Trim off corners, turn raw edge under slightly and stitch close to the edge. Fold edge over wide enough for the ribbon to slip through,  allowing enough for seam. Press. Really though, you could just fold over the corners like the above picture and sew the casings!

Stitch, making a casing for the ribbon. Feed ribbon through each casing.

The ribbon goes through each casing, crosses in the back and ties in the front.

Finished!

You might be interested in the half apron made from a tea towel, or this cute apron for kids. Don't forget the chef's hat!

]]> http://www.skiptomylou.org/2010/02/25/simple-apron-tutorial/feed/ 21 http://www.skiptomylou.org/2010/02/18/a-drawstring-bag-tutorial/ http://www.skiptomylou.org/2010/02/18/a-drawstring-bag-tutorial/#comments Thu, 18 Feb 2010 13:36:39 +0000 cindylouh http://www.skiptomylou.org/?p=11453 I was needing a little gift bag to hold some note cards for a sweet friend who has been spending way too much time at the hospital and I thought a fabric drawstring pouch would be perfect.

I used a piece of fabric 6 1/2 inches by 21 inches, but it can be made any size!

Turn each end under  1/4 inch and stitch along the edge.

With right sides together stitch sides together using a 1/2 inch seam, stopping two inches from the top.

Pink  edges and press side seams open.  At the top where the side seam is open, stitch around  the opening on each side.

Fold top edge down 1 inch and stitch all the way around close to the bottom edge.

Cut two pieces of ribbon or cording about 22" long each. Feed one piece through casing and back out the other casing coming out on the same side of the bag.

Repeat with second cord on opposite side.

Tie the string ends on each side together. (You can hind the knots in the casing part if you work at it)

Fill the bag with some goodies and you have a nice little treat!

The oilcloth receipt wallet went together quickly and I was able to use up some scraps.

Supplies:

2 pieces cut 7 1/4" by 6 1/2"

2 pieces cut 2 1/2" by 6 1/2"

about 14 inches skinny double fold bias tape

miniature clothes pins

Fray Check

Elmer's Spray Adhesive (optional)

Teflon presser foot or masking tape to cover bottom of presser foot to keep oilcloth from sticking to presser foot (if necessary)

Instructions:

Slip bias tape around the 6 1/2 inch side of the 2" wide piece and stitch. It can hang off the edge, it will be trimmed when finished.

Place the two large pieces wrong sides together. I sprayed just a touch of Elmer's Spray Adhesive in the center to keep the pieces from slipping. Try to keep adhesive away from area that will be sewn. Place pocket pieces on each edge. Use miniature clothes pins to keep in place. Sew close to the edge all the way around the wallet, reinforcing when sewing over bias tape. Trim bias tape and place a few drops of fray check on ends. (I was going to just wrap the end of the bias tape to the inside before stitching, however it made it bulky.)

Ta Dah!

Note: I get my oilcloth from Oilcloth Addict! Be sure to check out her personal blog, ModernJune, for some fabulous oilcloth tutorials and great tips for sewing with oilcloth.

Some special ladies and my sweet sister in law will be wearing these fabric sunflowers today to celebrate Kansas Day.

It took some cutting!  We used Wisecraft's tutorial, but changed the shape of the template. (I will put up the templates later)

Stack the two large flower shapes on top of each other.

Next fold one of the smaller flower shapes in half and place it on top of the larger flower shapes.

Take another small flower shape and fold it placing on top at a 90 degree angle.

Place another small flower shape on top at a 90 degree angle.

Place the last small flower shape on top at a 90 degree angle.

Sew a button on top, making sure you catch all of the folded layers. Next, sew a pin back on the back of the flower.

You can sew clusters of buttons, single buttons or stacked buttons.

Happy Kansas Day!

If you want more ways to celebrate Kansas Day you might be interested in:

Candy Sunflower Cupcake Picks

Sunflower Cupcakes

Sunflower cake made from Twinkies

I had everything I needed in my stash --tea towels ( from IKEA left over from another project), Heat N Bond Lite, bits of fabric, ribbon and trim.

To make the applique I drew  hearts on the paper side of the Heat n' Bond lite. Next, iron it to the WRONG side of the fabric. (If appliqueing a letter or number it must be drawn in reverse on the paper.)

Cut out the hearts.

Peel the paper from the fabric hearts. There will be a layer of glue on the backs of the hearts.

Stack up the hearts and iron to the tea towel. Stitch around the edges. After washing the edges might start to fray. If this is not okay, go around the edges with Fray Check.

Sew trim across the bottom of the towel.

Don't want to applique? Sewing a ribbon across the bottom of the towel is another simple way to dress it up.

If you want to learn more about applique check out this tutorial on simple monogram appliques. Reverse applique is another great technique that can be used to dress up a birthday crown.

we love you...

but,  is time to see you go!

White Chocolate and Peppermint Popcorn

• 16 oz. white chocolate (can use white chocolate baking morsels) or almond bark
• 1 cup finely crushed (like sand) peppermints (about 10-12 candy canes or 40 mints) I crush my peppermints in my food processor. The mints will scratch the plastic.
• 4 quarts popped popcorn (about 1/2 cup  corn kernels) I used this to pop my corn, so it had salt. If you are using air popped corn, throw in a pinch of salt when you sprinkle in the crushed peppermints.

Slowly melt white chocolate or almond bark in the microwave or on stove-top with double boiler. Stir often to keep chocolate from burning.  Stir  1/2 cup crushed peppermints into the white chocolate.  Place popped corn into a large bowl.  Pour melted white chocolate and peppermint mixture over the popcorn. Gently stir to coat popcorn while sprinkling remaining crushed peppermints over the popcorn.

Pour out onto parchment paper and allow coating to harden.

oh yummy peppermint popcorn!

You can even drizzle with chocolate like Our Best Bites!

If you don't like popcorn you might give Peppermint Bark a try.  Miniature candy canes make great heart suckers and cupcake toppers ---perfect for Valentine's Day! Learn more here.

Marie at Makes and Takes also has a round-up of ideas for left over candy canes.

Chef Hat Instructions

Supplies:

1 -  18" circle

1 -  8" X 24" rectangle

1 - 8" X  24" lightweight to medium weight iron on interfacing

dental floss

1/2 inch Velcro (about 12")

3" piece of double fold bias tape

Instructions:

Iron interfacing to 8" X 24" piece following manufacture's instructions. Press  fabric in half lengthwise and press each edge under 1/2".

Fold piece right sides together, starting 1/2" down from open side, stitch across each end. Turn right side out.

Stitch a 3" piece of bias tape around an edge of the circle.

Zig zag stitch over a piece of dental floss starting and stopping on each side of bias tape.

Gather.

Pin band piece around the gathered edge. Find center of band and center of top piece and begin pinning there.  Adjust gathers until the band fits the gathered edge, starting at stopping about a 1/4" over the bias tape on each side (notice how the 1/2" that wasn't sewn on each end neatly slips around the bias tape). Pin heavily to keep in place.  This takes some adjusting but it is so nice to have all the unfinished edges covered.

Sewing very close to the edge, sew band to top of hat, removing pins as sewing to keep band flat. It might be necessary to slightly pull the band to keep it smooth.

In the back fold left side over as far as the bias tape opening will allow on top of right side. Place Velcro in this overlapping area and sew all four pieces to hat band.

Sew along each edge of each end if desired, to close area placed over bias tape.

Finished!

I decided to give one of my sponsors Above All Fabric a try. I couldn't have been more pleased. The customer service exceeded all of my expectations --- she even visited with me on the phone helping me make my selections.  I was also thrilled with her prices, on every fabric she is below retail and has loads of sale fabric. The fabric selection is also tops, carrying all of the popular designers.  She also has a point reward system where you earn a point for every dollar spent and turn that into cash towards future purchases.  While she is a sponsor, I did not receive any compensation for writing this nor did I receive free product.  I wanted to pass along a great find!

Check out craft tutorials from all over the web every Monday at Made By You Mondays right here at Skip to my Lou!

Be sure to visit Make It Do, her blog is overflowing with creative ideas. Calli says, "In this blog I want to explore how happiness can come from simple things, and how good old fashioned hard work and resourcefulness might just be making a welcome comeback…."

Calli writes...

Yesterday, my girls and I were working on a few Christmas gifts for their friends.  One thing led to another and I found myself making yet another flower pin.  This time a Poinsettia.  I loved this project and ended up making two for my girls, and plan on making more.  They are perfect as a broach or as a hair clip.

Here’s what you will need:

• Small amount of red wool felt (I used scraps from another project.)
• Very small amount of green wool felt (also scraps)
• button
• pin or hair clip
• freezer paper
• template  here is my simple template, but I also found this wonderful template from Kaboose.  It has a few more petals than my simple flowers, but that might look even better, here’s the link: Kaboose Poinsettia Template

1.  Start by tracing your pattern onto the paper side of a piece of freezer paper.

2.  Cut out your template, and place it on your wool, waxy/shiny side down.

3.  Using an iron set to wool, iron on the template.  It will gently stick to your fabric.

4.  Using good scissors, cut out around the template.

5.  Peel the template away from the wool.  It doesn’t leave a mark.  Isn’t that cool?

6.  Repeat with the smaller flower.  I just set the button down to see how it would look.

7.  Cut a 1 1/4 inch circle out of red or green felt.  Cut two small slits in the circle, just wide enough to slip a hair clip through.  This is for the back of the flower, on which to attach the clip or pin.

8.  Using just the bottom flower, stitch the circle around the back of the flower.  I used white thread to show the stitching better in the photo… Yah, that was it.  It wasn’t because my machine was already threaded with white and I was lazy.  That wasn’t the reason at all.  I was just thinking of you.

9.  Somehow I missed taking a picture of cutting out the green center of the flower.  I cut my green with a fluted edge, which was a little tricky and requires good scissors.  You can also cut it in a circle, but in that case, I would choose a button with a fluted edge.  I was dying to try pinking scissors, but I don’t own any.  So I just cut the fluted edge out carefully.  Sometimes you just need to make it do.  The finished green center was a 7/8 inch circle fluted.

10.  Layer just the smaller top flower, with green center and button on top.  And stitch together going through all three layers.

11.  Glue the bottom and top flowers together using hot glue.

There’s a front and back view, with a hair clip attached.  I like that this flower is flexible, I can easily pull out the hair clip and I can slip in a broach pin to wear on a sweater, hat or scarf.

Here it is pinned on a sweater…

Thanks to an idea a reader told me about on Craftzine, I also thought this would make a perfect topper for a gift.  That way the wrapping is actually like giving another gift.  (Using cheap yarn is much, much cheaper than ribbon!)

Print these on sticker paper and you have a whole page of cute labels from Fresh Picked Whimsy

Festive gift tags from Orange You Lucky

Erin Vale has created these holders perfect for gift cards.

I love the labels that wrap around a card like these from Kellie at Scraplog

or these from Miss B shared by Creature Comforts

and these from Up Up, the Blog

Benign Objects shares a set of printables; cd holder, labels in all sizes, labels for jars and a pillow box

Cottage Industrialist has some patterned cards with nifty envelopes

If you have some last minute mailing to do, Make Do & Send has made mailing labels.

From On A Limb printables that could be made into stickers or tags

More free holiday labels and tags found here and here.