A New Year, a Challenge and other fun things

You may have noticed  a new button at the top of my sidebar, Craft Book Challenge.  Liesl from Liesl Made has challenged us to use our craft books and make at least one project from them every month for the year to come.  I think it's brilliant.  I have a small collection of craft books, but I've only used 4 or 5 of them so far, so I've decided to join in and see if I can keep up.  I will start with a bag pattern found in Seams to Me, by Anna Maria Horner.  I've already got the pattern cut out and the fabrics chosen, so hopefully I can make it in January.  I'll keep you posted on that.  You can check out the challenge here and join in too, it will be a lot of fun.

And if you need some more inspiration to get you started in 2011, check out this great compilation of tutorials made by Ursula at Muffins and More.  I know I've already bookmarked a few to try out in the coming months.

To start the New Year with some colors, I've made a new pair of pillowcases with fun patterns.  After last year's cows, let me present you my new monkeys!  I've used the very easy and quick tube method to make these.

And lastly, to answer Susanne's question, the mosaics in my previous post were made using a little software called Collage Creator.  It is meant for scrapbooking and is very easy to use.  You can download it for free here

I'll see you all later with new crafting projects!

Sylvie.

My own little success, and a winner

I've been done with this pillowcase for a few days, but haven't been able to post it before today. This is what I did following the Pillowcase Crochet Along hosted by Cassie. I was pretty scared of doing the crochet border when my experience of crochet was very basic and so far away in the past. To tell the truth, I did not remember anything about crochet, except the fact that I once loved it, when I was 10 or 12 years old. I actually had to watch crochet videos on the internet to understand how to do it. Pathetic, I know, but I was determined to learn it by myself, even though my sister offered to help me. It was part of the challenge. The result is far from perfection, but I am very pleased with it. And the great thing is that now I want to try other crochet projects. I've been eyeing some very tempting granny squares lately, here and there. We'll see where that leads me.

And now, time to announce the winner of my giveaway. I've put the names in a bag, and had my boyfriend pick one.

The lucky winner is:

Henria O.

My favorite sign of spring is when I can finally stop worrying about whether my kids are underdressed for the weather and start worrying if they are overdressed! In addition to that, I love the longer days....waking up to a sunny morning instead of a cold, dark one!

Thanks to all for participating and writing such nice comments on spring and fall. They were really cool to read, and they are linked to something I did over the last week. More on this tomorrow!

Pillowcase Frenzy

I don't know when or how, but I've become a little obsessed with pillowcases lately. I am still patiently working on Cassie's On The Edge Crochet Along, and we're getting closer and closer to the most dreaded - yet fascinating - part: the crochet border. I have sewn the pillowcase "with flap" without any trouble and I am very pleased with the result, but I won't show it here until is is complete (or ruined, haha) with the crochet border.

However, I've been working on another pillowcase project of my own, pictured above. I used a very quick and easy technique, the tube method, shown on AllPeopleQuilt, which I discovered thanks to my big sister.

All you need is too yards of coordinating fabrics to make two matching pillowcases in no time. My boyfriend likes cows (please don't ask why) and I, well, love Keri Beyer fabrics, as The Quilt shows without any doubt, so I had to get some Urban Farm as the main fabric for his pillowcase, and I matched it with lovely dots in light blue for mine.

I am sure I'll be making some more of these in the near future.

Sylvie