Category Archives: sew

What’s up?

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I hope you’re enjoying your Memorial Day 🇺🇸 celebrations in the USA today.  Or it’s just another Monday where you live and you can enjoy it as well.

Too much time and not enough motivation.

We are getting our deck boards replaced…hopefully this project will begin this week.  If the contractor doesn’t call this week, I will raise some 💩!

I had to rip back 12 rows of the Luminary socks I started as I screwed up the pattern.  Back on track now.

I need to replace the cushion covers on our porch furniture.  The closest IKEA is not opened yet and I’m NOT paying $200 for shipping!  I also don’t want to make new covers.

So I’m just not motivated to do much.

How about you?  Motivated?

Masking

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Last summer I snagged two facemasks from my doctor as we thought we had to remove something foul from under our deck and I wanted us to be contaminated from any airborne grossness.  As it turned out, we didn’t use them…until this pandemic.

As these were single-use masks, I needed to make something to cover our faces while out and about picking up necessities: food and wine.  I can’t remember where I found this mask pattern but I changed it as I went.  If you are interested in a how-to, just say so in the comments and I’ll see what I can do.

I found some prewashed cotton in my fabric stash and set to work.  Instead of using elastic around the ears, I found some bias tape I inherited from iPad aunt that I sewed together for the ties.

I also made a channel in the upper part to insert a twist tie (doubled for more strength) to keep the mask against the face.  This way I can remove the wire when I wash the masks.face mask

face maskface mask inserting wireI marked on the side that rests again the face with a fabric marker so we can see at a glance which end is up.face mask

The bottom is open for any additional filter we may want to insert.face mask

We have to make another food run later today so these will come in handy.

Are you making do with homemade face masks?  Or were you lucky enough to have had a small supply stashed away?

 

Vintage mute

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Our oldest grandson plays trumpet in his middle school band and the regional honors band concert was this past weekend.  Fortunately, we were able to attend the concert and he did a fantastic job playing with his peers from eight surrounding counties.

As usual, I snapped this picture mid-blink.

Anyway, he needed a bag of some sort to store one of the mutes for his trumpet.

A mute is a device fitted to a musical instrument to alter the sound produced: by affecting the timbre (or “tone”), reducing the volume, or most commonly both.

I found this vintage musical fabric in my stash.  It was vintage as it is only 36-inches wide and it came from my grandmother’s house.  I don’t know when the fabric manufacturers changed to 42-44 inch wide fabrics but it was a long time ago (1960’s or ’70’s).  I thought it was perfect for the bag except that it had some pink instruments on it and I knew that he wouldn’t like that.  So I got out my permanent fabric markers and went over the pink with the red and filled in some white trumpets with blue.

The lining is from an old fleece robe that was too long and coordinated with the outer fabric.

I cut the parachute cord drawstring too short to knot the ends so I just wrapped some black thread around the ends about 20-25 times, stitched it securely then burned the nylon ends with a lighter to keep them from fraying.

The bag has a simple box bottom.

I’m not sure if he liked it but it will keep his trumpet mute clean and cushioned on his case.

More bags

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These little bags make a great gift idea that only takes about an hour or two to complete.  Of course, when making 28, it takes a bit longer.

The small “what-not” bags I sewed together for our church’s fundraiser are finished.  Some are made with vintage fabrics from the 1950s, 60s, and 70s and some are from this century.Small notions bagsEach one is different in some way.  Some have different zipper colors or different lining fabrics, or both.

Small notions bags

Now to pack them up and get them to the church for the Christmas Tea this Saturday.