Zippered Bags

A friend recently gave me a shopping bag full of home dec samples.  They turned out to be the perfect size for some small zippered bags.  I had a small stash of thrift store zippers, and armed with some on-line tutorials, I made up a few bags.

I used some of these on-line tutorials:  Jedi Craft Girl's My Favorite Zipper Pouch, The Sewing Loft's Zipper Tab Tutorial, and the Fat Quarter Shop's video tutorial on making a simple bag.

Since home dec fabrics are heavier than conventional fabrics, there's no need to add a batting or liner.  The two layers of fabric create a substantial bag and it was fun to mix and match the fabrics. 

Ketjusilmukkahuivi (scarf)

I recently crocheted this fun scarf from a free pattern.   Ketjusilmukkahuivi(scarf) is written in Finnish, but other folks have decoded the  simple pattern and have very helpful notes on Ravelry.

You can either cut the yarn for fringe at the end of each row, or you can just crochet continuously.  At the end I hand sewed some tiny leaf beads onto the edges for added weight.

My scarf was made from a discontinued microfiber yarn with long color repeats.  I've seen others made from crochet cotton, which is often plentiful in thrift stores.  Use the hook appropriate to your yarn.

My scarf was made roughly as follows:

Chain 350 stitches, the pattern repeat is 10 double crochets and 15 chain stitches. 

At the beginning of each row, chain 3 (for the new row) then follow with 2 dc, and proceed with the pattern.  

End each row with 2 dc.  

This is a very flexible pattern.  If your math doesn't work out, go with the flow.  You can also vary the numbers of chains and double crochets to make the scarf more or less solid, for example, 5 dc and 5 chain stitches. 

Pillow Talk

I took the house blocks I'd recently made and sewed them into a pillow.  It feels good to be finished with these blocks.  

Continuing with the house theme, I sewed up another pillow with a piece of machine embroidery from Debra, and various home dec fabrics.

These make a nice group on one end of the day bed in my sewing room.

I got pillows for the other end of the day bed from this huipil--a traditional Mexican embroidered tunic--given to me by my friend Maria.  She loved this huipil and wore it until there were threadbare spots in the loose-weave cotton.

I did some very basic repairs on some of the holes, zig-zaging over the frayed edges and backing the fragile fabric with some white cotton.  Then I fussy cut some pillows from the fabric.

One of the small pillows is for Maria, as a thank you for sharing this beautiful embroidered fabric.

All of these pillows are backed with the banded portions of the fabric, and I have some pieces left over--maybe for some zippered bags.