Needles notebook

I sent a birthday present to T42 from one of the forums I take part in, I love her creations and especially the way she combines needle craft in many of them, that's why I chose to make a needle notebook for her and took the opportunity to take pictures of the process so I can post it here. It's the same as the black and white one I gave to Michal and posted last week.
T42 is the one that took the picture of the completed notebook as I sent it off before I had the chance to take a proper picture so thank you T42!
First choose your patterned fabrics, I like using 2 different ones, one for the outside and a different one for the inside but you can use just the one pattern.
Start out by cutting out 2 pieces of fabric, size 15X20cm (6X7.8inch) each.
Cut one of the pieces in half, now you have 1 piece size 15X20cm’ (6X7.8inch) and 2 pieces 15X10cm’ (6X4inch).

Cut out relatively thin and light iron-on interface, a piece for each piece of fabric, cut the interface a little bigger than your fabric to make sure it’s all covered. The interface will prevent the fabric from fraying at the edges.

Take out your ironing board, lay out the fabrics on the interfacing, note the glossy glue on the one side of your interfacing, you need to have the sticky side up and the left side of your fabric on top of it.
Iron just enough to make the fabrics edges stick to the interface (5-10 seconds), now flip and iron from the back side. Do the same with all your fabric pieces.

After it cool’s off trim the edges of all 3 pieces.

Take your 2 small pieces and sew the length just on one side. I used a dark color thread so you can see it better but rather have your thread the same color as your fabric.
Lay both small pieces on top of the larger piece (the right side of the fabric on the right side of the fabric) their sewn side turning inside and sew all round.
I added 2 pieces of ribbon on both sides before sewing together so I can later close the notebook by tying a bow.

Now turn it over to the other side, you will get 2 pockets.

Iron both sides, inside and out to flatten it.

Cut out 2 pieces of double sided thick interface and place each piece inside each pocket.

Iron from both sides until it sticks; this will create a harder cover.

Inside your notebook sew a piece of felt; I used the blanket stitch round the felt.

Embellish your cover and there you have it.

Next time I’ll show you how I embroider letters.

I'm going away for the weekend so if you have any questions I'll be able to answer in a couple of days. Have a great weekend!

Winter indulgence swap

The greatest swap we ever had in the forum! Each was supposed to create for her partner something as a present and add a do it yourself craft kit with material and instructions and something to warm the throat, could be a hot drink or a winter recipe.
I prepare my package for Maya (nickname: Boten) a dear woman! I started out making a scarf in browns before I knew who I was making it for and when I found it was Maya I realized the only color she doesn't like is brown...So it was back to square one for me. I made another 4 scarves before I was satisfied and eventually couldn't decide which to send so I ended up adding 2 to the package, 1 made from a combination of fleece and fabric in Black and white which is one of Maya's favorite color combinations and the other knitted with my favorite broomstick pattern in ceram colored wool which is one of my favorite colors (-:

I created a craft kit containing wool, a felting needle and instruction how to create a wool fairy and added a fairy I created and a voucher she could use for a wool fairy workshop at my home.

For the throat warmer I added my recipe for hot chocolate for two accompanied by 2 mugs and dark chocolate.Then, as I still had space in the box I added a fabric covered notebook, a pair of nice warm socks (that I forgot to take a picture of) and a ring (-:

I wrapped everything in a colorful box, added a cute card and sent it off by express mail.

I had a great time preparing this!

It's birthday season!

So many birthdays during winter! Last night us girls celebrated 2 birthdays, Orit's and Ifat's. Orit received a long long scarf made from 15 granny squares and Ifat a felt covered notebook and a fabric bag. As usual we had to much to eat and then had the birthday ceremony, there were 10 of us, each presented her card and gift, and they received such gorgeous gifts! My birthday is right around the corner (-:

A new felt covered notebook

I created this one for a swap in my favorite combination of pinks and browns. The brown lace on top is from the pile of scrap fabric that Ifat brought from the sewing workshop, I could see the potential immediately and fell in love with it after I ironed it.

Felt Box

Last night Neomi taught me how to make these lovely hand stitched felt boxes. They are great for storing soft things such as socks or tissue paper or even cotton-wool in the bathroom.
Measurements of this one are 20X20cm (8X8inches) but can be made any size.
Thanks Neomi and thanks to Maya for hosting the noisy group.
Tzik if you read this, I'm going to test you on this one (-:

Felt covered notebooks

My daughter is writing a diary so I made her a felt cover for it, her only instructions were no flowers as a main theme and not too much pink. She actually likes flowers as well as pink but I tend to overdose both, I can't help it I'm a declared pink addict, I admit it, so I have an excuse...

As the diary is top secret I could only take a photo of the cover, then she took it away and as I might never see it again I made some more. Here's another attemp to take it easy on the pink (-:

And then I heard a little voice inside me saying PINK, PINK, PINK.... When it comes to pink I'm too weak so I gave in.

Most of the work is done with a sewing machine with a touch of embroidery done by hand.

Here's another one I made for a dear friend's birthday a long time ago.

I love felt, it's warm, versatile, easy to use, friendly, the perfect material.