29 May 2015

Pretty Perfect Fabric and Patterns

Pretty Perfect Fabric is Art Gallery Fabrics!  "Feel the Difference" is their motto, and it is a good one, love the feel of their fabrics, I can even tell when it is AGF fabrics and they don't have their selvedge, just by the feel of them.
AGF is having a giveaway of 100 yards,  in order to enter the giveaway you must post a selfie of yourself with something you have made with AGF.  A selfie is a “photograph that one has taken of oneself, typically with a smartphone and shared via social media”
How good are you at doing Selfies? 
I am NOT very good at taking selfies, so difficult, eekk.. you can see my nose hairs, oh now you can't see my nose at all, talk about double chin, hey where'd the bag go?  so on and so forth, I took about a dozen different selfies.

So I made 2 items to enter, one is the Pretty Floral Divided Tote by Thread Riding Hood.

I made it out of the new Skopelos fabric designed by Katarina Roccella, these are the 2 exterior fabrics, Paparounes Pastel (that's poppies in greek) and Greeka Skouro (the greek key like symbol in Dark -Skouro) and for the Interior I used Underground Route from the Jungle Ave collection by Sara Lawson.
I took these pictures at a girlfriends shop, she sells Greek trinkets.
Paralia means beach in Greek, but it is also a place here in Greece.
 I tried to take some selfie pictures at the outdoor market or in Greek - Bazaari, but was feeling pretty exposed with everyone walking around and several neighbors were asking what I was doing, the Greek community always wants to know what that strange foreign women is up too.
I used some hardware from Emmaline Bags, the handmade bag label and a magnetic snap inside.

I picked up some strawberries at the market and picked up 2 birthday packages from the post office.
I also made the Perfect Petal Purse for my daughter a pattern made by Fenna from a Fabulous Home Sewn. out of Art Gallery Elements, Floral and Nature, I love basics and just love AGF Elements, can't wait to get my hands on some of the newer Prisma ones.
For that selfie you will need to go see it on my Instagram account :) -link on the side bar.
 I made a little stumpwork bee for the center of this sunflower purse.  I even made him wings out of some AGF fabrics, but decided that they were a little too big and was afraid they might get caught on things as my daughter wore her new purse.

So no wings for the little guy, but surrounded by delicious french knots representing the center of the sunflower.

The zipper has some bag bling with an Emmaline bags handcrafted zipper pull

See a Pretty Perfect Fabric and Pattern Pairing!
Did you make anything out of AGF?
#ShowUsHowYouAGF, #artgalleryfabrics & #wearefabrics

26 May 2015

All The Skirts

Hello All, I whipped up a skirt for my daughter over the weekend, I have been meaning to make one for a while out of this fabric that I bought from the Fat Quarter Shop.
"Pepe in Paris" by Riley Blake Designs and the text print is "Surrounded By Love" by Deb Strain for Moda
When I ordered this fabric I knew I wanted to make something for my daughter with it and along came the Skirt Fixation link up of "All the Skirts" and all of the pretty skirts made using Oliver & S patterns, I really need some good patterns, but I do love what I whipped up.

The skirt, an appliqued shirt and a purse to match!
I designed all of it myself based off of my daughters measurements, she is a little chubby compared to patterns.

The purse is felt with the fringe at the bottom, I sewed up the sides with a zigzag stitch using Aurifil Variegated Thread #3840
I made some pockets for the skirt, because as we all know little girls love pockets.
One on each side, the text print peeks out just a little on the top and is also used as the lining of the pocket.
I really hate hemming clothes so I did something to the bottom of the skirt so I wouldn't have to hem it, not sure what it would be called, but I just used the text print again and then added the trim.

But my daughter doesn't like the trim so much now because it keeps getting caught in her shoes, so I will be taking it off, but it will be okay cause the text print is what made it easy for me not to have to hem the skirt.
I need to learn the trick on how to get kids to stand still for photography shoots, bribery does not work on this child of mine.
It's still cold here in Greece for the morning walks to school.

running ahead of her, maybe I can get a front shot, just made her run faster :)
So on a hanger will have to get you a better picture of what the outfit looks like.
Linking up to "All the Skirts" with Skirt Fixation!

15 May 2015

A Challenge and FairyTales!

My friend Fenna who has the blog Fabulous Home Sewn is doing a Photo Contest with her patterns, she is the one who created the really cute Perfect Petal purse, that I made here.

and also the Pirate wallet, she has a few more new patterns that you should also take a look at.

Check out all of the awesome prizes available here.
The pictures are due at the end of this month May 31st! You can purchase her patterns on Craftsy.

And now to talk about Fairy Tales.
I am in a swap on Instagram (okay a few to many swaps on Instagram) and one of them is the SPD FairyTale Swap, well I really let my partner down in not telling her what fairy tale I like, but my problem is I like them ALL!  I went to Wikipedia and looked at the List of Fairy Tales, OMG, it is so cool, you can loose yourself in there, finding new fairy tales, reading the history behind them, it is so much fun!
So short story, darling partner, I don't have a favorite Fairy Tale, I think they are all pretty darn cool, I especially like the ones that have a moral or "parent warning" in them, like "The boy who Cried Wolf" which is Greek by the way, cool right!
I had fun finding new ones like "The bee and the Orange Tree", I can see this mini being made out of some Tula Pink fabric! (one of my favorite designers)
Tula Pink, The Birds & the Bees, Tree of Life
I didn't even know that "The Little Mermaid" was a fairy tale, I thought it was a Disney cartoon, but it is in fact a Hans Christian Andersen Story from 1837!  Who knew right, well I didn't, I love mermaids! and the real story is so much more interesting than Disneys remake :) Although a tad sader, but the moral of the story is so much more interesting.

So the short story is, make something you love and I will also love it, if you can contain a book of the fairy tale or a written note of which fairy tale you are making the mini from I will really appreciate it.  I love reading and finding new stories and sharing them with my children who still love to hear mommy read to them.
I am on Pinterest and Flickr if you need more ideas into what kind of style I like, my user name is grecomara.
Thank you so much!