Tag Archives: linen

Fun Fabrics

I was asked recently by My Girl Thursday to share my sources for the fun fabrics I have. She says she has the bug now, if you kind of sort of like fabric I’d leave now because you’ll be totally addicted to hoarding it after this post. Almost all of mine comes from Etsy shops so I’ll share some of my favs with you. Sometimes I just do a search for scraps, but my brain gets confused with number crunching the prices and shipping combos and I usually head back to the stores I know.

I’m addicted to cutesy Japanese prints. Boqinana has great stuff. It’s so hard not to fill my cart with ribbon after ribbon after ribbon. This store is also full of some great fabrics.

This and That from Japan . . . well the store name says it all. Sadly on vacation at the time of posting this but check back, it’s totally worth it. They carry great fabrics, supplies and craft books. Pages and pages of awesome I tell you!

The Hey Day Shop has fun fabrics and usually has a selection of scrap packs to choose from.

I’ve ordered from The Dainty Squid’s destash store before, not sure if it’s still up and running.

The only place I’ve been able to find fun Japanese fabrics in person is at Quilt A Bag in Markham, which is only good to know if you live nearish to there. The ladies are lovely and they carry a lot of Japanese craft books and supplies for projects, coin purse frames, handles, cute ribbons, Japanese craft books. They attend the Creativ Festival in October and carry a lot of great kits with everything you need to finish the project.

I’ve ordered vintage fabrics from Pink Fawn Designs before. While it’s pretty easy to find vintage linens if you go thrifting you can expand your collection, handy if you have a certain project in mind, and not have to use the entire sheet you bought on the one project.

Starlit Nest has packs sorted by designers, themes and even offers a big ole flat rate box deal. Shop 4 Craft has some great wooden buttons, if I’m just in the mood for buttons I go there if I have a hankering for fabric I’ll hit one of the shops that carries fabric AND buttons and get all splurgey.

For snaps I go to Cowgirl Snaps. When I found this shop I thoguht that the pictures must be tweaked adn there’s not way the colours could be that vibrant but when they arrived they were amazing. The colours are great and there are options for mixing and matching.


On my wish list are these great fun scraps. Sometimes, being in Canada, it’s hard to find scraps worth purchasing because shipping can get ridiculous. Someday I’ll splurge on these teeny bits of loveliness.

Friday Create Along

Now in the interest of being totally honest, I have to tell you I’m usually finishing my projects on Thursday nights. Which is ok with me, but usually leaves me scrambling for photos the next day! This week I was done my project on Saturday. Yes Saturday. Probably because it involved cracking open my copy of Zakka Style by this lovely lady and I couldn’t wait to get sewing.

I actually even made 2 kits since I’m involved in a handmade swap right now and I enjoyed the project a lot.

I hope she likes it! Anyone know where you can get awesome pins like those?! I can’t find any fun pins anywhere. These ones were gifts from Amy during the swaps where we happened to get each other, it’s happened twice.

Since I’m so busy this weekend, being away and all, I’m not going to choose a project for next week. I proclaim it a Create Along vacation. I’m allowed, it’s my blog.

Zakka Style Sew Along

If you have a copy of Zakka Style and are interested in a sew along there’s one going on over here. I’ll kinda sorta play along, I’m a free spirit and like to jump around and not follow directions exactly.

My new iPad cover.

I’ve had this idea for ages and finally had everything to make it. It’s so fun and I’m debating making it a PDF pattern, once I learn how to do that.

Joanna and I had a great time brainstorming a crafty address for the envelope.

The air mail ribbon is available a few places on Etsy and I ordered some fabric covered in stamp images and cut out some fun ones.

Miss me?

In my haste to get ready for my table today I didn’t post my Create Along, silly me.
But it’s probably a good thing because I’m not done my Cozy Blue creation anyway. I plan on working away on it while I sit today.

So reveal to come soon and here’s a fun quick tutorial for our next project. It’s from Noodlehead and I’ve had this page open in a tab for a while and my kids caught sight of it so now I’ve been nudged to making some.

Plus I’ve got loads of fun vehicle themed Japanese fabric lying around. Yeah, I have a problem.

It’s my birthday! It’s my birthday!

Annnnnnnd my BFF is pretty awesome.  Here’s some of the fun goodies she got me (she snooped in my Etsy favs). There’s a really cool nautical patterned fabric.

Some fun vinyl stuff, nice linen/cotton blends, fun ribbon and a button.

And this cool piece with vintage images on it, it’s some sort of panel type thing. I’ll find a use for it.

Luckily it’s a half day of work for me so here’s hoping Nate has a nice nap and Wesley is enamoured with his LEGO yet again this afternoon and maybe I can wander off and create something fun with all this pretty new stuff!

I’ve also got a DIY post featured here today, a little back to school organization sewing project that anyone with little kids to get ready will love. Hope you all have a great day, even if it’s not your birthday!

Wheee!

Ok, I got the most amazing scraps in one of my scrap swap packages. I can’t even begin to tell you how awesome the pieces were and how great they fit with the fun fabrics I love! Not to mention she threw in some fun stuff left over from when she ran a Japanese store online.

Here’s some eye candy.

Some of these Japanese prints are amazing! I don’t know if I can bring myself to cut them up and actually sew with them.

This one is great but I’m totally baffled on what it’s about. Must be another strange Japanese fairy tale, seems to be a lot of people on fire in those.

Anyhow, I’m smitten with the contents of this package. And remember to store your strawberries in a DRAY place.

My Little Red Riding Hood bag.

I love this bag already, even without handles!

I took a break from creating for others on the weekend and finished this Saturday night. I stayed up way to late to get it done I was so excited. I intended to sew the handles on Sunday morning and have a lovely new bag. BUT turns out the handles I bought (before I knew what fabric I was going to use) are too small. I won’t be able to put the bag on my shoulder and they’re so small they look a bit silly.

So I’ve rearranged my BFF night out (Thanks BFF!) so I can head to the store tomorrow and pick up a longer set of handles.

Guess I’ll have to just sew another purse for these handles I already have *smile*

I made a purse!

I know, you’re shocked right?

When I went to the Creativ Festival I hit upon 2 super exciting booths in the last aisle (apparently where I should have gone first). The combined powers of those booths have spawned this amazing purse. Oh and me staying up until 1:30 possessed with finishing it. That’s misleading, it’s a really quick bag to make, I just wandered down to my craft space really late.

Both of these booths were so crowded I had to fight my way to get to the things I wanted. At the Kallista Quilts booth I was amazed to see some Echino fabric. I have never seen any in person so it was great to get to pick from some pre-cut pieces and buy some right off the bolt. Kallista Quilts are also on Etsy if you care to see their selection. They have great quality Japanese linens.

A few booths away I found Quilt A Bag. These ladies also carry some lovely Japanese fabrics, some of the more cutesy stuff I like. They also carry all sorts of fun things to make bags and purses and totes and change purses . . . all of which are my weakness. I’ve got a little rule in place to curb my addiction, I’m not allowed to buy myself another bag/tote/purse/etc but I sure am allowed to have a new one if I work my butt of making it!!

I bought a kit for the vest bag but then went ahead and made it using a $5 piece of the Echino I got, it was just enough, a random fat quarter and I used the piece they included in the kit to line the bottom. I also got fancy and added an interior pocket and a magnetic snap.

I was really intrigued by the webbing used for straps. It was super easy to make the bag, there’s no turning because the webbing hides all the raw edges. Just fold it over and sew it on!

I’m so happy with how it turned out. Now to tackle the key ring coin purse.