New Obsession - Recycling - or Upcycling

While I was at the thrift store yesterday looking for more vintage sheets and pillowcases, to use in quilts, I walked past the sweater isle, and got an idea...


Cutting up old sweaters and making pillows! I'm sure that it is not a completely original idea - after purchasing a few and going home and doing a search on the internet, I did find a few, but non-the-less, I came up with the idea without seeing it somewhere else first, so to me, that makes it original!



So here is my first attempt at converting old "discarded" sweaters into home decor.

I thought if I used a cardigan it would provide a quick and easy way of putting the pillow form inside.

The cream, blue and green sweaters I picked up at the thrift store yesterday for a$1 each. I only got ones that were 100% cotton - I figured if that is the only type of sweaters I like to wear, it would be the only ones I should use for my pillow. The blue one is actually a Ralph Lauren - I will use the part with the Polo player on another pillow! The yellow sweater is one that I had in a bag to donate myself, because it had a tear in it - but I loved that sweater - it is cotton and silk and it feels so nice, so I decided to use it in my pillow!

Upon cutting them up, I thought of some other things to do with the sleeves and the bottom ribbing, so stay tuned for what I convert those into. I don't want to tell you what they are quite yet, incase they don't turn out as well as how I have them pictured in my mind!

I think I am going to donate this one to our church silent auction too, but check out my etsy site in the next few weeks if you would like a snuggly sweater pillow of your own, I bought some other sweaters I plan to convert also!

Picnic Quilt Set Almost Done

I have been trying to finish up the picnic quilt set that I started earlier in the week for my church silent auction next Friday. The organizers want all the items in by Monday. So with the exception of finishing the hand sewing on the binding and trimming the ties, I am done.

I found a pillow case that is very similar to the color wave and style of the sheet pieces I used in the quilt. I bought it at a thrift store this morning for $0.79!! So I made it into a tote bag to hold the quilt and all the picnic stuff...

It is lined with the same yellow and white polka dot fabric in the quilt, and there is a pocket inside that holds all the plates.

I also whipped up some fabic napkins in the polka dot and floral sheet fabrics.

All the winning bidder has to do is provide the food and drinks and away they go!

I need to give the organizers a dollar value so they know where to start the bidding. Any suggestions as to what this would cost or what you would pay?

The Last Offical Lake Weekend

Labor Day Weekend is considered the unofficial end of summer, and with that comes the end of lake season. When the kids were younger, we used to keep the boats in and the cottage open until mid-October or so. I actually remember Dave taking the boat out in a snow storm one year! But with all the school commitments, sports, etc, it has gotten harder and harder to get up after Labor Day. The cottage is still open, and the boats and jet ski are still in the water, but I'm not sure if we will have any more full weekends of use left this year! Nor am I sure we will have the boat running again this year... Our coolant line exploded on our last boat ride, and we had to be towed back to our place!

We did some year end stuff this weekend, but really tried to be out on the boat as much as possible - because it was the last weekend, but also because it was incredibly HOT!

I will miss the quiet family times at the lake, but look forward to next year!

One of My Current WIPs

I was asked to make something for our Church Fund Raiser Silent Auction that is taking place next Friday night. Of course being the procrastinator that I am, I have put it off till now!

Last night I was rooting around in my very messy quilting/craft room to find something to inspire me. I found a set of old sheets that I had picked up at a rummage sale for $1, and some yellow and white polka dot fabric that I'd found a while back on a $1/yard sale rack at the fabric store (that I had no idea what I woud do with it, but at $1/yard, I had to have some!), and started this...

My inspiration came from this quilt I'd seen on Hambone and Jennicakes blog. Mine may not be as cute, because I am only using one sheet pattern instead of many, but with the fabric I have and big squares, I think it will come together quickly and be pretty cute. I am going to make mine a square picnic quilt. I also found these in my garage...

that I had gotten in an old picnic basket I picked up somewhere. I use the basket to store stuff in my office, but didn't have a use for these, but they were so cute and so retro that I just couldn't get rid of them. I knew that someday I would find the perfect thing to do with them. I have a set of 6. I am going to put them together with the quilt and make a picnic set.

Being in a time crunch, which do you think would be better - tying the quilt of just doing a stitch in the ditch or other straignt line machine quilting. I can only do straight line quilting here at home - I tried doing free motion machine quilting with my machine - that is not designed for that - with disasterous results earlier this year. You can read the whole drama here. So some sort of straight stitch machine quilting or tying it are about my only 2 options at this late date. Any comments or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

An Early Birthday Present to Myself!

I saw these shoes on the Converse website about a month back while trying to find some shoes for my 13 year old daughter, and fell in love with them!!





I really wanted them, but they were $68 and I could not justify that! So I did some web searching and found them at shoes.com, and they were on sale, and I found a promo code and got another discount and free shipping (and no tax - don't tell) and got them delivered to my door in less than a week for $43!

They are really individual pieces of fabric sewn together (not one piece of stamped fabric) and they are even quilted! Being a RED lover and a quilter, I just had to have them!

Happy Early Birthday to ME!