Shop SewAmazin on Etsy now too!

Now that I've gotten a little experience selling my creations in my SewAmazin ArtFire Studio, I've decided to branch out.....

So ...... I've opened a SewAmazin shop on Etsy. I have listed a few items from my Garden Westies collection on Etsy to get the ball rolling and I plan to add more selections beginning in August.

If you visit my blog online, you'll see that I've updated the page name to read "My ArtFire & Etsy" where you can see mini viewers for both shops. Just click on an image to shop or browse wherever you are most comfortable!

Christmas in July!

Last Christmas, I made a flock of penguin card holders to give away as gifts and graduated to matching zipper cases and then to snow people and Santa zipper cases (all in-the-hoop designs from Embroidery Garden). These little guys and gals are so addictive and fun to make! And they can be customized and personalized so easily just by changing up a few fabrics and thread colors. So of course I had to make up a bunch for my Christmas in July Sale on ArtFire.

These zipper cases are adorable as decorations on Christmas gifts and can be used in place of wrapping paper, boxes and bags for your stocking stuffers and gift cards. They can be re-gifted and reused, hung on the tree, or used to carry your cell phone, camera or other gadget around the holidays.

This is the Christmas Plaid Snow Guy - his hat is green and red plaid cotton fabric, his scarf is red grosgrain ribbon and he has a small glittery red pom-pom attached to his zipper pull. He stands just about 7 inches tall by 4 inches wide across his belly. The narrowest part of his neck is about 3 inches across.

He has a coordinating Snow Girl with a Red & Green hat, who hasn't been properly photographed yet.

Of course, I had to make up a pair of Mets Fans - the Snow Girl (left) has a blue and orange ribbon scarf tied in a bow and an orange bead attached to her zipper pull.

The Mets Fan Snow Guy has a blue and orange ribbon scarf tied in a knot and a baseball bead attached to his zipper pull.

Did you notice that they both have blue hats with the orange 'dot' on top, just like the real baseball caps?

This couple is available separately, or as a pair. I'll even make them up in other team colors, if requested.

This is another snow couple, done in shades of purple. Why purple? Well, July is blueberry month and I've been making blueberry ice cream, which is purple!

The Pretty Purple Snow Girl has a soft lavender ribbon scarf and a bit of ribbon attached to her zipper pull. Her coordinating Purple Snow Guy has a hat made of dark purple and blue cotton fabric, and a dark purple ribbon scarf and zipper pull.

We can't forget about Santa! In July we celebrate Independence Day, and this All American Santa is a patriot!

Santa's measurements are the same as the Snow Guys and Gals above. His suit is made of cotton fabric printed in a medley of American flags. He has a tiny jingle bell tied to his zipper pull.

Santa also has a variety of more traditional red suits - this one is the Marbled Red Santa, made of red cotton fabric.

He also comes in a shimmery red cotton fabric and red cotton with tiny gold dots. And we may be adding to his wardrobe as we get closer to Christmas.

By the end of the month, I'd like to add some of the Penguin zipper cases and card holders to my shop. 

You can find all of my holiday listings in the Christmas section of my ArtFire studio.

To see more photos, visit my Flickr ArtFire Samples set.

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My Christmas in July Sale includes EVERYTHING in my SewAmazin ArtFire Studio, and *you* get to choose your savings.  You can either save 10% off everything in your shopping cart with the coupon code SAVE10 -OR- receive free shipping (to US & Canada only) on orders of $25.00 or more with the coupon code SUMMER11. You can use either code multiple times, but they cannot be combined in a single order. The codes are case sensitive and expire July 31, 2011.

Westie Coin Purses & Accessories

I think I *may* have mentioned once or twice how much I enjoy stitching out these in-the-hoop machine embroidery designs from Embroidery Garden. And you know it was only a matter of time before they were decorated with Westies! Here's a look back at some of the Westie-themed in-the-hoop accessories I've come up with so far this year, starting with the newest.

The most recently finished pieces are made from Garden Westies quilting weight cotton fabric from Spoonflower.com. The print design is by Kim Niles of KiniArt.com. (All of these Garden Westies accessories are available in the Westie Lovers section of my ArtFire studio.)

I call this one a 'Gadget Holder/Zipper Case' - it's made using the blank version of EG's Monogram Zipper Case, but I've replaced the ribbon loop at the top with a narrow fabric strap and a swivel lobster clasp, so it can be attached to a handbag or tote.

The entire zipper case is padded with cotton batting, lined in white cotton fabric and all the raw edges have been neatly finished with a 3-thread overlock stitch on the serger.

The fabric for the front and back have been fussy-cut so that the Westie face is centered. I chose white thread for the quilting stitches, so it would blend better where they cross parts of the Westie's face.

This gadget holder is the right size for carrying a cell phone, digital camera or other small device - or just about anything else!

I started out with one yard of the Garden Westies fabric and made a half dozen zippered coin purses using the blank version of EG's 4x4 Monogram Zipper Case.

The design repeat was just about perfect for centering the larger Westie face on the front and a smaller face on the back, with just the green floral sections for the lining. The raw edges inside have also been serged for a neat finish.

A decorative clasp hook on a split ring can be used to hang this little coin purse along the edge of a handbag for easy access.

With the odd pieces left over from the coin purses, I decided to make some Garden Westies Keyring/Card Holders using the blank version of EG's Monogram Key Chain Card Holder design.

The front has a fussy-cut Westie face and is quilted - the back has a pocket for holding cards - credit cards, frequent buyer cards, gift cards or business cards. The pocket can hold 3 or 4 credit cards at one time.

The first batch of fabric yielded only two of these card holders and they sold out quickly! I ordered more fabric and have more in stock now (if they sell out again, I'll order more fabric).

I couldn't bear to waste a single inch of this fabric! So the odd bits and pieces were turned into key fobs in two sizes. Once again, I used a design from Embroidery Garden, the blank version of EGs Monogram Key Fobs.

Each key fob has at least one Westie face showing. I couldn't decide which side should be the top - the end with the hardware (as shown in my photo) or the loop side. It depends on how you hold your keys ... so some of the fobs have the Westie ears pointing towards the hardware and some are turned the opposite direction.

I sold out of the first batch of small key fobs, too! They're back in stock again - for now. :-) And I have several large key fobs ready to go.

I sold out of this Westie-embroidered coin purse in this fabric. It's been featured in a couple of member-curated collections on ArtFire. (I'll make more with this embroidery design, but they'll be on a different fabric.)

I've had this Westie Full Body embroidery design for several years - it was one of the first designs added to my 'collection' when I began exploring machine embroidery. These designs appealed to me because of the texture created by the stitches that closely resembles a real Westie coat.

Back then, I didn't understand all the ins and outs of using the right stabilizer and choosing thread colors for subtle shading, so I gave up trying to embroider this design, as well as the Head Study (below).

Now that I have a little more experience, I thought I'd try stitching out both designs again - and they turned out great!

Each of the coin purses with Westie embroideries requires two embroidery sessions - one to do the Westie design and a second to create the in-the-hoop design.

The Westie embroidery is done on cotton quilting fabric with fusible knit interfacing applied to the back and medium weight cutaway stabilizer in the hoop. I experimented with several different weights of cutaway, tearaway and fusibles before deciding that this stabilizer combination resulted in the least amount of puckering of the fabric.

The Westie Head Study design was stitched out the same way.

After they were embroidered, I carefully cut the fabric so the designs were centered, then used the same in-the-hoop zipper case design (mentioned above) to make the coin purses, omitting the front quilting stitches.

I still have a few of these coin purses with the Westie face available.

One of the first items I listed for sale was this coin purse, made from an out of print design with a variety of dog faces in black and white with red collars and bandanas.

I had only one fat quarter of this fabric in my stash and was able to make 2 coin purses with the 'Westie' face featured on the front.

Oh how I wish I could find more of this fabric! But not finding it inspired me to look for other options - like embroidering the Westies and searching Spoonflower.com.

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 * A portion of the sales price of each of these Westie-themed accessories is donated to WestieMed

Visit my In-The-Hoop Set on Flickr to see additional photos of these items

A Pair of Backpacks - Butterick 5346

Earlier this year, I got a request to make a pair of backpacks - for my parents!

They take day trips to the beach and go hiking and needed something to carry binoculars (for bird watching), cameras, gloves, umbrellas, wallets, reading glasses, snacks and water bottles.

In my stash of patterns, I found this Butterick See & Sew B5346 with two backpack styles. We selected View B, which is the more traditionally shaped backpack. The finished size (in inches) is about 11 wide x 15 tall x 4 deep.

The pattern recommends home dec or heavy weight fabric with firm fusible interfacing for structure and support. We decided to use nylon fabric for it's water- and stain-resistance, so instead of interfacing, I basted low-loft polyester craft batting to the cover pieces for structure.

I made the bags one at a time; when the first was finished, I mailed it down to be inspected and to make any changes to the size or shape.

As designed, the main outer pocket is an added-on curved piece. I thought that would be too difficult to do in the nylon, so instead made a welt zipper pocket. The revised pocket turned out great and actually seems a little bigger than the original design.

The straps are made of 1 inch wide polypro nylon web. In another change from the pattern, these are adjustable so they can be lengthened to go over heavy winter jackets or shortened for lightweight summer wear.

The zippers are all closed-bottom sport zippers. The lining is white sport nylon.

Inside the backpack is a simple divided patch pocket.

On one side of the gusset is a small pouch pocket with a tab closure secured with velcro, just large enough to carry a small cell phone, camera or wallet.

On the other side of the gusset is a slightly taller pouch pocket with elastic along the open top edge.

There were no major changes to make to the design, so the second backpack is pretty much the same as the first. I'm including photos of the second backpack here because some of the pictures of the first one are a little fuzzy.

I didn't realize until I was comparing the pictures from both that I reversed positions of the side pockets on the second backpack! Oh well, I guess that will be one way they can tell them apart.

More Insulated Water Bottle Carriers

I began making this basic style of insulated water bottle carrier just about a year ago. The first one was based on a combination of patterns from around the web, but I've tweaked the design along the way to create this version.

Several are available now in the Insulated Water Bottle Carriers Section of my SewAmazin ArtFire Studio and the Bottle Carriers Section of my Etsy shop. These are all sized to fit a 27 oz. Kleen Kanteen, but will also fit bottles up to 3.25 inches in diameter by 9 inches tall. It can be custom sized for larger or smaller bottles. The drawstring top is meant to fit around the neck of the bottle to keep it securely in place.

This bottle carrier embroidered with a Westie wearing a red bandana. The embroidery design is from Balboa Threadworks and can be found at EmbroideryDesigns.com. I find it needs to be stitched over a piece of white topping, otherwise the base fabric (in this case black nylon) shows through.

Included with each bottle carrier is a removable, adjustable strap so it can be carried over the shoulder or around the waist. On some of the straps, I add grosgrain ribbon to customize the look and coordinate the strap with the embroidery design.  In this case, I decided to use a red ribbon with white dots to coordinate with the Westie's red bandana.

Shortly after I listed the red version in my shop, I received a request to customize the colors in a yellow and blue colorway. The Westie's bandana is stitched in a bright lemony yellow, the lining of the carrier is made of yellow ripstop nylon and the drawstring cording is a matching yellow.

The embroidery is done on royal blue nylon for the cover and the straps are made with ribbon in light blue with white dots.

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This Paisley Terrier bottle carrier is also available in my shop; I made a similar one for myself for taking water to the Bark Park last year. The embroidery design is from Embroidery Library. I made the terrier a somewhat generic light color so it could represent any number of breeds, not just Westies or Scotties.

In this case, I left the straps plain and used metal hardware instead of the black plastic swivel hooks and d-rings.

One of my customers who bought this bottle carrier wrote a note at checkout that she wished it were available in pink ... so I came up with this pink color way to customize it just for her. Even the straps are done in hot pink nylon webbing!

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Peace Love Paws is another one for pet and animal lovers and is also embroidered with a design from Embroidery Library on the cover. This would be suitable for both cat and dog owners. The strap is black nylon web with metal swivel hooks and d-ring hardware.

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Anyone interested in the three R's - Reduce, Reuse, Recycle - would appreciate this bottle carrier with a Recycle symbol, embroidered with a swirly vine and leaf design from Urban Threads in three shades of green. It has a plain black nylon web strap with metal swivel hooks and d-rings. This color combination looks good on royal blue nylon, too.

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In addition to these four bottle carriers, I've also listed one with a Black & White Wolf applique design, just like the one I made earlier this year (blogged as Insulated Water Bottle #15).

I plan to add more carriers in a variety of colors and embroidery designs as time goes on, and will accept requests for custom orders. I try to find embroidery designs for the covers that will either coordinate with a particular water bottle or will reflect the interests of the person using it. Some examples would be a hobby or profession, their favorite sport, animal, flower or perhaps their name or initial. To request a customized water bottle carrier, click on one of the Contact buttons in my shop.

I'm also working on a scaled down version of the insulated carriers for beer/wine cooler sized bottles and wraps for cans, but I'm still testing out the sizes of my samples.