May 2014 | Go-Go Kim

sewing + social media + so much more

Saturday, May 24, 2014

Sewjo Saturday! ( Thank you everyone and winner announced!)

After two weeks away from hosting Sewjo Saturday, I REALLY missed it.  I missed seeing all the wonderful things all of you are starting, working on and completing.

I had a fantastic plan of what I would be writing about today.  I had it completely, mentally planned. It will have to wait because what I was going to blog about is in here with a big lock and a specialized wire.  As soon as the boy gets home, I cannot WAIT to show you what is inside!




This week's incentive is a really awesome one! It is all SARA!!!!

Jungle Ave. fabrics by SaraArt Gallery Fabrics Lawson .  These are the fabric pieces I have left from the projects I was making.  There are some great sized pieces here but I do not have the time to measure them all, lol :o)
Big City thread collection by Sara Lawson for Aurifil
Two paper bag patterns from Sew Sweetness






Aragon





Let's get our SEWjo (sewing mojo) going!  This link up will be open the WHOLE WEEKEND to give you LOTS of time in case you need to do silly other stuff like make dinner or driving your kids somewhere and then there is always making sure you have good lighting. The things we all have to go through...sigh ;o)

To participate in the party please... 
1. Share a project from this past week or TODAY!!!  Link it up from your blog or, if you do not have a blog, your Flickr photos. It can be a  FABULOUS finish or a WIP ( any progress is always good)that you are working hard to get off your sewing table!

2. Share a link back to SEWjo Saturday somewhere in your post. I would be over the moon if you grabbed the button and shared that too ;o)

3. Share some love with some of the other posters!!!!  Visit some of the linked up photos and get inspired by other quilty friends' work. And please leave some sunshine in their comments! Let's support each other!  


Thank you EVERYONE for the links!  So many FAB projects.  I need to get back on the sewing horse THIS WEEK!

CONGRATULATIONS to  Lisa Marie :o)



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Thursday, May 22, 2014

Fabric Butterfly Shadow Box Tutorial

For Sara's booth I wanted to come up with some fun ideas, not sew but maybe eye catching.  I love butterflies and decided that this might be a fun project.  I found many with paper but nothing with fabric so here is a simple way to make these beauties.



You need:
Shadow box
Mod Podge
Template ( this is the one I made from using a few different ones to determine the right size for me)
There are also many other free templates so you can find the size that works best for your project.
Printabletreats.com 
Firstpallete.com
Lollychops.com
Cardstock paper for the butterfly
Scrapbook paper for the background
Thread ( I used Aurifil 50wt, anything heavier may tear the paper)
Scissors
Fabric scraps from your piles you have at home
Flat paintbrush
Optional
Alphabet stamps



Take the paper out of the back of the shadow box and trace onto your background.  Cut it out and set it aside.



Trace your template onto your white card stock

Cut the butterfly out.  At this point I recommend erasing all the lines from tracing.  It makes a mess but it is worth it.



with an inexpensive brush, paint a good layer of the Mod Podge onto the card stock


Place your fabric scrap on top of the  Mod Podge surface


Flip it and rub the back to make sure it is adhering.  Then flip and rub out to smooth the fabric.


Let the butterfly dry for about an hour, trim off the excess fabric and then using a longer stitch sew down the center two or three times. On my Bernina I used a 3.3 length.

After you have sewn the middle you will have threads hanging off the ends.

You can either flip them under and trim or flip them from the bottom to the top and use them as the antennae.  For Sara's boxes I trimmed them for the Amy Butler butterfly, I just wiped the thread with some Mod Podge that was left on the brush and secured them down to the paper.

The wings will hold a shape without feeling too stiff.  Since there is no Mod Podge on the front it does not compromise the look of the fabric in any way. So now is the time to play with how you want your winds to look.  Just bend the tips a bit and you should be good to go!

In the shadow box  they have these sticky bits.  Put them on the back of your butterfly and secure it on the background paper.


The lettering  for mine was a gift from Luke Haynes and just happened to come the day before I decided to do this project. You can use something like this with some ink or if you have lovely handwriting ( I do not) you can add a personal touch that way too :o)



These are two of the boxes that were in the booth and honestly, the photos here do not do them justice.




I hope you enjoy this project and if you have any questions please shoot me an email!
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Nested Churn Dash Quilt A Long!!!!

I am so excited to be a part of this FUN, FAST and Easy Quilt Along organized and hosted by Jane or as we all know and LOVE her Quilt Jane!  When I first saw this block I was absolutely GIDDY! It took a traditional block and gave it some ZING!  I have decided that for me, ZING is always very good! 


So I hope you will join this fun event with great designers all putting their own personal touches on this fab block designed by Jane :o) 

The following I totally ripped from Jane's page but it has all the correct info so I am sure she will not mind :o)

Nested Churn Dash Quilt-a-long - Starts June 1st 2014


Who is ready for a quilt-a-long of the Nested Churn Dash? Starting 1st June 2014, I will be taking you through the steps to make a 24" x 24" nested churn dash block.

Joining me will be 10 of my favourite quilters who will be making their blocks into a mini quilt.

For the more adventurous, you can continue on and using the 24" x 24" finished block you can make a pillow or mini quilt or make a quilt, ranging in size from 28" x 80" (1 x 3 block bed runner), 54" x 54" (2 x 2 block setting), 80" x 80" (3 x 3  block setting) and 106" x 106" (4 x 4 block setting). I will provide instructions for each setting.

Fabrics - April Showers, Happy Go Lucky
by Bonnie & Camille for Moda 
June 1st - Requirements, fabric selections and layouts.
June 6th - Tips and hints for making the blocks.

June 10th - Kim Niedzwiecki - http://www.gogokim.blogspot.com.au
June 11th - Pat Sloan - http://www.blog.patsloan.com
June 12th - Lissa Alexander - http://www.modalissa.blogspot.com
June 13th - FatQuarterShop - http://www.fatquartershop.blogspot.com.au
June 16th - Frances Newcombe - http://www.bellybuttonsboutique.blogspot.com
June 17th - Katy Jones - http://www.imagingermonkey.blogspot.com
June 18th - Sherri McConnell - http://www.aquiltinglife.com
June 19th - Sara Lawson - http://www.sewsweetness.com
June 20th - Amy Smart - http://www.diaryofaquilter.com

June 23th - Making a quilt using the Nested Churn Dash block.
June 30th - Finishing the quilt.
July 30th - Winners selected from the Flickr group.

The block pattern can be purchased and downloaded from here and here.

Upload your finished blocks or projects to the Flickr Group to win some beautiful Aurifil thread packs and other great prizes. Use #NestedChurnDash on IG, FB, Flickr and twitter. Winners will be announced 30th July 2014.

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Tuesday, May 20, 2014

Blogger's Quilt Festival Babylove Quilt

I am so happy to be joining in on the fun for the Blogger's Quilt Festival this time!

This simple scrappy baby quilt for a friend is named Babylove.  It is simple snowballs and was super easy to put together with the help of an Accuquilt and my son Adam.  It is such a variety of different fabrics from Thomas Knauer, Dear Stella, Kokka, Heather Ross, Denyse Schmidt and many others.  The batting I used was Pellon and the thread was Aurifil 50wt for the piecing and 40wt for the quilting.  The quilting was simple circles around where the corners met. I thought it added something fun by showing off the diamonds created by the block points.






I was super happy about the hand binding on this quilt.  I do not usually hand bind so I am not the best at doing it.  This one looks perfect to me ( happy dance).

I am going to enter this one in the Scrappy Quilts Category.


Please go and cheek out all the fantastic inspiration at Amy's Creative Side!!!




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WELCOME HOME MICHAEL! And lots of QUILTY LOVE!!!!



I must pre-warn you, this may end up to be a very long post.  There are so many wonderful people to thank for all the support they have given me this past year but especially the past six months when my number two son, Michael, left for deployment last November to Afghanistan.  Michael is in the Air Force and works as a Special Operations Weather Technician.  He is a combat weather guesser ;o)  I had experienced deployment before with my husband, he was a P-3 pilot in the U.S. Navy.  It was difficult being a deployment wife but this was different.  This is my baby boy!

I completely fell apart when he left. It is possibly the most difficult thing I have ever done.  I had been waiting really since the day he left to find out when he would be coming home.  If you are in the military, you understand sometimes deployments get extended, that sometimes arrivals get delayed and sometimes your loved one does not come home at all.  It is a reality that every military family lives with every deployment.  Where they go and what they do are not located in safe places. So all you can do is wait.  Wait to find out when they are coming home.

He had some dates about a month ago and that is when I discovered that he would be coming home the weekend of International Quilt Market...NNNNNNNnnnnnnoooooo!  He would be flying and staying overnight in MD ( about 2 hours north).  I was going to miss my son's homecoming.  I may have cried more than a little.

Two days before leaving for Pittsburgh, I asked on Facebook  if anyone would  be willing to help me make a sign for Michael.  I really had not thought it through, I did not have a real plan but I had so many amazing people say YES!!! So, I went forward...

I bought 19 pieces of poster board and Crayola markers!  That is really all one needs when making a sign :o)

Since I had never been to Pittsburgh before, I had no idea the layout of the Convention Center or where this would all take place or when.  Trying to get more than two people together in such a large place and all at the same time is quite a feat!  It was decided by the group that we would meet in the lobby right after the close of the day.

On Thursday night about 11pm,  We were putting the boxes back in the Aurifil booth after Sample Spree and my phone rings.  No one calls my cell since I never have it with me but I just happened to that night and it was MICHAEL!!!!   He was in MD ( a day early)  and he sounded tired but great! It did not seem real or like it was anything special at the time. It had not HIT me yet that he is actually home.  I missed seeing him in Maryland since he was only there for 24 hours and he had to return back to Ft. Campbell to check into his squadron and get moved into his new home. I will not be able to see him for a few more weeks. It was so hard for me not to be there to see him.


What happened the next day was incredible! These WONDERFUL people all came together to welcome home my sweet son! After a long day on the Market floor walking and talking ( it can be very exhausting) they came, sat on the floor,  and made the most beautiful sign I have ever seen!  I am so incredibly grateful to them all!  Then...it HIT ME HARD!  I saw them making the letters, I processed for a bit and then, I started shaking.  It was real...he IS HOME!  And , of course, I had been taking photos all day so it was at that moment that I realized I had NO camera and NO iPad to document ANY of this amazing event.  Jeni Baker stepped in to offer her camera for me to take photos.  If these are blurry of off, it was me, not her camera. Thank you Jeni, you are AMAZING!







THANK YOU and I LOVE YOU!

John Kubiniec                  Big Rig Quilting 
Victoria Findlay-Wolfe    Victoria Findlay Wolfe Quilts
Michele Muska                Craft Art Edu
Lynn Harris                      The Little Red Hen
Tracy Mooney                  Generation Q
Lisa Sipes                         That Crazy Quilt Girl
Thomas Knauer                Thomas Knauer Sews
Jodie Davis                       It's a Rubber Duckie World
Shelly Pagliai                   Prairie Moon Quilts
Violet Craft                       Violet Craft Designs
Kait Witte                         Cargo Collective
Rob Appell                       Rob Appell Designs
Kimberly Munoz
Sara Lawson                    Sew Sweetness
Lee Heinrich                    Freshly Pieced
Faith Jones                       Fresh Lemon Quilts
Angela Pingel                  Cut To Pieces
Ali Winston                     a.squared.w
Kaye Prince                     Miss Print 
AnneMarie                      Gen X Quilters
Jeni Baker                       In color Order

Michelle Freedman, Melissa Thompson MaherJake Finch, Rose Hughes, Katarina Roccella and her very kind husband




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Monday, May 12, 2014

Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day

LOVE LOVE LOVE Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day! Make sure to visit many many many other blogs to increase your chances of winning something AWESOME! So you can bounce to more blogs, I will make it super short... The Giveaway...

Anna Maria Horner  eleven fat eighth voiles and an Aurifil small spool collection of Favorite Things by Jeni Baker ( LOVE THIS one)!




To enter this giveaway

1.  Tell me what you are planning to do this summer?  Fun ideas with kids are ALWAYS WELCOME!

2.  Follow my blog  and let me know you are a new follower :o)  Already a friend here, say hello and give me a BIG HUG!!!!

3. Follow my Facebook page and let me know, If you already see all the fun stuff I post there, just leave a comment telling me  :o)

This giveaway opportunity is open to international entries and will close May 16 at 5 p.m. PST.  A random winner be chosen and announced by May 18. The winner will be announced in this original post. If you are a no reply blogger please leave you contact information in one of your comments ( do not add an additional comment).

Congratulations to the winner!

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Saturday, May 3, 2014

SEWjo Saturday and Accuquilt Clamshell Flower Cushion Cover Tutorial




Even though my blog has been quiet, I have been super busy with projects.  I have been helping my lovely friend Pat Sloan with one project for her upcoming new fabric collection One For You, One For Me ( and it is a BEAUTY!)  and now I am working on some amazing projects for  Sara's booth with Art Gallery Fabrics for her new collection Jungle Avenue.  It has been so much fun sewing everything with these wonderful colors!

A few months ago Accuquilt sent me some new dies to play with and I made the AMAZING Babylove Quilt with the snowball die for a friend.  Included in the set was a clamshell die.  I had been looking at clamshells for so long but have never wanted to sit and cut all of those curved pieces and wanted to see if I could find a new way to use them.  As soon as I saw Sara's fabric THIS flower popped into my head and OUT came the Accuquilt!

This pillow is so incredibly easy, fun and gratifying to make.  It can be a a FAB scrap buster and honestly I think it is a great pillow for teens to try to tackle.  I used the tutorial for the back of the cushion from the tutorial Jaybird Quilts featured on Sew Mama Sew.  BEST envelope pillow tutorial EVER!

I apologize in advance for the horrible photos, it was POURING down rain and honestly these were the best I could take at the time.  I am hoping they will be clear enough for you to be able to follow along.

Please read all the instructions before starting this project.

What you will need
Two 17 in squares of fabric ( one for the front and one for the quilt sandwich so it can be scrap or muslin)
One 17 in piece of batting  ( I used Pellon)
Assorted scrap fabric to make 21 clamshells
One strip of fabric 16.5x2 ( for the center flower
Four pieces of fabric 16.5x11 ( for the backing).  I used four since I lined the pillow.
Two 16.5x2.25in pieces of fabric for binding for the pillow closure binding
Thread ( I used my trusty Aurifil 50wt )
Accuquilt 4in clamshell die or a 4in clamshell template




Fold your fabric square in half both ways to determine your fabric center.


Center the first shell and pin in place.  organize the rest of the shells in a circle. I put just a touch of washable glue stick under each to hold them in place.


Place the top piece of fabric with the shells on top of the batting and backing fabric to make your quilt sandwich. Then sew around the edges of the shells.  

Please note that the shells that overlap need to be sewn down as shown in my really bad drawing below. I found this out the hard way and had some up close and personal time with Jack the Ripper to learn this lesson.

Choose four more clamshells and place them in on top of the previous shells.  Repeat the process of sewing the shells.


 To make the next round,  fold each clamshell in half

 Fold the "tail" up

Then flip over.  The tail flipped up crates a pocket to place the nest petal in.  It add thickness but that is okay since this is a textured project!

Make your circle in the center

Then sew the center about 1/4 inch in and then again in the center.

To make the center, take your 16.5x2 in strip, fold in half, finger press and sew the edge 1/4 inch in from raw edge

Mark with a washable marker every 1/2 inch

cut along those markings

Then cut  in the opposite side to help with spinning the fabric :o)

Pin the outside of the flower center down about 1/2 inch in from the center of the previous round of shells and start sewing ( you can use the shown seam since it will not show).  During this step you may need to stop sewing to adjust the circle.


I will be using a different example here, this one was made with a center not so tight to show what I did without ruffles in the way ;o)

At the very end place the end of the strip where you like and stick a pin dead center ( not through your finger though! I had just picked this one up to show the placement)


gently lay pin in place to keep the center

Tack down into place to just the right ( or left) of  the pin.  Make sure you are not sewing over the pin!


Ta DA!  Lovely texture and COLOR!!!!  Quilt as you like , trim down to 16.5 inches square and then hop on over to Sew Mama Sew to get the best backing instructions from Jaybird Quilts!


I hope you have time to make one of these for someone special ( like yourself)!  If you do make one I would love to see it!  If there are any questions about this tutorial  please send me an email :o)



Let's get our SEWjo (sewing mojo) going!  This link up will be open from Saturday through Monday to give you LOTS of time in case you need to do silly other stuff like make dinner or driving your kids somewhere and then there is always making sure you have good lighting. The things we all have to go through...sigh ;o)

To participate in the party please... 
1. Share a project from this past week or TODAY!!! Link it up from your blog or, if you do not have a blog, your Flickr photos. It can be a  FABULOUS finish or a WIP ( any progress is always good)that you are working hard to get off your sewing table!  

2. Share a link back to SEWjo Saturday somewhere in your post. I would be over the moon if you grabbed the button and shared that too ;o)

3. Share some love with some of the other posters!!!!  Visit some of the linked up photos and get inspired by other quilty friends' work. And please leave some sunshine in their comments! Let's support each other!  


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