Bringing Outdoors Indoors

Last week on S.Y.T.Y.C. we had an outdoor themes projects. Mine was “Bringing Outdoors Indoors”. I made a reversible table runner and placemats with embroidered ants on one side and an embroidered ladybug on the other side. I was excited to finally use this ladybug appliquéd but my kitchen has ladybug decorations in it. I choice the colors that I did for the table runner and placemats because it reminded me of a picnic quilt.

Adam helped me make the center piece for the table. I wanted some wood that looked really weathered and what better than the weather wood from our fence that got blown down a while back during a tornado. The wood was warped so it helped with the weathered look. Then I stained it with some ebony stain and the next day sanded it. I don’t completely love the flower vases I got to go in it. They are too short. So I need some taller vases for it. I have debated on stenciling “Anderson Est. 2011”, but I am not sure with the stain being so dark.

Don’t forget to head on over to S.Y.T.Y.C. and vote for your favorite around the world project!!

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Pocket Tees

Are you looking for pocket tees?  Make sure you check out Sheena Creates on Facebook.  I now have them available.  There is a limited number of them available at this time so make sure you get them before they are gone.

Currently I am selling them using the fabric from the post I did recently here and here.

Monogrammed Outfits Green, Pink, Orange & Blue Chevron

The next monogrammed outfits the girls and I wore was the green, pink, orange and blue chevron print.  It has a name but I can’t remember what its called.  I LOVE this fabric and so wish I had of bought more of it than I did.  Hopefully I’ll find some more of it.  Please excuse my lack of photography in this picture.  I had children with rather shaky hands helping me in taking the pictures.

With this fabric I made both girls a skirt and I made all three of us a pocket tee.  Last summer I bought two light blue t-shirts for the girls that I never used.  One is now to small for either girl and one fit Taylor perfectly, so I used it for this outfit.  A while back I bought a lime green t-shirt for Alyssa and I had yet to use it so I decided to use it for this outfit.  When I bought a bunch of t-shirts for myself I bought a green one which worked out perfect for this outfit.

Monogrammed Outfit Purple with Pink Polka Dots

A few weeks ago I did a lot of sewing one Saturday and in that sewing I made a lot of matching outfits with monogramming for the girls and myself.  Over the next few weeks I am going to feature these outfits on here and I will be offering some pocket tees on my Facebook page for sale from the fabric that is featured in each of these post so make sure you check it out because there is limited fabric and once its gone it may be gone forever.

The first outfit the girls and I wore was the purple with pink polka dots.  I bought these tank tops for the girls months ago and I never used them.  When I saw this fabric I knew it would be perfect to make them matching skirts with monogrammed shirts.  I also bought a good many t-shirts for myself in different colors and I decided the pink one was the perfect color for this fabric to make myself a monogrammed tee.

For the girls shirts I wasn’t sure about monogramming straight on the shirt and I didn’t think a pocket would look good so I decided to make a large monogrammed circle.  Luckily I had some pink in my scraps from a quilt I made years ago that was just the right color.

Summer Totes

One of the things I said I wanted to make for each of the kids for summer was a bag to carry their stuff in.  I found these really cute bags at Dollar Tree and I couldn’t resist them especially for a dollar.

Originally I wanted to monogram the bags the same way I did Alyssa’s shirt, but I had issues hooping the bags.  For some reason I couldn’t get the bag to hoop.

Taylor and I went to Hobby Lobby to find some fabric for their initials for the bags.  I told her I wanted some fabric that would look good on all four bags.  I wanted it to be the same fabric so all four bags would coordinate.  I also told her it couldn’t be too girlie.  At first she told me everything was too girlie then she found this fabric that was the prefect match.  It has all the different colors and its not girlie.

I used heat bond on the back of the fabric then I used my Cricut to cut out each child’s initial.  Using the heat bond I was able to easily iron the initial onto the bags and it looks great.  All the kids love them. Also they match the kids’ water bottles that I made them. I used the same font with my Cricut for these that I used for the water bottles.

Monogrammed A

Recently I told ya’ll I got an embroidery machine for Christmas and I am learning how to use it in my post Learning to Embroidery.  I have spent a good bit of time practicing and reading about how to embroidery so it looks the best.  After a good bit of practice I am happy to say I have finally made a shirt I am proud of.

I used my Cricut to cut out the “A” and I attached it to the shirt with heat bond.  Then using my curlz font I embroidered “Alyssa” diagonally across the “A”.  I was so excited to see how well it came out.  Alyssa wore it to school yesterday and I was lucky enough to get her to model it for a picture.

I have some bags I am going to embroidery for all the kids for summer and now that I have mastered this I know that is the same way I am going to do their bags.  Now to just figure out what fabric for the big letters and colors for the embroidery and they will be set for summer.

Learning to Embroidery

As you know I got an embroidery machine for Christmas, I have slowly been trying to learn how to use it. I have all these cute things I want to make the kids but I’ll be honest, it’s harder than just hooping the fabric and pressing a button. Hooping the fabric can be HARD. I want to monogram t-shirts for the girls. That sounds simple enough, NO! Knit fabric does not stay put very well. Anyway, today I spent some time practicing because I bought some bags I want to monogram for summer. I was pleased with the girls the first time I did it. Yay!!

The boys, not so much! First I tried these. My machine messed up several times and it shows. Noah didn’t really care for this one with his name since the big “N” is not capital but this font does the big “N” like that. OCD little boy!!

But the big letter is wider than what I want so I won’t be using this one for Bradley either.

Next I tried this font. Noah likes it and wants it but I do not like it. My machine messed up when I was doing Noah but not when I was doing Bradley so I know this is not the one.

Finding a cute boyish font that I like is hard. Hopefully I’ll have better luck when I go back to looking for a font. What font do you use for boy stuff??

Frame & Coasters

I love to use scraps from a project and make something else.  Last summer I made some cornhole bags for Adam and had some left over duck fabric.  I didn’t think I would ever use it for anything but it was too much to trash so I put it in my stash.

For Christmas I got an embroidery machine and I am still learning how to use it.  I have been looking for stuff lately that I could embroidery on for practice and for different ideas.  So I started looking through my stash and I found this grey and white chevron print duck fabric.  I didn’t have a lot of it but lets face it chevron print is HOT these days.  So I decided I’d give it a try.

Mine and Adam’s colors are red and black for the most part.  When we went to Mentone we stayed in a cabin that was decorated with red and black.  He purposed there and we spent our honeymoon there.  So when we bought our house I decorated our bedroom in red and black to keep the memory of the cabin.  Since my fabric is grey I decided I’d use some red thread and monogram our initials on them.

Originally I wanted four coasters but I messed one of them up and only had enough fabric left for three so I opts for two coasters and a frame.

The frame was one I had in my stash that was brown.  I sanded it and painted it black to match.

Once I was done I realized I wasn’t sure how I was going to put my fabric in the frame and the ends not show so I decided I’d make a mat for the frame.  I used some red scrapbook paper I had left over from Bradley’s birthday party (I promise I’ll share all of those details soon).  I made a 5×7 mat to trim down to a 4×6 picture.  Then I put my embroided fabric in the frame.

For coasters I cut the fabric to be 5″ square when I was finished.  I embroided two pieces of it, used my spray adhesive to hold some batting to one piece of it and then I sewed them up wrong side out leaving a small opening to flip them right side out.  Once I flipped them right side out, I pushed out the corners so that they were rounded and used my double needle to sew a boarder around them.  It was the first time I had every used the double needle and I must admit I LOVED it!!  I will be using it a lot more.  I think it gives things more of a finished look.

Valentine’s Shirt

I saw this idea forever ago on a blog that I follow. I saved the idea but I had not used it yet. I thought about it the other day when I made the dresses from Adam’s shirts but I had already put the dresses together before I thought about it so I couldn’t do it.

With my heart I decided to embroidery the heart with a scalloped edge, then I sewed lines across the heart before cutting the fabric to expose the lighter fabric.

I wasn’t really sure how this would work out so I didn’t stress about the fact that my shirt has sun damage on it before I did the embroidery on it.