Stitched Cards

Here's another quick and easy project to do.

All you do is find some card or thick handmade paper and sew some thinner paper to it. It is much better to do it on a sewing machine, but if you're brave you could try hand-stitching it. You could even use a pencil to mark where you want to go and do a fancy design, or 'write' Happy Birthday on it.

Then, have a photo shoot with your cards. Good props (background items) are necessary!

See you soon!

Oh, and check back on Monday to see who the winners are of the giveaway!

Mini Felt Bag Tutorial

Want to enter a giveaway? Scroll down to the previous post to see what's up for grabs!

Want something easy to make, but really cute?

Try this.

A cute little felt bag, and a great alternative to the felt phone holders I made here. These felt bags can hold your phone and a few other little things. :)

Step One

Cut your felt to the size you would like it to be. The way I did it is to use one continual piece of felt, so bear in mind that you will want it a lot longer than it is wide.

Step Two

Fold the piece of felt roughly in thirds as shown below.

Step Three

Work out where the middle of the turned-over piece is. Pin your favourite ribbon onto it and then stitch in place. Don't cut the ribbon ends off yet!

Step Four

Next, pin the sides, starting from the bottom to reduce lumps and bumps. Sew in place. Ok, now you can cut the ribbon edges! It just finishes it off nicer if you delay cutting.

Step Five

Find the cute snap fasteners that you inherited from a great aunt or grandma or someone. Work out where you want to position them, and sew them on.

They remind me of roses!

Step Six

This is optional, but you could sew a button on to hide the stitching like I did. I used a button with four holes, and matched them up with the four holes of the snap on fastener and sewed it on using the fastener as guide holes.  This isn't as hard as I thought it would be, and really finishes it off.

Step Seven

Enjoy your super cute bag!

Sorry Paddington didn't appear today, he was old and needed a wash to freshen up. He should be up soon, though!

See you on Friday!

My first giveaway!

*Giveaway is now closed*

To celebrate a month of blogging, I'm going to do a giveaway! It's only small, but it will help you out if you're new to stitching, or just need to top up your supplies.

You will get 11 colours of thread; black, brown, burgundy, grey, green, blue, sky blue, red, pink, yellow, and white.

Also included are three cute roses like this one.

And three buttons like this.

And a pack of needles like this.

Hmm, it sounds bigger now! Anyway, if you're interested, here's what you need to do to be entered.

Comment if you like it.

Yep, thats it!

If the commenting is not working (I'm yet to figure that one out, so bear with me) send me an email at

lizzydesigns1@gmail.com

Yes, a special email address just for my blog! Well, I didn't want to give out my personal one, you know!

Please don't be shy! Comment away!

The winner will be announced on Monday February 1st.

random.org will be choosing the winner.

If you win and I know you, I will give you your prize the next time I see you. If I don't know you, I will post it to you. I don't mind if you happen to live in the US or anywhere else.

See you soon!

Ribbon Storage and a teaser...

Want a fun way to store your ribbons?

Have fun with this idea.

Cute, huh?

All you do is wind your ribbon round some old spools (the wooden ones look nicer) and pin in place. Now you can see what ribbons you have at a glance. It also reduces creases. :)

I had fun photographing these...

Now for the teaser...

I'm doing something with this vintage pillowcase I found. It's something to do with sewing machines, quilting, and will help survivors of the Haiti earthquakes. Check back next week to see what I've been doing with it!

It's so cute! Paddington even has the 'Please look after this bear' label.

See you next week!

Doll Quilt Tutorial

Fancy trying your hand at making a doll quilt?

Try this quilt set, the perfect size for Barbie dolls.

Step One

First you need to cut out your pieces. I used a coaster as a template to cut out six of a cute vintage floral fabric, and six of a yellow gingham fabric that was once a tablecloth. I then arranged them as pictured. Now you're thinking,  "Hang on, why did she cut out six of each fabric?" Well, we need a back as well. So arrange them like I did, twice.

Step Two

Then, cut pieces of the yellow gingham to make the binding. Make sure they are quite wide as it makes it a lot easier. Lay them out as shown below. Note: You don't need to make any for the back, they will fold over to make the back's binding.

Step Three

Now, you need to join your squares together.

Stitch them down the sides as shown.

This is what you should end up with.

Do that for all your squares, making six pairs. Remember to trim the seams right down, this way you will have less bulk to quilt through.

Step Four

Get your first two pairs of squares and sew them with right sides together at the bottom.

Make sure that one seam is facing one way, and one the other. See?

This is what it should look like.

Great! Now, sew the bottom one to those two, as shown in the photo.

Do the same for your back squares. You should end up with two pieces of fabric like this.

Now, get some wadding and put it between the two layers, with right sides facing out.

This is what it should look like.

Then, quilt it however you like. I divided them into thirds, and quilted three lines down, and three across. It's best to start from the center, then you don't get fabric bunching up.

When I had quilted all I wanted to, I pinned the binding on. A special trick that I use is to pin one side on like the first photo. Then, I pin the other side, making sure the pins go through all the layers. You can now take out the first pins you pinned and all the layers of the binding will be held together for stitching. I did the long sides first.

Cut your binding at both ends to make sure there isn't lots of bulk material to sew through.

When both of the long sides were stitched, I did the same for the top, sewing over the ends were the other bits of binding are. Before I sewed it, I folded in the corners and pinned them in place. The photos should explain.

I also made two pillows with the scraps and stuffed them with wadding.

See you next time!