Welcome to the blog! Here you’ll find a hub for all my tutorials, advice, videos and other sewing news and inspiration. Choose a category or simply explore. Enjoy!
When making soft rag dolls, there are lots of options for how to make the hair! Some dolls have permanent hair dos that are sewn on, usually out of felt, and others have actual wigs made of yarn. The latter is what I’m sharing a tutorial for today — and I think you’ll be surprised at how easy to it to make yarn hair for rag dolls!
Read MoreI’m back with another short video tutorial for the Clara Ballerina Doll, this time for how to sew moveable, button jointed arms onto a rag doll. After all, a ballerina needs to move her arms, right?
Read MoreIf you’re making a soft rag doll and are hung up on how to hand embroider the doll’s face, or even if you just need a quick run down on basic stitches, I hope this super simple video embroidery tutorial is helpful for you!
Read MoreI am so elated to share my newest sewing pattern with you! My oldest daughter is an advanced ballerina and so ballet has been a big part of our family due to her all out passion for it these last many years. Through her influence, I’ve fallen in love with the ballet world along with her — the costumes, the music, behind-the-scenes, and the ballet itself.
That’s probably why this new pattern is near and dear to my heart. The Clara Ballerina Doll is the newest PDF pattern in my shop, or you can also purchase it on Etsy if you prefer. She comes with thorough instructions with lots of photos, and includes patterns for all her clothes: leotard, ballet wrap skirt, leg warmers and of course, her tutu.
Read MoreHave you ever wandered listlessly into your sewing room and wondered what happened to your sewjo? Or maybe you’ve wanted to sew, but just couldn’t seem to get started, couldn’t even see your cutting surface, or just didn’t have the materials you needed? If that’s ever described you, I have some tips for how to get your sewjo back!
Read MoreMy teen daughter spotted a pink velvet flower shaped throw pillow in a photo somewhere recently and asked if I could make one for her room. Um, of course I could! I made her a velvet flower pillow AND THEN I went on to design a patchwork version using the fat quarters I’d just received from my Annie’s subscription. I loved how it turned it so much that I went ahead and perfected the pattern piece, filmed a tutorial for YouTube, and added the printable PDF pattern for these cute flower pillows to my shop, so you can learn how to sew a flower pillow too!
Read MoreI’ve made a couple of fun pineapple block mini quilts and thought I’d share those today, along with a little round up of great pineapple quilt patterns! Traditionally, a “pineapple quilt block” refers to a particular quilt block style that’s a variation of a courthouse steps block, and tends to give off spikey pineapple vibes. But this list of pineapple quilt patterns will be patterns for actual pineapple blocks, in the literal fruit sense!
Read MoreBlazers are a hot trend right now! I was lucky enough to score a perfect vintage corduroy blazer at a thrift store last year and it’s been so useful in my wardrobe every since, it has my wheels turning about adding a few more blazers to my wardrobe in this upcoming season.
Read MoreI’m not sure what mood came over me yesterday, but I woke up and starting making printable gift tags for handmade items! I really wanted to make some funny ones, so I came up with three different designs for adding some sewing humor to my sewn gifts. I then listed them in my shop to share with YOU! Keep reading to see all three designs and to get yours from the shop :)
Read MoreBefore I let any of our family’s clothing head off to the thrift store donation center, I make sure I go through the bags to see if there’s anything in there that we can refashion into something else! This is a great experimental idea for sewing with kids, and it’s one that won’t cost you anything, so I’m here to share with you today several ideas for how to refashion and/or upcycle your kids’ outgrown or worn out clothing. Hopefully these ideas will get the creative juices flowing and get you and your kids sewing!
Read MoreI have a few quick solutions for fixing pockets in ready to wear dresses or skirts! I don’t know if you’ve had the same experience, but whenever I have a dress with side seam pockets, I get super annoyed by how the pockets either wrinkle and bunch up, adding bulk to my hip area, or shift out of place — sometimes I stand up and my pockets have fallen to the back of my dress. It’s annoying to have to always fix my pockets.
Read MoreMy oldest daughter has been redecorating her room a little bit and requested some fresh throw pillows! We went fabric shopping and chose a couple great fabrics that fit her color scheme and she ordered some pillow forms from Amazon and I got to work.
She wanted ruffled throw pillows, which I was happy to make because ruffles are just sew pretty in home decor! I’m so glad ruffles seem to be making a comeback. I’ve been pinning a lot of bedding looks lately and am very drawn toward ruffley gingham sheets and pillow cases. They’re so pretty.
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