A Tutorial Tuesday: Vintage Linens Pocket Notebooks

Since my last post where I shared my altered moleskin notebook, I've been going a bit crazy with making little notebooks. I have lots of vintage linens -pillowcases, sheets, napkins, hankies, you name it. I think they have such lovely patterns and colors so why not feature them on a little pocket notebook? I've written up a simple tutorial.

a little bit of sewin'

 Everywhere I go I take a little notebook and pencil with me. I have dozens of these things. All filled with scribbles, sketches, and whatever random thing I deem worthy of remembering. I buy a lot of cutesie notebooks but I also adore the plain little moleskines. They get the job done and they have a pocket. I am a big fan of pockets. Everywhere. Pockets.

Sewing Hiatus Has Ended -Meet Mr. Pig

I ended my long hiatus from my sewing machine with this little guy. He was about half machine sewn and the rest was done by hand. I used scraps from my vintage pile. His feet are a little wonky because the only plain black fabric I had was jersey. I'm not going to say sewing those itty bitty limbs was super fun but, I adore the end result. He needs a name don't you think? Any suggestions?

I kinda love how this picture came out. Mr. Pig looks as if he's telling a corny joke like this one: "Did you hear about the piglets who wanted to do something special for mother’s day?" "What did they do?" "They threw a sowprize party." Mr. Froggy is just not impressed.

I followed the pattern from Sew Me, Love Me and the instructions were well laid out and easy to follow. The photos in this book are lovely. All her little stuffed friends have a sweet homey look to them. Lots of patchwork and button details. I've already started on the next one!

Hope you're having a lovely day.

the benefits of cleaning out my closet

I come from a long line of pack rats. This can be frustrating ( such as when you are attempting to clear out 25 years worth of stuff out of a 4 bedroom house). But, sometimes I find awesome stuff that can become even more awesome. Example: this dress of mine from around the mid-nineties. The brand was "Chocolate Soup" -anyone remember that? I thought it had a lot of potential to be reconstructed into something I can wear now.

First, I separated the top and bottom portion. The rest was cake! The embroidered bit on top was destined to be a necklace. I decided to turn the bottom portion into a high-waisted skirt. This was my first attempt at shirring, which I now love after realizing how easy it is! I was aided by the tutorials over at Pretty Ditty and Threadbanger.

The results:
a lovely necklace


and a shirred skirt -

Ah, finally... a completed sewing project. I'm quite proud of this one, even though I literally hit a snag here and there. But, one broken needle later and many glances at the manual and I have this retro beauty.
I'm not new to sewing but, I'd still call myself a beginner. I used the folk bag pattern from the book, One Yard Wonders (which means this purse only cost me $12 to make!) The instructions were easy to follow and I learned a much smarter way to make a pocket and insert a lining. I'm going to make another one of these bags with the Heather Ross ponies fabric I've been saving. I had a bit of fabric left over so maybe a matching ipod case or card wallet is to follow.