Boho LOVE!

Happy Monday, friends! In addition to blogging about the Community Sampler sew-along, I'm going to try my best to keep up with sharing here all the other things that get made each week!



Last week I finished up several new projects, more zipper pouch bags and a special dreamcatcher for my Goddaughter Sylvia, all made using my favorite boho fabric combo -- Love Story & Indie Folk!



A few months back when Love Story and Indie Folk both arrived, the first thing I did was cut a half yard bundle of each into a variety of strips measuring one to two inches by the width of the fabrics, and I piled them high into a larger woven basket in my studio. From this basket I have made dozens and dozens of these boho zipper pouch bags. It's amazing how far these strips have stretched!

Three of the zipper pouch bags from last week's new batch got a fun, red, wooly pompom zipper pull and I love this new added decoration! The front side of each bag is my herringbone qayg that will be my go-to pattern for making the bags I sell. It's by far my favorite pattern to use for these kind of projects.



The reverse side is a simple stripe including several Love Story prints from the Enamored colorway, full of pretty peaches and coral, aqua and teal, and white and black!



A couple of the bags were finished with a red or baby blue suede zipper pull instead of the pompoms, which I love just as much. In additional to the new zipper pull options, I also added a side loop of an Anna Maria Horner Renaissance Ribbon!



The colors and pattern of this Postage Due Ribbon go perfectly with the boho style of these new bags!



A few weeks back, my super creative little niece/Goddaughter Sylvia told me over the phone about a terrible dream she kept having about vampires. She asked if I could make her a special dreamcatcher using fabrics to match the other things I've made for her that decorate her room. Today this dreamcatcher should be arriving to her in Hawaii and I can't wait to hear how she likes it!



I ordered enough dreamcatcher supplies to make a few more that will likely end up in my Etsy shop! I'll be back later this week to share which fabrics I'm using for my next set of zipper pouch bags and how those are coming along, so be sure to stop back!

xo Maureen

Floor Pillow Love!

Happy Monday! Last week was full of wonderfully productive sewing days and I have lots of good stuff to share this week as a result. First up is this Love Story & Indie Folk Skinny Braids floor pillow!



This super scrappy version of my new Quick Quilt As You Go design, Friendship Braids, is made up of 1"-2.5" strips of these pretty prints to make a big 26" square floor pillow. I have a tutorial in the works for my Friendship Braids quilt block using wider strips, and once you learn you'll see that the variations are endless. It's similar to the herringbone qayg that I teach in my Craftsy class & so often use in that it's just as fast and fun, but the pattern is very different in comparison. It feels new to me, so I'm really enjoying this new qayg pattern!



For this pillow I started with two 14" x 27" cuts of cotton batting that I covered edge to edge with skinny strips of fabrics before trimming them up and sewing the blocks together to finish as a pillow top.



As I stitched on new strips, I used a dark navy Aurifil 50wt from my Bohemian Gardens thread collection to add more quilting. I love the visible thread against these saturated colors. So pretty!



I love using heavy weight denims to back my pillows. For this floor pillow that will surely get lots of rough handling from the kids and pets, a denim or canvas was a perfect choice. Rather than using the right side of this AGF Crosshatch Denim in Rainy Night, I used the wrong side because I like the look of it just as much!



I bought a two-pack of down alternative Euro Pillows and I think for the second floor pillow I'll do this same skinny braids pattern using my stash of AGF denims. I have several new finishes to share this week so be sure to stop back!



xo Maureen

Love Story & Indie Folk Friendship Braids Quilt

I'm so excited to share my first quilt finish of 2018 -- A Friendship Braids QAYG Quilt made in my recently released Love Story collection for Art Gallery Fabrics + Pat Bravo's beautiful Indie Folk collection for AGF. These romantic, boho prints and saturated colors speak to me like no other. You may have noticed my affection for them over the past few weeks, I can't stop reaching for them for bags, pillows and this first quilt of the new year!



This quilt started back in November when I came up with this new qayg idea using the Quick Quilt As You Go method that I teach in my Craftsy class. To make this quilt top I used all twenty Indie Folk quilting cottons, several of my Love Story prints cut into strips measuring 3" x WOF, plus forty 8" x 15" cotton batting rectangles.



Once each rectangle cut of batting was covered with fabric edge to edge, I trimmed away the access fabric and batting to measure 7.5" x 14". I stitched the pretty blocks together first in pairs using just slightly larger than a 1/4" seam allowance and then I stitched them all together to finish a quilt top measuring approximately 56" x 68", a wonderful throw size!





I finished the quilt by attaching the backing fabric, my favorite Indie Folk print Khokhloma Burgundia, sewing through each layer a 1/4" from both sides of where my blocks were sewn together. Video instructions for finishing this style of qayg quilts can be found in my Craftsy class. I just love how quickly this style of quilt comes together, with such a beautiful finish each time!







I chose to bind this quilt using Pat's colorful, unique take on a stripe, Indie Folk's Trinket Vivid. I tend to use stripe prints for my binding and this one fits this finish so nicely!



I sold this quilt during my holiday sale back in December, but I've been so tempted to add this quilt as a made to order item in my Etsy shop since I sold this one, that I decided to give it a try!  It's truly one that I would love the chance to make again and again and again...



I tried my best to include details for those of you who are interested in making a Friendship Braids QAYG quilt of your own, but by all means, please feel free to ask any questions you may have in the comments anytime. Sharon Holland and I have been busy preparing our next sampler quilt-along, otherwise I would have loved to share a quick tutorial. I still would love to, if I can find a little extra time this month. In case you missed our announcement, be sure to check it out on my Instagram! We had such a wonderful experience co-hosting last year's Sewcial Bee Sampler together that we decided to do another, with a new pattern and a new name. I'll be back with details soon!

xo Maureen

Skinny Braids : :

Last night I started a new project that I'm really excited about today!



Back when my Love Story and Pat Bravo's Indie Folk collections arrived I cut a half yard bundle of both into narrow strips measuring 1"- 2.5" x wof, filling up a big basket next to my sewing machine. Since, I've been using them to make dozens and dozens of herringbone zipper pouch bags. This week I ordered more bag making supplies after I used up the last of what I had on hand and my basket of strips is still halfway full. I can't believe how many finishes I've made from this basket! I have a just a few bag left that I've added to my Etsy shop here -- Handmade Herringbone Bags



Yesterday I had the idea to use the strips to make a big floor pillow for my studio, using the friendship braid Quick Quilt As You Go that I used to make my recent Love Story & Indie Folk qayg quilt. I'll be sharing that finish on Monday, because first I have to share how much I love this braid pattern using skinny strips!

Can you image how amazing a quilt would look using such skinny braids? I plan to begin one ASAP!

I especially love the addition of the dark navy Aurifil quilting thread. Typically I don't add additional quilting when I qayg because the fabrics are already attached to the cotton quilt batting. Since this is a floor pillow that will get lots of use, I think the extra quilting will add some nice durability!



For my floor pillow top I made two skinny braid panels measuring 14" x 27" that I still have to trim up and sew together for my 26" pillow insert. I can't wait to see this project finished!



I'll be sharing both this pillow and the quilt that I recently finished & photographed using these pretty fabrics next week, so be sure to stop back!  xo Maureen

Love Story & Indie Folk Zipper Bags!

Back in September I found this amazing deal for a bulk order of colorful 9" zippers. At the time I definitely didn't need a 120 zippers but I couldn't resist such a great buy. So, when it came time to begin making new items to offer in this year's holiday sale, zipper pouches were #1 on my list!



Inspired by my recent Love Story & Indie Folk Friendship Braids quick quilt as you go quilt, I continued with the same very boho fabric combination to whip up a few dozen bags over the past few weeks, and I LOVE how they turned out!





The front side is the herringbone qayg pattern I teach in my Craftsy class and use so often in a variety of the projects I make from bags to pillows to full size quilts. It will forever be my go-to for pretty much everything! I love sewing using this technique and I love the scrappy style of this pattern, especially when using very thin strips of prints the way I did for these new zipper bags!

Each bag has a cushiony layer of cotton batting, a colorful zipper, denim side loop to add you own embellishments, a Love Story zipper pull and each bag is lined with my Wild & Free Woven Path quilting cotton for a really nice finish!



Each bag reverses to a striping of the same prints used for the bag fronts. I just can't get enough of this fabric combination. I think I'll make a few pillows next!



My Love Story & Indie Folk bags measure a little bigger than 8" x 8" finished and have a boxy bottom making them perfect for makeup, travel, art supplies, knitting & epp project, and more!






I first offered them on Friday on my Instagram in my Black Friday sale and just sold out today! A BIG thanks to everyone who purchased!

Next up I plan to offer a quilted stocking sale made using Amy Sinibaldi's holiday collection for Art Gallery Fabrics, Little Town. They are so sweet, I can't wait to photograph them today to share!

xo Maureen

Friendship Braids QAYG : :

For my Flower Child Quilt Market booth I made four pillow samples, one including a new quick quilt as you go pattern inspired by friendship braids.  Immediately after finishing my Flower Child pillow I knew I wanted to make an entire quilt using this pattern, combining prints from my new Love Story collection with Pat Bravo's newest, Indie Folk!





This is such a beautiful block with these pretty saturated prints, and it’s so fast! This block is assembled in very much the same way that you would construct a qayg log cabin pattern, but for this one I sewed the fabric strips working my way from the top to the bottom of each rectangle cut of batting which gives the illusion of woven strips, just like a braid!



To make this quilt top I used all twenty Indie Folk quilting cotton and several Love Story prints cut into strips measuring 3" x WOF. Once each rectangle cut of batting was covered with fabric edge to edge, I trimmed away the access fabric and added the trimmed block to my pile. I spent all of yesterday morning and afternoon stitching up blocks and this morning I had enough to piece together this new friendship braid qayg quilt top to photograph and share today!









Isn't she pretty? There's no way I'm done with this new quick quilt as you go just yet! I'm waiting on a new can of basting spray to arrive so I can back and bind this one to add to my shop, and I'm tempted to begin another right away with a little twist, using just Love Story this time! This will be such a great quilt pattern for using up those scraps, too!

Let me know what you think of this new qayg pattern, and if you have any questions feel free to ask in the comments! Happy sewing!

xx Maureen

New Love : :

For the past week I’ve been knee deep in Quilt Market prep. Next week I'll travel to Houston to share my next collection due out this coming March, and everything I've been stitching up has to be kept secret until the show. I can't wait for you to see these fabrics! Today, I'm taking a break from sewing to play with crepe paper, a first for me. I ordered a dozen or so rolls of colorful Italian crepe paper to make giant flowers in beautiful reds, bubblegum pink, apricot, peachy creams and white with several shades of green for leaf making...



I have just one practice flower finished and already this craft has stolen my heart! Have any of you given crepe paper flower making a try?



Also to have completely stole my heart is this beautiful bundle of fabrics, Pat Bravo's brand new Indie Folk collection!





The rich saturated colors and eclectic prints are so dreamy, I can't wait to sew with them after Quilt Market! I'm hoping to decide on a plan to have ready to start once I'm back home!





These fabric are the perfect complement to these changing days and the season that's upon us. Now I can't wait for Fall sewing!

I'll be back with soon with some Love Story fabrics to share, I hear they should be arriving any day!
xo Maureen